One afternoon last week there was something like pandemonium in Rapid City, S. Dak. Sirens screamed; storekeepers thrust exuberant signs in windows; offices closed early. By midnight most of Rapid City and the surrounding countryside had trekked southwest to the rim of Moonlight Valley, a woodsy pockmark in the Black Hills. There a hushed throng of 50,000 stared down into a floodlit bowl as Explorer II, latest & greatest stratosphere balloon, was made ready for its first ascent. Year ago Explorer I, latest & greatest of its day, had lurched reluctantly skyward from...
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