The Seattle Space Society is a small collection of street artists inspired by the rocket societies that flourished in the United States, Russia, Germany and England during the 1920's and 30's. These organizations developed and tested rocket technology which set the groundwork for all future human and unmanned space flight.
Big governments took over the majority of rocket engineering during the 40's and 50's and with proper funding humans were walking on the moon by the end of the 1960's. In the last half decade humans have sent spacecraft to land on or orbit every planet and moon from Mercury to Pluto and sent back the photographs to prove it. A few of these spacecrafts are now outside the influence of our sun 8 1/2 billion miles from where they left earth in 1977. They are on the edge of our solar system still sending back valuable information.
Humans have created art for millenia depicting scenes of interplanetary travel and by the middle of the 19th century people like Jules Verne were writing fantastic tales of trips to the moon with what would prove to be incredible accuracy. The 20th century however would become the major turning point in human history and give birth to the space age. In 1903 Konstantin Tsiolkovsky published both The Exploration of Cosmic Space by Means of Reaction Devices and Investigation of Outer Space Rocket Appliances. In the west however this year would be remembered as the year of the first controlled, powered and sustained heavier-than-air human flight. The Wright Bros flew their plane in 1903 for just 12 short but incredibly inspirational minutes. Charles Lindbergh flew across the Atlantic in 1927 and then just 30 years later the space age was kicked off with Sputnik in 1957. Yuri Gagarin made the first orbit around the earth in 1961 and Alexey Leonov stepped out of his spacecraft in 1965 and looked down at the earth for 12 whole minutes. Frank Borman, Jim Lovell and Bill Anders flew to the moon and back in 1968 and Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walked on the moon the following year accomplishing what seemed like fantasy just a century earlier. In 1972 Gene Cernan stepped off the moon, climbed back into his spacecraft and headed home. No one has set foot on the moon since.
Although only the US, Russia and China have put humans in space, India, Japan and the Europe have created advanced rocket technology that is capable of putting satellites into orbit and sending unmanned craft to the moon. In the 21st century NASA's budget has been cut extensively. The Shuttle program is coming to an end and Project Constellation which would have taken Americans back to the moon by 2020 and installed a permanent base there has been almost completely scrapped. Private industry funded by billionaire philanthropists are now currently developing the technology to put civilians in space and sub-orbital flights can already be booked for a couple hundred thousand dollars. China has discussed plans to put people on the moon before the decade is out and appears to be quite capable of doing so.
The Seattle Space Society is recreating many of mankind's most important, complex and creative machines accurately but with the cheapest materials possible and installing them around the city of Seattle and elsewhere.
