October Sky Essay

In the novel, October Sky, it is a story about a boy who has a dream to make rockets and not just be a coal miner. After graduating high school, the boys of Coalwood would normally go into the career of coal mining or be lucky enough to get a football scholarship. Sonny had no interest in coal mining and was not athletic; both of those choices were out of the picture for him. He is the son of Homer, a coal miner, and Elsie Hickam. He also has an older brother named Jim who was an amazing football player. Sonny and his five friends wanted to be something other than coal miners. They formed a group called the Big Creek Missile Agency aka the BCMA. The six of them worked very hard to learn calculus, test different types of fuels, and get a textbook about rockets for the school, to make the best rocket. Sonny was a product of the setting he made, he broke free from the Coalwood setting, and he was successful doing it.

Sonny created his own setting. He found interest in rockets when Sputnik, the first artificial Earth satellite was launched from Russia. Even though Sonny wanted to purs...