60 Quotes by Homer Hickam

NASA's charter is to give Americans the means to get into the wild, black yonder, beyond even the grasp of the federal government that funded it.

Personally, I've got bigger hopes for NASA. I will stipulate it should keep putting telescopes in space so we can figure out where we fit in the universe, and it should also keep building those little robots that can and do.

All my life, everything important that had ever happened had always happened somewhere else. But Sputnik was right there in front of my eyes in my backyard... I felt that if I stretched out enough, I could touch it.

When the moon was first visited in 1969, the astronauts brought back a treasure trove of unique minerals. Contained within specimens was an isotope called Helium-3, which turns out to be the perfect fuel for fusion reactors.

Glenn's 1962 Mercury flight was fraught with dramatics, from his 'Zero G and I feel fine!' exultation upon entering orbit to his reentry with what was feared was a faulty heat shield. After he safely splashed down, the nation erupted with applause and gratitude not seen since Charles Lindbergh's solo flight across the Atlantic.

When legislators do something that doesn't make a whole lot of sense, there's always the suspicion that they're in somebody's pocket.

If politicians want to save money, that's fine. They can look for all the wasteful spending they want, but not where the lives of miners are involved.

After I'd gotten a year under my belt in college, I thought I'd outgrown my home.

The time frame is summer 1961, a year after the gold medal in the National Science Fair. I always saw my 'Coalwood' books as a trilogy. This book finishes the story of my life in Coalwood. I think it's the best of the three.