Farewell from all your NASA colleagues

National Aeronautics and 

Space Administration

NASA HISTORY PROGRAM OFFICE

Office of Communications

Volume 29, Number 4 Fourth Quarter 2012

From

the Chief 

Historian

Welcome to our annual 

thematic issue of the 

National Aeronautics and 

Space Administration’s 

(NASA’s) News & Notes. 

For 2012, our end-of-theyear issue is focused on planetary exploration. 

Fifty years ago this fall, the first successful 

planetary mission, Mariner 2, was under way. 

There were earlier efforts to send a robotic 

probe to a body beyond the Earth-Moon system. The Soviets made two attempts to reach 

Mars as early as the fall of 1960, although 

those efforts were largely unknown at the 

time. But Mariner 2’s three-and-a-half-month 

journey and flyby of Venus were closely 

followed by the world. Its confirmation that 

Venus was uninhabitable by life as we know 

it radically changed the view of our nearest 

neighbors in the solar system. Our robotic 

partners in exploration have continued to 

challenge our assumptions and theories 

about the universe ever since. 

Our annual history symposium this year 

was dedicated to examining this legacy 

and considering where it might lead us in 

the future. “Solar System Exploration @ 

50” was cosponsored by the National Air 

and Space Museum, the NASA Science 

Mission Directorate, and the Jet Propulsion 

Laboratory and brought together scientists, 

engineers, managers, and historians at the 

Lockheed Martin Global Vision Center in 

nearby Crystal City for two fascinating days 

of discussions in late October. You’ll see a 

full report in our next newsletter, and we’ll be 

working on an edited volume of the papers 

that were presented. If you want more than 

that, follow the links at our Web site to find 

an archive of the symposium Webcast. 

continued on next page

50 Years of Planetary 

Exploration

This newsletter features a special theme celebrating 50 years of planetary 

exploration at NASA. The following articles focus on how each NASA 

Center has contributed to this legacy.

Glenn Research Center (GRC)

By Bob Arrighi, Glenn History Office/Wyle Information Systems, LLC

The several hundred Lewis Research Center (now NASA Glenn) employees gathered in the cafeteria were just settling down after remotely watching the first Titan-Centaur (TC-1) lift off into the blue Florida sky when 

a voice on the public address system announced that the range safety 

officer had destroyed the launch vehicle 12 and a half minutes into the 

flight. The Pratt & Whitney RL-10 engines on Lewis’s second-stage Centaur 

rocket had failed to ignite. The room became silent. The failed proof flight 

destroyed Lewis researcher Robert Lovell’s Space Plasma High Voltage 

Interaction Experiment (SPHINX) and raised serious concerns with NASA 

management and researchers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) about 

the new launch vehicle. They were relying on Titan-Centaur to launch six 

major interplanetary missions within the next three and a half years, including the $1 billion Viking orbiters and landers.

At the time, Lewis was responsible for all of NASA’s intermediate and large 

payload launches on expendable launch vehicles, including all missions to 

other planets. NASA’s involvement with launch vehicles began in October 

1962 with the acquisition of the Centaur Program. General Dynamics 

designed Centaur to be used with an Atlas booster to send the Surveyor 

News& Notes

continued on next page

In This Issue:

From the Chief Historian 1

50 Years of Planetary Exploration 1

News from Headquarters and the Centers 14

Other Aerospace History News 22

Recent Publications and Online Resources 24

Upcoming Meetings 29

Image in Aerospace History 30
NASA HISTORY PROGRAM OFFICE

From the Chief Historian (continued)

In the meantime, I hope you will join me in saying thanks to everyone who made 

the symposium a great success. 

Godspeed,

William P. Barry

Chief Historian

50 Years of Planetary Exploration (continued)

spacecraft to the Moon in the mid-1960s to examine sites for the Apollo landings. 

Marshall managed Centaur initially, but the program was transferred to Lewis following the failure of its first attempted launch in May 1962. Centaur was the first space 

vehicle to use liquid hydrogen, and Lewis research in the 1950s had demonstrated 

liquid hydrogen’s applicability to rockets. The Center was also currently correcting 

combustion instability in the RL-10 engines and resolving key issues regarding the 

pumping and handling of the cryogenic fluid.

Lewis’s extensive work on Centaur in the early 1960s resolved issues with the 

pumping, electronics, shroud, and propellant storage systems. The massive effort 

paid off on 30 May 1966 with the launch of Surveyor 1. Three days later, Surveyor 

became the first U.S. spacecraft to land on another celestial body. Centaur rockets 

sent six additional Surveyors to the Moon over the next year and a half. 

Lewis also acquired the Agena second-stage rocket program in late 1962. There 

were 28 Agena missions over the next six years, including Rangers 6 and 7 

(1964–65); five Lunar Orbiter missions (1966–67); Mariner 4 (1964), which was the 

first successful flyby of Mars and produced the first photography of a planet from 

space; and the Mariner 5 (1967) flyby of Venus. The Agena missions were phased 

out as Centaur became available after its Surveyor assignments.

Lewis created its Launch Vehicle Division in 1969 to oversee the numerous launches 

planned for the coming years. The division was responsible for addressing all AtlasCentaur problems, integrating the payload into the launch vehicle, establishing the 

correct flight trajectories, and preparing the vehicle for launch. The staff worked 

closely with the Kennedy Space Center launch operations, the exploration engineers at several NASA Centers, and eventually commercial and military organizations. The payload weight on nearly every mission increased during the spacecraft’s 

development. The increases strained Centaur’s capabilities, but subsequent negotiations brought the weight within range. Lewis was also responsible for testing the 

new shroud designs that were required for larger payloads. 

Atlas-Centaur’s initial interplanetary missions included the Mariner 6 and 7 (1969) 

flybys of Mars; Mariner 9 (1971) to Mars, which was the first spacecraft to orbit 

another planet; and Pioneer 10 (1972), which was the first spacecraft to visit Jupiter 

and the first to exit the solar system.

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Volume 29, Number 4 Fourth Quarter 2012

Meanwhile, Lewis worked with General Dynamics to update Centaur with a new 

computer system and an equipment module to attach the new electronics. In 1973, 

this new Centaur D-1A sent Pioneer 11 by Jupiter before it exited the solar system 

and launched Mariner 10, which was the first spacecraft to use the gravitation pull of 

a planet (Venus) to reach another (Mercury).

NASA planned even more complex missions for the mid-1970s that would require 

an even larger booster than the Atlas. The Air Force’s three-stage Titan 3E was 

selected, and General Dynamics altered the Centaur D-1A to serve as the Titan’s 

fourth stage. The most significant modification was the use of an entirely new 

shroud, which was wider than both the Centaur and Titan. This Centaur Standard 

Shroud underwent aerodynamic tests in the 8-by-6-foot Supersonic Wind Tunnel 

and full-scale separation and pressurization testing at Plum Brook Station. 

There was tremendous disappointment following the loss of the first Titan-Centaur 

in 11 February 1974. Investigators determined that Centaur’s liquid-oxygen boost 

pumps had failed to start. The boost pumps drew the oxidizer and propellant from 

their tanks to the engines. The NASA and General Dynamics engineers concluded 

that the issue was not unique to the Titan-Centaur and could have occurred on any 

of the previous Atlas-Centaur missions. All of the critical interface issues between 

Titan and Centaur had been demonstrated, so no additional test flight was required.

Tensions were relieved eight months later with Titan-Centaur’s successful launch 

of the German spacecraft Helios 1, which made the closest pass to the Sun to 

date. The twin Viking launches were less than a year away, however. There was an 

additional layer of stress added by the requirement to launch both vehicles within 

10 days of one another from the same pad. Lewis and Kennedy engineers prepared 

one vehicle for flight then removed it from the pad, then prepared the other vehicle 

with its payload. Once the first was launched, then the second vehicle was brought 

back, revalidated, and launched. It was a massive undertaking in a limited amount 

of time. The first Viking was launched on 20 August 1975. A delay with the second 

Viking spacecraft, however, pushed back its launch date until 9 September 1970. 

The Titan, Centaur, and Centaur Standard Shroud performed perfectly on both 

launches. The orbiters and landers arrived on Mars in July and September 1976, 

respectively. Although a fire severely damaged the launch pad during the second 

launch, there was relief that this had not occurred after the first. 

