a facility on Wallops Island, Va., from the Navy 

 and set up a Pilotiess Aircraft Research Division 

 there; this later became the Wallops Flight Cen- 

 ter. 



Consideration of jet propulsion was inhibited by 

 a Bureau of Standards study which concluded in 

 1923 that "propulsion by the reaction of a simple 

 jet cannot compete, in any respect, with air screw 

 propulsion at such flying speeds as are now in 

 prospect." There is nothing wrong with the state- 

 ment except that Americans seemed to fprget the 

 final caveat regarding flying speeds. By 1941, both 

 Germany and Britain had developed and flown 

 turbojets, so Vannevar Bush appointed a Special 

 Committee on Jet Propulsion. -7? The military 

 supported a little industrial research on jet en- 

 gines, but there was no significant United States 

 effort until NACA began a formal program in 

 1943; consequently, American jet aircraft were 

 not sufficiently developed for combat before the 

 end of the war. 



Although it was evident that jet- and rocket- 

 propelled aircraft had the potential of crossing the 

 sound barrier, wind tunnels choked up at air 

 speeds approaching the speed of sound. NACA 

 began research on a transonic wind tunnel in 

 1943, but the first manned aircraft intended to 

 break the sound barrier was started in 1944 with- 

 out one. Designated the X-1, this aircraft was a 

 joint venture of NACA and the military services. 

 Propelled by a liquid fuel rocket engine, it exceed- 

 ed Mach 1 in 1947. 



In 1950 the transonic wind tunnel was success- 

 fully built by using a "slotted throat." Within a 

 year its development led to the discovery of the 

 area rule which dictates the relative sizes of wing 

 and fuselage to minimize transonic drag. This dis- 

 covery enabled the development of the first fight- 

 ers able to exceed Mach 1 in level flight. In the 

 mid-1950's, supersonic wind tunnels became avail- 

 able. In the meantime, NACA's D-558-2 reached 

 Mach 2 in 1953. Aircraft of this type "perilously 

 filled in the flight envelope for transonic and super- 

 sonic flight and provided the design for genera- 

 tions of post-World War II military aircraft. "-78 



In 1952, at the request of its Committee on 

 Aerodynamics, NACA began consideration of 

 unmanned and manned flight at altitudes from 50 

 miles to infinity and at speeds from Mach 10 to 

 the velocity of escape from the earth's gravity. In 

 1954 the Air Force and Navy collaborated to de- 

 velop an X-1 5 which achieved Mach 6 and an alti- 

 tude of 108 kilometers. The Army did research 

 using captured V-2 rockets but their performance 

 was so erratic that many experiments were lost; 



-77Hirsch, p. 6. 

 •^'^Anderson, p. 1 1. 



the Navy developed the Viking rocket as a re- 

 placement research vehicle and it was quite suc- 

 cessful. 



In 1955 NSF, acting as agent for a number of 

 proponents, proposed that the United States put a 

 scientific satellite into orbit during the Internation- 

 al Geophysical Year (IGY) (July 1, 1957, to De- 

 cember 31, 1958). The Defense Department was 

 designated to take on the project, but with no in- 

 terference with military rockets. The "no interfer- 

 ence" provision dictated that a new booster be 

 developed as well as the upper stages The Navy 

 developed successful second and third stages, but 

 the booster was extremely modest, essentially a 

 Viking adapted to kerosene fuel instead of alco- 

 hol. A series of test firings failed, some spectacu- 

 larly. 



Post-Sputnik 



On October 4, 1957, the USSR launched Sputnik 

 I into orbit; there was an immediate strong reac- 

 tion in the United States. The Army was author- 

 ized to fire the sub-rosa satellite assembly which 

 the Army Ballistic Missile Agency (ABMA) had 

 built at Huntsville, using the Army's military Red- 

 stone rocket as booster, and they successfully or- 

 bited Explorer I with a basic research experiment 

 of Dr. James Van Allen's in it. 



Although Vanguard did succeed in putting three 

 satellites into orbit during the IGY, the Nation 

 was disappointed. -79 Not only had the USSR tech- 

 nologically upstaged the United States, but many 

 U.S. officials were alarmed at the apparent power 

 of the Russian ICBM booster. NACA responded 

 with a proposal to conduct research in astronau- 

 tics. However, in 1958, Congress passed the Na- 

 tional Aeronautics and Space Act, which provided 

 for the change of NACA to NASA within 90 days 

 and the subsequent transfer of space-related func- 

 tions of other agencies at the discretion of the 

 President over a period of 4 years. -80 Project Van- 

 guard was transferred from the Navy, with NRL 

 and the U.S. Naval Station at Anacostia providing 

 space until new quarters became available at Belts- 

 ville, Md. (now the Goddard Space Flight Center). 

 Other senior NRL scientists and engineers were 

 also recruited by NASA. Two Air Force lunar 

 probes and an Air Force large rocket engine pro- 

 ject were transferred, as were two lunar probes 

 and three satellite projects from the Army. After 

 considerable Army resistance, the Jet Propulsion 

 Laboratory and the Army's contract with the Cali- 

 fornia Institute of Technology to run it were also 



27'>Rosholt, Robert L.. An Administrative History of NASA. 

 i95>i-6?. (NASA; Washington. D.C., 1966), pp. ."5-6. Hereinaf- 

 ter referred to as Rosholt. 



-«iRosholt, pp. 8-l.S. 



COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS AND HISTORICAL TRENDS 355 



