MovieChat Forums > October Sky (1999) Discussion > A time when U.S. kids could learn chemis...

A time when U.S. kids could learn chemistry and rocketry on their own

posted 17 years ago by schear
38 replies | jump to latest

I was born in 1950 and also built rockets beginning in my Junior High days (about 1962). My friends and I started with the paper rockets still popular with hobbyists, first buying the engines and later progressing to making our own fuels and engines. By 1963, using a great book about amateur rocketry by the Army's Fort Sill, Oklahoma, Artillery School, we began building metal rockets. The first ones were about 24-inches in length and used zinc-sulfur as fuel (very safe stuff to work with). In time, we built rockets (even multistage) up to about 10-feet in height using various solid fuel combinations, including perchlorates (dangerous stuff to handle). Some used trapped exhaust gases to propel them from mortar increase launch velocity and reduce dispersion (most were unguided to reduce costs).

The later rockets were launched at several Southern California sites, including near Edwards Air Force Base and the China Lake Naval facility, with coordination of their control towers. The military tracked the rockets to tell us altitude achieved and approximate landing locations. Our highest confirmed altitude was in excess of 100,000 feet.

We learned practical metallurgy (while our other friends built spice racks in Metal Shop my buds were spinning nozzles and nose cones on the lathe), chemistry, aeronautics, etc., mostly on our own. We purchased all our chemicals without restriction (mostly from Central Scientific Company, Cenco, in Santa Ana), were solving redox reactions at 12 years old, built an instrumented engine test stand to record engine performance and none of our teachers turned us in to police for our brilliant experiments.

How times have changed! Today, you will be investigated for even trying to purchase these chemicals (and anyone selling them to you will be raided) and if you do manage to get them without notice you will probably face federal charges for launching the rockets if you don't get FAA approvals (very difficult to obtain).

Today you can't even buy a real chemistry set like we could. Public spokesmen will say its to protect children and society, but most any scientist will tell you that engaging in science involves some risk taking. If you remove all the risk you remove the fun and the learning. Is it any wonder that so few kids today choose to become chemists and enter other sciences?

[–] sopclod 16 years ago

One thing people tend to overlook when talking about the "good ol' days" is that the US population has roughly doubled over the last 50 years. That carries a lot of implications as far as how many accidents there are and how visible they are. People always say "we did this and that and we turned out fine, I never heard of anyone getting hurt" etc etc but I think it wasn't reported as much, people didn't pay as much attention to it.

In any case we can still foster learning and creativity, it's just different now than it was then.

[–] ring-2 16 years ago

Not everyone is drinking the cyanide kool-aid. There's a woman named Lenore Skenazy who is probably the most visible member of a movement called "Free Range Kids" (http://freerangekids.wordpress.com/) These people advocate a return to normal childhood behaviors without a lot of the senseless child-safety worries that have come about in the last few decades.

Granted, there's some difference between working with hazardous chemicals and eschewing the modern-day hysteria over (largely non-existent) stranger-danger. But really not that much! With some minimal guidance, common sense, and appropriate places to experiment, do-it-yourself rocketry could be as safe as any other childhood activity. It's definitely much safer than sitting on the couch playing video games and turning into a hypertensive, heart-disease-having lard-ass like the way a lot of kids are doing.

[–] nkeres01 15 years ago

I agree with a lot of these posts and think the major difference is children have fun and play but it is more structured. Instead of running around in the woods kids may go to soccer practice. Here's the problem: When children have freedom and all able to take risks and break rules they learn responsibility and are able to learn on their own.

My one complaint is that all too often people attack this generation for being lazy and watching way too much television. I have talked to many older adults who think children are dumb and this is also a very violent generation. Nothing could be further from the truth. Today, more young adults are attending and graduating from college than ever before, children volunteer twice as much as previous generations, and do better in school.

I don't mean to be preachy but I hate hearing people rant about kids today

[–] jarn2004 15 years ago

Its interesting this generation is "lazy" but this generation does a lot more than previous generations. Sure there are some kids who dont do anything, but the vast majority of them don't have time to run in the woods and play around. After school, where you are forced to learn a lot more than "simple math and english" most schools these days, at least those with the brightest students, have students learning different languages taking physics, chemistry,etc.... I'm not sure what schools you are talking about, but each generation learns more than the one before it.