The pad was quickly rebuilt, and Titan-Centaur sent Helios 2 toward the Sun in 

January 1976. Preparations for the two Voyager launches in August 1977 then 

began in earnest. Like Viking, these were to be launched from the same pad within 

10 days. Voyager 1 departed Earth’s atmosphere on 20 August 1977, and the launch 

team was able to get Voyager 2 up in 16 days. The Voyagers investigated Jupiter, 

Saturn (Voyager 2 also studied Uranus and Neptune), and 48 of their moons before 

leaving the solar system. In 1998, Voyager 1 surpassed Pioneer 10 as the farthest 

spacecraft from the solar system. Atlas-Centaurs launched Pioneers 12 and 13 

toward Venus in 1978. The launches brought Centaur’s whirlwind decade of interplanetary planetary missions to a close. 

continued on next page

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NASA HISTORY PROGRAM OFFICE

50 Years of Planetary Exploration (continued)

Centaur maintained a busy schedule launching satellites in the 1970s and 1980s, 

but NASA had difficulty funding interplanetary missions. In the 1990s, NASA began 

partnering with the European Space Agency for new planetary spacecraft. The first, 

the Solar Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO), was launched on an Atlas-Centaur 

in December 1995 to conduct in-depth studies of the Sun. The Cassini-Huygens 

launch on 15 October 1997 was one of the Centaur Program’s largest and most 

significant missions. The Cassini orbiter and Huygens probe arrived at Saturn in 

2004. Huygens landed on Saturn’s largest moon, Titan, in 2005 and became the 

first spacecraft to land on an object in the outer solar system. 

The Cassini launch brought an end to Glenn’s management of NASA’s interplanetary launches. NASA decided to consolidate Lewis/Glenn’s and Goddard’s launch 

vehicle programs with Kennedy’s. During its 35 years in the business, Lewis/Glenn 

managed the launches of 17 interplanetary missions, 14 lunar vehicles, and scores 

of satellites. 

Viking 2 (above) is launched on a Titan-Centaur on 9 September 1975. Viking 1 was launched on 20 

August 1975, and both spacecraft reached Mars the following summer. (NASA/JPL).

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Volume 29, Number 4 Fourth Quarter 2012

Ames Research Center (ARC)

Preview of Working on Mars: Voyages of Scientific 

Discovery with the Mars Exploration Rovers

By William J. Clancey, NASA Ames Research Center and the 

Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology Press, published 31 August 2012, hardcover with 24 color plates and 25 black-and-white illustrations

Excerpt from the Preface

The success of the Mars Exploration Rover (MER) missions begins to answer a 

question fundamental to space exploration: can people remotely conduct field 

science on another planet using a mobile, programmable laboratory? By virtue of 

its longevity—over eight years at this writing—and its complexity of organization 

and daily process, MER provides a wonderful and, in many ways, an unanticipated example for understanding and designing future planetary science missions. 

Through MER, a stable, sustainable enterprise has been developed and proven for 

reliably controlling two rovers with highly collaborative scientific and engineering 

teams. During these years, Spirit and Opportunity were driven a total of more than

40 kilometers (25 miles) and took hundreds of thousands of photographs with tens 

of thousands of Alpha Particle X-ray Spectrometer readings, Mini-Thermal Emission 

Spectrometer surveys, and microimages of more than 100 abraded surfaces. 

We have come a long way from our first forays with robotic field science in the 

lunar Surveyor missions of the 1960s and joysticking Lunokhod 2 23 miles across 

the Moon. MER is not the first investigation on a nonterrestrial surface, the first to 

use a programmed laboratory with multiple instruments and cameras, or the first to 

demonstrate programmed mobility. But it is the first to combine these capabilities 

and thus make field science on Mars possible, and it did so in a multiyear mission. 

The story of MER is the story of a unique human-robotic enterprise, with new scientific and engineering collaborations, and a prolonged journey together on a largely 

unknown planetary surface.

In this book, I suggest that we view MER as an “exploration system” for doing 

field science. With this framing, I ask, what aspects of the design of the rover and 

how it is operated account for the quality of the scientists’ work? In explicating the 

daily process of commanding the rover and comparing it to other missions, we 

find a variety of themes—“being the rover,” methodical planning, personal and 

public concerns, aesthetic interests—that together reveal how the scientists actually 

manipulated the rover and why the programmable tools and analytic instruments 

worked so well for them. These complementary aspects are easily missed when we 

focus independently on the science team, the rover’s design, science operations, or 

the scientific results.

The MER exploration system constitutes a blended scientific practice: exploring 

scientifically, engaging in field and laboratory work by interweaving human and 

robotic operations, using a textbook method (being systematic) yet stopping to 

continued on next page

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NASA HISTORY PROGRAM OFFICE

50 Years of Planetary Exploration (continued)

investigate interesting features (being opportunistic), and probing the landscape in 

a kinesthetic, imagined experience. Each part of these, such as using laboratory 

instruments in the field, poses a tension in the work; combined, they make this 

remote expedition an especially intriguing accomplishment.

Explicating the story of MER requires explaining the nature of field science on Earth 

(including, for example, undersea archaeology using submersibles and teleoperated robots), the nature of exploration as a cognitive activity (as opposed to a socialpolitical motive or period of history), and the factual differences of other surface 

missions (Viking, Surveyor, Sojourner, etc.) and orbital/flyby missions (e.g., Cassini). 

Focusing on what the scientists are doing on Mars, I investigate questions such as 

“What is the relation of science and exploration?” and “How was controlling Viking’s 

instruments different?” The answers reveal critical aspects of the MER exploration 

system that contributed to the expedition’s success, and these are lessons we can 

build on for exploring the rest of the Red Planet, asteroids, and the moons of the gas 

giants that lie beyond.

A key purpose of this book is to reveal, by plain speaking about what people are 

accomplishing with MER as conveyed through their personal experiences, that the 

practical relation of people and robotic systems is quite different than is typically 

implied in discussions about “robot explorers” or “partners” and the poetic description of MER as a “robotic geologist.” These inspirational descriptions have a place, 

but we must understand this new technology and articulate how it has worked so 

well if we are to know how to use and improve it. Understanding MER requires a 

theoretical foundation that includes the concepts of virtual presence and agency, 

an understanding that requires parting the curtain to see what lies behind tales of 

“Spirit’s struggles” and “Opportunity’s discoveries.” In addition to journalists, computer scientists and program managers can benefit, too: the rovers are tools, but the 

relation of the scientists to a programmable laboratory is far more complex than how 

a geologist relates to a hammer or, for that matter, how a principal investigator relates 

to a “payload” (the aerospace engineering name for a spacecraft instrument). This 

book combines perspectives from computer science, anthropology, philosophy, and 

cognitive science to build on the scientists’ stories, yielding a better understanding of 

why the rovers worked so well and the lessons for designing future missions.

NASA Headquarters

Historical Reference Collection (HRC)

By Jane H. Odom and Colin A. Fries

In keeping with the theme of this newsletter issue, the archivists want to point potential researchers to the “Spaceflight—Satellites and Probes” series in the HRC, which 

consists of 130 cubic feet of material from 1945 to the present. About half of this 

material documents dozens of missions pertaining to lunar and interplanetary flight 

(and exploration). Visitors will find a growing collection of files on the following missions: Cassini, Galileo, Lunar Orbiter, Magellan, Mars Observer, Mars Pathfinder, 

Mariner, Pioneer, Ranger, Surveyor, Viking, and Voyager, just to name a few. Within 

the files are materials on pre- and postlaunch activities, press kits (also available at 

6
Volume 29, Number 4 Fourth Quarter 2012

https://mira.hq.nasa.gov/history, and many of them are also on our iTunes U site), 

canceled missions, extended missions, and costs, among others. These materials 

are arranged alphabetically by name of probe and therein are filed chronologically. 

Also available in the HRC are Lunar and Planetary Missions Board Official Minutes, 

1967–70; Viking Cost Estimates, 1970–74; and Viking Project Monthly Financial 

Reports, 1969–77.

We have archival sources used for many of the books on planetary exploration published in the history series, including Exploring the Unknown: Selected Documents 

in the History of the U.S. Civil Space Program, Volume V, Exploring the Cosmos,

NASA SP-4407, 2001, edited by John Logsdon; William H. Pickering: America’s 

Deep Space Pioneer, NASA SP-2008-4113, 2008, by Douglas J. Mudgway; On 

Mars: Exploration of the Red Planet, 1958–1978, NASA SP-4212, 1984, by Edward 

Clinton Ezell and Linda Neuman Ezell; Mission to Jupiter: A History of the Galileo 

Project, NASA SP-2007-4231, 2007, by Michael Meltzer; When Biospheres Collide: 

A History of NASA’s Planetary Protection Programs, NASA SP-2011-4234, 2011, 

by Michael Meltzer; Humans to Mars: Fifty Years of Mission Planning, 1950–

2000, Monographs in Aerospace History, No. 21, NASA SP-2001-4521, 2001, by 

David S. F. Portree; and Deep Space Chronicle: A Chronology of Deep Space and 

Planetary Probes 1958–2000, Monographs in Aerospace History, No. 24, NASA 

SP-2002-4524, 2002, by Asif A. Siddiqi.

And lastly, the History Program Office is fortunate enough to house 1 of the 12 

Voyager gold records originally manufactured. Two are in space: one on Voyager 1, 

the other on Voyager 2. Both missions were launched in 1977 and are now on their 

way out of the solar system into interstellar space.

Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL)

A Retrospective on Mariner 1962, the First Successful Planetary Mission

By Erik M. Conway

This year marks the 50th anniversary of the first successful planetary mission, JPL’s 

Mariner 1962, also known as Mariner 2. Launched on 27 August 1962, Mariner 2 

was a derivative of JPL’s lunar impact spacecraft design, Ranger. Its twin, Mariner 1, 

was destroyed in a launch vehicle failure shortly before main stage separation.

