The High Frontier: Human Colonies in Space
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The High Frontier: Human Colonies in Space is a book by Dr. Gerard O'Neill. Written in 1976, this popular book was a roadmap for what the United States might do in outer space after Project Apollo, the drive to place a man on the Moon. It envisions large manned colonies in the Earth-Moon system, especially near stable Lagrangian points. These would be constructed using raw materials from the lunar surface and from Near-earth asteroids. The colonies were to spin for simulated gravity and be illuminated by the reflected light of the sun. Solar power satellites were also proposed as part of the overall infrastructure to be built.
The book went hand-in-hand with a political effort to obtain continued funding for manned space travel in the post-Apollo era.
[edit] In Media
Many of the concepts illustrated in the The High Frontier can be seen in the early series of the anime franchise Mobile Suit Gundam, 1979 - 1980, which depicts a world where humans have migrated into space colonies. The O'Neill cylinder colony design appears frequently, largely unchanged from its original concept.
