From The Earth To The Moon & Around The Moon

Author: Jules Verne

Talking of scientific knowledge, one of the fascinating things about this early account of a journey to the Moon is that Verne dispatches his space voyagers from a base not too far from Cape Canaveral in Florida, anticipating the actual space centre by nearly a century. Less reassuring is the fact that the space capsule is fired from a gigantic cannon, a means of propulsion that would, in reality, have flattened everyone in the craft.That aside, this novel and its sequel illustrate the fascination that the idea of travel to the Moon has held for so long. The first novel concerns the building of the giant cannon, and ends with the three travellers fired successfully into space. The sequel describes their journey to the Moon, their orbit around it, and their return to Earth, ending eventually with a splashdown in the sea.Why it's on the list:Leaving aside the notion of using a cannon to fire a projectile at the Moon, this was one of the most scientifically accurate of the early Moon voyages, and in many ways anticipated the actual nature of the NASA missions a hundred years later.