Keep Watching the Skies!: The Story of Operation Moonwatch and the Dawn of the Space Age 0691128545, 9780691128542

Table of contents :
Dedication
Contents
Acknowledgments
Organizations and People
Introduction: “THEY Said It Couldn’t Be Done!”
1 Cultures of Observation
2 An Astronomical Engineer
3 Wanted: Satellite Spotters
4 Of Spacehounds and Lunartiks
5 Seeing History through a Small Telescope
6 Amateurs Provide Strength on the Bench
7 Moonwatch Grows Up
8 The Legacy of Moonwatch
Explanation of Sources Used
Notes to the Chapters
Index

Citation preview

Kee Wat p chin g the S h kies! j

THE

Kee Wat p chin g the S h kies j!

STO R & TH Y OF OP ERA E DA TI WN OF T ON MOO HE S NWA PAC E AG TCH E

W. P

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PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS PRINCETON AND OXFORD

Cray

Copyright © 2008 by Princeton University Press Published by Princeton University Press, 41 William Street, Princeton, New Jersey 08540 In the United Kingdom: Princeton University Press, 6 Oxford Street, Woodstock, Oxfordshire OX20 1TW All Rights Reserved ISBN: 978-0-691-12854-2 Library of Congress Control Number: 2007941755 British Library Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available This book has been composed in Fournier with Script and Helvetica Neue display Printed on acid-free paper ∞ press.princeton.edu Printed in the United States of America 10 9 8 7 6 5

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To my parents, Bill and Carole McCray, in appreciation of a chemistry set, some binoculars, and— most importantly—the encouragement that came with them.

Contents

Acknowledgments Organizations and People

ix xi

Introduction “THEY Said It Couldn’t Be Done!”

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Chapter 1 Cultures of Observation

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Chapter 2 An Astronomical Engineer

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Chapter 3 Wanted: Satellite Spotters

72

Chapter 4 Of Spacehounds and Lunartiks

93

Chapter 5 Seeing History through a Small Telescope

139

Chapter 6 Amateurs Provide Strength on the Bench

165

Chapter 7 Moonwatch Grows Up

190

Chapter 8 The Legacy of Moonwatch

223

Explanation of Sources Used Notes to the Chapters Index

249 251 293

Acknowledgments

One day in 2002, while I was browsing yet another set of archival boxes, Pamela Henson, a historian at the Smithsonian Institution Archives, asked me if I had heard of Moonwatch. Once I started to look through the collection, I became fascinated with the stories it contained about amateur scientists. As I did the subsequent research for this book, many people and institutions provided invaluable help, guidance, and contributions. At the Smithsonian Archives, Pam Henson as well as Ellen Alers and Tracy Robinson provided excellent assistance as I examined the collections there. Additional archival assistance came from Janice Goldblum (National Academy of Sciences Archive), Brenda Corbin and Gregory Shelton (U.S. Naval Observatory Library), Francisca Ordia and Connie Adams (Boy Scouts of America), Michael Saladyga (American Association of Variable Star Observers), Catherine Zeiser (Millbrook School). The National Science Foundation provided timely assistance in the form of a grant (NSF Award #0323336—“Astronomy during the Cold War”), which the American Institute of Physics and Spencer R. Weart managed. Additional support came from the University of California, Santa Barbara. I was extremely fortunate to have David H. DeVorkin as a collaborator on the larger grant project and benefited from his numerous suggestions. I am especially grateful to David for his insights regarding Fred Whipple’s career and astronomy in the 1950s and 1960s in general. Teasel Muir-Harmony, now a graduate student at Notre Dame University, also provided excellent research assistance. Numerous other colleagues from the history community and my home department at the University of California, Santa Barbara, took the time to share opinions and research materials: Anita Guerrini, Jordan D. Marché, Michael Osborne, Robert W. Smith, Paul Spickard, and Thomas R. Williams. Formal archives did not provide my sole sources of information. Several former Moonwatchers or their families graciously loaned me materials from their personal collections and took the time to answer my queries by phone,

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email, and letter. Without their kind help, this book would be based on much less evidence and be far less interesting. I am especially indebted to John Bartholdi, Jack Borde, Donald Charles, Leo Deming, Russell Eberst, Jeanne Emmons Bishop and the late Richard H. Emmons, Steve Maran, Ted Molczan, Jay Pasachoff, Richard Ditteon, Jane Richardson, Victor Slabinski, Walt Steiger, Thomas Van Flandern, Joel Weisberg, and Babette Whipple, as well as all of the former Moonwatchers who kindly responded to my questions. Ingrid Gnerlich and her colleagues at Princeton University Press provided excellent assistance in bringing this book to completion. Finally, Nicole Archambeau deserves especial recognition for her excellent advice on editing and organization. This book is stronger for Nicole ’s suggestions and I am grateful for her encouragement. Santa Barbara, California

Organizations and People

Abbreviations AAVSO — American Association of Variable Star Observers, based in Cambridge, Massachusetts IGY — International Geophysical Year, which ran from July 1957 to December 1958 NAS — National Academy of Sciences, established in 1863 and headquartered in Washington, D.C. NASA — National Aeronautics and Space Administration, formed in 1958 NSF — National Science Foundation, established in 1950 and located in Washington, D.C. SAO — Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, located in Cambridge, Massachusetts Cast of Characters In Cambridge, Massachusetts James Baker — Astronomer and optical engineer who developed, along with Joseph Nunn, the basic design of the Baker-Nunn camera Leon Campbell, Jr. — Moonwatch’s director from 1956 to 1961 William Hirst — Moonwatch director from 1964 to 1968 J. Allen Hynek — Astronomer and director of the SAO’s satellite tracking program during the IGY Walter Munn — Field representative for the SAO Armand Spitz — Early Moonwatch organizer, science popularizer, and planetarium builder Richard Vanderburgh — Moonwatch director from 1961 to 1964 Albert Werner — Moonwatch director from 1968 until the program’s end in 1975

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Fred Whipple — Astronomer and director of Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory from 1955 to 1973 In Washington, D.C. Lloyd Berkner — Vice-president of the entire International Geophysical Year Leonard Carmichael — Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution Joseph Kaplan — UCLA physicist and chairman of the United States National Committee for the IGY (referred to, in the book, simply as the “National Committee”) Hugh Odishaw — Executive director of the U.S. IGY program who operated out of the National Academy of Sciences S. Paul Kramer — Odishaw’s assistant at the National Academy of Sciences Richard Porter — Electrical engineer for General Electric and chairman of the Technical Panel for the Earth Satellite Program (in the book, the “Satellite Panel”) Homer Newell — Leading scientist for the navy’s Vanguard satellite program Prominent Moonwatchers Bro. Wendell Adams, New Orleans, Louisiana Nunz Addabbo, Terre Haute, Indiana Jack Bartholdi, Albuquerque, New Mexico Jack Borde, Walnut Creek, California Don Charles, Walnut Creek, California Philip del Vecchio, Paterson, New Jersey Sally Dieke, Baltimore, Maryland Russell Eberst, United Kingdom Richard Emmons, North Canton, Ohio Paul Engle, Edinburg, Texas Rodney Faxon, Chicago, Illinois Edward Halbach, Milwaukee, Wisconsin Vioalle Hefferan, Albuquerque, New Mexico Walter Scott Houston, Manhattan, Kansas

Organizations and People

Neale Howard, Milbrook, New York Arthur Leonard, Sacramento, California Stephen Maran, New York, New York Ed Martz, Alamogordo, New Mexico Massasi Miyadi, Tokyo, Japan Ted Molczan, Hamilton, Ontario Miss Charlie Noble, Fort Worth, Texas Jay Pasachoff, New York City Tom Petrie, Cleveland, Ohio Dave Saltus, Arlington, Virginia Jane Shelby, New York City Victor Slabinski, Cleveland, Ohio Geoffrey Taylor, Adelaide, Australia Tom Van Flandern, Cleveland, Ohio Joel Weisberg, Albuquerque, New Mexico Jim Westphal, Tulsa, Oklahoma Donald Zahner, St. Louis, Missouri

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Introduction

“THEY Said It Couldn’t Be Done!”

Vioalle Clark Hefferan returned to her Seventh Street apartment, relieved it was finally Friday. All week long, she had helped students get ready for Bulldog Day, Albuquerque High School’s annual day of homecoming festivities. Although her students’ float, decked out in green and white, did not win any prizes, Hefferan knew that they would forget their disappointment by the time that evening’s football game started. As soon as Vioalle walked in the door, the phone rang. She put down her books and picked up the receiver. An out-of-breath voice exclaimed, “The Russians have launched a satellite!” It was 4:30 p.m. in New Mexico, on October 4, 1957. Only minutes had passed since news of the successful launch had traveled from the Soviet embassy in Washington, D.C., to the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Hefferan’s mystery caller begged her to assemble her team of amateur satellite spotters and be ready to observe Sputnik’s passage in less than an hour. As the sun started to set, Vioalle Hefferan phoned members of Moonwatch team #041 and passed the word. She realized she might not have any takers. Students from Hefferan’s high school astronomy club made up most of her team, and many of them might not want to cancel their dates for that

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Figure I.1. Vioalle Hefferan and her Moonwatch team on the roof of Albuquerque High School, c. 1961.

evening’s festivities (fig. I.1). Within two hours, however, two dozen teens rendezvoused with Hefferan on the fourth-floor roof of Albuquerque High School. The constellation Sagittarius emerged in the twilit sky, hanging between Saturn and the nearly full moon. However, Hefferan’s students weren’t interested in this particular moon. They had their sights set on spotting the earth’s newest satellite, one that no eyes had yet seen in the sky. While they did not know it at the time, amateur scientists around the world, equipped with homebuilt telescopes and ham radio equipment, were the only groups with the capability to spot and track the first satellites that October night. Although teams of engineers were constructing a global system of sophisticated and expensive satellite tracking cameras, this was unfinished. The Soviets’ surprise launch of Sputnik caught these professionally staffed stations, as one Chicago newspaper would chide, “with their telescopes down.”1

Introduction

Hefferan’s team and the dozens of other Moonwatch teams mobilizing around the world that evening stood to make history. As the night chill settled in, her students took their places at observing stations and scanned the skies through telescopes they had helped design and build. Their objective was ambitious. A speeding satellite could cross the face of the full moon in less than a second and traverse an entire continent in minutes. A student was ready at a nearby telephone to relay the team’s data—exactly when and where they spotted the Soviet satellite in the night sky—to scientists who anxiously waited to plot the course of the world’s first satellite. Telescopes pivoted, feet shifted, voices quieted, and eyes strained for a sign that the long-awaited exploration of space had begun.2

Satellites, Science, and the IGY In the weeks that followed, similar scenes repeated at Moonwatch stations all over the globe. Thousands of teenagers, homemakers, longtime amateur astronomers, school teachers, blue-collar workers, and other citizen-scientists took turns scanning the skies in the hopes of spotting one of the first satellites flashing by at 18,000 miles per hour. Despite their all-night vigil, the big prize of being the first team in the United States, perhaps the world, to see Sputnik, eluded Hefferan’s students that night. This was not due to lack of training or effort on their part, however. Predicting the orbits of artificial satellites and locating the actual objects in the wide expanse of sky was as much art and luck as science. Hefferan’s team soon learned that Sputnik wouldn’t be visible over New Mexico for several more days. When it finally did arrive, however, they manned their posts again and won acclaim throughout their school and state for spotting it. The novelty of what flashed and beeped in the October sky in 1957 is hard to appreciate today. As I write this, thousands of objects of varying size are orbiting the earth. Hundreds of these are functioning satellites. These objects girding the globe are critical links in a modern technological and scientific infrastructure that most people reflect on little, if at all.

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Only when a solar flare or technical glitch knocks a satellite out of commission do we realize how our lives tenuously connect to these objects silently speeding overhead. Global positioning tools in our cars and even watches rely on a system of satellites. Weather satellites help meteorologists predict the path of deadly storms giving people days rather than hours to evacuate. Other satellites send music and television shows to people ’s homes. Orbiting platforms with sensitive infrared detectors can spot plumes of hot gases coming from a hostile missile launch while others carry cameras that provide real-time intelligence data. Satellites have revolutionized world communications, provided entertainment for billions, and spawned vast multinational companies—all while knitting the world into a global village. Satellites and orbiting telescopes have also helped revolutionize how science is done. From the first small satellites and solar system probes that helped scientists understand the nature of the earth’s immediate environment to multibillion-dollar space telescopes, scientific instruments freed from landbound confines have provided scientists and ordinary citizens with extraordinary new powers of observation. When the amateur scientists of Moonwatch worked with professional scientists to spot and track the first satellites, they also helped humans move toward a new understanding of how we see ourselves, our planet, and our place in the cosmos. The initial entrée for amateur scientists to take part in this grand adventure came as professional scientists prepared for the International Geophysical Year. The IGY, as it was known in the 1950s, was the most ambitious and complex science project of the twentieth century. Between July 1957 and December 1958, tens of thousands of professional scientists from sixtyseven different nations staffed hundreds of stations around the globe. Together, they researched important topics in fields like geophysics, atmospheric sciences, and oceanography. During the IGY, scientists gained a remarkable new understanding of our planet. For instance, they detected the Van Allen radiation belts around the earth, explored Antarctica, and probed the worldwide system of underwater mountains and ridges to help explain how continents moved. Most stunning of all, though, and what dominated headlines, political debate, and dining room conversation more than anything else during the IGY, was the launch of the world’s first artificial satellites. The ramifications

Introduction

of first one and then several satellites affected national politics, influenced pop culture, and transformed international relations. The IGY provided opportunities not only for Moonwatchers but for amateur scientists of all interests. Ham radio operators, meteor spotters, and weather observers participated in IGY-related activities and stimulated interest among ordinary citizens to explore science ’s seemingly endless frontier. War-surplus equipment, commercially available science kits, and a knack for constructing their own equipment enabled the amateurs’ pursuits. The community of amateur scientists blossomed during the heyday of Operation Moonwatch.* Moonwatch and amateur science were part of the multifaceted bonanza of science popularization that emerged first after the end of World War Two and then again following Sputnik.3 As the public recognized the role of scientists in winning World War Two, the prestige of scientists rose dramatically. “Physical scientists are in vogue these days,” Harper’s commented after the war. “No dinner party is a success without at least one physicist to explain . . . the nature of the new age in which we live.”4 The postwar media consequently depicted scientists as heroic explorers and science as a majestic adventure. The symbols of postwar science were indeed grand. The United States Postal Service memorialized the Hale Telescope, perched high atop Palomar Mountain in southern California, on a postage stamp when it was dedicated in 1948. Beneath its graceful, classically shaped dome, the world’s largest telescope with its massive 200-inch mirror silently collected the universe ’s mysteries. Colorful articles in Time, Collier’s, and Life presented a romantic image of the lone astronomer exploring the universe with this giant new instrument. The public was fascinated by its size and majesty, some believing that its capabilities transcended even science. The president of the Rockefeller Foundation, which had funded the telescope, even described it as an instrument to help heal an ailing world.5 Giant telescopes, powerful atom smashers, nuclear-powered submarines, the structure of DNA, the invention * Throughout its lifetime, the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory gave its amateur satellite tracking program various names including (as this book’s title indicates) Operation Moonwatch as well as Project Moonwatch. For simplicity’s sake, hereafter I refer to it as Moonwatch.

