I was just reading in the excellent magazine Invention and Technology about the huge assembly building of NASA,and how it represents the dreams they had of shooting lots of stuff into space... dreams that never came true.
After the Apollo programs, NASA had plans for a space station, a moon base, and a visit to mars. All this was to have occured by 1980 or so... which probably meant 2000 or so.
I remember the time when we were in space, when the excitement was growing, the potential and possibilities unlimited, when a nation dreamed of something more than their daily toil.
Dreams that were crushed under the heels of a short-sighted government, people with no dreams themselves outside of immediate profit, who didn't want to spend the (admittedly huge) fortune needed to do this.
To this day I get angry and sad and betrayed when I think about it. These were *my* dreams.
At least I can take comfort in the fact that they used this money for good -- solving the problems of hunger and poverty in this country. A fair trade for a generation's dreams, don't you think?
Posted by Edwin at September 8, 2005 08:42 AM