His second, Rocket Boys, grew out of an article entitled “The Big Creek Missile Agency” that appeared in Air and Space magazine. naval history and was the result of an interest in scuba diving and German U-boats operating off the U.S. His first book, Torpedo Junction (1998), focused on U. He maintains his primary residence in Huntsville.Īfter his retirement, Hickam began publishing both fiction and nonfiction books. He is currently married to Linda Terry Hickam, whom he wed in 1998.

His first marriage, from 1977 to 1986, ended in divorce. At Marshall, he helped train astronauts and served in such positions as Payload Training Manager for the International Space Station Program. Army Aviation and Missile Command at Redstone Arsenal, the Seventh Army Training Command in West Germany, and then the National Aeronautics and Space Administration ( NASA) at Marshall Space Flight Center. Hickam began writing during this time, publishing several articles in magazines.įor 27 years after leaving the military, he was employed as a government engineer, working for the U.S. He spent a total of six years on active military duty, achieving the rank of captain. Army and served as a first lieutenant in the infantry in Vietnam in 1967-68.

He earned a bachelor of science in Industrial Engineering from Virginia Tech University in 1964. He and five rocket-obsessed friends formed the “The Big Creek Missile Agency” and built rockets, winning gold and silver medals in propulsion at the National Science Fair during his final year at Big Creek High School in 1960. As a young boy, his imagination was excited by reading science fiction writers such as Jules Verne, Robert Heinlein, and Isaac Asimov and by the historic launching of the Soviet Union’s Sputnik I satellite in 1957 when he was 14. Hickam was born in Coalwood, West Virginia, on February 19, 1943, the second son of Homer, a coal mine superintendent, and Elise Gardener Lavender Hickam. Marshall Space Flight Center from 1981 until his retirement in 1998. First assigned to Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Madison County, in the early 1970s, he later worked at George C. (1943- ) has gained both wide recognition as an author and professional respect as an aerospace engineer.

Best known for the national bestseller Rocket Boys (1998), which became the basis for the 1999 film October Sky, Homer Hadley Hickam Jr.

Rocket Boys by Homer Hickam