Santa and The Space Men

 

It has been a while but here is a strange Christmas post for you.  Something about Santa and Flying Saucers seems to go together like White wine and Cracker Jack. Sort of sweet and tangy and gets your attention.

Santa and the Space Men is a play for children about how Santa is universal. The only illustration is the cover but the contents show an interesting play, creative costume choices, and a Christmas song I think you missed out on.

Edith Quick and James Fluckey. Santa and The Space Men. Franklin, OH : Eldridge Pub Co. (56 p.) 1956.

And a great finale...

Danny Dunn and the Anti-gravity Paint (1956)

 

Very sorry for the large gap in posts. It has been the biggest gap I have had for years, missing 4 weeks of posts. So on with the children's books!

Danny Dunn and the Anti-gravity Paint was a 1956 fictional book. Part of a 15 book series about Danny Dunn written by by Jay Williams and Raymond Abrashkin.  In 1967 they reprinted "...and the Anti-Gravity Paint." It had a new painted cover making it seem modern to young space-age children. Danny Dunn books were loosely science-based so the problems were solved with scientific ideas. I thought the 1956 space race setting of the book connects it with others of the time like Rocket Ship Galileo.

Jay Williams and Raymond Abrashkin. Illustrated by Ezra Jack Keats. Danny Dunn and the Anti-gravity Paint. New York : McGraw-Hill. 154 p. 1967 reprint

On Space Flights (1956)

 

On Space Flight is a softcover Russian scientific book. It was published by The Young Guard publishing house and was intended for older children interested in rockets and space. The author was a Soviet astronomer who was known for his studies of gas dynamics. The book is mostly text but does have several nice illustrations.

Kirill Petrovich Stanyukovich. On Space Flights. Moscow : Young Guard. 32 p. 20 cm. 1956.

My Little Golden Book about Travel (1956)

 

My Little Golden Book about Travel is about all forms of travel (what a surprise). I am a big fan of the illustrator Tibor Gergely so I wanted to share a couple of his space travel illustrations that are found in this book.

Daly, Kathleen N, and Tibor Gergely. My Little Golden Book About Travel. NY : Simon and Schuster. 21 cm.22 p.  1956.

The back cover shows some of the other non-fiction Golden Books available.

Exploring the Universe (1956)

 

We continue our exploration of our "neighborhood" with Exploring the Universe. The illustrations are once again amazing. The book are 8" x 14" so the impact of these paintings in person is hard to recreate.

Gallant, Roy A. Illustrated by Hess, Lowell. Exploring the Universe. Garden City, NY: Garden City Books. (62 p.) 1956.

An illustration about why people thought eclipses occurred.

Our place in comparison to some really big objects

A spectacular strike

The fate of the universe as explained to a child in 1956.

Exploring Mars (1956)

 

To celebrate the 12th anniversary of the Dreams of Space blog I bring you exploring the solar system! The February posts are all from children's books exploring the solar system (and maybe a few nearby stars).

Roy Gallant and his illustrator Lowell Hess created some beautiful books about space for children. This one in particular is inspiring in pointing to our future on Mars.

Gallant, Roy A. Illustrated by Hess, Lowell. Exploring Mars. Garden City, NY: Garden City Books. (62 p.) 1956.

Both of these Mars landscapes are beautiful as double page illustrations.

I think the seasons on Mars (as color changes) helps explain how fascinating Mars through a telescope was for many years.

Space Ships and Space Travel (1956)

Space ships and space travel is a young adult/adult book about space flight.  

Ross, Jr. Frank. Space ships and space travel: The scientifically accurate story of man's attempts and plans to travel into interplanetary space.  London: Museum Press. (166 p.) 1956.

The author Frank Ross was also the author of the 1951 Juvenile book: Guided missiles : rockets and torpedoes, covering the principles and techniques of the missiles of today and tomorrow. 

Here are a few of the more fanciful illustrations:

With the LZ Rocket To the Moon (1956)

OK I like the illustrations but my Bulgarian is worse than my Russian so all readers are welcome to correct/help me.

Translated title is: With the LZ Rocket to the Moon. By Bozhidar Bozhilov. 1956.

According to the seller "The first Bulgarian science fiction novel written in verse." It is hard to tell if it is for older children but from the cover I am willing to include them as part of the audience.

 Each "chapter" has a nice space illustration to start it off.