Hypersonic: The Story of the North American X-15 (Revised Edition) (Specialty Press) Paperback – July 23, 2008

I was just starting grade school when the X-15 was making its final flights, and the books that came out soon after didn't even cover a fraction of the information that Mr. Jenkins compiles in this fantastic read. The spirit of his writing does capture the spirit of the nation at that time, when Americans felt they could do anything.Actually, one book did admirably cover the engineering points and human character of the X-15 program, and that was "90 Seconds to Space - the Story of the X-15" by Jules Bergman. It was printed many, many years ago (first printing in 1960), and in the following years I couldn't find any other books that met that standard of engineering and journalistic coverage. Jules Bergman was ABC's science editor for 25 years, and as a kid growing up during the Gemini and Apollo programs, I couldn't wait to hear his thorough and honest reporting on the subject. He helped make our space program one of the best liked federal programs in the world, and that's saying a lot."Hypersonic" by Dennis Jenkins picks up all of the remaining and vital pieces of X-15 program information, and the author crafts it all together into one fine read. He does a splendid job of explaining the strong-willed characters who had the genius and determination to even suggest such a program, the engineering challenges the entire team of engineers, pilots and support personnel faced, and their almost unbelievably continuous series of successes and triumphs.Yes, this is recommended reading!

Short of doing your own primary research, I don't see how you could find more complete information on the X-15 project than this book. The bonus is, the book is well written, clearly organized in a logical fashion, and has all the indicators of a labor of love on the part of the authors.I find myself constantly re-reading sections; the audacity (and talent!) of the people involved is breathtaking; the authors capture that. If, for example, you're fascinated with the development of the SR-71, and reading about the ingenuity exhibited by those folks in problem solving, this is a book for you.Never reckless, but never timid, these folks pushed through challenges that would scare the current NASA mob witless. In a weird way, the Soviet challenge may have set back manned space flight decades; we junked far more promising projects to win a race we were never going to loose anyway - the logical follow-ons to the X-15 were ignored in favor of quick-fix solutions. But no whining here! The X-15 stands on it's own merits as a thunderous success. Read this book!

Not to take from old Chuck's efforts, but I've always thought the X-15 was the more interesting program. It's amazing the level of accomplishments they made, yet the X-15 is far from being as well known to the public as some other programs in aviation. If you like the X-15, this is definitely the book. It's not the kind of book you just fly through and look at the photos, then throw on a shelf... It is definitely worth your while to take the time and really read through the details of how the aircraft worked, what the Pilots went through, and how the milestones were achieved technically. The flight log in the back is amazing in it's detail, evening listing the chase aircraft and chase Pilots involved in each mission. I purchased it along with the X-15 Scrapbook, and they work well together.

This must be one of the most in-depth books I have ever read about any airplane. Very well researched and documented, you will find a lot of information about almost every imaginable aspect of the aircraft. The numerous pictures (with their respective captions) are very descriptive and illustrative, in particular the excellent color ones.Well, if this is all so great, why did I rate it 'only' 4-stars? Most readers who take the time to write a review either do it because they really liked that particular book (in which case 5-star ratings are the norm), or they found something particular they disliked (in which case 3-star or less ratings are the norm). Personally, 5-stars should be reserved to books in which I can only find very little or nothing to crtitize, which unfortunately is not the case with Hypersonic.First comes the format: This book should have been printed in a different format (page size). As it is, there is so much information 'cramped' into one page, that it becomes almost a pain to really read through all of it. Additionally, the font size is so small (in order to pack the pages full), that you better have good eyesight and lots of light - not an ideal read before sleeping! The number of pages in this book does not reflect the content, it should be rather 500+ pages with 'normal' content per page.Then, I found it very anoying for such an otherwise so well done book to find that many typing and editing errors, this is really not a good editing job.Finally, I think the book deserved more 'cockpit' piloting stories that tell you what it felt to be mounted on top of such a powerfull rocket engine and for a few minutes be an astronaut, maybe even some more amusing annecdotes that must have happened throughout the 10+ years of flying. Even such an interesting subject as the X-15 can become a rather dry and technical read, and unfortunately this does happen in this book.Overall, this is an authoritative history of the X-15 program, focused on the enginerring and technical challenges that needed to be overcomed before putiing a man on a rocket plane and fly at Mach 6.7 and 350.000 feet - recommended.

Apart from the oldish layout (the book is nearly 20 years old), the content is fantastic. The text is really detailed, and well researched. Sometimes really technical (too technical for a humanities person such as myself), but the pictures alone are worth the reasonable price. I felt like being 10 years old again, exploring aeroplanes. And there is not better Aeroplane to do this than the X-15. Great book, you won't regret it if you love aeroplanes and the technical side of them.

Ottima pubblicazione sulla storia (essenzialmente) dell'X-15. Ottima documentazione fotografica. Estremamente interessante per l'appassionato. Un must-have. Tanti gli inediti. Vale la spesa.

I'd say this is a book for aviation geeks, for its prose is not that of a Tom Wolfe whose The Right Stuff was a masterpiece upon the humanity of how we got to the moon, and back. Those mid 20th century decades in aviation were the most febrile of times for aeroplane design, when new and exciting shapes seemed to materialise almost on a weekly basis. It appeared to end when the X-15 was retired.Hypersonic details the genesis and through to the end of the X-15 - the precursor and adjunct to the moon landings programme - and is beautifully laid out and printed. Dense, and closely spaced with facts about this most potent and lovely of human guided missiles, which was current as a wonder of the modern world when I was a lad. The writing is also balanced by its liberal use of photographs too (500!), most of which I'd never seen before. In fact so evocative of the times are the photos that I wish for the follow-up volume X-15: Photo Scrapbook ('the photos they didn't have the space to print in Hypersonic') to be made available again.

pubblicazione essenziale relativamente all'X15. Molto ben realizzata sia come materiale fotografico che testuale. Riferimenti storici e di prodotto molto accurati

Bon ouvrage sur l'histoire du développement du X15 avec beaucoup de détails et de photos. La densité du texte associé à un petit format rendent cet ouvrage un peu fastidieux à lire malheureusement. Beaucoup de détails historiques intéressant. A rapprocher avec le film "The Right Stuff" sorti en 1983.