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of the transistor, rockets probing the limits of the earth’s atmosphere—all broached the sublime and thrilled a public eager to understand and embrace the transformative potential of science and technology. What distinguished the citizens around the world who took part in Moonwatch from their curious neighbors was that they were not just passive consumers of science popularization. As dedicated observers, tinkerers, and experimenters, Moonwatchers and other amateur scientists vigorously worked with professional scientists to help produce new scientific knowledge. Moonwatchers were among the most enthusiastic devotees of science and technology in the 1950s. While the first Soviet satellites alarmed many Westerners, Moonwatchers had a different reaction. Their correspondence and newsletters spoke of the great adventure space exploration promised and the broader horizons that beckoned to their children. As one Moonwatcher rhapsodized during the IGY, “One cannot look for very long into the workshop of the Creator without changing his attitude towards life.”6 Before widespread disenchantment with science and technology took hold in the 1960s, launching satellites and exploring space seemed triumphant and glorious endeavors. Moonwatch provided an invitation for amateur scientists and other curious citizens to come along for the ride and actively participate.

What Was Moonwatch? The imminent availability of satellites in 1957 promised scientists new vistas for research. By knowing, with great accuracy and precision, where a satellite was, scientists could learn far more about their planet than earthbound instruments permitted. Orbiting instruments, for example, could reliably send scientists information about cosmic rays and other forms of radiation that the earth’s atmosphere screens out. By sighting the satellite from different points on earth and triangulating the observations, researchers could create a more accurate map of the earth’s surface and the planet’s actual shape. They could study the motion of satellites to understand how the earth’s gravitational field varied with location, such as over the earth’s equatorial bulge. In addition, the orbit of satellites could provide scientists with

Introduction

much more detailed information about the earth’s upper atmosphere, including its density and temperature. While this research might sound mundane today, in 1957 it was basic information essential for any future space exploration by either people or machines. These data were also valuable for national security. The air force, for example, couldn’t accurately launch rockets from Kansas to Kiev if it did not know exactly where on the earth Kiev actually was or how missiles would behave as they zoomed through the earth’s atmosphere. Before orbiting satellites could provide scientists and engineers with this cornucopia of information and applications, they needed to know where the satellites were and how they moved. While today’s modern tracking tools and sophisticated computer programs make this a relatively straightforward and incredibly precise operation, the situation was quite different when Sputnik and its brethren first appeared. Importantly, rocket engine and guidance technologies could not guarantee that the first satellites would go exactly where Soviet or American engineers wanted. A rocket burn of a few extra seconds, for an object moving several thousand miles per hour, could put it in an orbit much different from what engineers initially planned. Once a satellite had been lofted into orbit, it continued to move with stunning speed. A navy scientist in 1956 likened seeing a satellite to catching a glimpse of a golf ball tossed out of a jet plane.7 This created two challenges to people on the ground. One was finding the satellite—under the best of conditions, scientists imagined, it would appear as a faint star—while it moved against the vast celestial tapestry. The second task, after the object had been acquired, was to continue to track it. Once scientists had established the location of the satellite at several points in its orbit, they could use classical physics to calculate its orbit and thus predict when and where the satellite would be in the future. While the first satellites would broadcast radio signals, the first radio tracking systems wouldn’t produce the precision scientists wanted. Moreover, the transmitters themselves were delicate pieces of equipment, powered at first by short-lived batteries and operating in a harsh new environment scientists were just beginning to understand. In contrast, visual sighting and tracking offered scientists and politicians unquestionable proof that an object was indeed in orbit along with a dependable source of information about its position. Even if newfangled radio devices failed, visual satellite

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observations using the tried and true combination of human-eye-plus-telescope could still reveal to scientists many secrets of the earth’s shape and nature of the upper atmosphere. Other than meteors and comets, scientists had never tried to track such fast-moving celestial objects moving so close to earth. A satellite ’s speed varies with its apogee and perigee while its path over the earth’s surface can continually change over time. The orbit of the first Soviet Sputnik, for example, moved slightly to the west with each revolution while the earth itself moved underneath it. All of these variables made tracking the first satellites a major engineering and scientific accomplishment. This is where amateur scientists entered the picture. Moonwatchers, scientists initially thought, would assist professionally staffed (and presumably more reliable) optical and radio tracking stations. At least that was the plan. During the opening weeks of the Space Age, however, Moonwatchers and other amateurs became a much more essential part of the global satellite tracking network. Organized, trained, and geared up when the first Soviet sputniks appeared, these heretofore unknown citizen-scientists made critical contributions in the opening days of the Space Age and contributed to the work of “real” scientists and engineers. Harvard astronomer Fred L. Whipple conceived of Moonwatch when scientists around the world were making plans for the IGY. Whipple was already famous in scientific circles for his study of meteors and comets and for his wartime research on how to defeat enemy radar technology. He quickly transformed the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO), newly moved from Washington, D.C., to Cambridge, Massachusetts, into one of the world’s largest organizations for research in astronomy and space science.8 For years, Whipple had spoken publicly about the transformative potential of satellites and space exploration. In July 1955, when President Eisenhower announced that the United States would launch an artificial satellite during the IGY, the ambitious Whipple was ready. He quickly proposed that his observatory have the responsibility for spotting and tracking the first satellites. Whipple’s bold plan depended on the cooperation and integration of three very different ingredients. First, the SAO would establish a network of a dozen, specially designed cameras that could photograph satellites while simultaneously viewing relatively large swaths of the sky.

Introduction

These would be located all around the globe—Hawaii, Iran, Australia, and South Africa all had one—and staffed by trained technicians. Second, these camera stations would send their information and photographs to the SAO in Cambridge, where experts would crunch the numbers and predict the satellites’ orbits. All of this depended, however, on having a rough idea of where to look in the first place. Enter Moonwatch, the critical third piece of Whipple ’s plan. As Whipple first imagined it, Moonwatchers would perform only a few basic services. During the IGY, amateur volunteers would scan the skies at dusk and dawn, times when satellites are most visible, and send their sightings to the SAO. Serving as a global dragnet for satellites and giving professionally staffed tracking stations a rough estimate of where to start precision tracking, Moonwatchers would provide a valuable service. Amateurs would also maintain so-called death watches when satellites, captured by atmospheric drag and gravity, plunged back to earth. This information could lead, perhaps, to the recovery of satellite fragments while amateurs’ observations could help explain how objects like meteors (and incoming missile warheads) behaved in the upper atmosphere. Whipple and his colleagues did not foresee the public exposure Moonwatch would receive when Sputnik caught the professionally staffed tracking stations and the rest of the world by surprise, nor did they imagine that the program would last for nearly two decades. What Whipple did understand from the outset, however, was that amateur astronomers and other citizens around the world could help gather useful data and actively work with professional scientists. To help organize this immense undertaking, he recruited like-minded optimists: J. Allen Hynek, a professional astronomer from Ohio State University and UFO investigator who coined the term “close encounters of the third kind”; Armand N. Spitz, whose planetariums educated thousands of adults and children about the heavens; and Leon Campbell, Jr., a tireless and kindly science enthusiast well acquainted with the amateur astronomy community. Together, these four men launched Moonwatch in 1956, but only after overcoming several serious hurdles. They had, for example, to convince skeptics in the professional science community and Washington political establishment that amateurs were up to the task. As Whipple recalled, in mild

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language that belies the tensions surrounding the IGY’s satellite program, “Some of my colleagues were convinced that too few amateurs would volunteer, and that those who did would not always perform satisfactorily.”9 Understandably, perhaps, U.S. scientists and politicians were loath to take chances as millions of dollars, professional careers, and national prestige rested on the success of the American satellite effort. Whipple ’s campaign to include amateur scientists in the action was indeed a bold gamble. During the opening months of the Space Age, Moonwatchers around the world proved Whipple’s instincts right. Amateurs exceeded expectations and made a meaningful contribution to one of the largest science enterprises in history. During the opening months of the Space Age, in fact, their services were essential. Using telescopes hand-built or purchased from vendors like Radio Shack, Moonwatchers nightly monitored the skies while radio hams recorded Sputnik’s short-lived radio transmissions. Moonwatchers’ prompt response was due to their extensive training and participation in widely publicized national alerts. This preparation paid off. Within Moonwatch’s first two years, thousands of volunteers at more than two hundred stations worldwide joined the program. During the IGY, Moonwatchers made more than 10,000 satellite observations. As Whipple happily crowed years later to the global community of Moonwatchers, “THEY said it couldn’t be done! THEY said it couldn’t work! . . . And THEY were dead wrong!”10 Moonwatch succeeded for several reasons. Whipple and his SAO colleagues provided invaluable support and encouragement. The best performing teams had skilled and dedicated team leaders, people like Vioalle Hefferan in New Mexico and Richard Emmons in Ohio who organized, trained, and motivated their teams. Moonwatchers actively participated in science, making them more than eyewitnesses to the global satellite craze that exploded with the opening of the Space Age. Regardless of their background— participants came from rural areas and large cities of the United States and dozens of locales around the world—the enthusiasm of Moonwatchers caught the attention of average citizens interested in science and space exploration. Moreover, the thousands of amateur scientists who participated in Moonwatch were not merely passive data collectors. Devoted amateurs refined their equipment, developed new techniques, and formed local and regional networks to communicate their work.

Introduction

The influence of Moonwatch extended beyond the data that amateurs collected and shared. Dozens of teenagers entered science fairs and boasted of their Moonwatch experience when applying for college admission. Moonwatch, and amateur science in general, helped expand the horizons of young amateur scientists and encouraged them to consider professional research in astronomy or other fields. For some participants, Moonwatch helped launch their careers. For others, Moonwatch fulfilled a more personal need by providing an opportunity to study the heavens, learn new skills, and interact with people from their communities. People were proud of their participation. When the Smithsonian discontinued the program in 1975, one longtime Moonwatcher likened his participation to receiving an award for wartime valor. Just as importantly, Moonwatch stimulated interest in science and space among ordinary citizens. Dozens of local newspaper articles featured Moonwatch teams standing vigil in the community. Journalists, especially those in smaller towns, relied on information amateurs provided to help explain satellites and rockets to their eager readers. Moonwatchers, consequently, served not only as amateur scientists and civic-minded volunteers but also as ambassadors for science to their local communities. Through open houses, science fairs, and evening viewing sessions, they presented the significance of the first satellites to intrigued and concerned citizens. Despite experts’ initial claims that Moonwatch could never work, the Smithsonian continued the program long after the IGY ended. After the Eisenhower administration created the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), hundreds of dedicated amateur scientists maintained their participation and helped NASA track satellites. Continuing their tradition of maintaining satellite “deathwatches,” Moonwatchers in Milwaukee had a front-row seat in 1962 when the five-ton satellite Sputnik 4 plunged to its fiery fate. Amateurs’ observations allowed American scientists to recover significant pieces of the debris. During Moonwatch’s twenty years of existence, it helped provide an opportunity for an entire generation of citizen-scientists and space buffs to play a role in the Space Age. Undaunted by its official end in 1975, a small, tight-knit community of satellite watchers continued to observe satellites and is posting their results on the World Wide Web even today.

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Who Was an Amateur Scientist? “Amateur” — the word itself comes from the Latin for “lover.” And, like lovers, amateur scientists varied in intensity and the degree to which they were consumed. A broad continuum of citizens participated in Moonwatch, and a wide array of terms may describe them: dabbler, hobbyist, recreation seeker, devotee, and serious amateur scientist.11 Imprecise and flexible labels challenge our attempts to strictly separate amateur scientists from their professional counterparts. Historians have devoted considerable attention to the study of amateur scientists, their interaction with professional science communities, and the extent of amateur contributions to research. Most of this historiography focuses on the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. 12 This makes sense, as during that time scientists established their professional identities and set boundaries that delineated major research disciplines. By the time of the IGY, the traditional tensions historians have noted between professional scientists and amateurs were generally not an issue. Credentials, institutional affiliation, and access to major equipment and other resources have all offered ways to distinguish amateurs from professional scientists. Commitment and motive for participating in scientific activities also matter. Moonwatch, for example, naturally attracted many people intrigued by its Space Age novelty. Their contributions were indeed often “amateurish.” Quite often a person would read a newspaper article or hear a radio show about Moonwatch or the IGY satellite program and become intrigued, then captivated. But while perhaps not of much use to scientific research, their participation in Moonwatch or other amateur science programs often served valuable civic or educational purposes. Throughout this book, we will see how the amateurs of Moonwatch spanned a continuum of interest, motivation, and ability. Curiosity seekers and joyriders caught up in the IGY’s excitement joined more serious amateur scientists who wanted to help further scientific knowledge. As Moonwatchers, however, all of these people shared the goal of wanting to see satellites, regardless of motive. To achieve this end, amateurs established and followed standards and practices necessary for successful satellite spotting.

Introduction

Many amateurs became part of a larger community that circulated news and technical tips and met with other groups of amateur scientists or interacted with professional scientists. The varied roster of Moonwatch participants makes it clear that the identity of amateur scientists is more nuanced than one might first suspect. Along with high school students and those enthusiasts astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson calls “blue collar intellectuals,” many people with backgrounds in science, engineering, or some other technical area took part in Moonwatch or other amateur IGY activities.13 Therefore, I use “professional scientist” and “amateur scientist”—terms commonly used in the 1950s, while today “citizen scientist” is gaining popularity—with the recognition that the boundaries between them were sometimes indistinct and occasionally overlapped. However, in this book, one characteristic distinguishes the “amateurs” of Moonwatch from professionals. When doing amateur science, they were all unpaid volunteers.14 Instead of a paycheck, fame, or career advancement, remuneration came in the form of pride, peer recognition, the satisfaction of learning new skills, and the feeling that one was contributing, in however seemingly small a way, to the larger edifice of science. While some went on to build careers in science fields, they started as unpaid Moonwatch volunteers.

Discovering Moonwatch’s History Despite its long lifetime and many successes, Moonwatch is almost forgotten today. When television shows and Hollywood movies depict the opening years of the Space Age and the moon race that followed, they rarely take the participation of amateur scientists and other curious citizens into account. In the 1995 Oscar-winning film Apollo 13, the heroes are astronauts and managers at Mission Control. Ordinary citizens are relegated to spectators and passive witnesses. When the National Geographic Society released its television documentary Space Race: The Untold Story in 2006, familiar names like von Braun, Gagarin, and Armstrong once again took center stage.