Once they get out of school, they have extra curriculars. sports/ music etc....then have homework which is piled on. Its almost dark if not dark by the time they finish, where its not "safe" to be outside because of the pedophiles from the other generation, but regardless most are exhausted by then, so they become dumb and "watch tv".

And dont get me wrong, its a nice movie, but what the rocket kids did build a rocket and use simple velocity and distance equations to "find" it wouldnt win a 5th grade science fair these days.....let alone a highschool one......most of that stuff is covered before high school......

[–] nkeres01 15 years ago

I totally agree with Jarn. I don't understand how older generations look at younger ones and wonder why things aren't exactly the same as when they were kids. Is it that hard to understand that times change. Can someone please explain to me how this generation is so "lazy" and as many say "stupid". I think there are some arguments here but no one has ever intelligently explained this to me.

[–] Params7 15 years ago

Today's generation in the US is indeed 'lazy' and the majority is 'stupid' also. Im currently a junior in high school and i encounter alot of kids everyday who i just feel sorry for. Alot of my peers look at being smart and intelligent as a negative thing, sort of like an abnormality. I have many friends who i know are very intelligent but they just refuse to act it out. Its as if they are scared of being treated like the 'nerd' or the 'geek'.

In the past, children did not have the internet or videogames or television sets to sit down and watch when they had free time. The only things one could do were the simple things. Draw, play an instrument, write a story, play with a pet and the primary hobby, READ. This not only was a good source of knowledge based on the content of the book but expanded the child's vocabulary and language skills. It is the best hobby that any child can have and it is the result of this that alot of children were intelligent. Today, if i sit in the school library and do my homework or just read a book, i get snide remarks by students who walk by. It is not such a big deal for me because ive been used to it since i was a young'un but for the majority, it is discouraging and off putting.

I dont know where society is going but i do know where its NOT going and thats a world where intellect is encouraged and curiosity is allowed to explore. I just hope that a time machine is invented in my time so i can just go and enjoy the world described by all of you who were fortunate enough to be born in those times.

My time SUCKS! XD

[–] rlippman-2 11 years ago

A big part of this is that childhood is seen as a commodity demographic to be exploited by our capitalist system. There isn't a big economic incentive to hold up the high achievers and expect kids to aspire to that level. It's much easier and more profitable to hold up the under achiever as the standard, since so many more can reach that low level. From toy companies to clothing to music, movies and food, you name it, the same tried and true tactic for making money holds: you find out what the outlier/rebel kids are doing, you make a product or service to cater to that, you advertise it as the new "cool", and you watch the money roll in. In the end it makes a few people really rich, while at the same time it dumbs down society.

Sorry if this sounds like I'm advocating a socialist agenda, but the truth is that where profit is the main driving force behind what kids are encouraged to pursue, the results you get will not be a bunch of science fair entrants, but a lot of kids smoking pot on the couch after school (while both parents are working and can't supervise them properly) and watching cartoons instead of hiking around in the woods, building things in the garage and inventing stuff in the basement.

But hey, I don't want to be completely negative about this stuff. There are still a lot of good outlets for kids these days, and I know mine, and most of their friends are anything but lazy or dumb. My kid has more homework each day than I ever got in a week at his age, and he actually does it. His grades are mostly in the 90's (unlike mine at the same age, barely scratching by) and he is far more mature than I was at his age. We build and launch Estes rockets and fly RC planes - stuff I tried as a kid, but where I had to figure it all out on my own, learning what I could from magazines, he has the internet and parents who are completely plugged into his life. I ended up at various times with 3rd degree burns (very lucky it wasn't something worse!) and in trouble with the law, he has after school activities, music lessons, sports teams and his time on the computer building virtual worlds in Minecraft. I do lament that he doesn't have the same proficiency that I had with a saw and a hammer, but let's face it, a lot of what I could do with hand tools at his age is becoming obsolete for a big segment of society. Tomorrow's jobs will require those computer skills. And hey, if I had a computer to play with back in the 60's and 70's, you can be sure I would have done so!

I guess what I'm saying is that we live in a world where kids have greater opportunity to both learn and grow, or be couch potatoes and consumers of "cool". It's up to us as parents to guide them to make better choices. Everything the 'Rocket Boys' do in October Sky can be done today, only better, if we take the time and get involved in our children's lives.

_______

A wrench to the head changes everything.

[–] jaystarstar 15 years ago

With some minimal guidance, common sense, and appropriate places to experiment, do-it-yourself rocketry could be as safe as any other childhood activity.

