Apollo 11

On October 4, 1969, former German rocket scientist Wernher Von Braun watched the Apollo 11 moon landing with the other NASA scientists on the little TV’s at Mission Control. He was 57. Thirty years earlier he'd been designing rockets for Germany to use in the destruction of London. Wernher von Braun appears four times in A Book of Ages.

Picking Winners

In September 1945, German scientist Wernher von Braun, architect of the V-2 rocket program which had been blowing large holes in London, surrendered to the Americans instead of the Soviets. Which is why people on the moon speak English today instead of Russian. He was 33 at the time. He was 57 when he watched the American moon landing from mission control. Mr. von Braun appears four times in A Book of Ages.

Unity Mitford

On September 3, 1939, an hour after the declaration of war, attractive 25 year-old British upper-class Hitler-worshipper, Unity Mitford, sat down on a bench in Munich’s Englischer Garden and shot herself twice in the head. She didn’t die from it. She would live out the war in a vague, childlike state at her parents’ country house in Oxfordshire.

Adolf Hitler, Celebrity Memoirist

Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf was published on July 1, 1925. The author, a malcontent and former draft dodger, was 36. Hitler appears 11 times in A Book of Ages.