I was going to mention this anniversary, but decided not to, simply because I
put so much off-topic material on the list already. Nonetheless, today is a
significant anniversary, and I changed my mind when I received the following
announcement from NASA a few minutes ago:

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Subj:    NASA ADMININISTRATOR MARKS DR. GODDARD'S VISION
Date:   3/16/01 11:53:14 AM Mountain Standard Time
From:   [log in to unmask]
Sender: [log in to unmask]

Bob Jacobs
Headquarters, Washington, DC                March 16, 2001
(Phone: 202/358-1600)

Ed Campion
Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD
(Phone: 301/286-0697)

RELEASE: 01-47

NASA ADMININISTRATOR MARKS DR. GODDARD'S VISION

     The following is a statement by NASA Administrator
Daniel S. Goldin regarding the 75th anniversary of Dr. Robert
H. Goddard's first successful liquid-fueled rocket launch.

"Once publicly ridiculed for his vision to boldly expand the
frontier of space, Dr. Robert Goddard inspired a new
generation of explorers on this date in 1926. Dr. Goddard
initially  expressed interest in rockets in 1899, when he was
just 17 years old. By 1915, he had developed the detailed
mathematical theory of rocket propulsion and proved rocket
engines could produce thrust in a vacuum, making space flight
possible.

"Dr. Goddard's first work on rockets made little impression
on the scientific community and government leaders. Only
through modest subsidies and leaves of absence from his
university duties was he able to sustain his lifetime of
devoted research and testing.

"At the time of his death in 1945, Dr. Goddard held 214
patents in rocketry, and in memory of this brilliant
innovator, NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center was established
in 1959 in Greenbelt, Maryland.

"Dr. Goddard once said every vision is a joke, until the
first man accomplishes it. NASA honors his vision through our
continued leadership in aerospace technology and Earth and
Space sciences. We work each day to expand knowledge of our
planet and its environment, the solar system and the
universe. This Agency is committed to future excellence in
scientific investigation, the advancement of education, the
safe development and operation of space systems, and in
providing the inspiration for the next generation of rocket
scientists."

Additional information is available on the Internet at:

       http://www.gsfc.nasa.gov/75th/history.htm

                             -end-

                            * * *
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I know Goddard's story very well simply because it has always been of great
interest to me. Goddard was a professor of physics at Clark University in
Massachussetts, where he not only published a paper in the Smithsonian Misc.
Collections series in 1919 on "A method of reaching extreme altitudes", he
also set out about trying to build the liquid-fueled rockets that he
described in the paper.

To Goddard's everlasting regret, newspaper reporters actually read the paper
and hounded him throughout his time at Clark University, especially so once
he began to actually attempt flight. The NY Times ran an editorial saying
that professor Goddard "didn't have the brains that were ladled out in most
every American classroom", and his first attempt at flight, which only went a
few tens of feet, was reported as "Professor misses the Moon by 238,738 1/2
miles".

Because of complaints from his neighbors, and in an attempt to get more
privacy, he moved his flights to an Army camp at Hell Pond, MA. But it was in
Aunt Effie's backyard, 75 years ago today, that he was able to obtain the
first sustained liquid-fueled rocket flight.

One of Goddard's students, Edwin Aldrin (Sr.), the yet-to-be father of Edwin
"Buzz" Aldrin, the second man to walk on the Moon, knew Charles Lindberg and
arranged for Lindberg to call Goddard at his office. Lindberg, at the time,
was at least as famous as Neil Armstrong. When Goddard came home and told his
wife that he had spent the afternoon in a very interesting conversation with
Lindberg, she replied that that was very nice, and that she had had tea with
Marie, Queen of Rumania.

Lindberg was very interested in Goddard's work and recruited Daniel
Guggenheim to further fund his research. With Guggenheim's and Lindberg's
money, Goddard left Hell Pond, MA and moved his entire operation to Eden
Valley, New Mexico, just outside of Roswell, and it was from there that he
did his truly spectacular work.

Goddard died August 10, 1945, just ten days before I was born, so we didn't
share the planet as free-living souls. But Goddard's footprints are
everywhere here, and the Roswell high school is called Goddard, and they are
of course the "Rockets."

On July 20, 1969, the day that Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walked on the
Moon, the NY Times printed a retraction of their 1926 editorial, saying that
it appears the newspaper was in error and that professor Goddard was correct
all along.

Wirt Atmar