[astronomyed] "Planetary Wonderings" August Focus: Happy 50th Anniversary NASA!

  • From: Mary-Frances Bartels <ki0dz@xxxxxxxx>
  • To: astronomyed@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Fri, 01 Aug 2008 14:00:42 -0400

Planetary Wonderings
August Focus: Happy 50th Anniversary NASA!

By Mary-Frances Bartels, NASA Solar System Ambassador

Did you see NASA’s 50th anniversary mentioned in the news lately?  Google even had a specially dedicated banner for it.  So, when is or was NASA’s anniversary?  It seems that most media has placed the anniversary on July 29 since that was the day in 1958 that President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed the National Aeronautics and Space Act into existence.  This act led to the formation of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.  Prior to this, space-related activities were handled by multiple, mostly military, agencies.  Still, some would argue for October 1 as the true anniversary because it was on that date that NASA actually began operations.  The brevity of this article could never due proper justice to a history of NASA, so I thought I would briefly highlight some of the accomplishments made during NASA’s first year.

11 Oct. 1958
Pioneer I: First NASA launch from Cape Canaveral, Florida.  The flight was the second and most successful of the three Able space probes.

18 Dec. 1958
An Air Force Atlas booster placed into orbit a communications relay satellite, PROJECT SCORE. On 19 Dec., President Eisenhower’s Christmas message was beamed from this satellite, the first voice sent from space.

17 Feb. 1959
The U.S. launched Vanguard 2, an International Geophysical Year scientific satellite.

3 Mar. 1959
The U.S. sent Pioneer 4 to the Moon, successfully making the first U.S. lunar flyby.

9 Apr. 1959
NASA unveiled the Mercury astronaut corps.

28 May 1959
The U.S. launched two monkeys, Able and Baker, aboard a Jupiter missile and recovered them after a suborbital flight.  These were the first monkeys to survive spaceflight.

Resource of the Month:  Space History — The First 50 Years of Space: Every Single Launch... Ever!  This interactive timeline details 6038 liftoffs since Sputnik. http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/air_space/4221976.html (Click on Space The First 50 Years Timeline) This does take quite some time to download for those on dialup.

Activity of the Month:  Visit your local NASA facility.  In Ohio that would be the Glenn Research Center.  Though it already had a 50th anniversary open house in late spring, the GRC, located in Cleveland, has a Visitors Center with exhibits and auditorium.  More information may be found at http://www.nasa.gov/centers/glenn/events/index.html .

Suggestions, questions, and comments about “Planetary Wonderings” are welcomed and may be directed to stargazer @ keeplookingup.net (remove spaces).  Past columns may be found at www.keeplookingup.net (click on “Planetary Wonderings” on the right side of opening screen) and at //www.freelists.org/archives/astronomyed/ (columns from Jan. 2007 to the present).

Remember to keep looking up!

Sources (not mentioned in article):  http://www.nasa.gov/50th/timeline.html
                                                  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animals_in_space

 

 

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