The Collection
The Alustiza Collection gathers first and early editions documenting the written history of rocketry and space travel — from the earliest speculative writings of the nineteenth century through the dawn of the Space Age. It spans several languages (English, French, German, Italian, and Russian chief among them) and formats, from scholarly monographs and society proceedings to juvenile fiction, magazines, and ephemera such as rocket-mail stamps.
The catalog is organized into five parts, each covering a distinct period: Early Pioneers (before WWII), World War II, the Postwar Era, Prelude to Sputnik, and a fifth volume of Magazines and Miscellanea that falls outside the strict chronology. This site presents that catalog online, one volume at a time.
How to read an entry
Each entry lists the book's year, title, and author, followed by a short note on its significance to the history of rocketry and space travel. A bibliographic line follows with place of publication and publisher, language and edition/binding details, and — where applicable — a reference number from Michael Ciancone's bibliography of pre-1958 rocketry and space travel publications (see Sources, below). An entry marked “Ciancone: N/A” simply means the item does not appear in that bibliography, not that it is undocumented elsewhere.
Sources
Ciancone, Michael L. Foreword to Space Flight: an illustrated bibliography of pre-1958 publications on rocketry and space travel. Apogee Books, 2018. All books tagged with a Ciancone number in this catalog refer to this edition.
De León, Pablo. Historia de la actividad espacial en la Argentina – Tomo 1. Self published, Buenos Aires, 2008.
Winter, Frank H. Prelude to the Space Age: The Rocket Societies, 1924–1940. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1983.
Copyright
All rights on images, contents, and pictures of books listed in this catalog belong to their respective copyright owners.
First Edition. April 2026.