Apollo Guidance Computer Activities

AGC - Secondary Reading on the Apollo Guidance Computer

Secondary Reading on the Apollo Guidance Computer

edwards.jpg (3603 bytes) Paul N. Edwards, The Closed World: Computers and the Politics of Discourse in Cold War America (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1996).

Though Edwards does not directly discuss the Apollo Guidance Computer, his efforts to weave the story of electronic digital computing's development into the context of Cold War politics and culture provide a useful background for students interested in the AGC's political aspects.

tomayko.jpg (2664 bytes) James E. Tomayko, Computers Take Flight: A History of NASA's Pioneering Digital Fly-by-Wire Project (Washington: NASA History Office, 2000).

Tomayko details the use of an Apollo Guidance Computer as the first digital control computer in a high-speed jet aircraft.

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Paul E. Ceruzzi, Beyond the Limits: Flight Enters the Computer Age (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1989).

Written to coincide with a gallery at the Smithsonian Institution's National Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC, Paul Ceruzzi's book discusses a variety of twentieth-century aerospace computers, both analog and digital, including the Apollo Guidance Computer.

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Donald MacKenzie, Inventing Accuracy: An Historical Sociology of Nuclear Missile Guidance (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1990).

MacKenzie explores the interweaving of technologies and Cold War politics involved in the development of inertial guidance (used for guiding Apollo spacecraft as well as nuclear ballistic missiles.

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Otto J. Scott, The Creative Ordeal: The Story of Raytheon (New York: Atheneum, 1974).

Commissioned by the corporation itself, this history of the Raytheon Corporation provides little detail on the Apollo project, but does provide a sense of the company's background and involvement in high-tech defense research and development.

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Christopher C. Kraft, Flight : My Life in Mission Control, (E.P. Dutton Books, 2001)

Chris Kraft was NASA's Flight Director throughout the Apollo missions.  These are his memoirs. Written in an engaging style, they provide useful information on the human figures involved in Apollo.

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Thomas J. Kelly, Moon Lander : How We Developed the Apollo Lunar Module (Smithsonian History of Aviation and Spaceflight Series, 2001)

An in detail account of the design, manufacture and testing of the LEM by the chief engineer at Grumman, Tom Kelly. This volume explores issues of integration and quality control in detail.

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Paul E. Ceruzzi, A History of Modern Computing (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1998).

Paul Ceruzzi sets out a general history of the modern computer since the 1940s - and discusses the pioneering use of ICs in the Apollo Guidance Computer.

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Frederick P. Brooks, Jr., The Mythical Man-Month, (Boston, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1975, 1995)

Brooks' text on software engineering is directly relevant to several of the software engineering issues faced by that Apollo team.


site last updated 12-08-2002 by Alexander Brown