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

146 reMeMBerING the SpaCe aGe
to a world hitherto unavailable. 46 this was the most succinct, accurate, and
ignored prediction made in the book.
that prediction more than compensated for another prediction. In an
excellent example of extrapolating from expectations, Fogel assumed the forthcoming
arrival of the supersonic transport would negate any advantage of the
rocket for point-to-point transportation on earth as the maximum time saved
by rocket would be fve hours. 47
the Committee on Space had noted “one of the most widely discussed
second-order consequences of the space program is the difusion of spacegenerated
technology into the civilian economy,” a consequence space supporters
promoted optimistically. 48 Signifcantly, Fogel decisively dismissed what would
be called spinof in the case of the railroad. NaSa ignored Fogel’s unwanted
conclusion: tracking and promoting technology transfer absorbed approximately
half of the $35 million NaSa spent on impact studies in its frst decade. Indeed,
NaSa has long proclaimed and promoted the value of spinofs. 49
In a stepping stone to his magisterial The Visible Hand, alfred Chandler,
together with Stephen Salsbury, ofered very general hypotheses about innovative
inventions encouraging new methods of management and administration,
needs that emerge as the invention evolves instead of being immediately obvious.
Often, operational crises—usually in the form of deadly visible disasters—produce
the political attention (including from the press, public, and politicians)
needed to introduce large and complex organizations to manage these large and
complex technologies.
as the history of space programs amply illustrate, management has been
as challenging as the actual technologies with visible disasters often producing
major administrative changes. the continuing focus on management indicates
the space program is still a major work in progress.
From a NaSa perspective, thomas Cochran wrote the most disappointing
paper, not even adding a speculative paragraph at the end. From a railroad
perspective, however, Cochran served up a stimulating view of the demographic,
institutional, and social-psychological impacts of the railroad.
In an article that local and state governments seeking to attract businesses
should ponder, robert Brandfon examined what happened when a powerful
railroad monopoly, the Illinois Central, entered a poor state, Mississippi, with
goals quite diferent than those held by politicians and citizens. For Brandfon,
the key analogy was with NaSa’s then new Mississippi test Facility (now the
46 . Fogel, p. 106.
47 . Ibid, p. 104.
48 . earl p. Stevenson, “report of the Committee on Space,” Records of the Academy (American Academy
of Arts and Sciences), 1963/1964, 153.
49 . See for example Marjolijn Biejlefeld and robert Burke, It Came From Outer Space. Everyday
Products and Ideas from the Space Program (Westport, Ct: Greenwood press, 2003).