In Their Own Words
via history.nasa.gov
Short excerpt below. Read at the original source.
Explorer 1 was big news in 1958. The U.S. reaction to the Soviet Sputnik launches in 1957 had been “hysteria,” according to former NASA Chief Historian Roger D. Launius. “It was a shock,” he wrote, “introducing the average citizen to the space age in a crisis setting.” The very public failure of the next U.S. launch, […]