The other day I ran into Dr. Wernher von Braun – in a very strange and unlikely place. Unless you are a boomer or early Gen Xer you may not even have heard about him.

Fred Schneikert, a private first class in the US Army, accepted the surrender of a group of German rocket scientists at the close of World War II.

Wernher von Braun's book — I think it was his, or it could have been Oberth's book — spoke about how the head of the Mars colony would be called "the Elon." Now, I remember that, but I never ...