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

334 reMeMberING the SpaCe aGe
the quality of this transition to the Constellation program, one that
has not been experienced since the close of apollo and the emergence of the
Space Shuttle, reinforces Weitekamp’s suggestion that the history of NaSa be
examined in terms of its labor force. Weitekamp’s proposition fts squarely within
the landscape and documentary aesthetics found in the history of 20th century
photography. this thinking can be considered as a catalyst in leading conversations
that examine the existing photography of the labor force and its various work
sites. examining the frst 50 years can help prepare and plan for a systematic and
managed documentation of the next 50 years of space exploration.
In essence, it may be well worth evaluating the necessity for the researching
and cataloguing NaSa’s photographic archives and the collections of its contractors
as a means for creating the criteria for the next 50-year cycle. this would include
the photography from Kennedy, Marshall, Michoud, Stennis, Dryden, Goddard,
Glenn, Langley, Johnson, ames, Vandenberg, and JpL. the results of such
research may unveil collections of insightful work like high-speed engineering
(Schlieren photography), industrial, portraiture, and the day-to-day workings
of the labor force by one or more unrecognized photographers. for example,
there are, in fact, decades of remarkably sophisticated work by the industrial
photographers bill bowles, paul riedel, and Martin brown at NaSa’s Glenn
research Center (formerly Lewis research Center). I contend that research like
this may yield historically signifcant discoveries (not unlike Michael Lorenzini’s
curatorial research, discovery, and exhibition of eugene de Salignac’s engineering
and infrastructure photography). perhaps, in conjunction with the NaSa history
Division and a fight center’s archives, a combination of graduate students and
doctoral candidates with afnities towards the realm of the curatorial would be
likely resources in implementing such a long-term undertaking.
as the second 50 years of space exploration begins, so does its resulting
photography. rather than solely depending on NaSa fight center photography,
which is largely reactive to the moments at hand, I suggest taking a more
proactive approach. Why not engage fne art photographers and photojournalists
who may ofer historians, curators, policymakers, and, ultimately, the public a
more perceptive understanding of the current and future american space
programs before they vanish forever. In many respects, why wait until an
american space exploration program like the Space Shuttle is completed,
scrapped, and rusted like remnants of project apollo’s infrastructure.
take for examples Scott andrews prescient documentation of discarded and
“abandoned in place” launch pads at the Kennedy Space Center. Well beyond
the dusk of the apollo years, andrews documented (over a number of visits
beginning in the late 1990s) all that remains of Launch Complex 34. 87 andrews
87. See chapter two, Charles D. benson and William barnaby faherty, Moonport:A History of Apollo
Launch Facilities and Operations (NaSa Special publication-4204 in the NaSa history Series,
1978), http://history.nasa.gov/SP-4204/contents.html (accessed March 27, 2008).