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The participation of amateur scientists has, until now, been left out of the picture as historians and journalists have largely viewed the IGY and the start of the Space Age from the top down. While prominent scientists and politicians appear here, Moonwatch’s story and that of amateur science in general is history from the bottom up. At its heart, Moonwatch’s success rested not on professional scientists but on ordinary people, some with experience in science and others who brought only their excitement and enthusiasm. Therefore, it is to these previously unexamined lives that we must turn to understand this particular tributary of the scientific enterprise. The exclusion of amateurs is partly due to the vagaries of the historical record. Compared to the archival evidence that informs us about the lives of professional scientists, their communities, and their activities, amateur scientists often leave little behind to record their tinkering and experimenting. Perhaps because they often worked in contented isolation or participated in relatively obscure local clubs, reconstructing the world of modern amateur scientists presents special challenges for the historian. While national newspapers featured comments and stories about professional scientists like Fred Whipple, the lives and labors of amateur scientists were often known only to their local communities and within their own group of like-minded hobbyists. Fortunately—and in comparison to many other amateur science activities from the Sputnik era—a wealth of materials detailing Moonwatch’s history has survived and is accessible to exploration and investigation. Because Whipple and his colleagues at the SAO managed Moonwatch, for instance, letters, reports, and photographs are carefully preserved in dozens of large boxes at the Smithsonian Institution Archives in Washington, D.C. It is not just Moonwatch’s official records—the budget requests, travel invoices, carbon-copied office memos that detail the SAO’s management of amateur scientists—that have been preserved, though. To look only at these would reveal just part of the story and diminish the role of the thousands of Moonwatchers worldwide. Present in these well-cataloged files, many of which have not been examined comprehensively before, are also letters, telegrams, and other correspondence from the global network of Moonwatch team leaders and members. Indicating the pride these teams had in their accomplishments, amateurs also regularly forwarded newspaper clippings, informal newsletters, artwork,

Introduction

and even self-written team histories to the SAO, and the Smithsonian has carefully preserved them. In addition to these official records are the more ephemeral and much harder-to-locate sources that come from the basements and closets of former Moonwatchers. Personal correspondence, photographs, observing logs, and homemade scrapbooks—all of these supplement the documents kept by the Smithsonian and other professional archives. Finally, many people who participated in Moonwatch are still alive. Through email queries, phone calls, and face-to-face meetings, I was fortunate to have been able to interact with dozens of former Moonwatchers, some of whom continue to do amateur science. Their personal recollections and anecdotes complemented and added clarity to the information and stories preserved in the written record while providing fascinating insights into the past worlds of amateur science. This full range of materials has provided a richer picture not only of Moonwatch but also of amateur science and its interaction with the professional science establishment.

Moonwatch’s Importance To explore Moonwatch’s history through these diverse and compelling sources is also to rediscover vanished features of an American society typically seen through Baby Boomers’ nostalgic eyes. Moonwatch existed when the Cold War’s frigid tides surged through the United States. Indeed, like the IGY itself, it was very much a product of Cold War competition and concerns. Americans in the 1950s looked to the skies for many reasons. Hundreds of thousands of American citizens volunteered for the Ground Observer Corps in the 1950s in an effort to spot incoming nuclear-armed Soviet bombers. Coincidentally, reports of UFOs reached an apex in the 1950s, reflecting people’s fears of a surprise Soviet attack. Sputnik and its pulsing “beep-beep” appeared mysterious, suspicious, even frightening to many Americans’ ears. In 1957, there was good reason for these fears as evermore powerful nuclear weapons entered the Soviet and American arsenals. To Western military and political observers, Sputnik’s launch signaled that the Soviets possessed rocket technology sufficient to

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hurl large objects over thousands of miles. The unholy combination of rocket-plus-nuclear-bomb meant that these fearsome weapons could now reach their targets via missiles in minutes, not hours. America’s hope for postwar security was first eroded by the threat of Soviet bombers and then devastated by Sputnik.15 A schedule of Sputnik 2’s overhead passage published by the New York Times in November 1957 gave vivid proof of how quickly disaster could come: “Key West 2:55, Savannah 2:57, Atlantic City 2:59, . . .” The great oceans surrounding North America no longer barred a sudden attack on the U.S. heartland as they once had. Politicians and newspapers even connected Sputnik with a potential Soviet nuclear strike from outer space. As Senator Lyndon Johnson warned, in spite of scientists’ more sober appraisals, “Soon they will be dropping bombs on us from space like kids dropping rocks on cars from an overpass.”16 General anxiety persisted, diluted only somewhat by pride after the United States finally launched its first satellites in 1958. Sputnik did not just stir Americans’ fear of a Soviet-instigated “Pearl Harbor.” The shiny new objects orbiting the earth during the IGY trespassed into a region that, for many, was traditionally sacred and inviolate. Outer space meant celestial space. In Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, for example, a small crowd gathered in front of the Reverend Charles E. Roberts’s small church. They asked the minister to explain Sputnik and what it meant. Why, for example, wouldn’t it collide with angels in the celestial firmament? Roberts calmly assured them that God could take care of his own.17 Fear alone, however, did not shape Moonwatch’s context. More positive forces brought people out of their homes at dusk and dawn to look for satellites. In the 1950s, Americans joined civic and volunteer groups like the Kiwanis or Rotary Clubs in record numbers. Moonwatch presented scienceminded Americans with yet another opportunity to join a local group, express community pride, and participate in civic life, something that Americans valued especially in the 1950s.18 This book shows how Moonwatch ably supported the Smithsonian’s mission, which dated to its founding in the early nineteenth century: “for the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men.” In the United States and abroad, teams organized themselves to do just that. They raised funds from local sponsors, built their own equipment, and learned how to contribute to science in a meaningful way.

Introduction

In the United States and elsewhere, such contributions translated into national prestige and local civic duty. When one Moonwatch leader thanked her group, all of high school age and younger, for their ”contribution to helping the United States,” she also noted that they contributed to “its position as a world leader in Science and progress.”19 Moonwatch provided a way for citizens in the United States as well as overseas to participate in what was a cutting-edge international science project. Near Philadelphia, a sixty-seven-year-old grandmother and schoolteacher organized a Moonwatch team. When a local paper asked her why, she replied: “I wanted to do something practical for the IGY. I felt this was the best way to help.”20 Moonwatch was the IGY’s most successful amateur activity and became the public face of a global satellite tracking network. After the IGY ended, Whipple capitalized on Moonwatch’s popularity and the eventual success of the SAO’s professionally staffed telescope stations to secure a multiyear contract from NASA for satellite tracking. Worth millions of dollars annually, these agreements helped enable Whipple to rapidly expand the SAO’s efforts into promising new areas of research such as space studies, planetary science, and astrophysics. As a result of its successful growth, Whipple ’s observatory attracted prominent scientists (including celebrity-to-be Carl Sagan) and engaged in groundbreaking research. What is the legacy of Moonwatch, and what can its history tell us about the role of amateur scientists today? Moonwatch affected the lives of its participants in ways that cannot be expressed simply by the number of members the program had or how many observations they made. With teams in over two dozen countries during the IGY, Moonwatch helped people recognize the international nature of space research, an important factor at a time of intense Cold War tensions. Moonwatch introduced people to the possibility of careers in science. Viewed more broadly, Moonwatch helped boost science programs at high schools and small colleges throughout the country during the Cold War. This occurred at a time when the United States, in the wake of Sputnik’s shock, frantically revamped science education in a concerted effort to train more scientists and engineers. In 1957, science and technology were seen as means to increase national security, and amateur participation in science was part of this larger national agenda.

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Fifty years ago, Moonwatch provided opportunities for active learning for students and anyone else interested in science and technology. If hands-on education is the key to inspiring a new generation of scientists and engineers, then Moonwatch transcends its place as a curious episode of the early Space Age. Exploring Moonwatch’s history and the hitherto hidden services ordinary citizens performed can provide a valuable lesson about how people’s delight and fascination with science might be fostered once again. But to appreciate the chain of events that made Vioalle Hefferan’s phone ring and compelled her students to go up to their high school’s roof to peer into the sky, we must first return to the 1950s before the world had ever heard of Sputnik. Here, at the dawn of the Space Age, we will see how, in the minds of those who would join Moonwatch, enthusiasm for space exploration and amateur science fused with an imperative for vigilance and civic duty.

1 Cultures of Observation

Imagine it is springtime in 1951 and teenagers, including future Moonwatchers, are going to the movies. They have transformed their dollar bills into tickets, popcorn, and sodas with some change still left. They take their seats with the rest of an expectant and comfortably slumped audience. Together they harbor dreams, nurtured by radio shows and comic books, about space travel and exploring the frontiers of science. The lights dim and the curtain goes up. When RKO pictures released The Thing from Another World in 1951, film critics, a group indifferent if not hostile to the science-fiction genre, praised the movie’s “thrills and chills.”1 Its plot centered around a small band of heroic Americans who barely defeat an alien invasion bent on planetwide destruction and subjugation. One viewer recalled years later that his parents would not let him see it because rumor held the picture was too unsettling for young viewers.2 However, American audiences eager to be distracted from bad news emerging daily from the frontlines of the Cold War turned out in droves and made it a classic sci-fi film. Later that year, another box office success, The Day the Earth Stood Still, introduced viewers to Klaatu, a kindly yet stern visitor from an advanced alien culture. The spaceman brought with him his menacing companion

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robot, which he controlled with a phrase soon repeated by kids everywhere: “Klaatu barada nikto.” With help from the world’s scientists, Klaatu managed to warn politicians and the public against continuing a suicidal nuclear arms race. Both The Thing and The Day the Earth Stood Still became landmark films of the sci-fi genre. Each presented a different perspective on what shocks might come from the sky—devastation or a sign of peace. These movies and dozens more like them, with their high-tech spaceships, aliens from other planets, and powerful scientists, tapped into the psyche and popular culture of the early Cold War. They reflected the public’s intense interest in science and space exploration and stressed the need to maintain vigilance in the hope of spotting unknown, possibly dangerous, objects in the heavens. No doubt some moviegoers heard the final words of The Thing, flashed to all corners of the earth by a frantic reporter, as a call for watchfulness: “Watch the skies. Everywhere. Keep looking. Keep watching the skies!”3 By November 1957, people all over the world watched the skies for the first satellites, which previously existed only in the realm of science fiction movies and stories. In the United States, citizens reacted to these new objects with a bewildering array of feelings shaped by media coverage that interpreted the Sputnik story as a “drama of dream and dread.”4 Awe, paranoia, excitement all blurred together in the national consciousness as Sputnik became a symbol to which both fear or hope were fixed. In the 1950s, a whole host of objects and activities related to science and space exploration—science fiction movies, board games, science kits, television shows, comic books, and pop songs—orbited through the cultural firmament. At the same time, a strong ideology in 1950s America encouraged civic participation and advocated the need to be alert. Government and community groups stressed duck-and-cover drills, bomb shelters, and urban evacuation as keys to national and personal survival. Taken together, these cultural expressions about space, science, and watchfulness helped prime American citizens for Sputnik and the opening of the Space Age. Even as early as 1952, when a Saturday Evening Post cover featured a wide-eyed boy in a space suit boarding an airplane for the first time, the message was clear. People, especially kids, were crazy about space. For some, this childhood interest never waned but matured into a broader interest in science and technology. In the rest of this chapter, we will explore

Cultures of Observation

three communities from the 1950s—space buffs, vigilant and dutiful citizens, and devoted amateur scientists—that provided a reservoir of talent and enthusiasm for Moonwatch to draw upon.

Imagining Space Exploration The Thing ended with a warning for people everywhere to watch the skies. But just what were average citizens in the 1950s expecting to see if they scanned the sky? Many looked for flying saucers, the vehicle of choice for alien visitors to earth in the expanding universe of sci-films. Comics, films, and magazine articles convinced a significant part of the population—despite scientists’ explanations—that flying saucers were regularly observing us while the government covered up the phenomenon.5 When the pulp comic Weird Science appeared on newsstands in the summer of 1950, its cover depicted government officials dismissing UFOs as “utter nonsense” despite saucers shown hovering in the background. Fiction reflected reality, and the air force investigated over 3,400 sightings of UFOs between 1947 to 1955. This number later doubled in the wake of Sputnik. Saucers (and, later, Sputnik) sightings inspired musicians and authors. Take music, for example. In 1947, country singers The Buchanan Brothers released their novelty song “When You See Those Flying Saucers.” Like their earlier hit, a 1946 cover of the Fred Kirby–penned “Atomic Power,” this song tied the new phenomenon to fundamentalist prophecies of Judgment Day. After Sputnik appeared in the world’s skies, other songs on the airwaves echoed the Buchanan Brothers. Just like the music that flowed out of recording studios in the wake of Hiroshima, some of these space and, later, Sputnik-themed tunes reflected a cautious attitude toward technology especially common among some rural Americans.6 Like an earlier song that told of steel-drivin’ John Henry and his battle with a job-stealing, steam-powered machine, many folk and country tunes, circa 1950, expressed an ambivalence toward new machines and gadgets and chronicled the threat these posed to their rural listening audience.

