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crookedindifference:

Humanity’s Earliest Space Station Concept: The Brick Moon

The earliest concept for a space station is from an article called “The Brick Moon” by Edward Everett Hale. Published in 1868 in the Atlantic Monthly, Hale’s article described the construction of a 200-foot-diameter sphere made of bricks that is accidentally launched into space with people aboard.

Hale envisioned the brick moon as a possible navigational aide. It could have served as a fixed reference point above the prime meridian to help travelers calculate longitude, analogous to the North Star’s use in determining latitude.

While certainly impervious to being blown down by big bad space wolves, the brick moon was mostly fantasy. But Hale’s funny concept did foresee one major aspect of space station design: the astronomical price. In the story, the narrator calculates that the brick moon would require 12 million bricks and cost $250,000 (a tidy sum in those days).

- The Atlantic Monthly, 1896

(via the-star-stuff)