On Aug 13, 5:19 pm, Dr J R Stockton wrote:
In sci.space.history message
egroups.com, Mon, 13 Aug 2007 10:38:20, Al
posted:

In fact, tho not about a Mars expedition, A. C. Clarke's Prelude to
Space was published in 1951, and as a novel its just about as dull as
von Braun's , but does have a more professional narrative.

It does, however, include a sentence that would have been very useful
for quoting in (approximately) 1993-2000 and may also be so,
appropriately modified, in 2009-2012.

--
(c) John Stockton, Surrey, UK.

Hmm... you mean von Braun's book or Clarke?

I notice that von Braun has the Mars expedition set in the early
1980's which would have then been 30 years in the future , the last
issue of Collier's on space flight came out April 30, 1954 ( Can We
Get to Mars? and Is There Life on Mars), I remember as a 13 year old
being down cast when von Braun speculated that this Mars exploration
would take place in 25 years from that time.
I think everyone , but Clarke, was surprised we got to the Moon in
1969, ......Mars, alas my estimate of that is now 2050 ( one hundered
years after 'The 'Mars Project' was put together).
That is if its just a pure USA project, a full blown international
effort , my guess 2040 or maybe even 2030.