Harriman liquidates his assets, risks bankruptcy, damages his marriage, and raises funds in numerous legitimate and semi-legitimate ways "I", he says, "would cheat, lie, steal, beg, bribe-do anything to accomplish what we have accomplished". By arranging for many countries to assert their rights Harriman persuades the United Nations to, as a compromise, assign management of the Moon to his company. The United States also has a claim due to Florida and Texas. On that basis, Mexico, Central and parts of South America, and other countries in those latitudes around the world, have a claim on the Moon. As it passes directly overhead only in a narrow band north and south of the equator, he uses a legal principle that states that property rights extend to infinity above a land parcel.
Harriman seeks to avoid government ownership of the Moon. To a television network, he offers the Moon as a reliable and uncensorable broadcasting station. To an anti-Communist associate, he suggests that the Russians may print the hammer and sickle across the face of the Moon if they get to it first. He implies to the Moka-Coka company, for example, that rival soft drink maker 6+ plans to turn the Moon into a massive billboard, using a rocket to scatter black dust on the surface in patterns. To solve the tougher financial problems, Harriman exploits commercial and political rivalries. The technical problems are solvable with money and talent. Strong and two others agree to back his plans. One skeptic offers to sell "all of my interest in the Moon.for fifty cents" Harriman accepts and tries to buy the other associates' interests as well. The endeavor is both incredibly costly and of uncertain profitability. The necessary technology for a chemical-fueled rocket stretches the boundaries of current engineering. Most dismiss Harriman's plans as foolhardy: Nuclear rocket fuel is scarce as the space station that produces it blew up, also destroying the only existing spaceship. He asks his business partner, George Strong, and other tycoons to invest in the venture. D." Harriman, "the last of the Robber Barons", is obsessed with being the first to travel to-and possess-the Moon. Harriman, a businessman who is determined to personally reach and control the Moon.ĭelos David "D. A part of his Future History and prequel to " Requiem", it covers events around a fictional first Moon landing in 1978 and the schemes of Delos D. Heinlein, written in 1949 and published in 1950. " The Man Who Sold the Moon" is a science fiction novella by American author Robert A.
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