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Lunar Pogo Stick - Retro Technovelgy From 1968
Lunar Pogo Stick under development at Stanford in 1968:
(Lunar Pogo Stick)
“LUNAR POGO STICK for astronauts being designed at Stanford University will take advantage of the moon’s weak gravity to hop across the rugged moonscape in 50-foot jumps. Gyroscopes will keep the astronaut upright. Compressed gas in globes will fuel the piston bouncing mechanism at about 10 miles to the gallon. Other globes contain rocket fuel for jet steering to landings. (Drawing by Jim M’Guinness, Stanford Publications Service.”The above is per the original, verso-affixed Stanford University description. The following is from the subsequently affixed newspaper clipping:
“A pogo stick complete with gyroscopes and rocket jets, is being developed at Stanford University for hopping across the surface of the moon.
Even its guidance may be computerized for astronauts as it takes 50 foot jumps. The leaping will not be accomplished by the jets with their excessive fuel consumption, but by against the moon’s surface with a foot, after the manner of a kangaroo, rabbit or frog.
“The moon has no air to fly in, no water to float on, no road to roll over.” Said project leader Dr. Howard S. Seifert, professor of aeronautical engineering, at a recent seminar on the Stanford campus.”
In his 1954 novel Lucky Star and the Oceans of Venus, Isaac Asimov writes about the fictional hoppers:
Hoppers are probably the most grotesque forms of transportation ever invented. They consist of a curved body, just large enough to hold a man at the controls. There was a four-bladed rotor above and a single metal leg, rubber-tipped, below. It looked like some giant wading bird gone to sleep with one leg folded under its body. Lucky touched the leap knob and the hopper's leg retracted. Its body sank till it was scarcely seven feet from the ground while the leg moved up into the hollow tube that pierced the hopper just behind the control panel. The leg was released at the moment of maximum retraction with a loud click, and the hopper sprang thirty feet into the air...
See also these pictures of the moon hopper, from Rider in the Sky, by Raymond F. Jones, published by Thrilling Science Fiction in 1973.
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