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Space travel, UFOs, and satellites added new gloss to these traditional music themes that country artists refashioned for the Space Age. Most Sputnik songs were goofy ditties. Sixteen-year-old singer Carl Mann put out “Satellite No. 2” in 1958 that had the rockabilly cats doing the “Sputnik hop.”7 Mann, a regular on Tennessee radio stations, got much more airplay later that year with his version of the classic tune “Mona Lisa.” The space-song fad wasn’t limited to white artists. African American blues singer Roosevelt Sykes offered some support for a beleaguered Eisenhower. His 1957 tune “Sputnik Baby” bragged to Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev that American satellites could outperform the Soviets’ hardware. While not as popular as tunes Elvis Presley and Buddy Holly sang that year, jukeboxes and radios helped these early Space Age songs reach listeners beyond the traditional country music audience. If the appeal of musicians like these was perhaps limited to certain audiences, the same cannot be said for the flood of science fiction books and space-oriented comics that flew from American newsstands into the eager hands of teens and adults. Interest in science fiction and its presentation via books and comics was nothing new, of course. For decades, Jules Verne, H. G. Wells, Hugo Gernsback, and a host of lesser known authors helped establish science fiction’s popularity with their novels and pulp magazine stories. As early as 1869, the Atlantic Monthly serialized a story about an orbiting space station constructed from the high-tech material of the time—bricks. The sheer volume of sci-fi stories that were churned out and the vast national audience they reached distinguished the postwar era. Traditional sci-fi comics used voyage-in-space plots with reliable characters like bugeyed aliens and imperialistic space adventurers fighting them with the help of ray guns and comely women. Other publishers pushed the limits of the genre. Consider Entertainment Comics, one of the most popular comic franchises of the early 1950s. Known to fans as EC, the company began to publish science fiction titles like Weird Science and Weird Fantasy. Often presenting intellectual themes with doses of irony and cynicism that appealed to older readers as well as teens, EC comics tackled social issues like nuclear disarmament and racial discrimination. EC comics also attracted major sci-fi writers and published adaptations of soon-to-be classic stories such as Ray Bradbury’s chilling postapocalyptic “There Will Come Soft

Cultures of Observation

Rains.” In the early 1950s, comics reached millions of American kids as over five hundred titles appeared monthly at newsstands. Only a 1954 outcry over comics’ horror and crime-laden content and accompanying congressional hearings caused sales figures to drop. Their vigorous rebound coincided with the formation of Moonwatch teams around the world and the launch of the first satellites. The 1950s were, of course, a golden era for space operas that aired on radio and television. Space-themed television shows, beginning with the 1949 premiere of Captain Video and His Video Rangers, followed the vapor trail left by Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers. These shows became touchstones for millions of American kids and spun off closets full of children’s toys and games. With their melodramatic plots and heroic characters, shows like Captain Video and Tom Corbett, Space Cadet blended technological and military themes and reached millions of homes. In addition to popular comic titles, they formed part of a growing youth culture that featured space exploration and science as central themes. While adults did not always understand kids’ fascination with spacethemed toys and games, they could clearly see a potential profit in them. Boosted by increasingly sophisticated sales techniques that recognized children as a specific market, a cornucopia of material culture appeared that catered to their fascination with space. Every day, millions of kids played with toy ray guns and model rocket ships, joined clubs such as the Space Patrol and followed the Space Ranger code. In 1951, the Gimbel’s department store featured a “Space Cadet Christmas” with Tom Corbett’s ship, the Polaris, as a main attraction. Six thousand kids showed up the first day it opened, many no doubt with parents in tow, purses and wallets in hand.8 In the 1950s, saucer and satellite songs, comic books, and an abundance of space toys manifested the American public’s broad fascination with space exploration and spaceflight. This interest coincided with dramatic shifts in public opinion about the feasibility of travel to outer space.9 While skeptics first snickered at Robert Goddard’s ideas for space exploration, German missile technology exploded the idea that practical (and violent) uses of rockets were only the realm of dreamers and fabulists. In 1949, according to a Gallup poll, only 15 percent of Americans believed people would explore space by the year 2000. By 1955, this number had more than doubled, as some 38 percent of people polled believed humans would reach the moon

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within half a century. During the 1950s, as scientists and the military began to probe the frontiers of our atmosphere, events and ideas converged to convince many Americans that their children, if not themselves, would witness space travel. In October 1951, the Hayden Planetarium at New York City’s Museum of Natural History held the first in a series of symposia devoted to the possibilities and challenges of space travel. Willy Ley, a German émigré and advocate for spaceflight, organized the meeting. Ley had already contributed to the canon of early spaceflight with books like Rockets: The Future of Travel beyond the Stratosphere (written while V-2 rockets pummeled European cities) and the award-winning Conquest of Space published in 1949. Devoted to promoting space exploration, Ley’s opening talk at the New York symposium predicted a coming era of earth-orbiting satellites and space stations. Harvard astronomer Fred Whipple, a specialist on meteors and comets, followed Ley at the podium and talked about the revolutionary science that astronomers could engage in from space. Staff from Collier’s, one of the most widely circulated magazines of the time, attended the symposium and helped publicize it to a wider audience. Collier’s editor had a hunch that spaceflight would make a good story and dispatched Cornelius Ryan to a follow-up symposium held a few weeks later in San Antonio. Ryan, who later wrote The Longest Day, the classic chronicle of D-Day, was initially skeptical about his assignment. Whipple took Ryan out for cocktails and dinner, and famed German rocket scientist Wernher von Braun and Joseph Kaplan, a Hungarian-born physicist from Berkeley, joined them. A passionate all-night discussion ensued and, by the time their drinks were gone, they had sold the journalist on spaceflight. Beginning in March 1952, Collier’s published a series of influential articles that presented the American public with a smorgasbord of information describing the exploration of space. The editors at Collier’s recognized the importance of visual imagery and asked Chesley Bonestell to depict what space travel might look like. An American artist and astronomy buff, Bonestell had previously illustrated Ley’s Conquest of Space and made set designs for sci-fi films. Before their exposure to his images, most Americans interested in space subsisted on a diet of UFO stories and sci-fi movies. Bonestell’s artwork, some of it based on von Braun’s own blueprints, helped Americans visualize outer space. Through a combination of photorealism

Cultures of Observation

and scientific fact, Bonestell made space exploration seem both plausible and awe inspiring. When the first issue hit American newsstands, Bonestell’s evocative image of a massive multistage launch vehicle on its way to an earth orbit graced the cover (which pronounced “Man Will Conquer Space Soon”).10 Inside, readers found articles by von Braun, Whipple, and other noted scientists, all telling readers that space exploration was not just possible but inevitable. The Collier’s series had a tremendous influence on popular perceptions regarding manned space exploration. The magazine reached millions of readers who saw it in doctors’ offices and on newsstands. Speaking appearances by von Braun and Ryan as well as window displays of Bonestell’s artwork in major cities generated waves of publicity. Von Braun’s smooth and persuasive presentations on national television elevated public interest further. Other major popular magazines such as Time and Look copied the Collier’s approach, and Viking Books soon contracted two books based on the series. Ward Kimball, a longtime Disney staff member who had helped animate classics like Pinocchio and Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, read the Collier’s series with enthusiasm. In April 1954, when the final magazine installment appeared, Walt Disney was developing television shows to promote Disneyland, soon to open in Anaheim, California. Disney already had ideas for Adventureland and other parts of the park, but marketing Tomorrowland perplexed Disney until Kimball offered a suggestion. Why not take advantage of the public’s blossoming interest in rockets, satellites, and space exploration? Kimball told Disney, who no doubt was aware of the success enjoyed by space opera shows, “The kids really accept this stuff on space. They really believe it.”11 Caught up in Kimball’s enthusiasm, Disney gave him permission and a large expense account to promote both space exploration and Tomorrowland. On the evening of March 9, 1955, millions of Americans tuned their televisions to “Disneyland” and found the famous film director and animator seated at his office desk holding a sleek model rocket. New discoveries, Disney explained, had brought mankind to the next threshold, the new frontier of interplanetary space. In “Man in Space,” the TV show that followed, Disney introduced space boosters like Ley and von Braun. As consultants on the show’s production, they used their participation to explain the how and why of space travel. Disney’s show ended with a colorful animated

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sequence depicting the flight of a multistage rocket from a Pacific island into space and then back to earth. Some one hundred million Americans watched the show, which ABC rebroadcast two more times. It impressed President Dwight D. Eisenhower so much that he asked Disney for a copy, which he later had screened for Pentagon officials. Millions more visited Disney’s Tomorrowland park after its opening in 1955. At the park’s center towered a massive model of a rocket ship designed by Ley and von Braun. Another “atom-powered” rocket graced the entrance of the popular Rocket to the Moon ride, a trip Disney predicted would soon become routine. Disney went on to repeat his success with other television specials such as “Man and the Moon” and “Mars and Beyond,” the latter broadcast soon after the Soviets launched Sputnik 1. The Collier’s series, Bonestell’s art, and Disney’s films and rides helped convince Americans of the possibility of space exploration. These presentations excited people, stimulated their curiosity, and provided them with depictions of space travel that aimed to be realistic as well as inspiring. Many of the men who eventually became astronauts, for example, later said the Collier’s series and Disney’s television shows helped kindle their interest. The Collier’s series generated tremendous fan mail, especially from high school students, who had followed the series and wanted to become astronauts or learn more about space technology.12 As both an interested observer and a booster who helped stoke public interest in space, Fred Whipple noted in 1956 that “most of the colleagues smiled sagely when I talked about satellites, space stations and trips to the moon. Today the smirks have completely subsided. The teenagers today, indeed, are somewhat disgusted with their elders for being so slow in making space travel a reality.”13 Whipple would happily tap into this enthusiasm when he set out to organize Moonwatch.

Citizen Vigilance In 1952, Millard Caldwell, director of the newly created federal agency charged with civil defense, said that wars were won by “the people of Main

Cultures of Observation

Street.”14 Caldwell urged his fellow citizens to be watchful when the acceleration of the arms race, the histrionics of Senator Joseph McCarthy, and the unmasking of spies who had passed atomic secrets to the Soviets were the stuff of headlines. These events and the other crises and concerns of the Cold War fostered a general climate of hyperawareness in 1950s America.15 Just as children’s television shows portrayed fantasy heroes struggling against aggressive forces of evil, the aliens in movies like The Thing, Invaders from Mars, and other 1950s sci-fi films played on anxieties of a Soviet attack, either overtly with nuclear weapons or by insidious subversion from within. Some Americans feared, even expected, to see formations of Soviet airplanes unleashing nuclear devastation when they looked up. The appearance of Soviet satellites in American skies offered them yet another example of Soviet perfidy and extended the general public’s fear of invasion into outer space. The cover of Red Shadows, a Sputnik-era propaganda tract, even showed a stylized red glow reflected by an orbiting satellite into the shape of a hammer and sickle right in the middle of the United States. Lobby posters for the 1958 movie Spy in the Sky (directed by Billy Wilder’s lesser known brother, W. Lee) were less subtle—Sputnik flies over the United States as a giant eyeball superimposed next to it gazes down. The lurid hook for the film broadcasts that “the Enemy that watches . . . behind the veil of Space!” While melodramatic, the image reflected the concerns of many Americans. When Homer Hickam recounted how Sputnik inspired his amateur rocketry in the best-selling book Rocket Boys, he also remembered how its passage over the United States offended his staunchly conservative father.16 In this climate of hyperawareness, military and civil defense groups inculcated American citizens with the need to be watchful for enemy aircraft that could strike with little warning and devastating consequences. In response, hundreds of thousands of Americans—the patriotic and the paranoid alike—joined the Ground Observer Corps and maintained alertness against a Soviet bomber attack. The corps combined watchfulness with strong elements of civic participation and, in some cases, a fair helping of Cold War suspicion. It also provided a model Fred Whipple considered when he planned the organization and communications network for Moonwatch.17 The air force created the volunteer Ground Observer Corps in June 1950, less than a year after the Soviets exploded their first nuclear weapon. The military ably drew on the fears Pearl Harbor instilled in many Americans,

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a threat that seemed more dire in the 1950s when Soviet bombers could strike well inside America’s coastlines. The Ground Observer Corps increased its vigilance and scope of activities in 1952 with a new initiative dubbed “Operation Skywatch.” When President Truman approved the plan, he articulated a need to maintain a trained volunteer force of Skywatchers. “We will need every minute and every second of warning,” he said, “that our Skywatchers can give us.”18 From 1952 to 1959, U.S. citizens staffed thousands of observations posts spaced several miles apart from one another. Skywatch volunteers trained to recognize the shape of enemy aircraft and scanned the skies twenty-four hours a day. Their defensive perimeter stretched from the California coast to the Canadian border and down the East Coast as far as North Carolina. If a hostile aircraft was sighted—Skywatchers were especially alert for fastmoving multiengine craft—the spotter would notify the nearest Ground Observer Corps “filter center.” These clearinghouses processed the report and, if warranted, passed the alert to fighter jets that could be scrambled on an intercept course. Skywatch existed until advances in radar and the introduction of intercontinental ballistic missiles—the same basic vehicle that also launched satellites—made the program obsolete. The Ground Observer Corps and Operation Skywatch shared similarities with Moonwatch that transcended their monikers. The military conceived the Corps as a way for volunteers to monitor skies for incoming Soviet bombers, while Moonwatch was designed to look for Soviet and American satellites. The two sky-scanning efforts differed markedly, however, in their motivations and goals. While military leaders recruited volunteers to the Ground Observer Corps by appealing to their anxiety and concerns for national security, volunteers joined Moonwatch out of curiosity and enthusiasm for space and science, with vigilance a secondary consideration. The Ground Observer Corps encountered many obstacles as it implemented its volunteer aircraft spotting plan. Fred Whipple and his colleagues at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory would face similar difficulties a few years later as plans for the International Geophysical Year took shape. Recruiting dedicated aircraft spotters was a major challenge. By 1956, when participation in Skywatch peaked, the Ground Observer Corps had enlisted 380,000 volunteers to man some 17,000 posts and three dozen filter centers. However, only about 10 percent of the observation posts could

Cultures of Observation

manage to be on twenty-four-hour alert. Enlistment would spike during times of rising international tension or, more predictably, when school let out for the summer and the warmer weather made observing less arduous. The true test of volunteers’ commitment, as Moonwatch team leaders learned, came when days grew shorter and cold weather set in. Throughout its lifetime, advocates of Operation Skywatch labored to generate interest in the program and overcome public apathy. Operation Skywatch’s leaders had to contend with isolationist tendencies in some parts of the country where inhabitants, because of their geographical isolation, were not at direct risk themselves from a Soviet attack. Professional advertisers lent their skills in promoting Operation Skywatch just as they did for other civil defense efforts in the United States. The Advertising Council, Inc., a nonprofit public service group established during World War Two, prepared posters, radio spots, and other promotional material. Images such as a vulnerable-looking child holding a puppy accompanied slogans such as “Wake up, sign up, look up!” and “Safe because some American looked to the sky!” Celebrity spokespeople like Jack Webb, star of the television hit Dragnet, also urged alertness. Such messages tugged at Americans’ anxiety, curiosity, and civic responsibility. When Moonwatch recruited its volunteers a few years later, some people, primed by this advertising and stirred by their interest in science, joined the program. Once volunteers joined Operation Skywatch, the Ground Observer Corps’ leaders did their utmost to maintain morale and sustain interest. This task was made all the more difficult because no Soviet attack ever materialized. Volunteers grew bored and restless, especially in regions with low air traffic. Some observer posts would not spot a single aircraft in months.19 To help alleviate the monotony, the air force occasionally held practice alerts, sometimes at the national level, to test volunteers and give them an outlet for their enthusiasm and dedication. Volunteer pilots from the Civil Air Patrol, for example, did flyovers for certain regions to provide practice for volunteer Skywatchers. Moonwatch used similar practices. The air force aggressively promoted its citizen aircraft spotters and their contributions through a monthly magazine. With a circulation of about 300,000, The Aircraft Flash endeavored to unite the aircraft observers into a single community. Its articles advised volunteers on how to improve their group’s performance and reminded them of the important national service

