Andrew L. Chaikin (born June 24, 1956) is an American author, speaker and science journalist. He lives in
Vermont
Vermont () is a state in the northeast New England region of the United States. Vermont is bordered by the states of Massachusetts to the south, New Hampshire to the east, and New York to the west, and the Canadian province of Quebec to ...
.
He is the author of ''
A Man on the Moon'', a detailed description of the
Apollo
Apollo, grc, Ἀπόλλωνος, Apóllōnos, label=genitive , ; , grc-dor, Ἀπέλλων, Apéllōn, ; grc, Ἀπείλων, Apeílōn, label= Arcadocypriot Greek, ; grc-aeo, Ἄπλουν, Áploun, la, Apollō, la, Apollinis, label ...
missions to the
Moon
The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite. It is the fifth largest satellite in the Solar System and the largest and most massive relative to its parent planet, with a diameter about one-quarter that of Earth (comparable to the width of ...
. This book formed the basis for ''
From the Earth to the Moon
''From the Earth to the Moon: A Direct Route in 97 Hours, 20 Minutes'' (french: De la Terre à la Lune, trajet direct en 97 heures 20 minutes) is an 1865 novel by Jules Verne. It tells the story of the Baltimore Gun Club, a post-American Civil W ...
'', a 12-part
HBO miniseries.
From 1999 to 2001, Chaikin served as executive editor for space and science at
Space.com
Space.com is an online publication focused on space exploration, astronomy, skywatching and entertainment, with editorial teams based in the United States and United Kingdom. The website offers live coverage of space missions, astronomical discov ...
. From 2008 to 2011, he was a faculty member for
Montana State University in
Bozeman, Montana. In 2013, he wrote and performed the narration on a
NASA
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil List of government space agencies, space program ...
video re-creating the taking of the famous
Earthrise photo during the
Apollo 8 mission.
His book ''A Man on the Moon: One Giant Leap'' states that he grew up in
Great Neck, New York
Great Neck is a region on Long Island, New York, that covers a peninsula on the North Shore and includes nine villages, among them Great Neck, Great Neck Estates, Great Neck Plaza, Kings Point, and Russell Gardens, and a number of unincorpo ...
, and, while studying geology at
Brown University, worked at the NASA/Caltech
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
The Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) is a federally funded research and development center and NASA field center in the City of La Cañada Flintridge, California, United States.
Founded in the 1930s by Caltech researchers, JPL is owned by NASA an ...
on the
Viking program
The ''Viking'' program consisted of a pair of identical American space probes, ''Viking 1'' and ''Viking 2'', which landed on Mars in 1976. Each spacecraft was composed of two main parts: an orbiter designed to photograph the surface of Mars f ...
.
[ Chaikin 1999, Google Books search term]
"andrew chaikin" 1956 "brown university"
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Bibliography
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Cameo appearance
In the HBO miniseries ''From the Earth to the Moon
''From the Earth to the Moon: A Direct Route in 97 Hours, 20 Minutes'' (french: De la Terre à la Lune, trajet direct en 97 heures 20 minutes) is an 1865 novel by Jules Verne. It tells the story of the Baltimore Gun Club, a post-American Civil W ...
'', Chaikin made a brief appearance in pseudo-documentary footage in the first episode as the host of ''Meet the Press
''Meet the Press'' is a weekly American television news/interview program broadcast on NBC. It is the longest-running program on American television, though the current format bears little resemblance to the debut episode on November 6, 1947. ' ...
''.
References
External links
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Appearance on the Colbert Report
April 4, 2011
1956 births
Living people
Brown University alumni
Space advocates
People from Arlington, Massachusetts
20th-century American journalists
American male journalists
{{US-journalist-1950s-stub