I've collected a lot of rocketry stuff over the years, maybe none as cool as this book. The Rocket Handbook for Amateurs by Lieutenant Colonel Charles M. Parkins. I saw a copy of this book sell on ebay claiming to be a first edition. Maybe it was...maybe it wasn't. The listing included numerous photos of the book, but suspect is the fact that the copyright page had the lower third cut off, right were mine clearly states that its a "second impression". I don't really care that mine is a second edition, but I paid WAY less that buyer of the other book paid. I bought the book for the information it contained and maybe a little for the nostalgia of being able to read a book from the golden age of amateur rocketry. In any case my copy has something even better than being a first edition, an inscription from the author. It looks to me like the inscription is to someone with the initials H.C. I'd love to know who that is.
Charles M. Parkin, Jr. as he is described in the book:
Rocket expert, U.S. Army Engineer, Research and Development Laboratories, Fort Belvoir, Virginia; Founder of Youth Science Corps; President, American Rocket Society, Washington D.C. chapter.
In the later chapters of the book, he describes a small rocket which utilizes a sugar based propellant. I've often thought that it would be fun to build that rocket exactly to the specification in the book and then actually fly it.
Maybe I will do that some day...
