# Internal consistencies in Heinlein's Future History
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [December 5, 2002, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633 "2002-12-05T04:26:56Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)
#### Post date: [December 5, 2002, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633/1 "2002-12-05T04:26:56Z")
I recently picked up a copy of Heinlein’s collection _The Past Through Tomorrow_ (gotta love used-book sales), and was naturally re-reading it. It occured to me that we’re rather taking the editor’s word that these stories all occur in the same universe. So I decided to go through and pick out all of the cross-references and see which were connected and which weren’t.
First of all, Harriman is mentioned directly or indirectly in “Blowups Happen”, “The Man who Sold the Moon” (of course), “Delilah and the Space Rigger”, “Space Jockey”, “Requiem”, “The Black Pits of Luna”, “‘It’s Great to be Back’”, “The Green Hills of Earth”, and _Methuselah’s Children_. That gives us a good base to work on. Further, “Misfit” and _Methuselah’s Children_ are definitely tied together by A. J. Libby, and Lazarus mentions having consulted with Dr. Pinero, the hero of “Lifeline”, so we can fold those in, too, and several of Blind Rhysling’s songs show up in “Logic of Empire”.
“Logic of Empire”, meanwhile, contains the first mention of Nehemiah Scudder, the First Prophet. So that means that _“If This Goes On–”_ is also in the Future History. In turn, Dr. Micah Novak, one of the leaders of the Cabal and later drafter of the Covenant, ties _“If This Goes On–”_ together with “Coventry”. So that connects all of the stories in _The Past Through Tomorrow_, except for seven: “The Roads must Roll”, “The Long Watch”, “Gentlemen, Be Seated”, “’–We Also Walk Dogs’”, “Searchlight”, “Ordeal in Space”, and “The Menace from Earth”.
There are also other connections between the stories, of course: I believe there’s a mention in “The Man who Sold the Moon” to Erickson and Harper, inventors of the isotope fuels; “The Black Pits of Luna” and “‘It’s Great to Be Back’” both mention Rutherford radiation lab on the Moon; and “The Green Hills of Earth” and _Methuselah’s Children_ both mention the patronage/indenture system on Venus. “Coventry” and _Methuselah’s Children_, meanwhile, both refer to the Interregnum of the Prophets and the Second American Revolution, and in _Methuselah’s Children_ there’s also a skyscraper named after Novak.
But as for those other seven stories: The Harriman stories refer to the mechanized Roads, and _“If This Goes On–”_ and _Methuselah’s Children_ mention the ruins of the old Roadcities, with the latter also referring to the “Strike of '76”. There’s nothing firm to make an absolute connection (there might be other timelines with mechanized roads), but it’s pretty safe to say that “The Roads Must Roll” is probably part of the Future History.
I can find nothing in “The Long Watch” to connect it with the Future History, and in “Gentlemen, Be Seated”, the closest thing to a clue as to what timeline it takes place in is that there’s a Richardson Observatory on the Moon (which, so far as I know, isn’t mentioned elsewhere). “Searchlight” is very short on details of any kind (understandable, considering the length restrictions under which it was written), so about all we can say is that there are military bases on the Moon. And “Ordeal in Space” has nothing to connect it to the other Future History stories, but there are many clues that might help place it with some of Heinlein’s other lines: There are things called “drop chutes” which may possibly work by gravity manipulation, there’s a Three Planets treaty, Mars is inhabited by old, tired beings, one of whom is named “Knath Sooth” (I’m almost certain that I’ve seen that name elsewhere in Heinlein’s works), and the _Valkyrie_ was built sometime before the discovery of artificial gravity.
The remaining two stories, “’–We Also Walk Dogs’” and “The Menace from Earth”, I do not believe are properly part of the Future History, and were presumably included due to editorial error. “’–We Also Walk Dogs’” is the most blatent: Earth is governed by a sovreign planetary administration, totally at odds with the independent countries of the other works; the inhabited worlds of the Solar System include Venus, Mars, Titan, Jupiter, and Callisto, whereas the Jovian satellites, at least, are uninhabited in the Future History; and it’s O’Neil who invents the gravity modulator, not Libby in “Misfit”. For “The Menace from Earth”, the evidence isn’t absolute, but neither of the first two starships was designed by the engineering firm of Jones and Hardesty (or Hardesty and Hardesty) or named _Prometheus_, and I find it hard to believe that Holly wouldn’t have managed to wrangle that contract for the first starship.
