Marshall Space Flight Center
Marshall Space Flight Center, located in Redstone Arsenal, Alabama, is the U.S. government's civilian rocketry and spacecraft propulsion research center. As the largest NASA center, MSFC's first mission was developing the Saturn launch vehicles for the Apollo program. Marshall has been the lead center for the Space Shuttle main propulsion and external tank; payloads and related crew training; International Space Station design and assembly; computers, networks, and information management; and the Space Launch System. Located on the Redstone Arsenal near Huntsville, MSFC is named in honor of General of the Army George C. Marshall.
The center contains the Huntsville Operations Support Center, also known as the International Space Station Payload Operations Center. This facility supports ISS launch, payload, and experiment activities at the Kennedy Space Center. The HOSC also monitors rocket launches from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station when a Marshall Center payload is on board.
History
MSFC has been NASA's lead center for the development of rocket propulsion systems and technologies. During the 1960s, the activities were largely devoted to the Apollo Program, with the Saturn family of launch vehicles designed and tested at MSFC. MSFC also had a major role in post-Apollo activities, including Skylab, the Space Shuttle, and Spacelab and other experimental activities which made use of the Shuttle's cargo bay.Groundwork
After the May 1945 end of World War II in Germany, the US initiated Operation Paperclip to collect a number of scientists and engineers who had been at the center of Nazi Germany's advanced military technologies. In August 1945, 127 missile specialists led by Wernher von Braun signed work contracts with the United States Army Ordnance Corps. Most of them had worked on the V-2 missile development under von Braun at Peenemünde. The missile specialists were sent to Fort Bliss, Texas, joining the Army's newly formed Research and Development Division Sub-office.For the next five years, von Braun and the German scientists and engineers were primarily engaged in adapting and improving the V-2 missile for U.S. applications. Testing was conducted at nearby White Sands Proving Grounds, New Mexico. von Braun was allowed to use a WAC Corporal rocket as a second stage for a V-2; the combination, called Bumper, reached a record-breaking altitude.
During World War II, the production and storage of ordnance shells was conducted by three arsenals nearby to Huntsville, Alabama. After the war, these were closed, and the three areas were combined to form Redstone Arsenal. In 1949, the Secretary of the Army approved the transfer of the rocket research and development activities from Fort Bliss to the new center at Redstone Arsenal. Beginning in April 1950, about 1,000 persons were involved in the transfer, including von Braun's group. At this time, R&D responsibility for guided missiles was added, and studies began on a medium-range guided missile that eventually became the PGM-11 Redstone.
Over the next decade, missile development at Redstone Arsenal greatly expanded. However, von Braun kept space firmly in his mind, and published a widely read article on this subject. In mid-1952, the Germans were hired as regular civil service employees, with most becoming U.S. citizens in 1954-55. Von Braun was appointed Chief of the Guided Missile Development Division.
In September 1954, von Braun proposed using the Redstone as the main booster of a multi-stage rocket for launching artificial satellites. A year later, a study for Project Orbiter was completed, detailing plans and schedules for a series of scientific satellites. However, the Army's official role in the U.S. space satellite program was delayed after higher authorities elected to use the Vanguard rocket then being developed by the Naval Research Laboratory.
In February 1956, the Army Ballistic Missile Agency was established. One of the primary programs was a, single-stage missile that was started the previous year; intended for both the U.S. Army and U.S. Navy, this was designated the PGM-19 Jupiter. Guidance component testing for this Jupiter intermediate range ballistic missile began in March 1956 on a modified Redstone missile dubbed Jupiter A while re-entry vehicle testing began in September 1956 on a Redstone with spin-stabilized upper stages. This ABMA developed Jupiter-C was composed of a Redstone rocket first stage and two upper stages for RV tests or three upper stages for Explorer satellite launches. ABMA had originally planned the 20 September 1956 flight as a satellite launch but, by direct intervention of Eisenhower, was limited to the use of 2 upper stages for an RV test flight traveling downrange and attaining an altitude of. While the Jupiter-C capability was such that it could have placed the fourth stage in orbit, that mission had been assigned to the NRL. Later Jupiter-C flights would be used to launch satellites. The first Jupiter IRBM flight took place from Cape Canaveral in March 1957 with the first successful flight to full range on 31 May. Jupiter was eventually taken over by the U.S. Air Force.
The Soviet Union launched Sputnik 1, the first artificial Earth orbiting satellite, on October 4, 1957. This was followed on November 3 with the second satellite, Sputnik 2. The United States attempted a satellite launch on December 6 using the NRL's Vanguard rocket, but it barely struggled off the ground, then fell back and exploded. On January 31, 1958, after finally receiving permission to proceed, von Braun and the ABMA space development team used a Jupiter C in a Juno I configuration to successfully place Explorer 1, the first US satellite, into orbit around the Earth.
