On This Day In Alabama History: Homer Hickam Was Born In West Virginia

By Graydon Rust Alabama 200

February 19, 1943

Author and aerospace engineer Homer Hickam was born in West Virginia. A U.S. Army veteran who served in Vietnam, Hickam later spent 27 years as an engineer for the federal government, including a combined 24 years at Redstone Arsenal and NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville. While working for NASA, he specialized in training astronauts to work with science payloads and extra-vehicular activities. Since retiring, he has published more than a dozen fiction and nonfiction works on subjects including memoirs, U.S. naval history and historical fiction. Hickam’s second book, “Rocket Boys,” was selected by The New York Times as one of its “Great Books of 1998” and served as the basis for the 1999 film “October Sky.”

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