The origins of the Mariners lay in the unavailability of the Centaur upper stage, 

for which JPL had devised a very different, heavier interplanetary vehicle called 

Mariner A. Centaur had been promised for planetary launches in late 1962, but 

by mid-1961, Centaur development was still immersed in serious technical problems. This threatened to make a Venus mission planned for late 1962 using the 

Mariner A impossible. 

A JPL engineer named John Small organized a small design study to come up with 

a way to carry out a Venus mission using the Agena upper stage instead of Centaur. 

His group had proposed using the much lighter Ranger spacecraft instead. The 

Ranger, which used the already-flying Agena upper stage, could not carry much 

payload to Venus; in fact, JPL had to get Lockheed, the Agena’s manufacturer, 

continued on next page

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NASA HISTORY PROGRAM OFFICE

50 Years of Planetary Exploration (continued)

to lighten the Agena by about 100 pounds (45 kilograms) so that this “Mariner R” 

spacecraft would have a payload at all. NASA’s Planetary Program Director, Oran 

Nicks, approved of the switch to the Mariner R mission in September 1961. 

Mariner R differed from Ranger in its adoption of several pieces and subsystems 

from the canceled Mariner A effort. The high-gain antenna came from Mariner A, as 

did larger solar panels and the electronics packaging methodology. Mariner R also 

debuted JPL’s first use of louvers on some of the electronics boxes as a means of 

thermal control. 

Jack N. James, the Mariner R project manager, had been in charge of JPL’s launch 

operations at Cape Canaveral for the Explorer effort. He hired Daniel Schneiderman 

to be his spacecraft manager. The two planned to build three complete sets of 

spacecraft parts, two of which would be tested and prepared for launch. They ultimately decided to assemble and test all three, beginning what became a standard 

process at JPL for most of the next two decades: a “proof test model” that was identical to the flight spacecraft would be assembled and subjected to both design-level 

tests and environmental testing, while the “flight model” spacecraft would receive 

only the environmental testing.

The Mariner R schedule required the three spacecraft to be shipped to Florida for 

launch in May 1962, a little more than nine months from the start of the project. The 

design was frozen in January. The project was carried out under a “matrix” style of 

management, with a small project office led by James, set up independently of JPL’s 

technical divisions, providing leadership and project administration while the technical divisions did most of the engineering work. That too became JPL’s standard 

practice for spacecraft projects. 

The three spacecraft went to the Atlantic Missile Range in May, and James’s crew 

made the first launch attempt one day late, on 22 July 1962. In his memoir, he 

expressed his disappointment at the launch vehicle’s destruction: “This had happened to me on the Sergeant, and I could not believe it was happening again.” 

The Atlas had begun “fishtailing” after launch, a product of two interacting errors, 

and the Range Safety Officer blew it up. The second launch attempt had been 

scheduled for 21 days later, and that one nearly failed too. Mariner 2’s Atlas suffered 

a gyroscope failure, causing it to spin at 1 revolution per second. James called these 

“barrel rolls” and remembered 36 of them occurring before the gyroscope starting 

working again (the final report says 35). The Agena successfully corrected a velocity error resulting from the barrel rolls, and the rest of the injection onto the Venus 

trajectory and release of the spacecraft occurred properly.

Mariner 2’s flight to Venus was as eventful as its launch. The Earth sensor that 

provided attitude knowledge produced a signal that was too weak; at first the project 

engineers thought that it had locked onto the Moon but eventually realized that it had 

the right celestial body after all. It just was not producing the right signal level. The 

thermal predictions were also very low. Near Earth, the spacecraft ran up to 40°F 

hotter than expected. Near Venus, the exceedances were up to 70°F. (Beginning 

another longstanding JPL tradition, they had sufficient margin built in to survive even 

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Volume 29, Number 4 Fourth Quarter 2012

those errors). The midcourse correction appeared to occur perfectly but in fact had 

a large execution error (10 sigma, they calculated—they never did figure out why). 

One of the two solar panels shorted out on Halloween, somehow fixed itself a week 

later, and then failed again 14 November. Fortunately, by the time it failed again, 

Mariner 2 was close enough to Venus (and the Sun) that the lone solar panel could 

power all the instruments, so the mission scientists got all their data.

The Venus flyby occurred on 14 December, giving the United States its “first first” in 

the space race. And it got JPL’s Director, William Pickering, the honor of serving as 

Grand Marshall of the 1963 Rose Parade, for which JPL built a colorful float. Mariner 

2 was also JPL’s first successful mission since 1959; the Ranger project continued 

to fail until 1964. 

Mariner 2’s scientific results confirmed that Venus had a far hotter surface than 

most scientists expected. It had been possible to believe in a living, and livable, 

Venus in 1962, but not after Mariner 2’s short visit. The vehicle’s microwave radiometer reported a surface temperature of about 400 K, or 260°F. Later research 

would put the temperature even higher, well above what any known Earthlike life 

would tolerate. 

After the Venus flyby, Jack James’s team began preparing a smaller, Agena-sized 

version of Mariner A. It was first called Mariner C and later renamed Mariner 4. This 

spacecraft flew past Mars in 1965, returning the first up-close images of the Red 

Planet and cementing JPL’s status as NASA’s leading planetary Center for the rest 

of the decade. It also solidified James’s reputation as JPL’s leading project manager 

of the era, the standard for others to emulate.

JPL’s 1963 Rose Parade float moving down Colorado Boulevard.

continued on next page

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NASA HISTORY PROGRAM OFFICE

50 Years of Planetary Exploration (continued)

The Mariner 2 spacecraft. Note that the solar arrays are not the same size. 

The panel on the right side of the image is longer than that of the left; the white 

tip on the left panel was a cloth extension designed to even out the solar wind 

pressure on the spacecraft. 

Mariner 2 under construction.

Presenting one of the first images of Mars, from the Mariner 4 flyby in 

1965. From left, JPL Director William Pickering, Oran Nicks, Jack James, 

President Lyndon Johnson, and NASA Administrator James Webb.

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Volume 29, Number 4 Fourth Quarter 2012

Langley Research Center (LaRC)

By Dr. Joel S. Levine, Research Professor, Department of 

Applied Science, College of William and Mary

The Viking Project

In 1976, the United States had four active spacecraft (two orbiters and two landers) 

simultaneously operating in orbit and on the surface of Mars—all resulting from the 

twin Viking launches. Viking 1 was launched on 20 August 1975 and went into Mars 

orbit on 19 June 1976. The Viking 1 Lander soft-landed on the surface of Mars on 

20 July 1976 in the Chryse Planitia (later renamed the Thomas Mutch Memorial 

Station in memory of the Brown University professor of planetary science and head 

of the Viking Surface Imaging Team). The Viking 1 Orbiter operated until 17 August 

1980 (4 years, 1 month, 19 days, 1,485 orbits), and the Viking 1 Lander operated 

until 13 November 1982 (6 years, 3 months, 22 days). Viking 2 was launched on 

9 September 1975 and went into Mars orbit on 7 August 1976. The Viking 2 Lander 

soft-landed on the surface of Mars on 3 September 1976 in Utopia Planitia (later 

renamed the Gerald Soffen Memorial Station in memory of the Viking Project 

Scientist at the NASA Langley Research Center). The Viking 2 Orbiter operated 

until 25 July 1978 (1 year, 11 months, 18 days, 706 orbits) and the Viking 2 Lander 

operated until 11 April 1980 (3 years, 7 months, 8 days).

The scientific objectives of the Viking Mission included 1) obtaining high-resolution 

images of Mars from the surface and from orbit, 2) characterizing the structure and 

composition of the atmosphere and surface of Mars, and 3) searching for evidence 

of life on Mars. 

The Viking Orbiters carried cameras for photographing the surface of Mars from 

orbit, a radiometer for the thermal mapping of the surface to determine surface 

temperature, an infrared spectrometer to measure atmospheric water vapor, and a 

radio science experiment to investigate the atmosphere and ionosphere of Mars. 

During entry and descent through the atmosphere of Mars, a magnetic sector mass 

spectrometer and a retarding potential analyzer on the Viking aeroshell obtained in 

situ measurements of the chemical composition, temperature, pressure, and density of the atmosphere and ionosphere as a function of altitude. The Viking Landers 

carried cameras for surface photography; three instruments to search for biology on 

the surface of Mars (the three biology measurements were based on photosynthetic 

analysis, metabolic analysis, and respiration), conduct chemical analysis of the Mars 

soil and atmosphere using a gas chromatograph–mass spectrometer (GCMS), and 

perform elemental analysis of the Mars soil using an x-ray fluorescence spectrometer; a weather station to measure the weather on Mars (temperature, atmospheric 

pressure, and wind speed and direction); and instruments to measure the physical, 

magnetic, and seismic characteristics of Mars. 