Ridiculous.

If you want grade-school kids screwing around with explosives, metal casings and highly flammable fuels around YOUR house, more power to ya, but please do it about 50 miles from mine.

[–] heaintloveu 14 years ago

The gov't wants us to be dumb. That way they can more easily control us.

[–] oldmotem 14 years ago

Wow. I can't believe this movie generated quite a thread here.
The movie proved to me one thing: just how *beep* up the US has become due to terrorist threat/overprotection/incompetence in homeland security/overparanoia/no outlet for kids to have fun in a free and inventive society. I wondered why the space program has floundered for years. Now I know why. They simply don't have the talent or genius coming forward they did in years past. Too many cookie cutter drones coming out of college with no clue of a real inventor's bent or having been challenged in a way that could produce a totally new approach to something. That would be too terroristic and dangerous. Top secret or better clearance is required. To be a college student will soon require clearance levels from Homeland Security.

This movie was a great one. For the older crowd that could remember those days of freedom. And one of horror to show just how far this society has to go to get back to being one of productive, creative, free-flowing energy again (I am NOT talking about free-flowing energy being PRO sports which are now a drugged disaster. Another by-product of this country's greed and corruption).

Good luck to it. And maybe to filmmakers as well to make more movies of this type and fewer "GO 150 MPH FOR 1 1/2 HOURS OR YOU WILL DIE" type disasters.

I really liked the end just before the credits where they showed clips of the REAL people involved in this story when they were way back then. Excellent.

[–] ktowny 11 years ago

I let my 8 year old ride his bike around the neighborhood with him and his friend. I let me kids walk to school alone. I let my kids walk to the park alone. I'd let them go in the woods, but we live in a city.

As a kid, we'd spend a lot of time exploring the fields and woods. This was in the early 70s. Although it wasn't as innocent as we'd like to think. There were some creepy people out there. I remember a 'hippie' living in an abandoned rail station, doing who knows what. There were also teen kids who liked doing drugs in a clump of trees. They threatened to beat us up if they ever saw us again.

Love's turned to lust and blood's turned to dust in my heart.

[–] dcgalloway1956 10 years ago

I am glad that this film has inspired these comments. I graduated Magna Cum Laude with a B.S. in Chemistry in 1978. I later obtained an M.S. in Organic Chemistry and completed most of the requirements for a Doctorate in Chemical Education. I received a rigorous education in hard science that I am proud of. Unfortunately, I consider myself to be one of the last people to obtain a good scientific education since after I graduated academic standards were lowered with the result that students do not have the knowledge of science that they should have. The discouragement of the development of critical thinking skills is probably the consequence of a hidden political agenda. The educational system seems geared toward funneling complacent and malleable people into low-wage positions of little value. The chemistry set I had growing up is no longer available. Recently I taught General Chemistry and Physical Science courses at the university level and a substantial fraction of the students rebelled against wearing the mandatory safety goggles and were disruptive. Since 1989 Federal research programs have been discontinued, funding for basic research slashed, and chemical plants have closed with the result that many of these prestigious positions have migrated overseas. I am now working outside of my chosen field simply due to the lack of scientific jobs. The rise of political extremism and religious fundamentalism has had an adverse impact on the sciences across the board.

David C. Galloway

[–] Razzbar 10 years ago

You illustrate beautifully one problem I had with the movie, which can be explained that they were in a poor coal mining community, where you and I were on the West Coast.

In the movie, the boys are being discouraged and obstructed in their interest in rocketry. Where I went to school at the time, any kind with an interest in any kind of science would have been given every encouragement.

The movie condenses the Sputnik experience into something akin to a brief, passing, world-changing event. Everybody goes outside to look at it (we did) as it passes over, and it captures everybody's attention for a moment, but then life goes on... as usual.

It wasn't like that in my experience. When that thing went up, people didn't just note it on the news -- there was a general, long-term slow panic. It lit a fire. The nation's educational system was the pan, and we kids were in it. It was a huge, huge national motivator.

[–] Redart27 9 years ago

A kid I knew blew off his finger with one of those home chem sets. I figure many kids across the old USA did the same and the lawyers got wind of it all and put these home chem set companies out of business- either with lawsuits or regulations so strict they could only sell kits with baking soda and salt in them.

I am surprised no one has come out with a Breaking Bad home chemistry kit yet.