By Ta’shun Richardson

SpaceEploration Timeline

1900Although Tsiolkovsky was born more than one hundred years before Sputnik became the first object launched into space, he prepared the way for it and all future space exploration. Tsiolkovsky was a true visionary who theorized many aspects of space travel and rocket propulsion decades ahead of others. Tsiolkovsky also imagined satellites and space stations long before such ideas could actually be implemented

1914Goddard's Rocket Patents U.S. rocket scientist Robert H. Goddard receives two landmark patents for rockets. The first described a multi-stage rocket and the second described a rocket fueled with gasoline and liquid nitrous oxide. These two patents would become major milestones in the history of rocketry.

1926By 1926, Goddard had constructed and successfully tested the first rocket using liquid fuel. Indeed, the flight of Goddard’s rocket on March 16, 1926, at Auburn, Massachusetts, was as significant to history as that of the Wright brothers at Kitty Hawk.

1930The  US Navy’s only attempt to launch a liquid fueled rocket from an aircraft carrier. Operation Sandy involved the September 6, 1947 launch of a V-2 rocket from the deck of the USS Midway. A newsreel account of the launch can be viewed online.

1944After two previous failures, Germany successfully launches their V-2 rocket. It is the first man-made object to achieve sub-orbital spaceflight, reaching an altitude of 100 km (62 miles). The V-2 is the progenitor of all modern rockets including the U.S. Apollo program's Saturn V moon rocket.

1961The Redstone rocket launched the first American satellite into orbit. The rocket was developed by a team headed by Dr. Werhner von Braun, who had been working for the U.S. Army at Fort Bliss, Texas. In 1950, the team was transferred to Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Alabama, where the army centered its rocket development activities. The arsenal had been used during World War II to produce various chemical compounds and pyrotechnical devices. Its name referred to the color of the rock and soil in Huntsville

1967

Five Lunar Orbiter missions were launched in 1966 through 1967 with the purpose of mapping the lunar surface before the Apollo landings. All five missions were successful, and 99% of the Moon was photographed with a resolution of 60 m or better. The first three missions were dedicated to imaging 20 potential lunar landing sites, selected based on Earth-based observations. These were flown at low inclination orbits. The fourth and fifth missions were devoted to broader scientific objectives and were flown in high altitude polar orbits. Lunar Orbiter 4 photographed the entire nearside and 95% of the farside, and Lunar Orbiter 5 completed the farside coverage and acquired medium (20 m) and high (2 m) resolution images of 36 pre-selected areas. The images at the top of the page show the Lunar Orbiter spacecraft with the high and medium resolution cameras at the center, and an image of the crater Tycho taken with the Lunar Orbiter 5 medium resolution camera.

1969

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