Effective at the end of March 1958, the U.S. Army Ordnance Missile Command, encompassing the ABMA and its newly operational space programs. In August, AOMC and Advanced Research Projects Agency jointly initiated a program managed by ABMA to develop a large space booster of approximately 1.5-million-pounds thrust using a cluster of available rocket engines. In early 1959, this vehicle was designated Saturn.
On April 2, President Dwight D. Eisenhower recommended to Congress that a civilian agency be established to direct nonmilitary space activities. On July 29, the President signed the National Aeronautics and Space Act, forming the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. NASA incorporated the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, Ames Research Center, Langley Research Center, and Lewis Flight Propulsion Laboratory. Despite the existence of an official space agency, the Army continued with far-reaching space programs. In June 1959, a secret study on Project Horizon was completed by ABMA, detailing plans for using the Saturn booster in establishing a crewed Army outpost on the Moon. Project Horizon was rejected, and the Saturn program was transferred to NASA.
Project Mercury was officially named on 26 November 1958. With a future goal of crewed flight, monkeys Able and Miss Baker were the first living creatures recovered from outer space on May 28, 1959. They had been carried in the nose cone on a Jupiter missile to an altitude of and a distance of, successfully withstanding 38 times the normal pull of gravity. On October 21, 1959, President Eisenhower approved the transfer of all Army space-related activities to NASA.
Redstone Army Arsenal becomes the Marshall Space Flight Center
On July 1, 1960 the Marshall Space Flight Center, or the MSFC, was created out of the old Redstone Arsenal. The Center was then also placed under the jurisdiction of the recently created NASA, and Wernher von Braun was appointed as the Center's first NASA Director. Eberhart Rees, who was a former associate of von Braun from Germany, was also appointed as von Braun's Deputy for Research and Development.At the time of the creation of the MSFC, 4,670 civilian employees, about $100 million worth of buildings and equipment, and of land were transferred from AOMC/ABMA to the new MSFC. The official opening date of the MSFC had been July 1, 1960, but its dedication ceremony took place two months later on September 8. At the dedication ceremony President Eisenhower gave a speech. The MSFC was named in honor of General George C. Marshall.
The administrative activities in MSFC were led by persons with backgrounds in traditional U.S. Government functions, but all of the technical heads were individuals who had assisted von Braun in the many successes at the MSFC'S predecessor, the ABMA, where von Braun had been the Technical Director. The initial technical leaders of the new MSFC had all been former colleagues of von Braun starting back in Germany before World War II. These technical department and/ or division heads were as follows:
- Director – Wernher von Braun
- Deputy Director for R&D – Eberhard F. M. Rees
- Reliability Office – H. August Schulze
- Future Projects Office – Heinz-Hermann Koelle
- Light & Medium Vehicles Office – Hans Hueter
- Saturn Systems Office – O. Hermann Lange
- Technical Program Coordination Office – George N. Constan
- Weapons Systems Office – Werner G. Tiller
- Launch Operations Directorate – Kurt H. Debus
- Aeroballistics Division – Ernst G. Geissler. Included the Future Project Branch until that was dissolved in the mid 1960s.
- Computation Division – Helmut Hölzer
- Fabrication & Assembly Engineering Division – Hans H. Maus
- Guidance & Control Division – Walter Häussermann
- Quality Division – Dieter E. Grau
- Research Projects Division – Ernst Stuhlinger
- Structures & Mechanics Division – William A. Mrazek
- Test Division – Karl L. Heimburg
The initial main project at MSFC was the final preparation of a Redstone rocket for Project Mercury to lift a space capsule carrying the first American into space. Originally scheduled to take place in October 1960, this was postponed several time and on May 5, 1961, astronaut Alan Shepard made America's first sub-orbital spaceflight.
By 1965, MSFC had about 7,500 government employees. In addition, most of the prime contractors for launch vehicles and related major items collectively had approximately a similar number of employees working in MSFC facilities.
Several support contracting firms were also involved in the programs; the largest of these was Brown Engineering Company, the first high-technology firm in Huntsville and by this time having some 3,500 employees. In the Saturn-Apollo activities, BECO/TBE provided about 20-million man-hours of support. Milton K. Cummings was the BECO president, Joseph C. Moquin the executive vice president, William A. Girdini led the engineering design and test work, and Raymond C. Watson, Jr., directed the research and advanced systems activities. Cummings Research Park, the second largest park of this type in the US, was named for Cummings in 1973.