Von Braun

Chief rocket engineer of the Third Reich and one of the fathers of the U.S. space program, Wernher von Braun is a source of consistent fascination. Glorified as a visionary and vilified as a war criminal, he was a man of profound moral complexities, whose intelligence and charisma were coupled with an enormous and, some would say, blinding ambition. Based on new sources, Neufeld's biography delivers a meticulously researched and authoritative portrait of the creator of the V-2 rocket and his times, detailing how he was a man caught between morality and progress, between his dreams of the heavens and the earthbound realities of his life.

Zusatztext "Surpasses all previous books about [von Braun]. . . . Deeply researched, vigorously written, and balanced in its judgments." The Boston Globe "A serious, important book that does justice to its subject's moral complexity and place in history." Los Angeles Times Book Review Neufeld's thoroughly satisfying biography . . . written in clear, fast-paced prose, offers the most complete, fully documented and critical account that the imperfect documentary record is likely to yield. The New York Times Book Review A historian's masterpiece, will become the definitive biography. American Scientist Informationen zum Autor Michael Neufeld is the museum curator in the Space History Division of The Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum. He was educated at the University of Calgary and The Johns Hopkins University, where he received his doctorate in history. His book The Rocket and the Reich: Peenemunde and the Coming of the Ballistic Missile Era was published by The Free Press in 1995 and was awarded the AIAA History Manuscript Award and the SHOT Dexter Prize. He lives in Maryland. Klappentext Curator and space historian at the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum delivers a brilliantly nuanced biography of controversial space pioneer Wernher von Braun. Chief rocket engineer of the Third Reich and one of the fathers of the U.S. space program, Wernher von Braun is a source of consistent fascination. Glorified as a visionary and vilified as a war criminal, he was a man of profound moral complexities, whose intelligence and charisma were coupled with an enormous and, some would say, blinding ambition. Based on new sources, Neufeld's biography delivers a meticulously researched and authoritative portrait of the creator of the V-2 rocket and his times, detailing how he was a man caught between morality and progress, between his dreams of the heavens and the earthbound realities of his life. CHAPTER ONE The Wheel of Progress to 1925 Demagoguery and democracy are brothers in etymology and spirit . . . for the German ear the word democracy awakens memories of complete chaos after the First [World] War. Magnus Freiherr Von Braun When Wernher von Braun was about ten years old, his tall, elegant mother, Emmy Freifrau (Baroness) von Braun, asked him what he would like to do with his life. I want to help turn the wheel of progress was his answer, a response that sounded odd and surprising to her, coming out of the mouth of a small boy. An unusually abstract statement, it prefigured a lifetime of fascination with science and technology.Equally surprising, it came from the mouth of a true son of the Junkersthe noble caste that had once dominated the Prussian civil service, officer corps, and landowning elite. Engineering and science were not careers that Junker sons often chose, even in the 1920s. It seemed to reflect some inner compulsion of Wernher's, but it also reflected the tenor of the timesa time of dramatic technological and political change. He had been born in 1912, in a traditional prewar world; his massively built, mustachioed father, Magnus Freiherr von Braun, had been a rapidly ascending civil servant in the empire of Kaiser Wilhelm II, while his intellectually gifted mother was the orphaned daughter of an estate owner. Less than ten years later his father would be forced out of the civil service in the political turmoil of the new Weimar Republic. The family moved to the modern world city of Berlin. Yet as much of a maverick and a Berliner as Wernher von Braun would turn out to be, his Prussian Junker upbringing influenced his values, his abilities, and his choicesmore so, in fact, than his father would later be willing to credit. Of his parents' two families, the von Brauns and the von Quistorps, the former was of much older aristocratic stock. Magnus von Braun, who inherited from his father the hobby o...

Autorentext
Michael Neufeld is the museum curator in the Space History Division of The Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum. He was educated at the University of Calgary and The Johns Hopkins University, where he received his doctorate in history. His book The Rocket and the Reich: Peenemunde and the Coming of the Ballistic Missile Era was published by The Free Press in 1995 and was awarded the AIAA History Manuscript Award and the SHOT Dexter Prize. He lives in Maryland.

Klappentext
Curator and space historian at the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum delivers a brilliantly nuanced biography of controversial space pioneer Wernher von Braun. Chief rocket engineer of the Third Reich and one of the fathers of the U.S. space program, Wernher von Braun is a source of consistent fascination. Glorified as a visionary and vilified as a war criminal, he was a man of profound moral complexities, whose intelligence and charisma were coupled with an enormous and, some would say, blinding ambition. Based on new sources, Neufeld's biography delivers a meticulously researched and authoritative portrait of the creator of the V-2 rocket and his times, detailing how he was a man caught between morality and progress, between his dreams of the heavens and the earthbound realities of his life.

Leseprobe
CHAPTER ONE The Wheel of Progress to 1925 “Demagoguery and democracy are brothers in etymology and spirit . . . for the German ear the word democracy awakens memories of complete chaos after the First [World] War.” —Magnus Freiherr Von Braun When Wernher von Braun was about ten years old, his tall, elegant mother, Emmy Freifrau (Baroness) von Braun, asked him what he would like to do with his life. “I want to help turn the wheel of progress” was his answer, a response that sounded odd and surprising to her, coming out of the mouth of a small boy. An unusually abstract statement, it prefigured a lifetime of fascination with science and technology.Equally surprising, it came from the mouth of a true son of the Junkers—the noble caste that had once dominated the Prussian civil service, officer corps, and landowning elite. Engineering and science were not careers that Junker sons often chose, even in the 1920s. It seemed to reflect some inner compulsion of Wernher’s, but it also reflected the tenor of the times—a time of dramatic technological and political change. He had been born in 1912, in a traditional prewar world; his massively built, mustachioed father, Magnus Freiherr von Braun, had been a rapidly ascending civil servant in the empire of Kaiser Wilhelm II, while his intellectually gifted mother was the orphaned daughter of an estate owner. Less than ten years later his father would be forced out of the civil service in the political turmoil of the new Weimar Republic. The family moved to the modern world city of Berlin. Yet as much of a maverick and a Berliner as Wernher von Braun would turn out to be, his Prussian Junker upbringing influenced his values, his abilities, and his choices—more so, in fact, than his father would later be willing to credit. Of his parents’ two families, the von Brauns and the von Quistorps, the former was of much older aristocratic stock. Magnus von Braun, who inherited from his father the hobby o…

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