One Hundred Years of Flight USAF Chronology ... - The Air University

1957
July 1: The first intercontinental ballistic missile wing, the 704th Strategic
Missile Wing, activated at Cooke (later, Vandenberg) Air Force Base,
California.
July 31: The distant early warning line, a string of radar installations extending
across the Canadian Arctic to warn of impending aircraft attacks,
was declared fully operational.
August 1: The North American Air Defense Command, a joint United
States–Canadian command with an air-defense mission, was informally
established. An agreement ratified on May 12, 1958, formalized its
existence.
August 15: Gen. Nathan F. Twining became the first USAF officer to serve as
chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
October 4: The Soviet Union used an intercontinental ballistic missile
booster to launch Sputnik I, the world’s first artificial space satellite,
into Earth orbit.
October 16: The Air Force successfully launched an Aerobee rocket to a
height of 35 miles, where its nose cone separated and traveled to a
height of 54 miles. At this point, shaped charges blasted pellets into
space at a speed of 33,000 miles per hour, surpassing by 8,000 miles
per hour the speed necessary to escape from Earth’s gravity.
October 22: In Operation FAR SIDE, a four-stage, 10-engine, solid-propellant
rocket, fired from a balloon at 100,000 feet above Eniwetok, penetrated
at least 2,700 miles into outer space, boosting a scientificresearch
capsule.
November 3: A dog named Laika became the first animal to be launched
into Earth orbit, carried aloft in a Soviet spacecraft called Sputnik II.
November 29: Gen. Thomas D. White, USAF chief of staff, announced the
assignment of the intercontinental and intermediate-range ballistic
missile programs to Strategic Air Command and transferred the 1st
Missile Division to that command.
December 6: The first U.S. attempt to launch a satellite into orbit failed
when the Navy’s Vanguard rocket exploded on its launch platform.
December 15: The 556th Strategic Missile Squadron, the first SM–62 Snark
operational squadron, activated at Patrick Air Force Base, Florida. An
air-breathing jet cruise missile equipped with two rockets for launch,
the Snark was essentially a pilotless airplane with a warhead.
December 17: The Air Force first test-launched an Atlas intercontinental
ballistic missile. Its reentry vehicle landed in the target area after a
flight of some 500 miles.
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