Remembering the Space Age. - Black Vault Radio Network (BVRN)

138 reMeMBerING the SpaCe aGe
these contracts refected the goal of NaSa administrator James e. Webb
to harness and maximize the results of space spending to beneft all aspects of
american society, including regional economic development and education.
Webb’s interest, however, was not universally shared within NaSa, whose
managers and engineers saw these goals as unnecessary externalities defecting
them from spacefight. 11
the frst major study was a one-year project completed by the Brookings
Institute in November 1960. to gather information, Brookings organized a
two-day conference that included one historian, Melvin Kranzberg, a leading
force in the creation of the history of technology as an academic discipline and a
strong advocate of institutionalizing history in NaSa. 12 In the summer of 1962,
NaSa funded an eight-week summer study of ffteen areas of space research at
the State University of Iowa. If order of appearance indicated priority, then the
lowest area was the social implications of the space program. 13
these previous studies were more predictions, estimates, and recommendations
than actual research. 14 the Brookings report called on NaSa to
establish an in-house capability of at least three senior social scientists. their
responsibilities would range from selecting research priorities and assessing
ongoing projects to distributing the fndings and assisting in their application at
NaSa. the report stated “one of the most pressing and continuing research
challenges” would be to “develop efective methods to detect incipient implications
of space activities and to insure that their consequences are understood.” 15
What made the aaaS project diferent were its underlying goals and three
publications. While the primary goal “briefy stated, is to examine the impact
of space science and technology on american life,” there was another motive:
Educators’ Handbook, OMB/NaSa report Number S677. January 1983, http://www1.jsc.nasa.
gov/er/seh/social.html (downloaded august 2, 2007).
11 . W. henry Lambright, Powering Apollo. James E. Webb of NASA (Baltimore, MD: Johns hopkins
University press, 1995), pp. 99-100.
12 . Donald N. Michael, “proposed studies on the implications of peaceful space activities for
human afairs” (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 1960), viii. reprinted as a report
of the Committee on Science and astronautics of the U.S. house of representatives,
87th Congress, 1st Session, March 24, 1961. For Kranzberg’s role, see roger D. Launius,
“NaSa history and the Challenge of Keeping the Contemporary past,” Public Historian 21,
3 (Summer 1999), pp. 63-64.
13 . “Some Social Implications of the Space program,” in National academy of Sciences-National
research Council, A Review of Space Research (Washington, DC: National academy of Sciences,
1962), 16-1-32.
14 . Committee on Space eforts and Society, “Space eforts and Society: a Statement of Mission
and Work,” (Boston: aaaS, January 1963), reprinted in raymond a. Bauer with richard S.
rosenbloom and Laure Sharp and the assistance of others, Second-Order Consequences. A
Methodological Essay on the Impact of Technology (Cambridge, Ma: MIt press,
1969), p. 211.
15 . Michael, op. cit., pp. 3-4.