Some of the important scientific discoveries of Viking include 1) the first in situ 

measurements of the vertical distribution of atmospheric density, pressure, and 

temperature on Mars; 2) the first in situ measurements of the chemical composition of the atmosphere; 3) the discovery of nitrogen in the atmosphere; 4) the first 

11
NASA HISTORY PROGRAM OFFICE

50 Years of Planetary Exploration (continued)

evidence, based on the first nitrogen isotope measurements, that Mars lost the 

bulk of its atmosphere, which explains the geological evidence of past liquid water 

on Mars; 5) the discovery of the highly chemically reactive nature of the Mars surface; and 6) the lack of detection of organic material on the surface of Mars, which 

has been attributed to the highly chemically reactive nature of the Mars surface. 

The Viking Landers successfully accomplished the first soft landings on Mars. 

On 5 August 2012, at 10:32 p.m. PDT, when the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) 

Curiosity successfully soft-landed in the Gale Crater on the surface of Mars, the 

entry, descent, and landing (EDL) technology developed for the first two successful Mars soft landings by the Viking Landers in 1976 was clearly in evidence. 

The Viking technology employed in the MSL EDL included 1) the Viking-derived 

disk-gap band supersonic parachute, 2) the Viking-derived aeroshell, and 3) the 

Viking-derived throttleable hydrazine propulsion system for controlled descent 

and landing for a precision guided entry through the atmosphere.

The Viking Project was managed at the NASA Langley Research Center. LaRC 

also had responsibility for the development and management of the Viking Landers 

and the entry and lander science and instrumentation. The Viking Orbiters were 

designed and built by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. JPL also has responsibility 

for the orbiter science and instrumentation. The Viking Lander capsules were 

developed and built by Martin Marietta. Lewis Research Center (now the Glenn 

Research Center) managed the Viking launch vehicle, a two-stage Titan III with 

two additional solid-propellant rockets (solid rocket motors, or SRMs) attached 

with a Centaur upper stage. The NASA Kennedy Space Center was responsible 

for the launch of Vikings 1 and 2.

Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC)

By Mike Wright

Juno II Served as Explorer Satellite Launcher

Before solar system exploration began in earnest in the United States, America 

had to develop and launch its own satellites and spacecraft.

The Soviet Union opened the space race with America on 4 October 1957 when 

the Soviets orbited their Sputnik satellite. As a result, America’s leadership quickly 

realized that the Soviets had beaten the United States into space and, among other 

responses, directed the U.S. Army in Huntsville to modify an existing 1,500-milerange Jupiter missile and use it to launch a satellite. As later described by Wernher 

von Braun (who later served as Director of the Marshall Space Flight Center from 

1960 through 1970), the configuration for the satellite and the launch vehicle was 

designed simply by adding a single solid rocket motor as a fourth stage, then 

attaching a scientific payload provided at its forward end. 

Launched from Florida on 31 January 1958, the rocket lifted the Explorer 1 satellite 

into space, an event celebrated ever since as the first major milestone in the U.S. 

space program. The 18-pound satellite discovered the first of the natural radiation 

belts of Earth, identified by Dr. James A. Van Allen of Iowa State University. 

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Space experts referred to Explorer’s modified launch vehicle as Jupiter C or Juno I. 

The Explorer 1 launch in January brought success. Unfortunately, Explorer 2 

failed to orbit on 5 March 1958 because the last stage failed to ignite. However, 

on 26 March, a Juno I rocket successfully launched Explorer 3, which yielded 

more data about the Van Allen radiation belt and on micrometeorite impacts 

and temperatures. Other Explorer launches using the Jupiter C came on 26 July 

(the successful Explorer 4) and on 24 August (the unsuccessful Explorer 5). The 

Explorer 5 mission failed when it did not achieve orbit because of a collision 

between parts of the booster and instrument compartment.

Development of the Juno II variant began in the spring of 1958 under the Army in 

Huntsville. After NASA was created on 1 October 1958, the Army conducted the 

satellite launchings on behalf of the new space agency. On 1 July 1960, NASA 

created the George C. Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, which involved 

transferring about 4,000 Army personnel in Huntsville to NASA. As a result, NASA 

moved its responsibility for Juno II to Marshall.

Unfortunately, other events during the late 1950s and early 1960s have obscured 

historical interest in Juno II. For example, the significance of Explorer 1 has 

often overshadowed any focus on the satellite launchings that later depended on 

Juno II. In addition, historical interest in Marshall’s role in the Mercury Redstone 

program and in the Saturn moon rocket program has clouded interest in the 

Center’s work regarding Juno II. 

“One Juno II innovation was a shroud covering the upper-stage cluster assembly. 

This shroud was necessary to protect the payload and upper stages from aerodynamic heating during ascent,” von Braun wrote, adding, “Although the Juno II 

was not an optimum vehicle, it provided a quick and economical way to launch 

a payload over three times as heavy as that lifted by its Redstone predecessor, 

the Juno I. And like many other things in this early era of space achievements, it 

was available for minimum expenditure of time and money.”1

 Writing in the journal 

Technology and Culture in 1963, von Braun traced the history of the Juno II satellite program. 

He noted, for example, that Pioneer III, launched by a Juno II on 6 December 

1958, attained a 24,000-mile-per-hour velocity and discovered 24 radiation belts 

around Earth. Also on 3 March 1959, a Juno II launched Pioneer IV, the first U.S. 

satellite to orbit the Sun.

To end Juno II’s space adventures, it launched the Explorer 7, 8, and 9 satellites 

carrying more sophisticated space science experiments and weighing about 90 

pounds on 13 October 1959, 3 November 1960, and 27 April 1961. Explorer 7 provided significant data on magnetic fields, magnetic storms, solar flare activity, and 

radiation belts; Explorer 8 carried eight experiments and transmitted information 

on electron density and temperature, positive-ion mass and density, and micrometeorite distribution; and Explorer 9 returned valuable data on gamma rays.

1. Wernher von Braun, “The Redstone, Jupiter, and Juno,” Technology and Culture 4, no. 4 (autumn 

1963): 462–463. 

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NASA HISTORY PROGRAM OFFICE

50 Years of Planetary Exploration (continued)

Juno III–V

The successes of Junos I and II were projected to generate several other Juno 

configurations at Redstone Arsenal in the 1956–58 period. While the Juno III and 

Juno IV concepts never reached the hardware stage, the design and study of 

Juno V led directly to the giant Saturn.

Juno III studies began in 1956. These considered a vehicle based on the standard Jupiter booster, with a 500- to 600-pound orbital payload capability. The 

upper stages were to consist of solid rockets somewhat larger than the scaled 

Sergeants of the earlier Junos, and the second-stage cluster would have had 12 

motors instead of 11. However, the heavier cluster presented design problems, 

so the proposal was abandoned and the Juno series of rockets gave way to the 

well-known Saturn series.

News from Headquarters 

and the Centers

Headquarters

History Program Office

By Bill Barry

What a busy fall for all of us in the History Program Office at Headquarters. Like 

this issue of the newsletter, much of our focus recently has been on planetary 

exploration, but we’ve also been busy with many other things. Of course, the big 

event for the fall was our annual history symposium, “Solar System Exploration @ 

50.” (As I write this, the symposium is still a couple of weeks away, so expect a full 

report in the next newsletter.) Preparation for the symposium has been a significant 

team effort on the part of our cosponsors (the National Air and Space Museum, the 

Science Mission Directorate, and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory) and the history 

staff at Headquarters. As usual, we’ve depended heavily on Nadine Andreassen 

to make the seemingly impossible happen. We’ve also had some great support 

from our fall interns, Kelly Victor-French and Marshall Bennett. (You may remember 

from their introduction in the last newsletter that they are both graduate students at 

Georgetown and will be with us through the end of November.)

Speaking of interns, I should mention that the final parting gift from summer interns 

Jessica Brodsky and Joey Meyer was an item they produced themselves for our 

iTunes U site. If you haven’t seen their dozen-minute video, “Making NASA History,” 

you should make the time to do so. (Start at http://go.nasa.gov/ROuL7D.) The video 

aims to give middle school kids an introduction to NACA/NASA history, but most 

adults have enjoyed it too. During the summer, Jessica and Joey loaded a lot of 

other content on our new iTunes U site, including tons of material on the Apollo 

program. This was in particularly high demand following the death of Neil Armstrong 

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Volume 29, Number 4 Fourth Quarter 2012

this past August. Given the effectiveness of using iTunes U as a supplemental 

source of history material, our fall intern Kelly Victor-French has been uploading 

material about historic planetary missions in advance of the fall symposium.

Also in the science theme this fall, we had our third History Program Quarterly 

Brownbag Lunch speaker of the year in early October. This time, we were joined 

by the legendary Nancy Grace Roman for a discussion of the origins of astronomy 

research at NASA. She was both very informative and witty, keeping the capacity crowd of fans (including Associate Administrator John Grunsfeld) enthralled 

with her tales of a time before bureaucratic rigidity set in at NASA. We filmed the 

presentation and hope to have it available soon for you to view online. 

