Ted Huetter’s “Waiting for Spaceships” is a trip back to the innocent ’80s. #k5evening

SEATTLE — Evening Reads is Northwest authors telling us about their books in their own words. 

Most folks know this man as the public relations manager for The Museum of Flight, but he also just released a new book that will captivate anyone who loves space nostalgia.

“I’m Ted Huetter, and the name of my book is ‘Waiting for Spaceships: Scenes from a Desert Community in Love with the Space Shuttle.’

“This book is about people who came out to a place in the middle of the desert to watch Space Shuttles land in the 1980s. I’m a space nerd, so I was living in Los Angeles at the time, and about 100 miles north of there is place called Edwards Air Force Base. It’s located there because it’s really in the middle of nowhere, and it became the place where the first Space Shuttle landings were made.

 “And I just had to be there. What I discovered was that not only was it extremely photogenic, the people, the site, the landscape, everything. It was also that something very special was happening. 

“We knew that it (the Space Shuttle) would be close and then there would be someone like, “There it is! There it is!”  “Everyone’s going where? Where?” You can’t see it, and then a few moments later, you’d hear this sonic boom. And when you hear that, for some reason, it’s like a miracle. This little black dot appears in the sky. When it finally, finally touches down. There’s not much cheering, usually no cheering at all, because really, most people are choked up. It’s, it’s that powerful, almost a religious experience.

“I think what’s important about the story now we’re in the beginning of another new Space Age. Everybody’s talking, we’re going back to the moon, we’re going to Mars, we’re going to colonize space, that sort of thing. What’s important to remember is that the Space Shuttle Program, when it first started, this was the new Space Age, so there’s that patriotism. But still, it was something that was just organic. It was an organic interest that doesn’t quite exist these days. So, it stands in kind of a wonderful contrast, the beginnings of two different Space Ages.”

You can find Ted Heutter’s book “Waiting for Spaceships: Scenes from a Desert Community in Love with the Space Shuttle” on Amazon. 

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