They both get into an argument while on the way to their school up in War, West Virginia and both are forced to walk the rest of the way. The result of this fascination? It's your life, not theirs. To fix this, Sonny finds a book his father used to help teach himself math that he needed to know to run the mine. We learn about Sonny's father who has quite an impact on Sonny's rocket making later in the book and about his mother and the loving bond they share. He is also congratulated by his inspiration, von Braun, but does not realize the engineer's identity until he has gone.
Here he meets someone who works with his hero Wernher von Braun and discovers that his hero is also at the science fair and begins to search for him. In the reality of which this scene is emblematic, the rocket boys' most successful rocket reached an impressive altitude of 30,000 feet 9,100 m higher than the summit of Mount Everest. Sonny sees it as a no-lose situation. It grabs the attention of a vicious company man who attempts to tear down Cape Coalwood, but with the help of Homer Sr. A series of vignettes including footage of a Space Shuttle launch and home movie footage of the characters in the 1950s reveal the outcome of the main characters' lives.
I got their autographs, too, just as Homer sends away for a signed photo of Werner von Braun. Finally, everyone else comes out alive. Chapter 9 - Jake Mosby; In this chapter we are introduced to a man named Jake Mosby. At its widest theater release, 1,702 theaters were showing the movie. Homer doesn't know much about rockets and he is not a brilliant mathematician but he goes to the library and starts reading books about rocket building and he keeps on dreaming.
The boys strive to really understand what the book is really about. Homer and Jim fought one another hundreds of times growing up. Quentin smirks, and replies that he knows everything about rockets. He also discovers the main troublemaker has left town and so decides it would be better off not knowing who had killed his cat. When we first meet Sonny, he doesn't really have a direction in life. He builds the rocket using an empty flashlight tube, and punches a hole in it using a nail.
I was born for this. This gives the two a moment together giving Sonny the last part of what he wanted the rockets to do. It is fueled by flash powder from old cherry bombs. The problem is that he knows the superintendent will not allow it. The second blows up, throwing shrapnel everywhere. Homer is a good student, but math and science are his weak points.
They go out to dig out metal pipes from the ground for scrap metal. This initiates the idea to team up with others. It seems they have reached their limit of propellant's abilities. It seems that lightning has struck one of the vents which caused a collapse. Around this same time, his mother finds him.
He answers with the simple idea that they should go to the moon Sonny reaches the National Science Fair and discovers the competition is bigger than he had expected. He almost blows himself up and he ruins his mother's fence but he keeps on dreaming. Dubonnet leaving and Sonny's father in flames. They both get into an argument while on the way to their school up in War, West Virginia and both are forced to walk the rest of the way. To soothe his pain, he read books. A big part of this chapter is when Sonny's schools football team is suspended from the football season the upcoming year.
He is quite odd but yet extremely intelligent. This puts a lot of stress on Sonny, and he isn't sure if he can take it. Shortly thereafter, Homer takes the bus to school with Jim. Miss Riley, the new high school chemistry teacher, is excited at the prospect of the school entering the science fair and winning a trophy that has nothing to do with football. At the same time, Homer interprets Sputnik as an invitation: an invitation to study science and engineering. Homer storms out of the house, vowing to never return or look back.
Once the boys ran off leaving Sonny to face the punishment of his mother Elsie came out along with a few of their neighbours to make sure that everything was alright. The new fuel was not packed tight enough so they melted the fuel into the rocket to pack it tighter. While their first launches are failures, they experiment with new fuels and designs and eventually succeed. This was brought on by a lawsuit the town's fathers made whilst trying to get them into the state championship. The school curriculum has changed due to Sputnik with hours of homework every night. Near the end, Sonny's mother is furious and claims that he will never work in the mine because of how dangerous it is to his health.