Before Saturn (1962)

[Music] first of a bun first of a family of rockets which will open deep space to science and carry humans to other planet space is open to us now this the second half of the 20th century a moment in time when our maturing space decade can begin to support the imagination of mass yet what is past before Saturn is important it is easy to say looking at the Saturn vehicle this product of our space age these are the people our space age if these same men know full well that the journey to space began not a few year back only long time how long how far back [Music] in ancient Greece there was the poet Lucien he tells of a ship lifted into the air by a great storm and carried to the shining island of the moon but said Lucien these were things which were not and never could have been and for a thousand years thereafter the men of science agreed everyone knew the earth was the only world and center of the universe and the Stars well thoughts of light illumination until in the Middle Ages the great astronomers and mathematicians Copernicus Galileo and Kepler they said there are other worlds and proved it Kepler went further he conjured up the first human visitor to the moon a man pulled by demons across the shadow which falls from Earth to the moon during an eclipse later in 1638 two english bishops published serious works on travel to the moon fiction to be sure but regarded as a blend of witchcraft and satanic knowledge by their contemporaries still it remained for the nineteenth century and it's remarkable prodigals burned to bring together the facts and fantasy of space travel space travel announced Monsieur Bern in 1865 may be accomplished by being shot from a huge cannon a cannon with a barrel 900 feet long in his story veterans of the American Civil War been together for the adventure they sink the cannon barrel below the Florida terrain and then are off to the moon within the hollow cannon projectile of course in reality the projectile would have fallen far short of a moon but the velocity computations were surprisingly accurate and astonishingly miss Yvonne hit upon a very familiar launch area today the sights of our space launch areas are everyday images worldwide and we all know that the rocket free to operate in any atmospheric environment is the ideal transport to space but in the not-too-distant past this was not readily apparent it took men of genius in Russia the effects of scarlet fever rendered Konstantin Tsiolkovsky totally deaf plunged early into a silent world of fantasy his enormous talent quietly produced solid technical studies in a brand new field astronautics there were many visionaries among them the remarkable Herman gunt in his theoretical knowledge of propulsion was less than sound but he did set down plans for a workable space vehicle and moreover he paved the way for the small group of European rocket pioneers who now beard of these one name stands out Hermann Oberth came from provincial Romania to Germany after World War one by 1923 at the age of 29 he perfected a complete series of mathematical theories on space travel his book when at last he found the publisher caused a small sensation [Music] in Europe a stimulated public eagerly discussed Hobart descriptions of rocket space travel in America the rocket remained the perennial pyrotechnic every fourth of July yet one man working a quiet lifetime in self-imposed isolation created a whole space rocket technology in 1919 the Smithsonian Institution published a report the author and obscure New England scientist dr. Robert H Goddard day the Smithsonian houses many of the rocket artifacts of dr. Goddard's career they present a vivid profile of a step-by-step mastery of the theory of rocket propulsion and its practical application the first liquid propellant flown successfully by Goddard the first development liquid cooling for a rocket nozzle the development of fuel pumps the use of vanes in the jet stream coupled with gyroscopes for Direction control all these fundamental technical breakthroughs were dr. Goddard's and his work is embodied in every rocket which has flown since his work was done and in his time like the other pioneers dr. Goddard had his problems with the public and particularly the public press his professorial report somehow electrified the nation's editors at least for a day but within 24 hours common sense prevailed and dr. Goddard received the editorial reprimand reserved for crackpots despite this the idea of rocket travel was infectious the widespread symptoms of the era became apparent even to the editor of The Times people everywhere had rocket fever and out came the fringe area rocket specialists to join the game any number could play in Central Park Prince McCauley case demonstrates his invention and there were Rockets for both propulsion in Europe rocket racecars rocket rail cars rockets for ice boats rockets for gliders through it all aiming toward the true ultimate use of rocket power space flight the pioneers quietly sharpened their skills and tried to explain their accomplishments today accomplishments are explained to a vast space news hungry public we accept space we understand something of the Rockets role and that of the Rockets passenger man but again looking back in the dim recesses of history who was the first man to try for a space flight ah that's right who won who according to ancient accounts this Ming Dynasty astronaut fitted his bamboo spacecraft with all the black powder fire rockets it would hold and when the Rockets were ignited by a platoon of pigtailed technicians one who was converted gloriously on the living to legend in the 1920s one man might have eventually created a real moon vehicle he was persuaded to build one quickly for the movies professor Albert space rocket for the film the girl in the moon while technically accurate was a hardware fantasy it could never have gotten off the ground with typical ingenuity the Pioneers appropriated the movie moon rocket and used it to raise research funds and on both sides of the Atlantic the store of rocket knowledge grew in America the young men of the American rocket Society built and flew liquid propellant rockets in Germany the Society for space travel attracted the best young development minds in Europe among them a promising student engineer who neglected his classes to work at the grandly named Berlin rocket Airport but with the approach of a second world conflict the rocket once again went to war chosen to head the vast research and development project was the youthful burner von Braun an early start support by the German army and the best rocket technicians the first long-range ballistic rocket weapon came into being and by 1942 at peenemünde v2 the b2 was still far from perfect but the money and brains expended on its development had elevated rocketry from gadget Ori to Applied Science at the end of the line the collapse of the thousand-year life the acquired German rocket capability could still turn out 900 large rockets a month some of its skilled practitioners were lost but at the request of the United States many v2 engineers chose to work in this country white sands proving grounds they joined with American engineers to resume rocket development but once again in the troubled error of the mid century rocket development meant development of rocket weapons all the rocket scientists held fast nevertheless to their first faith the rocket for the exploration of space along with the evolution of the missile family the plans were itemized for the eventual and inevitable space project thus when the Russian satellite Sputnik one opened the space-age Explorer one was placed in orbit soon after the conquest of space and begun Saturn followed the necessary space servant of the nation designed to further the most ambitious space programs Saturn was planned built tested at the George C Marshall Space Flight Center and ready for launch in little more than three years but the huge rocket the men who made it and the men who fly Saturn are beholden indebted to those who dreamed of space before them the roster is long at the top of the list the visionaries of old dreamers of a long ago age of wisdom astronomers of the middle ages the enthusiasts of the 19th century the dedicated theoreticians of the 20th century the development teams which brought rocket techniques acquired in another land another time and for other objectives to bear presently on the universal objectives of space exploration for some of the pioneers it is still possible to visit and to marvel at the giant their early efforts helped make possible some have become part of the team now working to create the Saturn family but with sarin and all men who work towards space history begins anew each day the fulfillment of the dreams of centuries is just ahead the great events of history are now visible the space vehicle now joins this history same history new chapter [Music] [Applause] [Music]