[Chad C. Mulligan]

Long before the tabloid, long before Mick Jaggar, Robert Heinlein penned The Rolling Stones about a spacefaring family of three generations who leave their home on the Moon for the asteroids, and eventually the outer planets. The "flatcats" in the novel might be the antecedent for Tribbles.

[Chad C. Mulligan]

Now that I think on it: There were families in Heinlein's much more adult novel The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, too. Grandma Hazel of The Rolling Stones sprang from one. His second novel, (unpublished as a book for a very long time),Beyond This Horizon ends with family scenes. There are stories of family life in Time Enough for Love, and a family (albeit rather dysfunctional) is at the core of To Sail Beyond the Sunset