OVERVIEW
One of the signature events of the twentieth century was the success of sending human beings beyond our planetary sphere to set foot on the moon. This was a technological achievement at many levels -- in terms of the engineering required by the spacecraft, in the acquisition of scientific data that would allow the preservation of life during travel in outer space, and in the rise of what came to be called "Big Science" (research that needed national investment). The space race was a deeply political venture, embedded as it was in the Cold War being fought by the Soviet Union and the United States, and it was a widespread media venture, occurring as it did in the age of television, of mass magazines with color images, theme parks such as Disneyland, and the global reach of the products of entertainment industry. During this same time period, science education curricula were reformed, the news industry experimented with science journalism, and magazines devoted solely to science became more numerous and popular.

LIST OF READINGS AND LEARNING ACTIVITIES

Reading Assignments:

Ede & Cormack, Chapters 12-13

Learning Activities:

View: The Story Of The Sputnik Moment. America Went Nuts In 1957 (1- 1 1/2 hours)
Crash Course History of Science #37: "Air Travel and The Space Race" [12 min]

Explore the following sites:

The Space Race: Online Exhibit from the Smithsonian’s Air and Space Museum

Chasing the Moon: The Road to Apollo[Interactive website at PBS on Apollo missions 1, 8, and 11]

Read about the popular media and space and science:

“Science Television the Sputnik Age ” by Ingrid Ockert in Physics Today (9.22.2017)

“The First Book of Space Travel: How a Woman Writer and Illustrator Enchanted Kids with Science in 1953” by Maria Popova at Brain Pickings