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they were providing. Paramilitary uniforms, awards and medals for service, and special visits to military events—including a nuclear weapons test in Nevada—generated enthusiasm and raised the esprit de corps among volunteers. Reading back issues of The Aircraft Flash, one enters a time warp to the heart of the Cold War where paranoia met public participation in sometimes bizarre ways. Magazine covers sported attractive women spotters or military hardware, with photos inside showing fund-raisers, parade floats, and young winners of beauty contests, all sponsored by the Ground Observer Corps. Articles lauded the top observing posts and their tireless patriotic volunteers. Forest service workers in fire towers volunteered, it reported, as did bridge attendants. In North Carolina, wardens “donated” inmates’ time. One person trained the family dog to bark when planes flew overhead, while another spotter owned a goose that could honk a similar alert. Even blind Americans gave their time by working at filter centers or, in some cases, putting their “keen sense of hearing” to work during times of bad weather and poor visibility.20 With so many volunteers organized and scanning the skies, curious sightings increased. In the first two weeks after Operation Skywatch began, volunteers sent in sixty new UFO sightings.21 One New York boy at a “lonely, mountainous post” reported the flight of an “unexpected multi-engine plane.” After fighter jets were scrambled, the pilots identified the aircraft as President Truman’s airplane, the Independence, with Secretary of State Dean Acheson on board. The air force, proud of the boy’s diligence yet embarrassed by the results, treated the boy with a special visit to a local base.22 Operation Skywatch heavily recruited among American teens—nearly a quarter of all volunteers were youths—at a time when American conservatives fretted about juvenile delinquency. Boy Scout and Girl Scout groups found aircraft spotting an attractive hobby, and The Aircraft Flash ran dozens of pieces extolling adolescents who bucked stereotypes of rebellious youth by contributing to national security. As one boy from Pulaski, Tennessee, said, “We are the juveniles who are not delinquent.”23 Moreover, with its focus on rockets, jet airplanes, amateur radio, and other high-tech tools, aircraft spotting—as portrayed in The Aircraft Flash—held special appeal for teenage boys and young men. With no Soviet attack forthcoming, the Ground Observer Corps encouraged members to stay sharp. Volunteers spotted tornadoes, took part in

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charity functions, helped locate downed aircraft, and maintained community watches. In November 1956, The Aircraft Flash presented yet another way for Corps members to earn “distinction and prestige”—they could also spot satellites.24 The possibility of contributing to “one of the greatest adventures of pure science” while keeping an eye out for possible Soviet satellites caught the eye of Rodney J. Faxon in Chicago. An engineer who helped make parking meters, Faxon’s real passion was supervising Charlie Mike Two Five Green, the military’s moniker for his Ground Observer Corps post. For several years, Faxon and his crew watched for suspicious aircraft from the twentyfirst floor of the Edgewater Beach Hotel. Their wide-windowed room, filled with shortwave radio gear, airplane identification charts, and binoculars, once broadcast the radio serial Amos ’n’ Andy. With a spectacular view— Lake Michigan to the east and the Chicago Loop to the south—Faxon and his team stood ready to send a more somber message to civil defense authorities. A local paper described Faxon as “a man who doesn’t sleep much” and a vigilant volunteer who would not quit his civil defense work for even double salary at his regular job.25 The corps recognized his dedication and even selected his station as Post of the Month.26 Faxon’s ability to recruit volunteers was aided by his cordial relation with the hotel’s management, which helped sponsor his post, provided discounted meals, and hosted frequent awards banquets. When Faxon saw an article in The Aircraft Flash (fig. 1.1) relating how aircraft spotters could also help track American and Soviet satellites, he quickly recruited a Moonwatch team from his Ground Observer Corps roster.27 Donations from local sponsors went toward radio equipment and telescopes. Lacking a strong science background, Faxon and his group attended astronomy talks at the nearby Adler Planetarium. However, despite their training and time spent monitoring the skies for Soviet bombers, when the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory roused Faxon’s group the night of October 4, 1957, the Soviets’ surprise launch caught Faxon’s team—like the rest of the United States—unprepared.

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Figure 1.1. Cover of the June 1957 issue of The Aircraft Flash.

Cultures of Observation

Devotees, Dabblers, and Tinkerers Not all people looking up at the skies in the 1950s were teenaged space fans or patriotic aircraft spotters. When Sputnik appeared in the October sky, it also flew over space buffs, science enthusiasts, and amateur experimenters all pursuing their own hobbies and obsessions. When the time came, Fred Whipple drew upon their eagerness to recruit volunteers for Moonwatch. Enthusiasts, including many teens and young adults, read about science, saw it depicted in movies and television shows, and bought toys and hobby kits with science themes. Enabled by increasingly sophisticated equipment, amateur scientists pursued their interests in geology, meteorology, rockets, and astronomy with zeal. Like automobile tailfins and hula hoops, the resurgence of hobbyist scientists reflected America’s postwar economic prosperity. Budding investigators used their disposable income to buy telescopes, ham radio gear, and other instruments manufactured by one of the many companies that sprang up in the 1950s. The growth of amateur science in the 1950s signaled the broader interest of Americans for science and technology. Science ’s dark side also tempered their fascination. In an era of thermonuclear weapons, scientists could be security risks as well as security blankets. The unmasking of atom spies like Klaus Fuchs cast scientists, especially those with access to classified information, in a suspicious light. Stereotypes of scientists as sorcerers, monsters, or spies filled B-movies and comic books of the 1950s.28 Whatever their concerns, lingering or otherwise, the average U.S. citizen nonetheless believed science and technology contributed to the nation’s security, economy, and health. Consequently, before the Soviets launched Sputnik, 83 percent of Americans thought “the world is better off due to science.” Even more people believed that scientists wanted to “work on things that will make life better for the average person.”29 Some Americans translated their beliefs and interests into action. They did not want to just read about science and see it portrayed on the silver screen—they wanted to participate. Clair L. Strong was one of the people who helped bring amateur participation in science to a wider audience. Born in Iowa some five decades before Sputnik, Strong’s interest in amateur science and experimentation

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was inspired by the sight of a steam-driven threshing machine that passed by the family farm when he was a child. “I couldn’t rest until I built a steam engine. Then I got interested in chemistry. . . . Tinkering with both things and words, I was bound to write a column.”30 An electrical engineer by training, Strong used his widely read monthly articles in Scientific American to present information for folks wanting to do amateur investigations in astronomy, genetics, geology, seismology, meteorology, radio propagation analyses, and even particle physics. In 1955, Strong contacted the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), the organization charged with coordinating U.S. activities for the IGY. Strong wanted to know how his readers could contribute to the IGY’s global research enterprise. According to Strong, letting this vast army of amateurs get “in on the act” would, at the very least, help strengthen “the layman’s enthusiasm for the aims of science . . . a consequence of no mean public relations value to science.”31 Some 50,000 people, he told the academy, read his amateur science column every month. Twice that number of people around the world made “an avocation of one or another aspect of science.” This group—he characterized them as “Introverts. Compulsive tinkerers. They relax by doing, not talking”—included some 6,000 weather observers, 10,000 variable star watchers, and 30,000 amateur radio enthusiasts.32 And these were just the devotees who actively did science on a regular basis. If Strong counted the teens who joined high school science clubs, the space buffs, and the regular readers of magazines like Popular Science, the number grew substantially. After Sputnik, for instance, Strong revised his estimate upward to some half a million regularly active amateurs in the United States alone.33 Despite Strong’s contention that the enthusiasm and organization of amateurs would more than compensate for any shortcomings in their training and equipment, the most august body of American scientists responded coolly to Strong’s overture. By the time two Soviet satellites circled the planet, however, the disinterested—sometimes even dismissive—attitude of many professional scientists had begun to change. While the distinction between professional and amateur scientist was relatively easy to make by the 1950s, the amateur astronomy community was anything but homogeneous. Some people turned to astronomy for relaxation, others for education. Others were attracted by the camaraderie

Cultures of Observation

of telescope making or the solitude of looking upward on a crisp winter night. Serious amateurs honed their skills to the point where they could occasionally rival their professional counterparts. Clyde Tombaugh, for example, landed a job at the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona, after high school. In 1930, Tombaugh was searching for the mysterious “Planet X” that astronomers’ calculations said should exist yet they could not find. A skilled photographer who had a penchant for perfection but no college degree, Tombaugh found what an eleven-year-old British schoolgirl later christened Pluto. While Tombaugh’s achievement brought him international renown, thousands of other amateurs experimented and observed in happy obscurity. Richard H. Emmons is a classic example of a person passionate about science who became a longtime member of Moonwatch.34 Emmons’s career as an amateur combined years of experience watching the night sky with skill and dedication as a teacher. His experiences also help illustrate the opportunities and challenges amateur astronomers had before Sputnik. Emmons was born in May 1919 in Canton, Ohio, on the same day that British astronomers made observations confirming Einstein’s theory of general relativity. At thirteen, Emmons was reading Popular Science on his family’s front porch when he came across an article about a giant asteroid that had recently passed close to earth. The idea that something from so far away could have such dire consequences and yet be observed by people such as himself hooked the young boy. Emmons devoured everything he could find on science, especially astronomy, starting with a book from the family library called The Science History of the Universe. The young Ohioan even queried Albert Einstein in 1935 about whether other planets supported life. Einstein replied (in German) that such ideas were beyond the current realm of knowledge but not impossible. That the world’s most famous scientist wrote back to Emmons was news itself in his hometown. Emmons’s father, a respected local attorney, encouraged his son with a small refractor telescope from Sears that he bought for thirty dollars, a good deal of money during the Depression. Emmons first used it on the night of July 25, 1932, to observe, as he recorded in his notebook, the bright star Arcturus and then Saturn and the waning quarter moon. By the time he turned sixteen, Emmons had become the local authority on matters astronomical.

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He wrote a monthly column on astronomy for the local paper and spoke on radio stations (fig. 1.2). In one broadcast, Emmons gave an evocative minute-by-minute account of a lunar eclipse visible over North America in 1937. A few days later, the teenage amateur scientists was delighted to hear a hitchhiker he had picked up tell him all about the fabulous description of the eclipse he had recently heard from “one of the world’s great scientists.” While Emmons kept his identity secret from the hitchhiker, he discovered that the roots of Americans’ interest in astronomy went deep. As early as the nineteenth century, journalists publicized the discovery of new celestial objects such as a great comet that blazed across the sky in February 1843. Its appearance heralded a wave of observatory building that surged across the country.35 Having an impressive telescope became a standard by which communities and colleges judged themselves, an asset comparable to museums, orchestra halls, and the like. Communities and individual philanthropists competed for glory, prestige, and cultural distinction by funding observatories and telescopes. As Emmons realized, the public could demonstrate more than a passing interest in astronomy if properly encouraged. In the 1950s, local communities repeated this pattern as they strived to field Moonwatch teams, a competition driven in part by their enthusiasm for science and a mania for all things Space Age. Meanwhile, within the broader amateur astronomy community, club members squabbled over whether they should focus on recreational observing or serious scientific work. Geographic distance foiled attempts to unite local clubs, so regional groups formed, some obtaining a critical mass of members and interest, others dying out. Adding to this complexity, hundreds of “lone wolfs” (due to location or temperament) eschewed organized groups. Moonwatch provided an opportunity to unite these disparate groups into a single network working toward a common purpose. By the time he was a sophomore at Kent State University, Emmons had outgrown his first telescope. Using money earned from his newspaper column and local speaking engagements, he bought a thirteen-inch piece of thick glass and started fashioning it into what would become one of many hand-built telescopes. In doing this, Emmons engaged in an activity especially popular among science enthusiasts at the time. Between the 1920s and the start of World War Two, thousands of people built their own telescopes.

Cultures of Observation

Figure 1.2. Richard H. Emmons as a young man, in 1934, holding the first check he received from giving an astronomy lecture.

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This telescope making movement started in earnest in 1923. Albert G. Ingalls was a new writer for Scientific American at the time. While visiting the New York Public Library, he happened across an astronomy magazine with an article about amateur telescope making. Captivated, Ingalls decided to promote the principles of telescope making in his magazine column, which he eventually called “The Amateur Scientist.”36 The articles Ingalls wrote struck a resonant chord among amateur scientists across the country. After his first column appeared in November 1925, more than a thousand readers wrote to Scientific American for more information. Those with patience and modest technical skill learned to grind and polish their own telescope mirrors. In turn, many of these enthusiasts started telescope-making clubs across the United States. Ingalls’s columns formed the basis for successful books on telescope building and inspired a generation of do-it-yourself investigators. For three decades, Ingalls’s columns appeared in Scientific American, and, after his retirement in 1955, Clair Strong took over authorship of “The Amateur Scientist.” In 1938, Emmons finished his new telescope—one of over seventy he made during his life—with its hand-polished thirteen-inch mirror. The administration of Kent State University permitted him to put the telescope (at the time, the third largest in the state) on the campus’s front lawn. Emmons used it to augment public lectures and demonstrations for students and townspeople. Astronomy and telescope making also figured in Emmons’s personal life. He met his wife, Phyllis, in high school after she passed him a note asking where in the sky she could find Saturn (fig. 1.3). The two became close friends and he helped her polish the mirror for her first small telescope. After he and Phyllis wed in 1940, they moved to Los Angeles, where Emmons completed his bachelor’s degree at the University of Southern California. While he finished his education, he worked as a flight test engineer after the navy turned down his application for a commission. One of his favorite professors at USC was Stanislaw Ulam, who spent some time at USC in 1945. The two men occasionally met for coffee, and Emmons recalled that the Polish mathematician invited him to Los Alamos in New Mexico. It was only a few months after Hiroshima, and Emmons, uncomfortable about leaving his family for research Ulam could not fully divulge, declined the offer.

Cultures of Observation

Figure 1.3. Emmons and his wife, Phyllis, visiting Allegheny Observatory in Pittsburgh.

Instead, Emmons returned to Canton, Ohio, where he taught physics and astronomy courses. He also started an astronomy club (fig. 1.4) and helped its members make dozens of telescopes which they used to explore the night skies. In 1949, eager to expand the educational possibilities amateur astronomy offered, Emmons took some of his students on a field trip to the Buhl Planetarium in nearby Pittsburgh. The trip inspired Emmons to build a small planetarium at home. While unaware of it at the time, Emmons joined a larger movement underway in the United States. In the 1950s, Spitz Laboratories, owned by science popularizer Armand N. Spitz, sold scores of

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Figure 1.4. One of Emmons’s students posing with her homemade telescope.

relatively inexpensive pinhole planetaria to schools and colleges around the United States.37 The company became the largest manufacturer of planetaria, and its success brought Spitz renown among amateur scientists. Emmons, who later met Spitz, constructed his “star ball” in similar fashion. He took a globe of the earth and drilled it with hundreds of carefully placed holes. The holes represented the pattern of stars in the night sky and

Cultures of Observation

were joined by larger ones he could partially mask with tape as needed to project lunar phases, planets, and the like. A bulb inside the globe provided light for projecting images, and Emmons set his homemade planetarium on a motorized mount. In the first six months of operation, over 1,500 students from nearby high schools and colleges attended his presentations. The homemade instrument also became the basis for Emmons’ graduate research on the educational and outreach possibilities such small planetaria enabled. In the mid-1950s, Emmons, now an engineer for Goodyear Aerospace, moved his homemade planetarium to the “Star Barn.” This was what townspeople called the garage behind Emmons’s house, which he formally christened as the North Canton Planetarium (fig. 1.5). Although the Star Barn—a wood-fired stove warmed it on winter nights—could seat only about three dozen people at a time, he entertained and educated thousands of visitors over the next several years. Guests were often greeted by Phyllis, and, with his two children helping out, he used the planetarium to explain physics, mathematics, navigation, and even mythology. Richard Emmons was just one of thousands of devotees in the United States who read about science and space travel and translated their interests into action. Like Emmons, many amateurs wanted to do more than simply marvel at the night sky. They became skilled observers, gave public lectures, built equipment, and in some cases made genuine scientific contributions. Either as solo observers or as club members, these people transcended being labeled as mere telescope makers or casual nighttime sky watchers. After 1945, astronomy clubs formed all over the United States at an increasing rate, spurred in part by new companies that made telescopes and other gear for the amateur scientist. By the time the Soviets launched Sputnik, there were over two hundred clubs nationwide. These groups popularized astronomy and became centers of science for recreational as well as serious observers. Like space exploration and aircraft spotting, amateur science activities held a special attraction for children and teenagers. Before the surprise of Sputnik, toy and instrument companies produced a wide range of science kits and science-related “toys” that helped stimulate scientific curiosity among children. For example, Alfred C. Gilbert, famed as the inventor of the Erector Set, added chemistry sets and an “Atomic Energy Lab” to his product line.38 These products introduced science to youngsters as something

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Figure 1.5. Grade-school children inside Emmons’s “Star Barn” in North Canton, Ohio.

fun and entertaining rather than a tiresome school subject. Other companies followed Gilbert into this market. In 1954, after a Chicago company announced a new line of science kits, a spokesperson from the Department of Commerce commented that such products, by stimulating children’s interest, might even aid “preservation of our freedoms.”39 In other words, a lot was riding on that chemistry set or small telescope waiting under the Christmas tree.