That covers all of the stories in _The Past through Tomorrow_; what about Heinlein’s other books? _Time Enough for Love_ is obviously part of the Future History; less obviously, _Farmer in the Sky_ is as well (one of the characters in that book has a verse from “The Green Hills of Earth” inscibed on his tombstone). _Space Cadet_ is clearly in the same universe as “The Long Watch”, since Johnny Dalquist is one of the Four who are always called on the roster, but although the Venusians in _Space Cadet_ are portrayed consistently with those in “Logic of Empire”, I remain unconvinced that these two stories are part of the Future History. _Orphans of the Sky_ may or may not be; I seem to recall Lazarus referring to the events of that story in _Time Enough for Love_, but with the name of the ship changed.
_Time for the Stars_, _Tunnel in the Sky_, and _Citizen of the Galaxy_ are definitely not Future History, as each has a different method of FTL, with no mention of the Libby hyperspace drive. Likewise, _Rocket Ship Gallileo_ has a different account of the first Moon landing. _The Moon is a Harsh Mistress_, and, by extension, _The Rolling Stones_, is probably not in the Future History: In the Future History, the residents of Luna are all the best and brightest, which seems rather inconsistent with the Moon’s use as a penal colony. _Friday_, with a Balkanized United States, and _The Puppet Masters_, with an alien threat from Titan, can likewise be probably ruled out as being part of the Future History. Offhand, I can’t think of any other stories which I can definitively place one way or the other, although I have suspicions that _Stranger in a Strange Land_, _Podkayne of Mars_, and _Red Planet_ are all in the same timeline, as well.
Any I missed?
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### Author:  [@iamthewalrus\_3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamthewalrus_3)
#### Post date: [December 5, 2002, 5:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633/2 "2002-12-05T05:01:49Z")
First, I have to say that I’m impressed with the amount of thought and work you’ve put into this. I don’t have much to add, except that Heinlein himself did comment on this at one point.
In one of his later books, possibly _The Number of the Beast_, there is talk of certain numbers given to each timeline. Unfortunately, I don’t have my copy of the book handy, but I do recall that the timeline in which the future history existed, along with Maureen and Lazarus Long, was Timeline #2 (codename “Leslie Lecroix”). Also, IIRC, Jubal Harshaw was around and established as being part of Timeline #3 (codename “Armstrong”). My gut feeling is that _I Shall Fear No Evil_ is also of this timeline, but that could be wrong. All in all, at least 3 or 4 were enumerated.
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### Author:  [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)
#### Post date: [December 5, 2002, 5:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633/3 "2002-12-05T05:35:25Z")
Yeah, I’m aware of the explicit sorting in _The Cat who Walked through Walls_, but I’m deliberately ignoring it, as well as _The Number of the Beast_ and _To Sail Beyond the Sunset_. I’m one of those who maintains that Heinlein was senile by the time that he wrote those, and could not be trusted to get his own stories straight. Besides, where’s the fun in an author coming out and _saying_ “This book was in this timeline, that book was in that timeline, and these other books were in that timeline”? It’s much more interesting to work from internal clues.
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### Author:  [@CaptMurdock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CaptMurdock)
#### Post date: [December 5, 2002, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633/4 "2002-12-05T05:54:30Z")
My question: is the Hazel Meade Stone of _The Rolling Stones_ the same character as the Hazel Stone AKA Gwen Novak of _To Sail Beyond The Sunset_ and (I believe) _The Cat Who Walks Through Walls_?
