Book recommendations about “early days” stories outside of tech

Question

Howdy HN - I'm wondering if folks have any recommendations for books about the early days of companies/industries outside of tech/silicon valley? For example is there something similar to "Hackers" but about the space program, or "Masters of Doom" but about a rock band? Thanks!

neversaydie · Accepted Answer

For the Space Shuttle part of the space program specifically, Rowland White's Into the Black is a great recounting of how that program got started and came to fruition with the first flight: https://www.amazon.com/Into-Black-Extraordinary-Columbia-Ast...
Haven't read my copy yet, but for the origins of the (extremely important) container shipping industry, Marc Levinson's The Box comes highly recommended: https://www.amazon.com/Box-Shipping-Container-Smaller-Econom...
Another one high on my to-read list; the story of the 19th century telegraph system and its impact (figure this is early enough to fall outside the traditional tech category): https://www.amazon.com/Victorian-Internet-Remarkable-Ninetee...

dcminter · Answer

Two rather old autobiographies might be interesting to you:
"Slide Rule" by Nevil Shute [0]
A large part of this recounts the development of the R100 airship in Britain.
"Jet: The Story of a Pioneer" by Frank Whittle [1]
A substantial part of this is about the invention of the Jet engine.
Obviously they're both focused on the individual but hopefully that's ok.
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[0] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/107298.Slide_Rule
[1] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/29565586-jet

textread · Answer

Shoe Dog: about Nike