The Space Race had begun with the 1957 launch of the Soviet satelliteSputnik 1. This came as a shock to the American public, and led to the creation of NASA to expedite existing U.S. space exploration efforts, and place most of them under civilian control. After the successful launch of the Explorer 1 satellite in 1958, manned spaceflight became the next goal.
The program took its name from the wing-footed, fleet god of travel in Roman mythology, and is estimated to have cost $2.24 billion (current prices) and to have involved the work of 2 million people. The astronauts were collectively known as the "Mercury Seven", and each spacecraft was given a name ending with a "7" by its pilot.
After a slow start riddled with humiliating mistakes, the Mercury Project gained popularity, its missions followed by millions on radio and TV around the world. Its success laid the groundwork for Project Gemini, which carried two astronauts in each capsule and perfected space docking maneuvers essential for lunar travel, and the subsequent Apollo Moon-landing program announced a few weeks after the first manned Mercury flight. However, they were unable to beat the Soviet space program to the goal of the first man in space, and emerged from the program still behind the Soviet Union.
Robbert Hutchings Goddard (1882–1945) is considered to be one of the fathers of modern rocket propulsion. A physicist of great insight, Goddard also had a unique genius for invention. By 1926, Goddard had constructed and tested successfully the first rocket using liquid fuel. Indeed, the flight of Goddard's rocket on March 16, 1926, at Auburn, Massachusetts, was a feat as epochal in history as that of the Wright brothers at Kitty Hawk. Yet, it was one of Goddard's "firsts" in the now booming significance of rocket propulsion in the fields of military missilery and the scientific exploration of space. Goddard's work largely anticipated in technical detail the later German V-2 missiles, including gyroscopic control, steering by means of vanes in the jet stream of the rocket motor, gimbal steering, power-driven fuel pumps and other devices. His rocket flight in 1929 carried the first scientific payload, a barometer, and a camera. Goddard developed and demonstrated the basic idea of the "bazooka" two days before the Armistice in 1918 at the Aberdeen Proving Ground. Goddard was the first scientist who not only realized the potentialities of missiles and spaceflight but also contributed directly in bringing them to practical realization. This rare talent in both creative science and practical engineering places Goddard well above the opposite numbers among the European rocket pioneers.
An Atlas V 551 rocket launches from SLC-41, Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, on January 19, 2006, carrying the New Horizons probe, which would visit Pluto on July 14, 2015. It was the first launch with the 551 configuration, its launch augmented by five AerojetAJ-60A solid-rocket motors, providing a total of 2.7 million lb-f of thrust at liftoff. New Horizons would achieve the fastest velocity at launch of any spacecraft, at 58,000 kilometres per hour (36,000 mph). It was the first spacecraft launched directly into a solar escape trajectory.
…that the backup crew of Apollo 11 consisted of Jim Lovell, Bill Anders and Fred Haise, although after Anders announced his intention to retire, Ken Mattingly was also assigned in case the mission was delayed until after Anders had left? The backup crew, with Mattingly replacing Anders, was later assigned to Apollo 13.