On the publications front, Bob Arrighi’s Propulsion Systems Laboratory monograph 

came back from the printer in late August and has been a significant success. An 

e-book version of the book is now available (http://www.nasa.gov/connect/ebooks/

pursuit_power_detail.html). I was particularly pleased that our Headquarters colleagues responsible for printing managed to find some funding that allowed us to 

put the second volume of the Shuttle bibliography into print. (We had originally 

been expecting that this might only be available as a PDF online.) Also due out 

before you get this newsletter is the set of oral histories done with NASA leadership in 2008 (to mark the 50th anniversary of NASA). NASA at 50: Interviews with 

NASA’s Senior Leadership was edited by Rebecca Wright, Sandra Johnson (both 

of Johnson Space Center), and Steve Dick (our former Chief Historian). The book 

provides a valuable snapshot of NASA in a time of transition. The next major 

publication in line for production is NASA’s First A, by Rob Ferguson. This is an 

overview of the first five decades of aeronautics research at NASA. It should be 

in print this winter. 

One of the secrets of our success in getting all of these publications into your hands 

is Yvette Smith. Since starting her yearlong detail with us in August, Yvette’s editorial skills have proven invaluable in pushing a number of manuscripts to completion. 

Her Web savvy has also proven invaluable as we have provided more content to the 

NASA Web team. If you haven’t visited http://www.nasa.gov/history lately, you might 

want to take a look at how Yvette has transformed that page into a news site for both 

NASA generally and the History Program Office. As you will read below, our archival 

teammates have also been incredibly productive this fall. I continue to be awed by 

the talent and commitment of the history team here at Headquarters and across the 

Agency. We have some great history to make ahead of us.

Historical Reference Collection

By Jane H. Odom and Colin A. Fries

In the Headquarters archives, the staff continues to stay busy with reference 

services and processing projects. During the last quarter, we hosted an average 

of a dozen people per month who came in person to the History Program Office 

to conduct research. We had research visits by NASA staff as well as visitors from 

the National Air and Space Museum, the National Research Council, the Naval 

Research Laboratory, George Washington University, American University, the 

15
NASA HISTORY PROGRAM OFFICE

News from Headquarters and the Centers (continued)

University of Maryland, Carnegie Mellon University, the University of Oklahoma, 

Brown University, Texas A&M, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and the 

University of British Columbia.

A number of archive projects either are under way or have been completed recently 

that researchers will find of interest. The processing (arrangement, description, 

and preservation) of a large audiovisual collection, circa 1960–2011, is complete. 

The collection includes over 45 cubic feet of material in numerous formats.

Of the 300-plus audio reel-to-reel recordings identified in this recently processed 

collection, 15 more have been selected for digitization, bringing to nearly 90 the 

total that have been converted to WAV and MP3 formats. The latest batch to be 

digitized includes interviews, speeches, press conferences, and testimony, dated 

1960–73, of Headquarters and Center officials (Homer Newell, Thomas Paine, 

James Fletcher, Arnold Frutkin, George Low, and Wernher von Braun), astronauts 

(Alan Shepard and Pete Conrad), and life sciences experts (Clark Randt, Orr 

Reynolds, and Sherman Vinograd).

The review of boxes on loan from the Federal Records Center continues unabated, 

with material recently being added to the HRC from boxes containing Lunar 

Roving Vehicle documentation, 1969–72. Additionally, an effort has begun to 

capture born-digital press kits for NASA missions. These will be uploaded to our 

internal database and will also be made available externally for research use at 

https://mira.hq.nasa.gov/history/.

I

More than 1,500 archivists attended the Society of American Archivists Annual Meeting in August 

in San Diego. Participants had more than six dozen sessions, numerous networking opportunities, 

and a dozen local repository tours and open houses from which to choose. Pictured above in the 

exhibit hall are, left to right, Tracy Grimm, Archivist for Flight and Space Exploration at Purdue 

University; Jane Odom, Chief Archivist at NASA Headquarters; and April Gage, Archivist, and Ratana 

Ngaotheppitak, Life Science Data Archivist, both from Ames Research Center.

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Volume 29, Number 4 Fourth Quarter 2012

Ames Research Center (ARC)

By Glenn Bugos

Jack Boyd and Hans Mark joined Ed Hoffman of the NASA Academy of Program/

Project & Engineering Leadership (APPEL) for a Masters with Masters interview 

on 13 August. They reviewed lessons learned over their decades of leadership 

in America’s aerospace efforts and offered advice for those looking to become 

leaders within NASA. Video of the discussion is on the NASA APPEL Web site 

(http://www.nasa.gov/offices/oce/appel/knowledge/multimedia/index.html). 

Jack Boyd and Glenn Bugos presented a paper at “AIAA Space 2012” in Pasadena 

entitled “Mars Exploration: Contributions of NASA Ames Research Center.” They 

reviewed the role of Ames in the ecosystem of NASA planetary exploration and 

focused on the Ames legacy of achievement in entry systems, Mars atmospheric 

science, exobiology and astrobiology, telepresence and robotic science operations, and mineralogy and in situ resource utilization. Glenn Bugos completed a 

redraft of Atmosphere of Freedom to publish it as a pictorial history and highlight 

the Center’s rich legacy of visual imagery. 

In other history news from around the Center, economic historian Alex Macdonald 

presented his work on the long Space Age with a space history panel at 

the U.S. House of Representatives on 15 June (http://www.c-spanvideo.org/ 

program/306613-1). Stephanie Langhoff, reflecting on her legacy as Ames Chief 

Scientist, compiled a history of the Director’s Colloquia at Ames since 1999 and a 

history of the H. Julian Allen Award for the most groundbreaking research paper. 

The staff of Code TS reviewed and documented the 3.5-foot hypersonic wind 

tunnel, anticipating its planned demolition. Historian Megan Prelinger returned 

to research the history of Moffett Field’s interaction with San Francisco Bay, to 

prepare an exhibit for a new exhibition at the Exploratorium on an atlas of the Bay. 

Bill Clancey, chief scientist in the Ames human-centered computing division, published an important new book, Working on Mars: Voyages of Scientific Discovery 

with the Mars Exploration Rovers (MIT Press). Clancey explores how the missions 

of the Mars Exploration Rovers (MERs) combined the functional perspective 

of engineering with a social and psychological perspective so that humans, 

machines, and the environment interacted to make possible the first overland geological expedition on another planet. This work was funded in part by the NASA 

Science Mission Directorate as part of the History of the Scientific Exploration of 

Earth and Space (HSEES) research grants that were administered in conjunction 

with the NASA History Program.

April Gage overhauled a facilities tour brochure, which has proven very useful in 

introducing the many Ames partners to the diverse capabilities of our Center (http://

historicproperties.arc.nasa.gov/tour_arc_rschfacility/tour_arc_rschfacility.html). 

She also processed and rehoused 36 scrapbooks in our collection. Published in 

the Ames Astrogram is an article April wrote on test pilot George Cooper receiving 

the medal of the Legion of Honor of France at the French consulate. 

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NASA HISTORY PROGRAM OFFICE

News from Headquarters and the Centers (continued)

Jack Doran joined us as an intern from the San Jose State University School of 

Library and Information Science. Jack will process photographs and digitize documents on the Planetary Atmosphere Experiments Test (PAET), a precursor to all 

the planetary probe missions from which NASA learned much about the structure 

of the atmospheres of Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Titan. 

As a gift to the NASA Langley Research Center on the 95th anniversary of its 

founding, and recognizing Langley’s role in the birthing of NASA Ames, our 

History Office presented to the Langley history office a finding aid for the Langley 

records at the National Archives facility in Philadelphia. We digitized the extant 

finding aids and overhauled them to the current archival standard (called DACS), 

reformatted a container list, wrote the introductory material, supplemented it with 

five other finding aids, and marked it up in Encoded Archival Description. It is 

now available, alongside the records of Ames, at the Online Archive of California 

(http://www.oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/c8st7njm/). We hope that other finding 

aids from the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) years of other 

NASA Centers might also be digitized, posted online, and available to researchers 

in time to mark the 100th anniversary of the NACA.

Dryden Flight Research Center (DFRC)

By Christian Gelzer

Peter Merlin was asked to attend the annual Society of Experimental Test Pilots 

gathering and staff a table to provide copies of Breaking the Mishap Chain to 

those in attendance. One of the other authors, flight surgeon Dwight Holland, will 

also be on hand. 

Pete just wrapped up his most recent manuscript, A New Twist in Flight Research: 

The F-18 Active Aeroelastic Wing Project, which will be going to peer review 

shortly. From his introduction: “In the early part of the 21st century, advances in 

materials and adaptive control technologies allowed aeronautical researchers to 

revisit the wing warping control technique pioneered by the Wright brothers, and 

take a small step toward development of wings with a bird-like ability to change 

shape for optimized efficiency. This new concept, called Active Aeroelastic Wing 

or AAW, is a synergistic technology that integrates air vehicle aerodynamics, 

active controls, and structures to maximize aircraft performance. The concept 

turns aeroelastic flexibility—once a liability—into a net benefit.”

