Rockets - New Trail To Empire.

R. L. Farnsworth’s booklet for the United States Rocket Society, subtitled Reviews and Bibliography and marked Second Edition on the cover because the first edition was mimeographed. A typed slip states that it was written in January 1945; copyright 1945. Dedicated to his wife Evelyn, it opens with a frontispiece portrait of Farnsworth as president of the Society.

The text moves from “What Is a Rocket?” and “The Rocket Has ‘Arrived’” through mail, plane and meteorological rockets and a list of rocket problems—gravitation, finance, fuel, space, design and “Return Trip Tickets!”—to the case for the Moon (“Why the Moon?”, “Big Business,” “Lunar Empire and Competition,” “The Renaissance!”). It closes with a bibliography (pp. 22–29), an index to articles in Astronautics, the journal of the American Rocket Society, and a page on what the Society is and how to join.

This copy is signed by Farnsworth: a hand-written complimentary-copy inscription on the first page is signed by him as President and Treasurer, and a typed slip is tipped in reading “With my compliments: R. L. Farnsworth—On to the Moon!” Also in the collection, a signed notice from the US Rocket Society (Jan. 1945) announcing this booklet, along with further Farnsworth correspondence (see Catalog E, Miscellanea), and the Society’s magazine Rockets (Vol. 1, Nos. 1, 3–5), also in this catalog.