Orders Of Magnitude A History of the NACA and NASA, 1915-1990

Washington D. C.: NASA. Very Good+. 1989. 1st Edition; 1st Printing. Paperback. 0160042593 . B&W Illustrations; This is a trade paperback book. The book has illustrated covers and a glued spine. The book is in Very Good+ condition and was issued without a dust jacket. The book and its contents are in clean, bright condition. The text pages are clean and bright. ""An Act to provide for research into the problems of flight within and outside the Earth's atmosphere, and for other purposes." With this simple preamble, the Congress and the President of the United States created the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) on October 1, 1958. NASA's birth was directly related to the pressures of national defense. After World War II, the United States and the Soviet Union were engaged in the Cold War, a broad contest over the ideologies and allegiances of the nonaligned nations. During this period, space exploration emerged as a major area of contest and became known as the space race. During the late 1940s, the Department of Defense pursued research and rocketry and upper atmospheric sciences as a means of assuring American leadership in technology. A major step forward came when President Dwight D. Eisenhower approved a plan to orbit a scientific satellite as part of the International Geophysical Year (IGY) for the period, July 1, 1957 to December 31, 1958, a cooperative effort to gather scientific data about the Earth. The Soviet Union quickly followed suit, announcing plans to orbit its own satellite. " (from NASA's website) .