Cultures of Observation

The new medium of television, as Disney discovered, also helped children make the connection between amateur science and entertainment. Beginning in 1951, NBC broadcast Watch Mr. Wizard. It starred Don Herbert, a former bomber pilot whom the New York Times called a “television Einstein.”40 Herbert’s experiments, many of which could be repeated at home, explained basic scientific principles to young viewers and their parents. Herbert’s formula worked, as over 100,000 kids applied for membership in one of the 5,000 Mr. Wizard Science Clubs that sprang up in North America. The fact that his “assistants” were precocious children added to the show’s long-lived popularity. That Mr. Wizard had such an appeal for kids and teens was no surprise for people like Richard Emmons and Vioalle Hefferan. At the Albuquerque High School, for example, where Hefferan’s Moonwatch team worked, the science club was already a quarter-century old when Sputnik appeared. The club started in 1933 when Eldred “Doc” Harrington, a former student (class of 1920) turned teacher, conducted “a damned interesting chemistry experiment.”41 He told a few students about it, and soon a dozen or more volunteers started showing up for “Harrington’s Dawn Patrol.” Over the next two decades, Harrington’s informal program graduated over four hundred alumni, dozens of whom later earned undergraduate and advanced degrees. Other high school science clubs devoted to astronomy, rocket building, or engineering did likewise, demonstrating that science was not just knowledge passively learned from books but an activity in which they could actively take part. Midcentury science fiction reflected the pleasures and profits to be gained from teenaged amateur science. Consider the words of Delos D. Harriman, the entrepreneur-hero in Robert A. Heinlein’s 1940 story “Requiem” who helped pioneer space travel. “I wasn’t unusual,” Heinlein’s character says. “There were lots of boys like me—radio hams they were, and telescope builders, and airplane amateurs. We had science clubs, and basement laboratories, and science-fiction leagues—the kind of boys who thought there was more romance in one issue of Electrical Experimenter than in all the books Dumas ever wrote.”42 Heinlein’s story handily connected the future exploration of the space frontier with basement chemistry experiments and the backyard telescopes. Teens in the 1950s who grew up with Buck Rogers, Flash Gordon, Captain Video, and other space serials also saw how sci-fi films gave scientists—even

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amateur ones—central roles in their plots. Captain Video, for instance, was a science whiz from the twenty-first century whose talents were closely matched by his evil adversaries. Science and technology, as the show demonstrated with its fantastical devices such as atomic rifles and the “Opticon Scillometer,” offered power to those who understood them. Children could tap into the power that science offered, too. In 1953, film critics panned Invaders from Mars, but today it stands as a classic example of Cold War–era horror. A young amateur scientist named David first spots a flying saucer while studying the constellation Orion with his telescope. His father, a rocket scientist engaged with a secret military project, goes to investigate. What returns home is anything but the loving parent David once knew. As the people around him fall victim to the aliens’ power, the boy is thrust into a nightmare-like world where only his vigilance can save him. Invaders from Mars managed to skillfully, if not always artistically, merge the 1950s flying saucer phenomenon with fears of nuclear weapons and the threat of Martian (i.e., Soviet) infiltrators. In the midst of all this mayhem is a young, persistent (if not somewhat paranoid) scientist-in-training. The plots of The Thing, Invaders from Mars, and similar movies allude to essential elements that Moonwatch drew upon. Civic duty, the virtue of vigilance, intense public interest in science and space, and the long tradition of amateur science in the United States were all strands in the Cold War cultural tapestry of the 1950s. Taken together, they helped create the cloth from which Fred Whipple fashioned Moonwatch. When Whipple and his colleagues began to seek volunteers for Moonwatch, they found a corps of amateur scientists and other citizens—people like Emmons, Faxon, and Hefferan—already “space minded” and eager to participate. Rallying them to a common purpose took months of promotion and demanded the efforts of people who understood amateurs’ potential long before the scientific establishment recognized it. While many professional scientists questioned the abilities of ordinary citizens, one member of their elite circle did not. Fred Whipple believed that this polyglot assortment of teenagers, telescope makers, space buffs, aircraft spotters, amateur sky watchers, and ordinary citizens excited about science could indeed prove the doubters wrong.

2 An Astronomical Engineer

If Fred Whipple had not started Moonwatch, he would have joined it. Like other people around the world who were drawn to the program, Whipple possessed a lifelong fascination for scientific research while also imagining the possibilities futuristic endeavors such as space exploration held. How things worked interested Whipple from a young age. He repaired the family’s Model T and enjoyed Alfred Gilbert’s Erector sets. These childhood hobbies taught Whipple the joy of building things, while improvised chemistry experiments nurtured Whipple’s interest in science. A neighbor’s homemade radio generated enough excitement that he still enthused about it decades later. Science fiction helped round out Whipple’s childhood pastimes. After directing the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO) for almost two decades, Fred L. Whipple (fig. 2.1) reflected on his career as an astronomer. Despite the long list of honors he received, including election to the National Academy of Sciences, recognition for his research from Presidents Truman and Kennedy, and dozens of awards from scientific societies around the world, Whipple hesitated to describe himself as a scientist. “I’m fundamentally,” he told an interviewer, “an engineer at heart.”1 Whipple’s self-description belies the extraordinarily rich contributions he made to science during a career that spanned eight decades. Comets, meteors, planetary astronomy, variable stars, supernovas, radio astronomy,

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Figure 2.1. Photograph of Fred L. Whipple, taken in 1968, in his office at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory.

telescope design—Whipple worked in all these areas. Yet his view of himself as an engineer, someone with an intuitive understanding of how things work and what can be done with them, explains a great deal about Whipple’s career. From his arrival at Harvard University in 1931 to his long tenure as the SAO’s director, Fred Whipple wanted to build. After he became director of

An Astronomical Engineer

the SAO in 1955, Whipple built an astronomical empire by investing the observatory’s resources and reputation into the nascent field of satellite tracking. Research programs he assembled at Harvard earlier in his career provided a template that he used to create a global network of professional and amateur satellite spotters and engineer their support from a diverse set of patrons with divergent goals and needs. In the final tally, Whipple planned his satellite tracking network just as one might design a telescope or rocket motor. Whipple believed in Moonwatch and lobbied for amateur participation, both for its own sake and because it could help generate momentum for his grander ambitions. However, just as engineers can’t always predict how their devices will be used, the amateurs who made up Moonwatch transcended Whipple’s original intentions in ways that impressed and surprised even him.

From Red Oak to the Ivy League Red Oak, Iowa, sits near the banks of the Nishnabotna River, close to the state’s borders with Nebraska and Missouri, and at the intersection of two main roads. The first white settlers established the town around 1850, naming it for the tough trees that grew tall alongside a small creek. It became the seat of Montgomery County, the population of which tripled in the late nineteenth century with the construction of the Burlington Northern Railroad. The railroad brought prosperity in the form of new industries like meat packing, buggy making, and glove manufacturing. By 1900, visitors leaving the train depot could stroll north down a tree-lined street and see the town’s beautiful courthouse with its impressive brick clock tower. The attractive three-story Johnson Hotel and numerous Victorian-era mansions lent respectability and sophistication to the quiet midwestern farming town. Fred Lawrence Whipple was born on November 5, 1906, near Red Oak, where his parents, like many people in Montgomery County, rented a modestsized farm. Like many of their neighbors, the Whipples were devout Presbyterians of English and Scotch-Irish descent. As a student, Whipple did better than the other children of Red Oak. Spelling bees and math contests

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were easy victories for the young boy, and he kept his fascination and facility with numbers throughout his life. Whipple ’s parents gave their son a small telescope, but his primary interest in the device was not looking through it but rather taking it apart to see how it worked. He admired Einstein as a scientist, but the more worldly Thomas Edison seemed the brightest man in the world to the boy, foreshadowing the pragmatic bent Whipple ’s career later displayed. While supportive of their son’s science interests, his parents were more eager to impart religion to him. His father, Harry, was an elder in the local church, and the young Whipple spent most Sundays at Bible school and church services. It took him years to get clear of his religious upbringing, which he saw as antithetical to being a good scientist. When a magazine reporter asked him about his personal beliefs, he went out of the way to stress his “slowly and painfully obtained belief in absolute atheism.” The exploration of space and the discovery of life elsewhere would benefit the world, he once said, by removing beliefs in a “mystic father figure and dogmatic religion.”2 In the winter of 1922, Whipple and his family moved from frigid Iowa to Long Beach, California, a move that delighted his mother, Celeste. Tired of farm living, she believed the Golden State offered her son more opportunities. Whipple loved his new surroundings, especially the ocean. After a year at Occidental College, he transferred to the University of California, Los Angeles. Other than math, tennis was his major interest in college, and Whipple might have pursued it professionally except for a childhood bout of polio that left one leg weak. His choice of a career in astronomy was serendipitous, almost made by default. By his junior year at UCLA, even the advanced math courses bored him. The lab work of physics didn’t appeal to him, and he was too squeamish to pursue a medical career despite his parents’ wishes. Fortunately, Whipple enrolled in an astronomy course in his junior year and he relished it. His taste for science fiction stories, especially the ones that appeared in Hugo Gernsback’s new magazine Astounding Stories, nurtured Whipple ’s attraction to astronomy and space. Armed with a letter of recommendation from his astronomy teacher, he applied for graduate school at Berkeley and started classes there in 1927. A modest fellowship paid his tuition and summers spent working at the

An Astronomical Engineer

family grocery store provided additional income. At Berkeley, Whipple came under the tutelage of Armin O. Leuschner. Leuschner’s research specialty was orbit theory and computing the motions of celestial bodies, especially comets and asteroids. He had built the school’s astronomy program into the largest in the United States at the time and was also well connected in Berkeley’s university administration. Whipple observed Leuschner’s networking skills and developed his own talents for organizing long-term research programs and courting patrons.3 At Berkeley, Whipple also discovered the blossoming field of astrophysics. In the late 1920s, astrophysics was undergoing major changes catalyzed by revolutionary developments in quantum mechanics. Donald H. Menzel was one of the pioneers in American astrophysics, and he taught occasionally at Berkeley. Whipple asked Menzel, who was only five years older, to be his thesis adviser. This fortuitous choice enabled him to receive Menzel’s tutelage on more avant-garde problems in astrophysics work, and the two men became close friends. Meanwhile, Whipple continued working with Leuschner in the more staid field of orbit computation. In fact, as a graduate student, Whipple was one of the first to publish orbital calculations for the newly discovered Pluto.4 Whipple finished his degree in 1931 and had to decide what to do next. The Depression was underway, Whipple was newly married and had a young son, and few people saw astronomy as the path to riches and stability. Menzel put in a good word for Whipple with Harlow Shapley, the wellknown director of the Harvard College Observatory. Shapley, in turn, offered Whipple the opportunity to come to the observatory as a staff member. Whipple believed Harvard, despite its fiercely competitive atmosphere, offered the best opportunities for a young astronomer in those years. For example, the Harvard summer schools that Shapley organized in the 1930s brought together students, newly minted professors, and famous scientists for weeks at a time to discuss research that combined traditional observational astronomy with the latest in theoretical physics.5 Whipple accepted Shapley’s offer, and Menzel joined his friend and former student at Harvard a year later. The two scientists gradually established themselves as an effective and powerful team and their careers closely intertwined in the coming decades. Both Menzel and Whipple became highly esteemed professors in Harvard’s astronomy department and helped revive

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astronomical research at Harvard after it stagnated in the latter years of Shapley’s tenure. When he first arrived at Harvard, Whipple was interested in studying galaxies. Shapley, however, made it clear to Whipple that this was his own territory, so the new hire turned his attention to objects closer to earth. Shapley put Whipple in charge of managing a suite of modest-sized telescopes that Harvard operated at its new Oak Ridge station several miles away from light-polluted Cambridge. Harvard had an established practice of routine observing in which semiskilled telescope operators collected large amounts of data. Teams of women, often underpaid and unacknowledged, analyzed it before passing the results on to “real” scientists, an exploitive system that Whipple disapproved of. Using data collected at Oak Ridge during routine sky patrols, Whipple discovered several new comets as well as an asteroid he named Celestia in honor of his mother. During his first few years at Harvard College Observatory, Whipple also developed new ideas and techniques that later paid off when he decided to start the satellite tracking program. It all began with meteors. Meteors are the small chunks of iron and carbon that we see on a dark night when they plunge into the earth’s atmosphere. Friction with air molecules heats both the meteor and the air surrounding it, forming a plasma of ionized gas. By studying the glowing trail of the meteor and its surrounding plasma, scientists can determine its chemical composition and get insights into the nature of the atmospheric medium through which it travels. In the 1930s, astronomers believed that meteors came from outside the solar system and that understanding their nature and movement better could serve as a way to study interstellar space. Evidence suggested meteors moved, at a speed that made them independent of the sun’s gravitational field, in what scientists call hyperbolic orbits. Having a better understanding of the speed at which meteors moved would help confirm or reject the idea that they originated from deep space. Harlow Shapley also saw meteoritic studies as way to foster interdisciplinary research, an ideal cherished by the heads of the major philanthropic foundations that supported American science before the federal government became its prime patron.6 In late 1930, Harvard College Observatory sponsored an expedition to Arizona to study meteors.7 Meanwhile, Whipple, who by now had considerable interest in these wandering chunks of rock and metal, continued to collect data using two Harvard sky survey cameras located in the Boston

An Astronomical Engineer

area. With improved photographic emulsions and shutter techniques, Whipple’s observations helped him wring useful data from the poor observing conditions around Cambridge. Gradually, scientists in the United States and overseas accepted the interpretation Whipple and his collaborators presented, which said that meteors do not, in fact, have interstellar origins. Instead, their velocities and elliptical orbits place their origins within our own solar system. Scientists, however, remained uncertain about the most basic parameters of the meteors themselves, such as their structure, composition, and even their average size. Whipple’s prewar research on meteors helped cement his reputation as a rising star in the scientific world. However, the origin of meteors held little interest beyond a relatively small community of astronomers and geophysicists. Nevertheless, Whipple recognized that insights gleaned from meteors could also reveal information about the earth’s atmosphere that was otherwise impossible to obtain.8 He began to think about pursuing his research on a grander scale. Whipple envisioned future research stations with specialized instruments placed dozens of miles apart that could study meteors simultaneously from different locations. Realizing this ambition would require lots of money as well as staff and an infrastructure to support it.9 By using meteors as probes, Whipple started his exploration of the earth’s upper atmosphere. After World War Two, government agencies recognized the importance of such research. “Shooting stars,” as Harlow Shapley noted, “perform in that same level of the earth’s atmosphere where the shooting rockets and rocket ships of the future are planning to operate.”10 The government’s interests coincided with Whipple ’s, and he established a broad network of collaborators, amateur scientists, industry contacts, and patrons whom he could draw upon when he engineered his ambitious satellite tracking scheme in the 1950s.

