As The 50th Anniversary Of Apollo 11 Nears, New Books Highlight The Mission's Legacy
The countdown has begun. It's T-minus a month or so until the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11 — and humanity's first and famous steps on another world.
In appreciation of that achievement, and the five-decade milestone, a flotilla of books has also been launched exploring Apollo's story and raising questions about its ultimate legacy. Surveying just a few of these works, it quickly becomes apparent how singular America's achievement was with Apollo. Even more pressing, however, is how these books show that — half a century later — we're still grappling to understand its long-term meaning for our nation and the world.
If you're looking for a. Beginning with the American panic after the Russian launch of Sputnik in 1957, Donovan ably maps out the United States' path to Apollo 11. Once President John F. Kennedy declared, in 1961, that America would reach the moon before the decade was out, NASA found itself on the hook for inventing space-travel on the fly (literally).
