Rocket Boys/October Sky

In high school, I must have seen the movie October Sky at least once per year - three alone my freshman year! A typical teenager, I didn't see its significance or the overarching story it was trying to tell.

October Sky, the movie based on the bestselling memoir Rocket Boys by Homer Hickam, chronicles the misadventures of some amateur rocket builders trying to use their brains instead of the typicall football brawn to escape from their coal mining town of Coalwood, West Virginia and pursue college educations.

Inspired by the Russian launch of Sputnik, the aspiring engineers founded the Big Creek Missile Agency, and Homer "Sonny" Hickam began a personal quest to join NASA scientists at Cape Canaveral and beat the Russians to the moon.

Earlier this summer, I read Rocket Boys, and I've just finished reading its sequel/equal The Coalwood Way. Apparently there's a third memoir by Mr. Hickam, but my local library doesn't have it, so I'll have to track it down myself.

Having read the books and re-watched the movie this summer, I am truly inspired by this tale of dedication and overcoming adversity to launch science-fair-winning rockets and ultimately attend college. As an aspiring engineer myself, I can often see parallels to my own life and it makes me think all engineers must be dreamers to do what we do. In The Coalwood Way, Homer tells us he was afraid to be labeled a "dreamer" because he figured himself pragmatic, not a do-nothing with his head in the clouds, so he opted for the label "rocket boy." I like to think I'm a rocket boy too.