Rockets and Missiles: The Life Story of a Technology

194 Pages·2004·1.42 MB·English

by  A. Bowdoin Van Riper

R O C K E T S A N D M I S S I L E S
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R O C K E T S A N D M I S S I L E S
THE L IFE STORY
1
OF A TECHNOLOGY
A. Bowdoin Van Riper
GREENWOOD TECHNOGRAPHIES
GREENWOOD PRESS
Westport, Connecticut • London
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Van Riper, A. Bowdoin.
Rockets and missiles : the life story of a technology / A. Bowdoin Van Riper.
p. cm.—(Greenwood technographies, ISSN 1549–7321)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0–313–32795–5 (alk. paper)
1. Rocketry (Aeronautics)—History. 2. Ballistic missiles—History. I. Title.
II. Series.
TL781.V36 2004
621.43'56—dc22 2004053045
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data is available.
Copyright © 2004 by A. Bowdoin Van Riper
All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be
reproduced, by any process or technique, without the
express written consent of the publisher.
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 2004053045
ISBN: 0–313–32795–5
ISSN: 1549–7321
First published in 2004
Greenwood Press, 88 Post Road West,Westport, CT 06881
An imprint of Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc.
www.greenwood.com
Printed in the United States of America
The paper used in this book complies with the
Permanent Paper Standard issued by the National
Information Standards Organization (Z39.48–1984).
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
For Janice P. Van Riper
who let a starstruck kid stay up long past his bedtime
to watch Neil Armstrong take “one small step”
Contents
Series Foreword ix
Acknowledgments xi
Timeline xiii
1. Introduction 1
2. The Age of Black Powder, 1000–1900 7
3. The Birth of Modern Rocketry, 1900–1942 25
4. Rockets in World War II, 1939–1945 41
5. Rockets for Research, 1945–1960 57
6. Ballistic Missiles and the Cold War, 1945–1990 71
7. Rockets to the Moon, 1960–1975 93
8. Tactical Missiles in the Cold War, 1950–1990 111
9. Spaceflight Becomes Routine, 1970–Present 125
10. Missiles after the Cold War, 1990–Present 139
11. Conclusion:What Next? 155
viii C o n t e n t s
Glossary 161
Further Reading 165
Index 169
Series Foreword
In today’s world, technology plays an integral role in the daily life of peo-
ple of all ages. It affects where we live, how we work, how we interact with
each other, and what we aspire to accomplish. To help students and the
general public better understand how technology and society interact,
Greenwood has developed Greenwood Technographies, a series of short, acces-
sible books that trace the histories of these technologies while document-
ing how these technologies have become so vital to our lives.
Each volume of the Greenwood Technographies series tells the biography
or “life story” of a particularly important technology. Each life story traces
the technology from its “ancestors” (or antecedent technologies), through
its early years (either its invention or development) and rise to prominence, to
its final decline, obsolescence, or ubiquity. Just as a good biography combines
an analysis of an individual’s personal life with a description of the subject’s
impact on the broader world, each volume in the Greenwood Technographies se-
ries combines a discussion of technical developments with a description of
the technology’s effect on the broader fabric of society and culture—and
vice versa. The technologies covered in the series run the gamut from
those that have been around for centuries—firearms and the printed book,
for example—to recent inventions that have rapidly taken over the mod-
ern world, such as electronics and the computer.
While the emphasis is on a factual discussion of the development of