The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is
the agency of the United States
government that is responsible for the
nation's resident space program and for aeronautics andaerospace research.
HISTORY:
From 1946, the National
Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA)
had been experimenting with rocket planes such as the supersonic Bell X-1.[15] In
the early 1950s, there was challenge to launch an artificial satellite for the International Geophysical Year (1957–58). An effort for this was the
American Project Vanguard. After the Soviet launch of the world's first artificial satellite (Sputnik 1) on October 4, 1957, the attention of the United
States turned toward its own fledgling space efforts. The U.S. Congress,
alarmed by the perceived threat to national security and technological
leadership (known as the "Sputnik crisis"), urged immediate and swift action;
President Dwight D. Eisenhower and his advisers counseled more
deliberate measures. This led to an agreement that a new federal agency mainly
based on NACA was needed to conduct all non-military activity in space. The Advanced
Research Projects Agency (ARPA)
was created in February 1958 to develop space technology for military
application.
On
July 29, 1958, Eisenhower signed the National Aeronautics and Space
Act, establishing NASA. When it began operations on October 1, 1958,
NASA absorbed the 46-year-old NACA intact; its 8,000 employees, an annual
budget of US$100 million, three major research laboratories (Langley Aeronautical Laboratory, Ames Aeronautical Laboratory,
and Lewis Flight Propulsion
Laboratory) and two small test facilities. A NASA seal was approved by President Eisenhower
in 1959. Elements of the Army Ballistic Missile Agency and the United States
Naval Research Laboratory were
incorporated into NASA. A significant contributor to NASA's entry into the Space Race with
the Soviet Union was the technology from the German rocket program (led
by Wernher von Braun, who was now working for ABMA) which in turn
incorporated the technology of American scientist Robert Goddard's earlier works. Earlier research efforts
within the U.S. Air Force and
many of ARPA's early space programs were also transferred to NASA. In December 1958, NASA gained control
of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory,
a contractor facility operated by the California Institute of
Technology.
