FAR TRAVELERS: The Exploring Machines

The first 25 years of space exploration resulted in extraordinary technological achievements and quantum increases in the scientific understanding of our home, the planet Earth, and the solar system in which it resides. Communications, weather, and other Earth observational satellites affected, directly or indirectly, the lives of most of us. Man traveled to the Moon, explored its surface, and returned with samples of our nearest celestial neighbor. Unmanned spacecraft have explored our sol...