• Astronauts' footprints and Lunar Rover tire tracks will stay on the Moon for millions of years. There is no wind to blow them away.

• Nothing can grow on the Moon, but plants did grow in Moon soil on Earth.

• Astronauts become a little taller in space. Since there is less gravity, their bones are less squashed together.

• When astronauts first shaved in space, their weightless whiskers floated up to the ceiling. NASA had to develop a special razor that would draw the whiskers in like a vacuum cleaner.

• "Happy Birthday" was the first song to be performed in outer space. It was sung by the Apollo IX astronauts on March 8, 1969.

• Texas is the only state that permits residents to cast absentee ballots from space. The first person to vote from space was David Wolf. He used email to cast his vote for Houston mayor from the Russian space station Mir in November, 1997.

• A NASA employee purchased six plastic owls at Wal-Mart in 1995 to protect the space shuttle from woodpeckers.

• Earth radiates back into space as much heat as it receives from the Sun. If this did not occur, the temperature on Earth would steadily rise and life on Earth would become impossible.

• The freeze-dried ice cream astonauts take on space missions has most of its water content removed. Freeze-drying makes ice cream lighter and removes the need for refrigeration.

• Earth is putting on weight every day as meteors and microscopic space dust particles fall from space.

• Earth travels through space at 660,000 miles per hour.

• The moon is the final resting place for Dr. Eugene Shoemaker, a U.S. Geological Survey astronomer. He had wanted to be an astronaut but, because of a medical problem, he was unable to become an astronaut. Instead, he trained Apollo mission astronauts about craters. Upon death, his ashes were delivered to a crater on the moon on July 31, 1999 through the use of the Lunar Prospector spacecraft. In this same mission, they attempted to learn if there is water on the Moon.

astronaut - a person who is trained to travel in a spacecraft

astronomy - the study of stars, planets, and space

asterisk - the (*) mark used in printing and writing to tell readers to look another place on the page for more information.

"ast" is Greek for:

Great Space Sites!

Kids
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Children's Books About Space
from Amazon.com

ages
4-8Big Silver Space Shuttle by Ken Wilson-Max
4-8Astronauts Today by Rosanna Hansen
4-8The Best Book of Spaceships by Ian Brown
4-8Floating in Space by True Kelly and Franklin Mansfield Branley

4-8Gail Gibbons' wonderful books: The Moon, Stargazers, The Planets, The Reasons for the Seasons, Sun Up, Sun Down

4-8Seymour Simon's beautiful books: The Universe, Sun, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Comets, Meteors, and Asteroids, Stars

9-121000 Facts About Space by Pam Beasant

9-123-D Space: Unique 3-D Color Photography That You Can Really See (Eyewitness Books)

9-12Adventure in Space: The Flight to Fix the Hubble by Elaine Scott, photography by Margaret Miller

9-12Amazing Pop-Up, Pull-Art Space Shuttle by David Hawcock

9-12The Adventures of Sojourner: The Mission to Mars that Thrilled the World by Susi Trautmann Wunsch

9-12Eyewitness Visual Dictionaries: Flight by Fiona Courtenay-Thompson (Ed.)

9-12Eyewitness: Space Exploration by Carolle Stott, illustrated by Steve Gorton

9-12Eyewitness Time and Space by John R. Gribbin and Mary Gribbin

9-12Apollo: An Eyewitness Account by Artist/Astronaut/Moonwalker Alan Bean