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

aMerICaN SpaCefLIght hIStory’S MaSter NarratIve
aND the MeaNINg of MeMory
CIvIL SpaCefLIght aS aMerICaN trIuMph aND
exCeptIoNaLISM
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the history of american spacefight has rested for some 50 years on the
master narrative of an initial shock to the system, surprise, and ultimate recovery
with success after success following across a broad spectrum of activities. It is
a classic story of american history in which a vision of progress, of moving
from nothing to something, dominates the story. that master narrative ofers
comfort to the american public as a whole, but most especially to the governing
class who take solace in how the nation responded to crisis.
for example, the surprising Soviet success with Sputnik, so the master
narrative relates, created a furor and led the united States to “catch up” to
the Soviet union in space technology. this crisis forced the eisenhower
administration to move quickly to restore confdence at home and prestige
aboard. With mounting pressure, the eisenhower response became typical of
earlier crises within the united States; politicians locked arms and appropriated
money to tackle the perceived problem. In this efort, both the civilian and
military space eforts benefted, one openly and the other in secrecy. the
Department of Defense approved additional funds for an army efort, featuring
Wernher von braun and his german rocket team, to launch an american
satellite. the army’s explorer project had been shelved earlier in favor of
concentrating on vanguard as the frst american scientifc satellite, but drastic
times called for drastic measures and suddenly the atmosphere in Washington
had changed. the army was told to orbit the frst satellite by february 1, 1958,
only four months after the frst Sputnik. von braun and his team went to work
on a crash program with a modifed Jupiter C ballistic missile. the frst launch
took place on January 31, 1958, placing explorer 1 in orbit. on this satellite
was an experiment by James a. van allen, a physicist at the university of
Iowa, documenting the existence of radiation zones encircling earth. Shaped
by earth’s magnetic feld, what came to be called the van allen radiation belts
partially dictates the electrical charges in the atmosphere and the solar radiation
that reaches earth. 2
following this, Congress passed and eisenhower signed the National
aeronautics and Space act of 1958. this legislation established NaSa with
a broad mandate to explore and use space for “peaceful purposes for the
beneft of all mankind.” 3 the core of NaSa came from the earlier National
2. robert a. Divine, The Sputnik Challenge: Eisenhower’s Response to the Soviet Satellite (New york,
Ny: oxford university press, 1993), pp. 93–96; roger D. Launius, NASA: History of the U.S. Civil
Space Program (Malabar, fL: Krieger publishing Co., 1994), pp. 26–27; James a.van allen, Origins
of Magnetospheric Physics (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution press, 1983).
3. “National aeronautics and Space act of 1958,” public Law #85-568, 72 Stat., 426. Signed by the
president on July 29,1958, record group 255, National archives and records administration,