Who was the first citizen of Italy to travel to space, Franco Malerba or Philippe Perrin?
Franco Malerba Franco Egidio Malerba (born October 10, 1946, in Busalla, Metropolitan City of Genoa, Italy) is an astronaut. He was the first citizen of Italy to travel to space.
Luigi Gussalli Luigi Gussalli (1885–1950), engineer and inventor, was a pioneer of motor cars. He turned to astronautics in the 20’s, corresponding with world leaders in this field, such as Oberth and Goddard and exchanging with them theories on interplanetary flight and its prospects. He developed a special double-reaction engine, wrote extensively on multi-stage rockets and published two books on space travel. The first one, in 1923, described a space flight to the Moon, the second one, written in 1946, is even more astonishing in its theme: “Interplanetary travels by means of solar radiations”.