The Gordon Elementary Book Club recently published a picture book about acclaimed local astronaut Richard Gordon, whom the school is named after.

The book is titled Richard Gordon’s Big Adventure. Gordon, who died in 2017, was from North Kitsap and part of the Apollo 12 mission in 1969. He is one of 24 people who have flown to the moon. He was also a Naval officer and aviator, test pilot and football executive. He graduated from NK High in 1947 then got his chemistry degree from the University of Washington in 1951.

The book club is led by teacher-librarian Nadejda Taylor who has been with the school since 2018. She said it was a student-led effort as many have been asking for years why there aren’t any books about Gordon at the school. So they decided to take matters into their own hands and create the book they were looking for.

But not just any student was allowed in the club as it wasn’t part of the school curriculum. The students had to prove themselves by submitting an application along with writing and illustration samples to show their abilities. “The students had to not only prove to me that they were independent and reliable, but to the teachers as well,” Taylor said. “They needed to have a record of being able to finish their work on time and take on additional responsibilities.”

The group consulted local children’s authors like Suzanne Selfors and Lynne Brunelle to get the book published. But perhaps the biggest help to the group was another local author, Phil Parker, the father of one of the students in the club, who guided the project for the two years it took to get self-published.

“Writing and illustrating and finding a way to combine ideas of thirty-ish kids, and editing, editing, editing…took longer than anything,” Taylor said.

The students in the club were in grades 3-5, many of whom are in middle school now since the project started in 2022.

“Writing Richard Gordon’s Great Adventure was important to my school because we wanted people to know who our school is named after,” said Isis Hunt, who is now in middle school. “I’m very grateful that I had the opportunity to write a book, especially because I plan to be an author when I grow up.”

Gordon visited the school named after him several times. His brother, Norm, visited the school in 2023 and helped provide some personal anecdotes and a wealth of information from the scrapbook created by his daughter, Taylor said. It includes hundreds of photographs and newspaper clippings that the club used. They are planning to invite him to a celebration event about the book Oct. 5, which was Gordon’s birthday.

Copies of the book are available at the school library, at Saltwater Bookshop in Kingston, and on Amazon. The book club will also be at the Poulsbo Kids Book Festival Nov. 16.