Curtis Peebles was the driving force behind the idea of naming minor planets, sometimes called asteroids, after the X-15 pilots. Dryden’s petition to the 

International Astronomical Union (IAU) was accepted in February of 2012, and 

we issued the first citation publicly to Joe Engle on 2 August, when he came to 

Dryden in conjunction with a talk he gave at the Center. We have issued a citation 

to Bill Dana and are in the process of doing so to family members of the other 

pilots. The IAU citations, which are in sequence, are similar to Engle’s: “Air Force 

test pilot Joe Engle (b. 1932) was the eighth pilot to fly the X-15 and made a total 

of 16 flights. He received Air Force astronaut wings for a flight that took him to 

18
Volume 29, Number 4 Fourth Quarter 2012

85[,]500 meters. Engle also flew the Space Shuttle, becoming the only person 

who reached space before being selected as an astronaut.” 

On a sad note, the funding for Curtis’s position has been lost; consequently, as of 

30 September, he completed his work with the history program. 

Christian Gelzer finished his two Shuttle-related books, but they have both slipped 

into peer-review limbo. He has been working on two other projects, however, so 

his disappointment was brief. Both flight projects involve new technology seed 

money and university student interns, and he plans on making both projects into 

publications. And he, like everyone else in his office, spent the better part of three 

days escorting and accommodating media of various kinds before, during, and 

after Endeavour’s visit en route to the California Science Center. 

Susan Edwards finished cataloging her father’s (John Edwards’s) material. She 

came by recently to drop off the material, which now occupies 2.5 shelves of a 

Lektriever. The collection is cataloged, if not yet loaded electronically into our 

database. April Gage, at Ames, has been key to this, and we are indebted to her 

as well as Susan, whose generosity of gift and time we now benefit from. 

Johnson Space Center (JSC)

By Rebecca Wright

The NASA Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) began operating 

in 2006, working with two industry partners that have developed and demonstrated 

their capability to serve the U.S. government. Housed at Johnson Space Center 

(JSC), the small COTS workforce has supported the efforts with the private sector 

while building a methodology and model for future partnerships. The JSC History 

Office will be working with the COTS group to “tell the story” of their brief history. 

This project will include lessons learned, details of the model, challenges encountered, and processes developed to ensure smooth and productive partnerships. 

Joining the History Office staff to serve as the lead on this effort is Rebecca 

Hackler, who is a native Houstonian who grew up in the backyard of NASA’s 

Johnson Space Center. After graduating summa cum laude with a B.A. in history 

from Texas Lutheran University, she pursued her diverse interests by teaching 

English at an elementary school in Spain and completing her M.A. in Central and 

Eastern European history at the Jagiellonian University in Poland. Most recently, 

Rebecca completed her M.S. in museum studies at the University of Glasgow in 

Scotland, where she also volunteered for Glasgow Museums and taught ballet 

classes at Dance Glasgow. 

For several years, Rebecca worked as a researcher with the NASA JSC History 

Office, supporting multiple oral history projects by researching interviewees, 

editing and indexing transcripts, operating recording equipment, and converting 

obsolete media to digital files. Other highlights from her experience include her 

work on The First 50 Years, a pictorial history of JSC, and the Goosebumps: The 

Science of Fear exhibit for Space Center Houston. 

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NASA HISTORY PROGRAM OFFICE

News from Headquarters and the Centers (continued)

In 2011, Rebecca was honored with the Universities Space Research Association 

Student of Year Award for her work with the JSC History Collection, where she 

processed the archival collection of astronaut Robert A. R. Parker and organized 

an exhibit on early Space Shuttle design that was featured at the “Celebrating 

Shuttle: An American Icon” event at the University of Houston–Clear Lake. 

This joint project between the JSC History Office and the COTS office will be 

ongoing during FY 2013.

Stennis Space Center (SSC)

By Katie Wallace

The Mars Science Laboratory’s successful landing on Mars early on 6 August was 

a huge engineering accomplishment! Years of research, planning, collaboration, 

and dedication came down to 7 minutes. Seven minutes determined success or 

failure. The successful landing and immediate operation of Curiosity compares to 

earning Olympic gold.

As an engineer and an educator, I was excited to hear that a key theme to the 

Curiosity landing was STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) 

education. Everyone on the Curiosity team discussed the importance of science 

and technology to our country and the world’s future. Recent studies cite the need 

for STEM education to be a national priority. Indicators show the United States is 

losing its technological edge. Indicators include 1) math and science middle school 

test scores that rank in the lower half among industrialized countries, 2) declining 

enrollment in engineering and technical science majors, and 3) decreased funding 

for research in physical sciences.1

NASA is in a unique position to excite and inspire students about STEM education 

and to help grow our technical workforce. The Stennis Office of Education has 

focused on that goal through specific STEM activities, including teacher professional development and student engagement. Studies show that an effective way 

to reach students is to provide training for teachers who will share knowledge with 

hundreds of students per year. At Stennis, we provide free, credit-bearing workshops to teachers across Mississippi and Louisiana. We are collaborating with 

Louisiana to provide STEM instruction for their Math Science Partnership. Over 

the past three summers, just in the months of June and July, we have reached 848 

preservice and inservice teachers. This fiscal year, we have reached 706 teachers 

and over 8,000 students and parents. Our workshops have a satisfaction rating of 

99 percent.

In addition, we focus on student activities that enrich the school curriculum. We 

completed 24 years of Astro Camp this summer and changed the curriculum to 

include a science lab and other larger-scale activities. This year, 476 students, 

ages 7–15, participated in weeklong sessions. We included military families by 

hosting a camp at Keesler Air Force Base.

1. Rising Above the Gathering Storm (Washington, DC: National Academies Press, 2007).

20
Volume 29, Number 4 Fourth Quarter 2012

We also reached students through the Summer of Innovation initiative requested 

by NASA Administrator Charles Bolden to offer summer enrichment activities 

to underserved and underrepresented students. Stennis partnered with the 4-H 

Club, the Boys and Girls Clubs of America, and robotics teams to offer STEM 

camps. Programs were held in 28 Mississippi counties, reaching 650 students. 

There also were special programs at Columbus and Keesler Air Force bases. 

Summer activities ended with a surprise visit from former astronaut and NASA 

Associate Administrator for Education Leland Melvin, who spoke to 4-H campers 

about living and working in space.

It has been a busy and successful summer for the Stennis Office of Education. 

As we continue to inspire the next generation, we hope one of those students 

may be the next engineer or Mars rover designer. Without everyone’s support and 

engagement, the office could not be successful. To learn more about Stennis and 

NASA education, visit http://education.ssc.nasa.gov.

Summer Astro Campers launch Estes Rockets they 

constructed during a weeklong camp at Stennis Space Center.

21
NASA HISTORY PROGRAM OFFICE

Other Aerospace History News

National Air and Space Museum (NASM)

By Roger Launius

In fall 2012, Palgrave Macmillan will publish Exploring the Solar System: The 

History and Science of Planetary Exploration. From the beginning of the Space 

Age, the United States and the Soviet Union, followed soon by other nations, 

began an impressive effort to learn about the planets of the solar system. The 

data collected and analyzed by scientists revolutionized our understanding of our 

neighbors. These efforts also captured the imagination of people from all backgrounds like nothing else except the Apollo lunar missions. As a result, the cause 

of planetary exploration had little difficulty in capturing and holding widespread 

public support. The significance of this project is twofold: 1) it will capture in one 

place a set of broad studies of the history of robotic solar system exploration, and 

2) it will open opportunities for greater involvement of social scientists, historians, 

and scientific and technical academics in considering a topic that has not attracted 

them heretofore. There is no question but that the greatest share of historical work 

has been on human spaceflight, and that story is very much in the public consciousness. This book is intended to be a work that will provide important insights 

about themes that might be productively explored by others in the future and an 

opportunity to energize scholars to pursue this important topic. The chapters are 

listed below:

Introduction, Roger D. Launius, Smithsonian Institution

Part I: Managing Planetary Science

1. “Homer Newell and the Origins of Planetary Science in the United 

States,” John D. Ruley, Modesto, California

2. “The Survival Crisis of the U.S. Solar System Exploration Program in the 

1980s,” John M. Logsdon, George Washington University

3. “Faster, Better, Cheaper: A Sociotechnical Perspective on Programmatic 

Choice, Success, and Failure in NASA’s Solar System Exploration Program,” 

Amy Paige Kaminski, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

Part II: Developing New Approaches to Planetary Exploration

4. “Redefining Celestial Mechanics in the Space Age: Astronomy, 

Astrodynamics, Deep-Space Navigation, and the Pursuit of Accuracy,” 

Andrew J. Butrica, Washington, DC

5. “Big Science in Space: Viking, Cassini, and the Hubble Space Telescope,” 

W. Henry Lambright, Syracuse University

6. “Visual Imagery in Solar System Exploration,” Peter J. Westwick, 

University of Southern California

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Volume 29, Number 4 Fourth Quarter 2012

7. “Returning Scientific Data to Earth: The Parallel but Unequal Careers of 

Genesis and Stardust and the Problem of Sample Return to Earth,” Roger 

D. Launius, Smithsonian Institution

Part III: Exploring the Terrestrial Planets

8. “Planetary Science and the ‘Discovery’ of Global Warming,” Erik M. 