As for Heinlein being “senile” I will say some of the quasi-liberatarian notions he espouses in his later books leave me cold. Incest is acceptable (as long as it’s kept private and doesn’t lead to pregnancy) but smoking pot is a **hanging offense?!?!** Jeezus! Just who did Heinlein think were buying all those copies of _Stranger in a Strange Land_\* back in the sixties? It sure weren’t the Rotarians!
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### Author:  [@Tristan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tristan)
#### Post date: [December 5, 2002, 8:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633/5 "2002-12-05T08:00:30Z")
Waiting for Fenris to jump in here, as he is more grounded in The Canon than I am.
_Ordeal in space_ is probably connected to _Double Star_, since the Three Planets Treaty is mentioned in both. This makes a certain amount of sense, I suppose. Also, the Martian names seem to meme the same, although that could be a Heinlein thing.
And yes, I think the Hazel/Gwen is the same character. It’s a good thing to be rescued from old age by time traveling hedonists…
Also, wasn’t the _Prometheus_ the name of the ship that ended up drifting with the stagnant culture that had lost it’s tech? Or am I imagining things… you know the story, the one with knives being the primary weapon, and mutants are in the fore-section…? If so, it’s mentioned in one of those books you don’t want to allow… LL mentions it during the dinner party, citing the fact that the descendants on the moon of a planet are fierce fighters, who seem to be killing more scientists than vice-versa.
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### Author:  [@Dr.Rieux](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Rieux)
#### Post date: [December 5, 2002, 8:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633/6 "2002-12-05T08:18:03Z")
Tristan, you’re thinking of _Orphans of the Sky_, half of which (the first half, IIRC) is called “Universe.”
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### Author:  [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)
#### Post date: [December 5, 2002, 8:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633/7 "2002-12-05T08:51:53Z")
Hazel Stone is also the young Hazel that appears in “The Moon is a Harsh Mistress” as leader of the Baker Street Irregulars. And I believe “The Rolling Stones” has the same martians as “Stranger in a Strange Land” and “Red Planet”, and that therefore ties them all together with “The Moon is a Harsh Mistress”. And aren’t they the same martians that appear in “Double Star”, and “Between Planets”? I also got the impression that “The Green Hills of Earth” was set in that universe, which would tie them all back in to the future history.
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### Author:  [@Tristan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tristan)
#### Post date: [December 5, 2002, 10:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633/8 "2002-12-05T10:06:54Z")
That’s it, thank you.
After learning the hard way about loaning out books, and moving 2 times in a year, and a divorce where we fought over the books more than the kids, my RAH juveniles are almost totally gone.
_sob_
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### Author:  [@partly\_warmer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/partly_warmer)
#### Post date: [December 5, 2002, 10:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633/9 "2002-12-05T10:53:25Z")
Although I like Heinlein (in fact I wrote to him once) (oh, yes, and I’ve read some of his manuscripts in Special Collections at UCSC), I’ve never had the feeling that every single one of his stories were connected by a common universe. If that’s what he intended from the beginning (very doubtful), then he failed.
More likely, we’ve got an editor/publisher who noted early on that the stories didn’t absolutely contradict one another, and could be represented as a “set”: In the sense of a “set” the buyer would want to get a complete collection of.
Reading his manuscripts – just to add a little to my contribution here – it’s evident that Heinlein sat down at the typewriter, wrote a story, corrected the original by hand, and sent it to the publisher. The final versions published correspond with the long, cheap yellow newsprint he used. He typed _one_ draft. Unless he had this entire universe in his head, it’s hard not to conclude that he was just telling stories as they came to him. Without any, fixed, grand plan.
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### Author:  [@Fenris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fenris)
#### Post date: [December 5, 2002, 12:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633/10 "2002-12-05T12:28:37Z")
What a great post **Chronos**! A couple of points for the moment:
1. There’s a missing story from **The Past Through Tomorrow** : “Let there be Light” which can be found in the collection **The Man Who Sold The Moon** that was left out because Heinlein didn’t like the slang in it (he was wrong: it’s charming). (There’s also two versions of it: but the differences are maybe 50 words: one is mildly risque, the other not)
2. The martians of **Red Planet** are certainly the martians of **Stranger** (and there’s a line in **Stranger** about “young nymphs” and another about "considering throwing the colonists off Mars). **Rolling Stone’s** Martians aren’t seen on-panel, all we know is that Lowell is strangely subdued and thoughtful after seeing them. So maybe.
