Category: Nonfiction
Reviewed by: John Vester
Title: In Search of Falling Stars: H.H. Nininger’s Classic Find a Falling Star, Revisited & Expanded
Author: Harvey H. Nininger, edited by Jim Banks
Format: Hardcover/Kindle
Pages: 592
Publisher: Bookpress
Date: November 2024
Retail Price: $49.95/$24.95
ISBN: 978-1960259011
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The name Harvey Nininger may not mean much to the average reader, unless you are a fan of meteorites. Nininger almost singlehandedly established the science of meteorics. He anticipated such new ideas, now accepted as established facts, that the Earth has been scarred many times by prehistoric meteor crashes; that the meteor that created Meteor Crater in Winslow, Arizona, is not buried there but exploded, leaving only small to dust-sized iron particles scattered over a wide area outside the crater.
Nininger’s full story is contained in this massive autobiography, stitched together from Nininger’s own autobiography Find a Falling Star, original manuscripts and unpublished materials, including the book It Wasn’t Always Meteorites by Margeret Nininger Huss. All this material has been blended together seamlessly by Jim Banks, Nininger’s grandson.
And it’s a fine job of bookbinding as well, with great, legible type, engaging dust cover, and some surprising art under that dust cover. The only quibble would be with the photo captions, set in a near microscopic font size.
But the story of Harvey Nininger’s life is the real treasure here. The first part of the book follows his life chronologically, from his poor yet formative beginnings in Kansas to his remarkable academic career and adventures. The second part of the book is subject oriented, delving into topics like Meteor Crater, Nininger’s museum, his collection of meteorites, locating meteor falls, the nature of dust clouds left by meteors screaming through the atmosphere, among the many meteoritic subjects that fascinated Nininger.
Nininger loses no opportunity to editorialize about how meteors got no respect until he came along, about the inadequacy of theory unsupported by field work in the natural sciences, and about the errors of so-called experts. The reader will be happy to hear his soap box pronouncements, in view of the amazing successes over his long and ever productive life.
Nininger’s unconventional and trailblazing story does not distract from the fact that he was a serious scientist. He wrote many seminal papers on the subject of meteortics, had many friends and colleague with names you would recognize, and has every right to the title of the founder of the science of meteorics.
Whether you’re into meteorites or not, the story of this remarkable man is worth your time. Nininger himself was disappointed in his original published autobiography Find a Falling Star because of the material left out. Editor Banks writes that he hopes the new book is the autobiography Nininger would have wanted. It’s clear he succeeded.
© 2025 John Vester