Conway, Jet Propulsion Laboratory

9. “Exploring Planet Earth: The Development of Satellite Remote Sensing 

for Earth Science,” Andrew K. Johnston, Smithsonian Institution

10. “Venus-Earth-Mars: Comparative Climatology and the Search for Life in 

the Solar System,” Roger D. Launius, Smithsonian Institution

11. “Missions to Mars: Reimagining the Red Planet in the Age of Spaceflight,” 

Robert Markley, University of Illinois

Part IV: Unveiling the Outer Solar System

12. “Parachuting onto Another World: The European Space Agency’s 

Huygens Mission to Titan,” Arturo Russo, University of Palermo, Italy

13. “Pluto: The Problem Planet and Its Scientists,” David H. DeVorkin, 

Smithsonian Institution

14. “Transcendence and Meaning in Solar System Exploration,” William E. 

Burrows, New York University

23
NASA HISTORY PROGRAM OFFICE

Recent Publications and 

Online Resources

NASA Publications 

Celebrating 30 Years of the Space Shuttle Program, designed by Adam Chen and 

edited by William Wallack and George Gonzalez (NASA NP-2012-01-838-83). This 

book includes details and color photographs about each mission from STS-1 to 

STS-135. Available in print through the Government Printing Office Bookstore (http://

bookstore.gpo.gov/actions/GetPublication.do?stocknumber=033-000-01355-8) or 

download as a PDF at http://www.nasa.gov/connect/ebooks/shuttle_retrospect_

detail.html.

Dressing for Altitude: U.S. Aviation Pressure Suits—Wiley Post to Space Shuttle, by 

Dennis R. Jenkins (NASA SP-2011-595). This e-book discusses the development 

and details in the pressure suits worn during the Space Shuttle Program. Available 

online in various e-book formats for download at http://www.nasa.gov/connect/

ebooks/dress_for_altitude_detail.html.

On 28 June 2012, the Headquarters History Lunchtime Quarterly Speakers Program 

featured Professor Harry Lambright giving a talk called “The Politics of Mars: 

Robotic Exploration from Mariner to MSL.” His presentation is available online at 

http://history.nasa.gov/Politics%20of%20Mars.pdf.

The NASA History Program Office iTunes U site contains free multimedia downloads for important moments, activities, and figures in NASA history. New items 

include Voyager, Mariner, and Viking materials. Search for “NASA History Program 

Office” in iTunes or use the following link: http://go.nasa.gov/ROuL7D.

NASA Publications Reprinted by Dover Publications

Suddenly, Tomorrow Came: The NASA History of the Johnson Space Center, by 

Henry C. Dethloff (Dover Publications, September 2012). This illustrated volume 

traces the Johnson Space Center’s history, starting with its origins at the beginning 

of the space race in the late 1950s. Thrilling, authoritative accounts explain the 

development and achievements of the early space voyages; the lunar landing; the 

Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo programs; and the Space Shuttles and International 

Space Station. Reprint of NASA’s 1993 edition.

Commercially Published Works

Compiled by Chris Gamble

Emigrating Beyond Earth: Human Adaptation and Space Colonization, by Cameron 

M. Smith and Evan T. Davies (Springer-Praxis, June 2012). Humankind has been 

actively expanding geographically and in doing so has adapted to a wide variety 

of hostile environments. Now we are looking toward the ultimate adaptation—the 

colonization of space. Based on the most current understanding of our universe, 

NASA HISTORY PROGRAM OFFICE

24
human adaptation, and evolution, the authors explain why space colonization must 

be planned as an adaptation to, rather than the conquest of, space. The authors 

argue that space colonization is an insurance policy for our species and that it isn’t 

about rockets and robots but instead about humans doing what we’ve been doing 

for four million years: finding new places and new ways to live.

X-planes of Europe: Secret Research Aircraft from the Golden Age 1947–1967, by 

Tony Buttler and Jean-Louis Delezenne (Hikoki Publications, May 2012). Although 

much has been written about the legendary American “X-planes” of this era, far less 

is known about many of the secret and exotic research aircraft designed and built 

in Europe. Now, these once highly classified aircraft are brought together in detail 

for the first time. With many unpublished photographs, previously classified drawings, and detailed appendices, the stories of these remarkable aircraft combine to 

produce an in-depth record that gives these rare and exotic flying machines their 

proper place in aviation and military history.

Rocketing Into the Future: The History and Technology of Rocket Planes, by Michel 

van Pelt (Springer-Praxis, May 2012). Rocketing Into the Future journeys into the 

exciting world of rocket planes, examining the exotic concepts and actual flying 

vehicles that have been devised over the last 100 years. The book then looks at 

the possibilities for the future. The technological and economic challenges of the 

Space Shuttle were a major handicap, and thus the program was unable to fulfill its 

promise of low-cost access to space. However, the burgeoning market of suborbital 

space tourism may yet give the necessary boost to the development of a truly reusable space plane.

NASA Space Shuttle Crew Escape Systems Handbook, by United Space Alliance 

(Periscope Film, LLC, May 2012). Prepared for NASA by contractor United Space 

Alliance in 2005, this Space Shuttle Crew Escape System Handbook details the 

equipment, systems, and procedures that would have been used in the event of 

an emergency during launch. Designed for use by astronauts, instructors, and 

ground personnel, the text describes and explains the crew-worn equipment and 

orbiter hardware, emergency escape modes, and crew duties and responses 

during egress. 

NASA Space Shuttle Main Engine Design Features, by Rocketdyne Division 

Rockwell International (Periscope Film, LLC, May 2012). This informative booklet 

provides an overview of the design, components, and physical characteristics 

of the Space Shuttle main engines originally created by NASA prime contractor Rockwell International in 1973 during the development of the Space Shuttle 

main engines.

Saturn IB/Saturn V Rocket Payload Planner’s Guide, by Douglas Aircraft (Periscope 

Film, LLC, June 2012). Originally prepared by the Missile and Space Systems 

Division of NASA contractor Douglas Aircraft, this book was created to acquaint 

payload planners with the capabilities of the Saturn IB and Saturn V rockets. It 

shows methods by which Saturn vehicles can accommodate payloads of various 

weights and volumes for different missions and methods by which they might be 

modified to allow even greater performance. 

continued on next page

Volume 29, Number 4 Fourth Quarter 2012

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NASA HISTORY PROGRAM OFFICE

Recent Publications and Online Resources (continued)

History of Rocketry and Astronautics, edited by Marsha Freeman, American 

Astronautical Society (AAS) History Series, vol. 37, International Academy of 

Astronautics (IAA) History Symposia, vol. 26 (AAS/Univelt, Inc., 2012). These are 

the proceedings of the 40th History Symposium of the International Academy of 

Astronautics, Valencia, Spain, 2006. 

Down to Earth: Satellite Technologies, Industries, and Cultures, edited by Lisa Parks 

and James Schwoch (Rutgers University Press, May 2012). This book presents 

the first comprehensive overview of the geopolitical maneuvers, financial investments, technological innovations, and ideological struggles that take place behind 

the scenes of the satellite industry. This collection takes readers on a voyage 

through a truly global industry, from the sites where satellites are launched to the 

corporate clean rooms where they are designed, and along the orbits and paths that 

satellites traverse. 

Meta-Geopolitics of Outer Space: An Analysis of Space Power, Security and 

Governance, by Nayef R. F. Al-Rodhan (Palgrave Macmillan, June 2012). Al-Rodhan 

sheds new light on the debate about the geopolitics of outer space, going beyond 

applying traditional international relations approaches to space power and security 

by introducing a multidimensional spatial framework. The metageopolitics framework includes space and expands classical power considerations to cover seven 

state capacities.

Artificial Satellites and How to Observe Them, by Richard Schmude, Jr. (Springer, 

July 2012). The book describes all of the different satellites that can be observed, 

including communication, scientific, and spy satellites, as well as the International 

Space Station. Schmude describes how to recognize them and even how to predict 

their orbits. The book tells how to observe artificial satellites with the unaided eye, 

with binoculars, and with telescopes. Many images of artificial satellites taken from 

Earth are included.

Landsat and Its Valuable Role in Satellite Imagery of Earth, edited by Ryan K. 

McHale (Nova Science Publishers, Inc., September 2012). The U.S. Landsat mission has collected remotely sensed imagery of Earth’s surface for more than 35 

years. At present, two satellites, Landsat 5 and Landsat 7, are in orbit and continuing to supply images and data for the many users of the information, but they are 

operating beyond their designed life and may fail at any time. Landsat has been 

used in a wide variety of applications, including climate research, natural resources 

management, commercial and municipal land development, public safety, homeland security, and natural disaster management. This book presents information on 

Landsat and its valuable role in satellite imagery of Earth. 

