
The Six
The Extraordinary Story of the Grit and Daring of America's First Women Astronauts
- 432 pages
- English
- ePUB (mobile friendly)
- Available on iOS & Android
The Six
The Extraordinary Story of the Grit and Daring of America's First Women Astronauts
About this book
"Vivid." — The Guardian * "Engrossing." — Booklist * "Suspenseful, meticulously observed, enlightening." —Margot Lee Shetterly, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Hidden Figures In this account of America's first women astronauts "Grush skillfully weaves a story that, at its heart, is about desire: not a nation's desire to conquer space, but the longing of six women to reach heights that were forbidden to them" ( The New York Times ). When NASA sent astronauts to the moon in the 1960s and 1970s the agency excluded women from the corps, arguing that only military test pilots—a group then made up exclusively of men—had the right stuff. It was an era in which women were steered away from jobs in science and deemed unqualified for space flight. Eventually, though, NASA recognized its blunder and opened the application process to a wider array of hopefuls, regardless of race or gender. From a candidate pool of 8, 000 six elite women were selected in 1978—Sally Ride, Judy Resnik, Anna Fisher, Kathy Sullivan, Shannon Lucid, and Rhea Seddon.In The Six, acclaimed journalist Loren Grush shows these brilliant and courageous women enduring claustrophobic—and sometimes deeply sexist—media attention, undergoing rigorous survival training, and preparing for years to take multi-million-dollar payloads into orbit. Together, the Six helped build the tools that made the space program run. One of the group, Judy Resnik, sacrificed her life when the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded at 46, 000 feet. Everyone knows of Sally Ride's history-making first space ride, but each of the Six would make their mark. "A spirited group biography…it's hard not to feel awe for these women" ( The Wall Street Journal ).
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Information
Table of contents
- Cover
- Title Page
- Dedication
- Cast of Characters
- Prologue
- Chapter 1: But Only Men Can Be Astronauts
- Chapter 2: Far from Home
- Chapter 3: Still Warming Up the Bench
- Chapter 4: NASA Catches Up
- Chapter 5: Are You Still Interested in Coming to Work for NASA?
- Chapter 6: Jet-Setting
- Chapter 7: The Dawn of the Space Shuttle
- Chapter 8: Working with Men
- Chapter 9: Choosing “The One”
- Chapter 10: Ready, Set…
- Chapter 11: Sally’s Ride
- Chapter 12: Take Two
- Chapter 13: A Walk into the Void
- Chapter 14: Anna to the Rescue
- Chapter 15: The Heist
- Chapter 16: The Prince and the Frog
- Chapter 17: Turning Point
- Chapter 18: Closing a Chapter
- Epilogue
- Photographs
- Author’s Note
- About the Author
- Index
- Copyright