Dr. Comet’s Big Science Historians have long seen World War Two as a watershed period for American scientists. Researchers from disparate fields learned to work together on common projects as they redirected their talents for experiment and

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theory to more practical applications—radar, penicillin, rockets, and, of course, the atomic bomb. Their research, conducted under wartime duress, contributed mightily to the Allied victory. For scientists, the combination of research experience, awareness of military needs, and connections to the political establishment proved a powerful combination. When the war ended, previously apathetic military services had a near-religious conversion to the value of scientific research. As James B. Conant, Harvard’s president and a key figure in the Manhattan Project, saw it, “the Defense Department is now like . . . the man who sprang on his horse and rode off wildly in all directions.”11 After the war, Whipple was one of the wranglers who took control of that horse and led it where he wanted. As the United States edged closer to entering the war, Whipple worked furiously to prepare a summary of meteor research he had done to date. In early 1942, near exhaustion, he completed what became one of his most significant publications. In less than twenty pages, he summarized what years of photographic studies of meteors had revealed about atmospheric densities and temperatures.12 Despite wartime chaos, Whipple ’s article caught the attention of other scientists and the military, and it became the standard work on the topic for some time. Whipple ’s review brought more than professional accolades. It served notice that incoming meteors could perform as effective probes of the atmosphere ’s upper regions. And, by summarizing the state of current knowledge, Whipple positioned himself to solicit postwar funding from patrons he knew would be interested in exploiting the expanding aerial frontier. After finishing his major review article, Whipple put aside astronomical studies and devoted his full attention to research for Harvard’s Radio Research Laboratory. There he helped develop effective countermeasures to German radar technology. In 1942, British bombers were beginning to carry out massive bombing raids deep into German territory, and American air power was gearing up to add to the carnage. One of the most deadly obstacles Allied bomber crews faced was German radar, which could direct enemy fighters and anti-aircraft fire at them. Whipple helped invent “chaff ” (or “window,” as the English called it). Chaff consisted of strips of aluminum foil about ten inches long bent to an L shape by a lawnmower-like blade that Whipple devised. When Allied bombers dispersed bales of chaff

An Astronomical Engineer

over German targets, the metal strips made it difficult for German radar to distinguish real targets from false ones. Consequently, Allied losses of bombers and their crews dropped significantly. For many American scientists, their war-related research helped them realize the practical value of their knowledge and experience. Their experiences also encouraged them to shed reluctance toward accepting federal patronage. Whipple was no exception. As the “chief of chaff,” Whipple served as a key adviser for the Americans’ radar countermeasures program. When the war ended, Whipple returned to Harvard. President Truman recognized the Harvard astronomer’s contributions with a Certificate of Merit, and, after years as an untenured lecturer, the university finally awarded him an appointment as an associate professor in 1946. Intrigued by new research topics like comets, Whipple ’s ambitions spurred him to pursue larger-scale projects in the postwar science boom. Whipple eagerly entered the realm of Big Science—a type of research marked by its expense, its reliance on complex tools and instruments, its use of large teams of researchers and technicians, and, in many cases, its connections to military interests and needs.13 For Whipple, this was a conscious choice. As he once noted, running a small research project didn’t differ much from managing a bigger one, while more ambitious projects held potential for richer scientific payoffs.14 Whipple’s wartime work gave him a better idea of how to manage large projects and stoked his interest in cultivating and collaborating with federal patrons. Whipple, in short, recognized that national security needs could be both translated into and coupled with scientific research agendas. Whipple’s research reputation and his wartime service and contacts earned him seats on several key advisory panels. For example, he was a member of the U.S. National Advisory Committee on Aeronautics, the U.S. Research and Development Board Panel, the Upper Atmosphere Rocket Research Panel, and the vice-president of the American Astronomical Society in the late 1940s. Whipple frequently encountered many of the same scientists and engineers on these various panels, and together they helped decide postwar research priorities and funding allocations. Whipple, in other words, had arrived. After 1945, Whipple focused his general research program on space science, a nascent field of research that probed the upper atmosphere and the

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environment of outer space itself.15 The availability of captured German rockets, improved instruments, and the deep pockets of military patrons eager to learn about rockets and the realm in which they operated helped draw Whipple and many other researchers into space science. In early 1946, for example, Whipple joined a diverse collection of scientists and engineers from universities and military labs who wanted to use rockets to do research high in the earth’s atmosphere.16 For Whipple, getting in situ atmospheric measurements from rockets could serve as a valuable complement to his photographic meteor studies and help refine their accuracy. For the rest of his career, Whipple remained bullish on space exploration and one of the biggest advocates for space-based research, which also stimulated his later enthusiasm for Moonwatch and satellite tracking. Like many of his colleagues, the idea that one day scientists might move beyond shooting rockets high into the atmosphere and eventually make prolonged use of telescopes and other instruments in outer space fascinated Whipple. In numerous articles and public talks, he enthused about the new vistas instruments in space could offer.17 Whipple also speculated about possible problems the space environment might pose for man-made objects. In 1946, RAND, a defense-oriented think tank, prepared a classified report on the possible uses of artificial satellites. The study (fancifully titled “Preliminary Design of an Experimental Earth-Circling Spaceship”) described what an artificial satellite might contribute to meteorology, communications, reconnaissance, and scientific research. But, once orbiting the planet, would meteors damage these new moons? Whipple proposed that future satellites have a thin skin of metal to absorb energy from small meteor impacts.18 Wernher von Braun later incorporated Whipple’s “meteor bumper” into his own designs for space vehicles and, once space travel moved from fantasy to reality, it became standard equipment. Rockets, satellites, space telescopes—all of these captured Whipple’s imagination after the war ended. In the years before Sputnik, he read a good deal of science fiction, especially works by Arthur C. Clarke, an author whose works he admired for their vision and scientific realism. His forays into space science also reignited his love affair with meteors. Whipple saw obvious connections between understanding their behavior and any efforts to launch rockets and satellites high into the atmosphere, into orbit, and eventually into deep space.

An Astronomical Engineer

As the United States and the Soviets settled into the Cold War, rocket scientists and aeronautical engineers eagerly worked to determine how the density and temperature of the earth’s atmosphere changed with altitude. Such seemingly mundane knowledge was crucial for the design and operation of high-performance aircraft and missiles, and meteors could provide important clues. As he later phrased it, meteoritic studies were of “great interest to the military in these present days of extra-atmospheric missiles.”19 Scientists also knew that meteors disturb the ionosphere, the part of the atmosphere that begins around fifty miles in altitude, as they pass through it. Since long-distance communications use radio waves that bounce back and forth between the ionosphere and the ground, scientists were especially keen to better understand atmospheric phenomena. To fully develop the potential of meteoritic studies, Whipple expanded his research efforts. The small patrol cameras he and his team had been using in the Cambridge area would suffice no longer. Armed with new purpose and direction, Whipple set out to engineer a much grander research network that connected directly with rocket research and military needs. He developed the Harvard Meteor Project as “a program of research on the physical nature of the upper atmosphere and on the ballistics of objects moving at extremely high speeds through rarefied air.”20 Whipple ’s skill in engineering and directing it presaged his plans for Moonwatch and the Smithsonian’s global network of satellite tracking stations. In late 1945, Whipple asked the navy’s Bureau of Ordnance for funds to build a system of bigger and better cameras that could precisely photograph fainter flashes from shooting stars. The navy agreed and awarded Whipple $60,000, a very large sum of money for an astronomer to receive before NASA and the National Science Foundation existed. Whipple chose James G. Baker, a recent Harvard graduate, to craft the new cameras. A brilliant optical engineer, Baker would later design the optics for classified reconnaissance programs such as the U-2 spy plane. For Whipple’s project, Baker designed what became known as “SuperSchmidt cameras.” The name came from a telescope design developed by Bernhardt Schmidt, an Estonian optician, in 1931. Schmidt telescopes use a spherically curved mirror with a correcting plate placed in front of it that compensates for optical aberrations. Baker’s Super-Schmidt cameras could image a wide swath of sky at one time, giving Whipple ’s team the chance to

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capture more meteorites in each photograph. Baker’s innovative optical design later served as the basis for the professionally manned satellite tracking cameras Whipple deployed for the IGY. Putting such capable instruments in the cloudy Cambridge area made little sense to Whipple, so he opted instead for the clear skies of New Mexico. He chose a location near Las Cruces and the White Sands Missile Range, where scientists and the military launched rockets carrying scientific payloads. This meant that Whipple’s cameras on the ground and the instruments borne upward by German V-2 and American Aerobee rockets basically looked at the same patches of sky and atmosphere. The navy supported Whipple’s research (he called it “meteor-astroballistics”) until the mid-1950s, when the air force picked up the program.21 Whipple skillfully emphasized certain aspects of the Harvard Meteor Project so as to appeal to particular audiences. He told his navy sponsors, for example, that “meteor-astroballistics” could help scientists understand how objects move through rarefied air at high speeds. He advised a colleague interested in radio-wave propagation that meteor research allowed one to better understand the ionosphere. And to his astronomical colleagues, Whipple stressed its value for better understanding the basic science of meteors.22 Whipple wasn’t being disingenuous, just canny. Many communities shared curiosity about meteors, and Whipple exploited the robust flexibility of his subject to generate and maintain support for his program. His meteor research was, in his mind, “a rare example of astronomical results that can be obtained with the same procedures as those needed by the Services.”23 When he proposed his plans for tracking satellites, Whipple likewise took advantage of the interests of multiple audiences, including amateur scientists. His studies of meteors, meanwhile, did not simply assuage the needs of his military sponsors and fill his Rolodex with the names of well-placed associates. They led, in fact, to Whipple ’s most famous scientific discovery. In the late 1940s, the origin and makeup of comets puzzled astronomers. Most scientists thought comets were basically flying clouds of particles held together by gravity, what they called the “gravel-bank” model. Yet this conceptual picture couldn’t account for a good deal of observational evidence or explain their origin. Why did comets seem to be so fragile, with some breaking up after passing by the sun a few times? And why did their movement and speed change over time?

An Astronomical Engineer

Whipple’s meteor research primed him to develop a more accurate model for the structure of comets. In the late 1940s, he developed a theory to account for the drag effects on meteors as they plunged through increasingly dense air. Specifically, he tried to account for the jetlike action seen as material vaporized from an incoming meteor. He realized that a new model of a comet’s core could explain such effects. In a series of papers and presentations from 1949 to 1951, Whipple proposed that the cores or nuclei of comets are icy conglomerates or, as the press later called them, dirty snowballs.24 Whipple described a comet’s nucleus as having two parts. One part included icy material that burned off in increasing amounts as the comet approached the sun. The other part was small meteoritic particles embedded throughout the ice which were released as the frozen material passed from solid to vapor. Whipple’s model accounted for a whole host of behavior, including the jetlike structure in the region around the comet’s nucleus that can alter the body’s speed and direction. The idea also explained why comets can produce streams of meteors as they approach the earth. Whipple ’s structural model helped solve some basic riddles of comets for scientists and had a marked effect on his career.25 Later seen as one of the most important contributions to solar system science in the twentieth century, Whipple’s articles outlining his comet model became some of the most widely cited papers in the astronomical literature.26 Nicknamed “Dr. Comet,” he parlayed recognition from the science community into more resources for his research programs at Harvard. In 1951, following the publication of his groundbreaking papers on comets, the navy gave Whipple some $100,000 a year for meteor research. More than twenty times the amount typically available to an average astronomer then, Whipple’s windfall equaled about half the budget of Harvard’s observatory and more than a quarter of what astronomers proposed to ask from the newly formed National Science Foundation to support their entire community. Whipple’s extensive extramural grants did not sit well with Harlow Shapley, who held traditional views about how astronomers should fund their research. Many observatory directors of Shapley’s generation had shepherded their institutions through war and economic depression and were cautious about becoming dependent on federal patronage or losing control of their research programs.27 In his third decade as director of the

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Harvard College Observatory, Shapley was skeptical of federal contracts, suspicious about military-sponsored projects, and unhappy over the paucity of resources for “pure” astronomical research unconnected to military or industrial applications.28 Despite Shapley’s tepid support, Whipple’s funding from military sources continued to grow, and soon his meteor project employed almost two dozen people, making it one of the biggest research programs in astronomy at the time.29 Whipple worked to balance his love for scientific research with the management of large-scale projects that allowed him to exploit his administrative skills and contacts. One of his former students recalled that Whipple carefully arranged his schedule to keep afternoons free for research. He reserved a few hours each Friday for dispatching the week’s quota of requisitions with a “rhythmic turning of each page and a rubber stamp of approval at intervals of five seconds.”30 By the early 1950s, Whipple had the experience and tools—impeccable research credentials, generous patrons, and powerful contacts—to support his penchant for ambitious projects. While he worried about “becoming purely an ‘operator,’ ” as he told a friend, he chafed under the limits of Harvard’s astronomy department.31 Ultimately, he wanted freer rein to engineer bigger research endeavors. When scientists announced plans for the International Geophysical Year, Whipple saw the opportunity. If the Americans and Soviets were going to launch the world’s first satellites, someone, he reasoned, would have to track and photograph them.

Composing a “Symphony of Science” The International Geophysical Year (IGY) provided a global stage for the amateur members of Moonwatch, led by Whipple, to make their grand entrance. While Big Science efforts often inspire hyperbolic statements boasting the “biggest this” or the “costliest that,” scientists and journalists were on the mark when they labeled the IGY a “symphony of science” and the “greatest exploratory effort of modern times.”32 It was, quite simply, the largest scientific undertaking ever conceived. Sixty-seven nations took part.

