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Exploring the Unknown - Selected Documents in the History of the U.S. Civil Space Program, Volume III: Using Space (Paperback)
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Exploring the Unknown - Selected Documents in the History of the U.S. Civil Space Program, Volume III: Using Space (Paperback)
Series: NASA History
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One of the most important developments of the twentieth century has
been the movement of humanity into space with machines and people.
The underpinnings of that movement-why it took the shape it did;
which individuals and organizations were involved; what factors
drove a particular choice of scientific objectives and technologies
to be used; and the political, economic, managerial, and
international contexts in which the events of the space age
unfolded-are all important ingredients of this epoch transition
from an Earthbound to a spacefaring people. This desire to
understand the development of spaceflight in the United States
sparked this documentary history series. The extension of human
activity into outer space has been accompanied by a high degree of
self-awareness of its historical significance. Few large-scale
activities have been as extensively chronicled so closely to the
time they actually occurred. Many of those who were directly
involved were quite conscious that they were making history, and
they kept full records of their activities. Because most of the
activity in outer space was carried out under government
sponsorship, it was accompanied by the documentary record required
of public institutions, and there has been a spate of official and
privately written histories of most major aspects of space
achievement to date. When top leaders considered what course of
action to pursue in space, their deliberations and decisions often
were carefully put on the record. There is, accordingly, no lack of
material for those who aspire to understand the origins and
evolution of U.S. space policies and programs. This reality forms
the rationale for this series. Precisely because there is so much
historical material available on space matters, the National
Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) decided in 1988 that it
would be extremely useful to have a selective collection of many of
the seminal documents related to the evolution of the U.S. civilian
space program that was easily available to scholars and the
interested public. While recognizing that much space activity has
taken place under the sponsorship of the Department of Defense and
other national security organizations, the U.S. private sector, and
other countries around the world, NASA felt that there would be
lasting value in a collection of documentary material primarily
focused on the evolution of the U.S. government's civilian space
program, most of which has been carried out under the agency's
auspices since 1958. As a result, the NASA History Office
contracted with the Space Policy Institute of George Washington
University's Elliott School of International Affairs to prepare
such a collection. This is the third volume in the documentary
history series; three additional ones detailing programmatic
developments with respect to space transportation, space science,
and human spaceflight will follow. The documents selected for
inclusion in this volume are presented in three major chapters,
each covering a particular aspect of the utilization of space
capabilities and the unique characteristics of the space
environment. These chapters address: (1) communicating via
satellite; (2) observing the Earth from space for practical
purposes (Earth science will be covered in a later volume); and (3)
the various ways in which space activities have had economic
impacts. Volume I in this series covered the antecedents to the
U.S. space program, as well as the origins and evolution of U.S.
space policy and of NASA as an organizational institution. Volume
II addressed the relationship between the civilian space program of
the United States and the space activities of other countries, the
relationship between the U.S. civilian and national security space
and military efforts, and NASA's relationship with industry and
academic institutions. As mentioned above, future volumes will
cover space transportation, space science, and human spaceflight.
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