Fighting for Space & Breaking the Chains of Gravity
Spaceflight historian, author, YouTuber, and space personality, Amy Shira Teitel discusses the history of space flight, the space program, and all things Vintage Space.
About Fighting for Space: A book that will appeal to readers of Fly Girls and The Astronaut Wives' Club, Fighting for Space is the mostly-unknown tale of Jackie Cochran and Jerrie Cobb--two accomplished aviatrixes, one generation apart, who each dreamed of being the first woman in space, but along the way battled their egos, their expectations, and ultimately the patriarchal society that stood between them and the stars. Fighting for Space is a dual biography of these fascinating and fearless women, using their stories as guides through the changing social, political, and technical landscape of the time.
About Breaking the Chains of Gravity: The revealing backstory of spaceflight before the establishment of NASA. NASA's history is a familiar story, culminating with the agency successfully landing men on the moon in 1969, but its prehistory is an important and rarely told tale. Breaking the Chains of Gravity looks at the evolving roots of America's space program--the scientific advances, the personalities, and the rivalries between the various arms of the United States military. America's space agency drew together some of the best minds the non-Soviet world had to offer. The National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics and the U.S. Air Force, meanwhile, brought rocket technology into the world of manned flight. The road to NASA and successful spaceflight was paved by fascinating stories and characters. At the end of World War II, Wernher von Braun escaped Nazi Germany and came to America where he began developing missiles for the United States Army. Ten years after he created the V-2 missile, his Jupiter rocket was the only one capable of launching a satellite into orbit. NACA test pilots like Neil Armstrong flew cutting-edge aircraft in the thin upper atmosphere while Air Force pilots rode to the fringes of space in balloons to see how humans handled radiation at high altitude. After the Soviet launch of Sputnik in 1957, getting a man in space suddenly became a national imperative, leading President Dwight D. Eisenhower to pull various pieces together to create the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
Presented in partnership with the Wisconsin Science Festival.
Amy Shira Teitel
Amy is a spaceflight historian, author, YouTuber, and popular space personality. She holds a Bachelor's degree with combined honors in History of Science and Technology Studies and a Master's in Science and Technology Studies. Amy fell in love with spaceflight when she was seven years old; researching for a second grade project on Venus she was captivated by a cartoon image of two astronauts on the Moon. She needed to know how and why men walked on the Moon, and she never let that fascination wane. She found an outlet in her undergraduate studies started blogging in November 2010. Blogging turned into writing -- my first book, Breaking the Chains of Gravity, was released in 2015 -- and ultimately to my youTube channel, Vintage Space.