Space is ticket for Titusville children’s book author

BY MARIA SONNENBERG

It remains to be seen whether Adrienne Romberger’s children’s rhyming book, “Ticket to Space,” becomes a hit movie or a New York Times bestseller, but the Titusville resident already has a major advantage over most authors today: her book is going to space.

“Ticket to Space,” was selected by “Story Time from Space” to be launched to the International Space Station, where it will be read aloud by an astronaut to children around the world.

“Story Time from Space” is a project of the nonprofit Global Space Education Foundation.

Romberger’s book launched in February on the SpaceX Crew-6 mission.

Available to earthlings through Amazon, “Ticket to Space” leads kids ages 3 to 8 through space history with spokesrocket Gus, named for Gus Grissom.

“Gus takes the reader on a journey through the history of American space travel through the Mercury, Gemini, Apollo and Shuttle programs,” Romberger said.

Romberger has been a space fan for decades.

“I have been curious about space travel since I was 9,” said Romberger, who grew up in South Florida.

In the fourth grade, Romberger’s grandmother casually suggested that she ought to go to space.

“I believed her and was enthralled,” she said.

She followed all the launches, from Mercury through Gemini, on her family’s tiny blackand-white television. In college, Romberger and her girlfriends piled into her 1962 Chevy Nova for a trip to Titusville, where they slept in the car while waiting for the Apollo 8 launch.

Life had other plans for Romberger, and she did not go into space, but worked as a graphic designer and, later, as a fourth-grade teacher.

“When I retired from teaching, we moved to Titusville and I became a tour guide at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex,” Romberger said.

The idea for “Ticket to Space” evolved from the realization that people who lived through the Space Race didn’t remember much about it and that their grandchildren knew even less.

“I wrote the book for the grandchildren of my generation, so they might grow up with an interest and appreciation for the U.S. space program,” she said.

“Ticket to Space” taps into Romberger’s skill sets as artist and teacher, for she both wrote and illustrated the book.

Her stint as tour guide connected Romberger with several astronauts, including Dr. Don Thomas, veteran of four Shuttle missions, a frequent “Astronaut of the Day” at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex and author of “Orbit of Discovery.” When Romberger mentioned she was writing a book, Thomas encouraged her.

“It was such an inspiration to have Don Thomas, an astronaut, to take the time to cheer me on,” she said.

Romberger is currently working on a sequel to “Ticket to Space,” with an anticipated publishing date of 2024.

Her love for space travel has inspired at least one person to join the space industry.

“My son says that it is a result of my enthusiasm for the topic when he was a boy,” she said. For more on “Ticket to Space,” visit seamoosestories. com VV