<P>With the Soviet Union’s launch of the first Sputnik satellite in 1957, the Cold War soared to new heights as Americans feared losing the race into space. <I>The X-15 Rocket Plane</I> tells the enthralling yet little-known story of the hypersonic X-15, the winged rocket ship that met this challenge and opened the way into human-controlled spaceflight.</p><P> Drawing on interviews with those who were there, Michelle Evans captures the drama and excitement of, yes, rocket science: how to handle the heat generated at speeds up to Mach 7, how to make a rocket propulsion system that could throttle, and how to safely reenter the atmosphere from space and make a precision landing.</p><P>This book puts a human face on the feats of science and engineering that went into the X-15 program, many of them critical to the development of the Space Shuttle. And, finally, it introduces us to the largely unsung pilots of the X-15. By the time of the <I>Apollo 11</I> moon landing, thirty-one American astronauts had flown into space—eight of them astronaut-pilots of the X-15. <I>The X-15 Rocket Plane</I> restores these pioneers, and the others who made it happen, to their rightful place in the history of spaceflight.