The Authors

Charles Dunlap Benson grew up in Winter Park, Florida, not far from Cape Canaveral's missile ranges. He attended Davidson College, earning Phi Beta Kappa honors and All-Southern Conference selection in football. After service with the 82d Airborne Division, Benson entered graduate training at the University of Florida (Ph.D., 1970). His dissertation concerned roles and missions of the armed services after World War II. He is the co-author (with William Barnaby Faherty) of Moonport: A History of Apollo Launch Facilities and Operations (NASA SP-4204), 1978. After completing his work on the present volume, he was recalled to active duty in the U.S. Army and is now a lieutenant colonel

William David Compton was born in De Leon, Texas (1927), and received B.S. and M.S. degrees from North Texas State University and the Ph.D. from the University of Texas (Austin). His academic training was in science, and he taught at West Texas State University and Colorado School of Mines before moving to Prescott, Arizona, to help establish a science program in a new liberal-arts college. After four years at Prescott, he was granted leave to study at Imperial College of Science and Technology, London, and received an M.Sc. in history of technology from the University of London in 1972. At Prescott College he inaugurated a program of liberal studies in science and technology. Upon completion of the Skylab history, he worked for an energy consultant firm in Houston and is presently under contract to NASA to write a history of Apollo's lunar exploration missions.