The Encyclopedia of US Spacecraft Author:Bill Yenne Mankind has been fascinated by the heavens for millenia and entertained notions of space travel for at least a century, but it has only been within the last three decades that it has been possible for man to place his tools and himself in the vastness beyond the earth's atmosphere. In the 1980s. when the phrase "live via satellite&... more »quot; is routine fare on our televisions and Space Shuttles venture forth with the same regularity as major ocean liners, it is often hard to remember how far we've come since 1957. American spacecraft have taken men to the moon, landed on Mars, and explored the region around Jupiter's moons. American spacecraft have also mapped the earth and provide continuous meteorological data to Americans from Hawaii to Maine and from Alaska to Florida. The encyclopedia is a detailed catalog of spacecraft developed for commercial, military, and NASA programs. We have included a description of each spacecraft together with a brief outline of its launch history and the results obtained by scientific missions. Data on space stations and launch vehicles are included in the appendices.« less