IIRC we see the Martians of **Between Planets** and they’re _nothing_ like the other Martians.
In addition, we can be sure that **Space Cadet** and **Between Planets** are in completely different universes: their Venusians are completely incompatible, despite the common tie of both of them having a peace-keeping sattilite that orbits the Earth, prepared to drop bombs on anyone who causes trouble.
1. The story “The Sound of his Wings” listed in the unwritten stories section of the timeline eventually morphed into **Stranger**. We know **I Will Fear No Evil** is part of the Future History 'cause Lazarus specifically mentions the events.
2. **Friday** ties into “Gulf” and “Gulf” has bombs that make suns go Super-Nova and “self-styled supermen”. No way can I see a connection between them and the Future History. The characters from **Job** visit **Friday** ’s world at one point (IIRC the Texas scene), but those three are off in their own corner (with **Unpleasant Profession of Jonathan Hoag** very, VERY loosely tied in too, more thematically than anything else.)
More later…
Fenris
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### Author:  [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)
#### Post date: [December 5, 2002, 12:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633/11 "2002-12-05T12:32:17Z")
It’s not true that _all_ of Heinlein’s stories are connected in a single universe. I don’t of any author for whom that’s true.
But Heinlein’s “Future History” is not some editor’s creation – Heinlein himself set it up and named it. He made up a huge chart laying it all out back in the 1940s, and added to it since. The chart appears – with variations – in several places, notably in the omnibus vo9lume **The Past Through Tomorrow**. IIRC, Heinlein himself said which stories belong to it, and has changed his mind through time. Some stories have only a peripheral connection. “Lifeline”, for instance, is only linked to the others because Lazarus Long says at one point that the Doctor tried to measure his Lifeline, but didn’t give him an answer and returned his money. The implication is that Long has an unnaturally long life. I’m sure Heinlein added this throwaway bit because of his sentimental attachment to the story – it was the first he published.
There’s more info on the Future History chart in **A Heinlein Companion** and in **Heinlein in Dimension** , and maybe in the Science Fiction Encyclopedia.
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### Author:  [@partly\_warmer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/partly_warmer)
#### Post date: [December 5, 2002, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633/12 "2002-12-05T13:43:18Z")
I understand, Cal, I just don’t believe Heinlein was always trying to do that. The only support I have to add is subjective: Heinlein’s stories almost never seem to me to have much of a connection. In fact, the Lazarus Long books seem to be about entirely different people. Just my 2 cents.
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### Author:  [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)
#### Post date: [December 5, 2002, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633/13 "2002-12-05T14:48:38Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by partly\_warmer \*
> \*\*… it’s evident that Heinlein sat down at the typewriter, wrote a story, corrected the original by hand, and sent it to the publisher. The final versions published correspond with the long, cheap yellow newsprint he used. He typed _one_ draft. Unless he had this entire universe in his head, it’s hard not to conclude that he was just telling stories as they came to him. Without any, fixed, grand plan. \*\*
I disagree. He mentions in those manuscripts that he kept extensive notes on the stories he had in mind (he began writing Stranger in a Strange Land on several different occasions, and had binders full of information he wanted to use for it).
Also, having worked in the publishing industry, I have no problem with the idea that somebody who could have a story go from his head to the printers with two (2) rounds of revision could do this while keeping an overarching world history in his head, and making his stories stick to it.
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### Author:  [@partly\_warmer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/partly_warmer)
#### Post date: [December 5, 2002, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633/14 "2002-12-05T15:21:12Z")
Well, I’m reporting what I saw, not making a value judgment.
It may be true that he handled his later books differently, but the earlier ones, such as “Door into Summer”, were written once, corrected, and submitted. The entire manuscript fits into a 2 inch high box. He wrote on yellow newspaper. The cheapest thing he could get, I guess. He typed straight through. His notes (which I do not have handy) indicate that he went back and corrected them with a pen. Directly on the original. After that, there are practically no differences between the hand corrected copy, and the published version.
