| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 93.2

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| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 93.2 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

First Man: The Life of Neil A. Armstrong. By James R. Hansen. (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2005. xiv, 768 pp. $30.00, ISBN 0-7432-5631-X.)
In recent years, stories of the lives of the astronauts—particularly of those who led the United States into space in the heyday of the 1960s and early 1970s—have been a boon publishing niche. Often a blend of nostalgia and the heroic, those books fill an appetite for the golden era (now perceived) of space exploration. All are autobiographical (directly or "as told to") or are journalistic renderings.	1
Until now. The Auburn University professor James R. Hansen, a noted aerospace historian, has brought a scholar's eye and methods to the life of Neil Armstrong—astronaut, first human to set foot on the moon, icon for the multiple cultural meanings of space exploration. Hansen's account is thorough. Running to nearly 800 pages, he covers the scope of Armstrong's life: childhood (from his birth in 1930) and family life in rural Ohio, education as an aeronautical engineer at Purdue University, service as a Korean War navy pilot, as a test pilot of high-performance aircraft for the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, and as an astronaut, and then life after moon landing fame, including a stint as a faculty member at the University of Cincinnati. The astronaut years (1962–1971) compose the bulk of the book.	. . .

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