Rocket Ship Galileo

infobox Book |
name = Rocket Ship Galileo
title_orig =
translator =


image_caption = First Edition cover
author = Robert A. Heinlein
illustrator = Thomas Voter
cover_artist =
country = United States
language = English
series = Heinlein juveniles
genre = Science fiction novel
publisher = Scribner's
release_date = May 1, 1947
media_type = Print (Hardcover & Paperback)
pages = 212 pp
isbn = NA
preceded_by =
followed_by = Space Cadet

"Rocket Ship Galileo" is a science fiction novel by Robert A. Heinlein, published in 1947, about three teenagers who participate in a pioneering flight to the Moon. It was the first in the Heinlein juveniles, a long and successful series of science fiction novels published by Scribner's. The novel was originally envisioned as the first of a series of books called "Young Rocket Engineers".

Plot summary

After World War II, three teenage male rocket experimenters are recruited by the uncle of one of them, Dr. Cargraves, an actual rocket scientist, to refit a conventionally-powered surplus "mail rocket".

It is to be powered by a thorium nuclear pile which boils zinc as a propellant. They use a cleared area in a military weapons test range in the desert for their work, despite prying and sabotage attempts by unknown agents.

Upon completion of the modifications, they stock the rocket, which they name the "Galileo", and take off for the Moon, taking approximately 11 days to arrive. After establishing a semi-permanent structure based on a Quonset hut, they claim the Moon on behalf of the United Nations, then set up a radio to communicate with the Earth.

However, they pick up a local transmission, the sender of which promises to meet them. Instead, their ship is bombed. Fortunately, they are able to hole up undetected in their hut and succeed in ambushing the other ship when it lands, capturing the pilot.

They discover that there is a Nazi base on the Moon. They bomb it and land. One survivor is found, revived, and questioned.

The boys also find evidence of an ancient lunar civilization, and postulate that the craters of the moon were formed not by impacts from space, but by nuclear bombs that destroyed the alien race.

When the base's Nazi leader shoots the pilot in order to silence him, Cargraves convenes a trial and find him guilty of murder. Cargraves pretends to prepare to execute the prisoner by ejecting him into vacuum. The Nazi capitulates in the airlock and teaches them how to fly the Nazi spaceship back to Earth.

The boys radio the location of the hidden Nazi base on Earth to the authorities, leading to its destruction. They return as heroes.

Film, TV or theatrical adaptations

The 1950 movie "Destination Moon" was loosely based on "Rocket Ship Galileo", and Heinlein was one of three co-authors of the script. The film's plot also resembles that of "The Man Who Sold the Moon", which Heinlein wrote in 1949 but did not publish until 1951.

ee also

* Space Nazis

References

*cite book | last=Bleiler | first=Everett | authorlink=Everett F. Bleiler | title=The Checklist of Fantastic Literature | location=Chicago | publisher=Shasta Publishers | pages=146 | date=1948

External links

*isfdb title|id=6102|title=Rocket Ship Galileo