Many of the corrections he made, by the way, were not to sentence structure, or choice of wording, but to mechanical details such as how long it would take a spacecraft to orbit a planet.
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### Author:  [@partly\_warmer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/partly_warmer)
#### Post date: [December 5, 2002, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633/15 "2002-12-05T15:26:34Z")
P.S. I am willing to go back and review his manuscripts, if anyone feels there’s something else that needs looking into. It would take about a month, at this point, though.
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### Author:  [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)
#### Post date: [December 5, 2002, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633/16 "2002-12-05T18:43:35Z")
_Double Star_ and _Red Planet_ / _Stranger_ are certainly not the same universe. In the former, the Martians are somewhat shorter than humans, a bit blobby, and reproduce asexually by fission. In the latter (someone might correct me on this; I never managed to finish _Stranger_), the Martians are tall and gangly (when mature), trilaterally symmetric, and reproduce sexually, with the younger forms female and the older forms male. I don’t think that we’re given a clear description of the Martians in _Podkayne of Mars_, other than the fact that a Martian doesn’t have a definite sex (hence Podkayne is just as appropriate as a female name as as a male), but this could be interpreted as consistent with either _Double Star_ or _Stranger_. I get the impression that _Podkayne_ Martians are the same as _Stranger_ / _Red Planet_ Martians, but I’m not sure on what I’m basing that.
I had forgotten about the Three Planets Treaty being in _Between Planets_ (that was the one with Venusian dragons, no?), but it could well be consistent with “Ordeal in Space”. I’ve also considered the possibility that the conference in “’–We Also Walk Dogs’” was to hammer out the Three Planets Treaty, but I don’t think there’s enough detail there to be sure.
I don’t have a copy of _Orphans of the Sky_ handy, but the ship might have been the _Prometheus_ there, and the name of the engineering firm which designed it was certainly mentioned (was it Hardesty & Hardesty?). All I remember for sure is that when Lazarus tells essentially the same story, he uses a different name for the ship. This might mean that the name of the ship was changed, or it might mean that similar events occured in both universes.
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### Author:  [@OttoDaFe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OttoDaFe)
#### Post date: [December 6, 2002, 7:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633/17 "2002-12-06T07:09:36Z")
The “older sister” of the _New Frontiers_? The _Vanguard_.
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### Author:  [@Fiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiver)
#### Post date: [December 6, 2002, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633/18 "2002-12-06T16:37:20Z")
With regard to consistency, how do Heinlein’s “Future History” stories stand up against Larry Niven’s “Known Space” stories?
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### Author:  [@Fenris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fenris)
#### Post date: [December 6, 2002, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633/19 "2002-12-06T16:53:16Z")
About the same, if you ignore obvious “We need to fill space” stories like “We Also Walk Dogs” and add back in stories like “Let There Be Light” which _has_ to be included and wasn’t for ‘artistic’ reasons.
If you go by Heinlein’s timeline, not quite as well.
Fenris
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### Author:  [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)
#### Post date: [December 6, 2002, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/internal-consistencies-in-heinleins-future-history/140633/20 "2002-12-06T16:53:57Z")
Boy, that’s difficult to answer. But don’t be too sure that ‘Known Space’ would have ever happened without the Future History having occured.
**We Also Walk Dogs** is clearly the odd story out in the future history. I’m certain I once read an interview with RAH wherein he stated that he wasn’t certain about its inclusion but decided he liked the story enough to do so. I mean, where else are Jovians mentioned in the Future history.
Or here’s a puzzler for you…
If you accept the races in the FH we have Terrans, Venusians, Martians and Jovians in the Solar System. That’s 4 species of intelligent life right there. Toss in the Little People and the Jockaira during Methusalah’s children and we’re up to six.
Yet beyond the FH the other stories set it Timeline Leslie LeCroix feature no extraterrestrial intelligences. Is Heinlein’s solar system the only one that produced intelligent life in abundance?
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