Scarce first edition of the 1953 book The Mars Project by Wernher von Braun. Published by the University of Illinois Press, in Urbana, Illinois. Hardcover (lacking dust jacket), 7.25 x 9.25, 91 pages. Book condition: VG/None, with sunning to spine and extremities of boards.
In March 1952, von Braun published the first of a series of articles for Collier’s magazine dedicated to interplanetary spaceflight. Accompanied by illustrations from Chesley Bonestell, Fred Freeman, and Rolf Klep, the articles thrilled a generation and soon led to the publication of The Mars Project in 1953 by the University of Illinois Press. Von Braun envisioned a 70-member crew aboard a fleet of ten spacecraft, comprised of seven ‘passenger’ ships and three ‘cargo’ ships. The cargo ships would orbit the planet and dispatch groups of explorers to the Martian surface on the smaller passenger vessels. In the launch toward Mars the ships would fire their engines for 66 minutes, using more than three-quarters of the propellant on board, and enter a coast for 260 days until arriving at their destination. They would then spend 443 days exploring Mars before returning to Earth, another 260-day voyage.
