“The Magnificent Failure”
Published under the pen name Rene Lafayette

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Publication date: March 1949

Original publication: Startling Stories

Genre: Science Fiction

Series: Conquest of Space

Story description: Jonathan Bates, the legendary “Father of Exploration,” reaches the moon, discovers George Carlyle has preceded him, then takes off for Mars and Venus and successfully returns. When subsequent spaceflights end disastrously, Bates builds a bigger ship, takes on a little boy and his dog as companion voyagers, and leaves Earth, never to return.