Tragedy and Triumph in Orbit: The Eighties and Early Nineties, by Ben Evans 

(Springer-Praxis, June 2012). To commemorate the 50th anniversary of Yuri 

Gagarin’s pioneering journey into space, Springer-Praxis is producing a short series 

of books that reveals how humanity’s knowledge of flying, working, and living in 

space has grown in the last half century. Tragedy and Triumph in Orbit, the fourth 

book in the series, explores the tumultuous events of the 1980s and the beginning of 

26
Volume 29, Number 4 Fourth Quarter 2012

the 1990s, a time when a reinvigorated Cold War between the United States and the 

Soviet Union bred further distrust and intense competition between the two old foes. 

Space Policy in Developing Countries: Security and Development on the Final 

Frontier, by Robert C. Harding (Routledge, June 2012). This book analyzes the 

rationale and history of space programs in countries of the developing world.

Rather than merely describing the programs and their technical details, the book 

places these programs within the context of international relations theory and 

foreign policy analysis. 

Robotic Exploration of the Solar System, Part 3: The Modern Era 1997–2009, by 

Paolo Ulivi and David M. Harland (Springer-Praxis, August 2012). In this book, the 

authors provide a comprehensive account of the design and management of deep 

space missions, the spacecraft involved (some flown, others not), their instruments, 

and their scientific results. This third volume in the series covers launches in the 

period 1997–2003.

Doing the Impossible: George E. Mueller and the Management of NASA’s Human 

Spaceflight Program, by Arthur L. Slotkin (Springer-Praxis, July 2012). This account 

describes for the first time how George E. Mueller, the system manager of the 

human spaceflight program of the 1960s, applied the Department of Defense’s 

system program office (SPO) methodology and other special considerations, resulting in the success of the Apollo program. While Apollo remained Mueller’s top 

priority, from his earliest days at the Agency he promoted a robust post-Apollo program, which culminated in Skylab, the Space Shuttle, and the International Space 

Station. As a result of these efforts, Mueller earned the sobriquet “the father of the 

Space Shuttle.”

Becoming Spacefarers, by James A. Vedda (Xlibris Corp., June 2012). In this book, 

the author offers a no-nonsense account of the current doldrums of spaceflight in 

the United States and how the nation might deal with it. He makes clear that we are 

in a crisis, that business as usual will not enable us to overcome it, and that it is not 

sufficient to rest on past successes or to accept the present partisanship and parochialism. In addition to diagnosing the problems, Vedda also offers useful and, in 

some cases, provocative prescriptions for how Americans might untie the Gordian 

knot of current approaches to spaceflight.

Commercial Spaceflight: Assessments, Challenges and Trends, edited by Nathaniel 

J. Clements and Edison G. Hahn (Nova Science Publishers, Inc., June 2012). This 

book examines the commercial spaceflight industry with a focus on space tourism 

and commercial space transportation of NASA crews and cargo. 

This Is Redstone Missile Weapon System, by Chrysler Corporation Missile Division 

(Periscope Film, LLC, May 2012). While Redstone’s role as a weapon system was 

brief, it had a major impact on America’s early space program. In January of 1958, 

just four months before the U.S. Army activated the Redstone in Germany, a modified version designated Jupiter-C put Explorer, America’s first satellite, into orbit. In 

1961, the Mercury-Redstone Launch Vehicle lifted Alan Shepard into space. This Is 

Redstone provides a detailed overview of this historic weapons system, originally 

Volume 29, Number 4 Fourth Quarter 2012 

continued on next page

27
NASA HISTORY PROGRAM OFFICE

Recent Publications and Online Resources (continued)

created in 1959 by prime contractor Chrysler Corporation, which built 101 of the 128 

missiles produced. It includes chapters about the missile’s structure, operation, propulsion and propellant systems, ground support equipment, guidance and controls, 

firing site operations, and more.

Reaching for the Stars: The Inspiring Story of a Migrant Farmworker Turned 

Astronaut, by José M. Hernández (Center Street, September 2012). Born into a 

family of migrant workers, toiling in the fields by the age of six, José M. Hernández 

dreamed of traveling through the night skies on a rocket ship. This is the inspiring 

story of how he realized that dream, becoming the first Mexican American astronaut. 

Turned down by NASA 11 times on his long journey to donning that famous orange 

spacesuit (on STS-128), Hernández’s message of hard work, education, perseverance, and “reaching for the stars” makes this a classic American autobiography.

European Identity through Space: Space Activities and Programmes as a Tool 

to Reinvigorate the European Identity, edited by Christophe Venet and Blandina 

Baranes (Springer, August 2012). This publication investigates the effect space 

activities have already had on building a European “spirit” (e.g., through European 

missions or European astronauts). The book’s intention is to identify creative ways 

and means for how to further use space for shaping the European identity. For this 

purpose, the focus is not only on policy analysis but also on expertise from the fields 

of cultural science and the arts to tap their creative potential and also their theoretical approaches to the topic. 

Forever Young: A Life of Adventure in Air and Space, by John W. Young with James 

R. Hansen (University Press of Florida, September 2012). Enthusiasts of space 

exploration have long waited for John Young to tell the story of his two Gemini 

flights, his two Apollo missions, the first-ever Space Shuttle flight, and the first 

Spacelab mission. This book delivers all that and more: Young’s personal journey 

from engineering graduate to fighter pilot, to test pilot, to astronaut, to high NASA 

official, to clear-headed predictor of the fate of planet Earth.

Working on Mars: Voyages of Scientific Discovery with the Mars Exploration Rovers, 

by William J. Clancey (The MIT Press, August 2012). Beginning in 2004, a team 

of geologists and other planetary scientists did field science in a dark room in 

Pasadena, exploring Mars from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) by means 

of the remotely operated Mars Exploration Rovers (MERs). Drawing on his extensive observations of scientists in the field and at JPL, Clancey investigates how 

the design of the rover mission enabled field science on Mars, explaining how the 

scientists and rover engineers manipulated the vehicle and why the programmable 

tools and analytic instruments worked so well for them. He shows how the scientists 

felt not as if they were issuing commands to a machine but rather as if they were 

working on the Red Planet, riding together in the rover on a voyage of discovery.

The History Program Office gives sincere thanks to volunteer Chris Gamble, who 

compiles this section for us every quarter. Please note that the descriptions have 

been derived by Chris from promotional material and do not represent an endorsement by NASA.

28
Volume 29, Number 4 Fourth Quarter 2012

Upcoming Meetings

The 127th annual meeting of the American Historical Association will be held 3–6 

January 2013 in New Orleans, Louisiana. Please see http://www.historians.org/

annual/2013/index.cfm for more details.

The 221st meeting for the American Astronomical Society will be held 6–10 

January 2013 in Long Beach, California. Please see http://aas.org/meetings for 

more details.

The 51st AIAA Aerospace Science Meeting, including the New Horizons Forum 

and Aerospace Exposition, will be held 7–10 January 2013 in Grapevine, Texas. 

Please see https://www.aiaa.org/asm2013/ for more details.

The midwinter meeting of the American Library Association will be held 25–29 

January 2013 in Seattle, Washington. Please see http://www.ala.org/ala/ 

conferencesevents/upcoming/index.cfm for more details.

The 19th Annual Space Exploration Educators Conference will take place on 7–9 

February 2013 at Space Center Houston in Houston, Texas. Please see http://

www.spacecenter.org/TeachersSEEC.html for more details.

The 17th Annual International Space University Symposium will be held 

5–7 March 2013 in Strasbourg, France. Please see http://www.isunet.edu/

annualsymposium for more details.

The 44th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference will be held 18–22 March 

2013 at The Woodlands, Texas. Please see http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/

lpsc2013/ for more details.

The 51st Robert H. Goddard Memorial Symposium will be held 19–21 March 

2013 in Greenbelt, Maryland. Please see http://www.astronautical.org/goddard for 

more details.

The 29th National Space Symposium will be held 8–11 April 2013 in Colorado 

Springs, Colorado. Please see http://www.nationalspacesymposium.org/ for 

more details.

The annual meeting for the Organization of American Historians will be held 11–14 

April 2013 in San Francisco, California. Please see http://annualmeeting.oah.org/

for more details.

The Humans to Mars Summit will be held 6–8 May 2013 in Washington, DC. 

Please see http://www.exploremars.org/h2m for more details.

29
NASA HISTORY PROGRAM OFFICE

Image in Aerospace History

The Mars rovers in a family photo: Mars Science Laboratory’s Curiosity rover (right), Mars Exploration 

Rovers (MERs) Spirit and Opportunity (left, only one pictured), and Mars Pathfinder’s Sojourner 

(center). The rovers have increased in size to carry more scientific instrumentation and travel longer 

distances. (NASA/JPL-Caltech)

30
Volume 29, Number 4 Fourth Quarter 2012

The NASA History Program Office, under the Office of Communications, NASA 

Headquarters, Washington, DC 20546, publishes News and Notes quarterly.

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e-mail us at histinfo@hq.nasa.gov or call 202-358-0384. 

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NASA Headquarters History Program Office Staff Contact Information:

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 202-358-0383

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 202-358-0087

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 202-358-0387

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 202-358-0386

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 202-358-5196

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 202-358-0375

Created and produced by the following:

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