Books like Von Braun by Michael J. Neufeld

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks follows the story of Henrietta Lacks, a poor black tobacco farmer whose cancer cells were taken in 1951 without her consent and later became the first immortal human cell line, HeLa, driving major scientific breakthroughs while raising questions of ethics, race, and medical exploitation.

Explores the grassroots fight against the AIDS crisis in 1980s New York, detailing the rise of ACT UP, the fight for affordable treatment, and the lives of activists and patients who demanded medical progress and civil rights.

Rise of the Rocket Girls chronicles the trailblazing women who, as Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s early human computers, calculated trajectories that launched America's first satellites and opened the path to space exploration.

A biography that reveals the hidden life of Samuel M. Steward—novelist, poet, professor, and post‑Stonewall tattoo artist—through unpublished diaries and research correspondence, illustrating early homosexual existence in America.

Socio‑researcher Sudhir Venkatesh infiltrates a Chicago crack‑dealing gang, documenting urban poverty and crime from within.

The Astronaut Wives Club follows the lives of the wives of NASA’s Mercury Seven astronauts as they navigate fame, social change, and personal trials while supporting one another during a historic era.

Bernard Schriever’s drive to build intercontinental ballistic missiles shaped America’s deterrent strategy during the Cold War, steering the U.S. toward a nuclear peace while racing against Soviet advances.

"In March 1953 Maurice Wilkins of King's College London announced the departure of his obstructive colleague, Rosalind Franklin to rival Cavendish Laboratory scientist, Francis Crick." "But it was too late. Franklin's unpublished data and crucial photograph of DNA had already been seen by her competitors at the Cambridge University lab. With the aid of these, plus their own knowledge, Watson and Crick discovered the structure of the molecule that genes are composed of - DNA, the secret of life. Five years later, after more brilliant research under Bernal at Birkbeck College, at the age of thirty-seven, Rosalind died of ovarian cancer. In 1962 Wilkins, Crick and Watson were awarded the Nobel prize for their elucidation of DNA's structure. Franklin's part was forgotten until she was caricatured in Watson's book The Double Helix." "In this biography Brenda Maddox has been given unique access to Rosalind's personal correspondence and has interviewed all the principal scientists involved, including Crick, Watson and Wilkins."--BOOK JACKET.

Looks at the evolving roots of America's space program--the scientific advances, the personalities, and the rivalries between the various arms of the United States military. After the Soviet launch of Sputnik in 1957, getting a man in space suddenly became a national imperative, leading President Dwight D. Eisenhower to pull various pieces together to create the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.