An Astronomical Engineer

Tens of thousands of people—from professional scientists to engineers and dedicated amateurs—at thousands of sites scattered pole to pole studied and surveyed the earth. Oceanographic survey ships, polar research camps, high mountain observatories, backyards, and high school rooftops served as field stations and research laboratories. The IGY’s cost was stunning as well. It cost some $2 billion (about $14 billion in today’s currency), with America’s share fully one quarter of this. And while members of Moonwatch may not have realized it, they too became part of this global enterprise—the tip, as seen from an amateur scientist’s perspective, of a scientific and administrative iceberg. Geophysics includes those sciences that involve the entire planet: its oceans, landmasses, atmosphere, the earth’s actual shape, its magnetic field, and the sun’s effects on the planet. Twice before, in 1882 and again in 1932, scientists and explorers had organized what served as predecessors to the IGY. During these International Polar Years, as they were called, scientists carried out broad research programs that enlisted the cooperative participation of several nations who dispatched expeditions to the polar regions. The studies done on these voyages collected vast amounts of data on the high northern regions. Weather observations, studies of the aurora borealis, and atmospheric research were just a few of the programs scientists undertook in these harsh surroundings. The relatively new innovation of radio enabled scientists to coordinate simultaneous studies across long distances and aided the accomplishments of the Second International Polar Year. In fact, radio propagation studies, which gave scientists a better understanding of how the upper atmosphere behaved, were also estimated to be worth several millions of dollars to communication corporations alone.33 In comparison to the IGY’s complexity and its long-term political and cultural impacts, its origins strike one as modest, perhaps even quaint. On April 5, 1950, a small group of scientists gathered to honor Sydney Chapman, a renowned British geophysicist visiting the United States from Oxford.34 They met at the suburban Maryland home of James A. Van Allen, a thirty-five-year-old physicist who did high-altitude research with rockets and other instruments. Van Allen and his colleagues were joined by Lloyd V. Berkner, an Antarctic explorer and expert on the science of radio communications. After World War Two, Berkner worked at the nexus of scientific research, national

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security, and foreign affairs. A tall, commanding, engineer-turned-science adviser, he was a well-connected and astute power broker who understood how to use committees and organizations to mediate and leverage the needs of scientists with those of the state.35 When the scientists gathered at Van Allen’s home, Berkner suggested to them that the time had come for another International Polar Year. The next one, if tradition held true, would occur fifty years after the last happening— that is, in 1982. However, scientists expected that the eleven-year sunspot cycle would peak in 1957 and 1958. This time of unusually dynamic solar and atmospheric activity would be well worth studying. Moreover, since the end of World War Two, rapidly improving technologies like rockets and radio telescopes offered scientists powerful new tools to study the planet. Berkner had more in mind than scientific benefits as he supported plans for what became the largest international scientific enterprise of the twentieth century. He had recently supervised an influential study of science and foreign affairs for the State Department. Berkner and other scientists attuned to policy issues recognized that the IGY had critical national security and political dimensions. As one well-informed observer remarked, the IGY promised “interesting and exciting” science, but it also served as “an important tool of U.S. foreign policy.”36 The prominence scientists gave to the exploration of the polar regions and the launching of satellites suggests how the IGY’s scientific, diplomatic, and military objectives intertwined. For example, scientists hoped that they would develop a better understanding of the earth’s shape during the IGY. Tracking satellite orbits offered scientists a way to measure the distance between geographic points and ascertain the exact shape of the earth—what researchers call geodesy— more accurately. Whipple, for instance, envisioned a network of professionally staffed satellite tracking stations spaced over the globe that would give scientists an exact prediction of a satellite ’s position. Once scientists knew the exact orbit of a satellite, they could reverse their calculations and work out the distance between the tracking stations spread all over the globe to within thirty feet. Moonwatchers became indirectly entangled in this complex web of foreign relations and broader security objectives. According to the New York Times, amateurs helping spot satellites for the professional tracking stations would contribute to research that had national importance.37 As Life magazine

An Astronomical Engineer

phrased it, in an age of guided missiles that could travel thousands of miles, knowing “the exact distance from, say, Tallahassee to Timbuktu” was vital to national security.38 Underlying the useful applications of satellite-based geodesy was the simple fact that the American IGY satellite program was vital to the larger interests and goals of the Eisenhower administration. As a result, government officials and leading IGY scientists went to tremendous lengths to manage public perception of the satellite program in the United States and abroad.39 After the dinner at Van Allen’s house, Chapman and Berkner, who had personally participated in the Second Polar Year, took the initiative in building a consensus for their plans among the international community of scientists. This was no easy task given the Cold War tensions of the early 1950s, and, consequently, the IGY possessed a prominent political dimension from its very beginning. When scientists responded unenthusiastically to the modest aims of a new Polar Year, Chapman suggested renaming the endeavor the International Geophysical Year to better reflect broader plans for a truly synoptic study of the planet. As a result of Berkner and Chapman’s extensive lobbying and organizing, scientists gathered in July 1953 in Brussels for the first plenary session of the Special Committee for the IGY. This group of scientists—known officially as the Comité de l’Année Géophysique Internationale—was ultimately responsible for planning and coordinating IGY efforts of all participating nations. The committee, with Chapman and Berkner as its president and vice-president, respectively, decreed that the IGY would last for eighteen months, running from July 1, 1957, to December 31, 1958. Scientists chose this window of time because it represented the anticipated peak of the next solar sunspot cycle and offered researchers ample opportunity to study the sun’s effects on the earth. Conspicuously absent from early IGY plans were any concrete proposals to launch artificial satellites. Even as late as March 1954, official U.S. plans for the IGY only included provisions for launching rockets from groundbased and balloon platforms. These efforts would be limited to probing the upper atmosphere, not escaping it. This would soon change as the launching of satellites came to dominate media coverage of the IGY. Despite being a cooperative global enterprise with dozens of participating nations, countries organized and funded their IGY programs in different

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ways. In the United States, the IGY activities of professionals and amateurs alike were organized under the auspices of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS). The Academy, originally formed in 1863 when President Lincoln signed it into existence, had the mandate to “investigate, examine, experiment, and report upon any subject of science or art.” It provided important scientific and technical advice to the federal government and was the most esteemed honorific society for American scientists. In the following paragraphs outlining how scientists and bureaucrats organized the IGY in the United States, I am not trying to merely impress (or bludgeon) the reader with the program’s scale and complexity. Instead, they reflect the complex world of postwar science administration with its networks of interlocked committees, on several of which Fred Whipple served. American funding for the IGY came from Congress and went to the coffers of the National Science Foundation. These funds then flowed through the NAS to the United States National Committee (hereafter, the “National Committee”) for the IGY. The National Committee evaluated the myriad array of proposals that universities, research institutions, and individuals sent to it. It selected worthy ones for funding and oversaw the progress of these projects as part of the overall IGY science program. On top of all this, the National Committee prepared for the expected flood of research data and handled public relations, education, and outreach campaigns. To manage this seemingly Herculean set of labors, the NAS chose Joseph Kaplan, a UCLA physics professor, as the chairman of the National Committee. Meanwhile, Hugh Odishaw, formerly a scientist and administrator from the National Bureau of Standards, and his staff at the NAS handled the day-to-day management of IGY administration for the United States. While the National Committee set the grand strategy of American activities for the IGY, the scale and scope of its research programs necessitated an additional layer of guidance. Attached to the National Committee were a slew of technical panels and working groups covering every important topic in geophysics from aurora studies to seismology. By the time the IGY got underway, some two hundred top American scientists were helping oversee scores of IGY-related research programs. Fred Whipple, as part of this elite corps, served on the most critical and politically sensitive IGY panel. Despite its awkward name, the Technical

An Astronomical Engineer

Panel of the Earth Satellite Program (hereafter, the “Satellite Panel”) oversaw the scientific and engineering aspects of the satellite project, offered input on institutional relations, and informed the public. The fact that this was the only technical panel on which both Joseph Kaplan and Hugh Odishaw took part attested to its importance. When Whipple presented his plans for amateur participation in the IGY, he had first to persuade members of the Satellite Panel that nonprofessional scientists were up to the challenge.

Whipple Makes a Plan On July 29, 1955, James C. Hagerty, President Eisenhower’s press secretary, made front-page headlines around the world when he announced what many leading scientists had expected for months—that the United States would launch the world’s first artificial earth satellite sometime during the IGY. Carefully written press releases from the National Academy stressed the project’s scientific aims, and a statement from Lloyd Berkner compared the possibility of a satellite launch with the Wright brothers’ historic first flight. A more florid editorial effused that when “man talks of artificial satellites and of conquering the immensity of interstellar space, he is transformed into a defiant, creative Prometheus tearing at the chain that binds him to this rock of an earth.”40 The announcement thrilled space and science enthusiasts like Richard Emmons and Vioalle Hefferan who had looked forward to such news for years. Along with tens of thousands of other science enthusiasts around the globe, they followed news about U.S. satellite plans. At a news conference in the White House conference room, Hagerty and a “battery of prominent scientists” high in the ranks of the IGY fielded scores of questions from reporters who wanted all the details about the proposed satellite.41 While more imaginative journalists asked if this was the forerunner of some attempt to reach other planets, practical-minded reporters wanted to know if the satellite would be visible from the ground. For future Moonwatchers, the answer that the “surest and simplest” way of tracking the small satellite would be with telescopes and binoculars aroused interest and speculation.42

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Hagerty’s announcement did not surprise Fred Whipple. Since 1954, he was the only astronomer on a secret committee whose classified purpose was to study how the military might quickly launch a satellite. Project Orbiter, as the effort was known, reflected a growing enthusiasm for artificial satellites among scientists and military leaders who believed one could be launched as early as 1956.43 Whipple provided members of Project Orbiter with technical advice about how a small satellite—the object would be only about twenty inches in diameter and weigh a modest five pounds—could be optically tracked. Even at this early stage, Whipple considered the value of establishing a broad satellite tracking network. His research experience photographing comets and meteors provided him with a precedent to build on, and Whipple began to think that equipment similar to Harvard’s Super-Schmidt meteor cameras could be used for precision satellite photography. When some skeptics questioned whether a telescope on the ground could even see a small satellite passing overhead two hundred miles up, Whipple produced calculations showing that optical tracking could work, especially if the object were painted white or had a reflecting surface.44 However, Whipple had yet to work out how camera operators, even with their specially designed equipment, would know where to look for a satellite in the first place. In this way, the initial spotting of satellites immediately after their launch became one of the major missions that Whipple imagined members of Moonwatch could perform. Though the U.S. Army championed Project Orbiter, it never soared beyond the world of blueprints and classified meetings. In early August, the Eisenhower administration announced that a competing proposal from the navy had edged out the army’s bid. Project Vanguard—a name the navy would later regret—would use a complex three-stage rocket to boost a satellite carrying scientific instruments into orbit. Vanguard would take advantage of electronics miniaturization, a relatively novel technology in 1955, to compress as much scientific capability as possible into the satellite ’s thirtyfour pounds. Due to its extensive experience with upper-atmosphere rocket research, radar, and radio technologies, the Naval Research Laboratory, located on the banks of the Potomac River in southeast Washington, D.C., had responsibility for managing Vanguard. The choice of the navy’s Vanguard project proved to be one of the most controversial decisions of the early Space Age.45 Vanguard had the advantages

An Astronomical Engineer

of a larger and more scientifically valuable payload, something researchers obviously favored, while its unclassified origins in the Naval Research Laboratory avoided any awkwardness that might arise with Orbiter. Some military leaders favored the Vanguard project because they believed it would interfere less with the development of the ICBM programs they valued more. That Wernher von Braun, a former Nazi rocket scientist, championed the Orbiter proposal didn’t improve its attractiveness for some in Eisenhower’s administration. One must remember the broader context of the U.S. selection of Vanguard as well. In the summer of 1955, few imagined that the Soviets would ever beat the United States and launch a satellite first. The broader IGY research program was essentially written by American scientists, and the Soviets did not make a public commitment to a satellite launch until September 1956. Despite Press Secretary Hagerty’s insistence that only “scientific purposes” mattered to the U.S. satellite program, military and national security needs were inextricably entangled with it.46 Nuclear-armed missiles and scientific satellites, of course, rely on the same basic rocket technologies. In the White House, Eisenhower and his advisers hoped that a scientific satellite launched during the IGY for scientific purposes could serve as a stalking horse for future military reconnaissance satellites and enable flyovers of the Soviet Union without causing an international uproar.47 Like the IGY itself, the American satellite program wove together scientific research, technological development, military needs, and diplomatic objectives. Whipple was in the midst of a major career move when the Eisenhower administration revealed its satellite plans. In May 1955, Leonard Carmichael, the secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, presented Whipple as the new director of the SAO.48 Just as important was Carmichael’s news that the observatory would relocate from Washington, D.C., to Cambridge, where it would be affiliated with Harvard University. In time, Whipple ’s decision to accept the director’s office of the SAO would appear a major coup. It eventually placed him at the epicenter of the Cambridge science community, gave him control of the SAO’s research agenda, and enabled him to retain a firm foothold in Harvard’s astronomy program. However, in 1955 one would have been hard pressed to see what advantages Whipple’s move provided him. The Smithsonian’s observatory, when

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it was located in Washington, had a reputation as a third-rate institution. Its small staff used their insignificant budget to maintain a moribund research program almost solely devoted to measuring variations in how much energy the earth received from the sun and whether this affected the terrestrial climate.49 Whipple’s appointment set the stage for a complete revamping of the SAO’s research programs and its rapid elevation to a top-notch research institution. What did Whipple and Harvard hope to gain by association with this lackluster scientific institution? One answer might lie in the nature of Cold War–related research. Whipple had close connections with several classified defense programs and held a top-secret security clearance since at least 1953.50 With Whipple in charge of the SAO and still possessing a Harvard affiliation, the university itself might engage in classified research, something that Harvard’s rules forbade on its campus.51 Whipple had his own reasons for assuming leadership of the Smithsonian’s observatory, and the coming era of satellites was a major one. At Harvard, Whipple was frustrated by resistance he encountered to large projects supported by federal contracts and grants. As the SAO’s director, he would face much less opposition to undertaking increasingly ambitious projects. Whipple’s initial studies for Project Orbiter and emerging plans for launches of Vanguard during the IGY led him to see opportunities in satellite tracking. This mission might offer a springboard for his new observatory to revitalize itself and dramatically expand its influence and its research programs.52 “The satellite and high altitude vehicle approach,” Whipple wrote, could enable “broad studies of a revolutionary sort made by these new techniques.”53 Moreover, the meteor photography program he had nurtured at Harvard, when combined with James Baker’s skill in designing innovative optics for cameras and telescopes, could serve as the basis for capturing satellites on film. Satellite tracking by professionals and amateurs, Whipple imagined, might provide a key component for his goal of building a worldclass research institute. In mid-October 1955, two years before the Soviets launched Sputnik 1, the Satellite Panel held its first meeting in Washington. Richard W. Porter, a senior engineer from General Electric who had helped select the navy’s Vanguard proposal over the army’s Orbiter, served as the group’s chair. The scientists and engineers discussed Vanguard’s scientific objectives. They

An Astronomical Engineer

also debated for which aspects of the satellite program the National Academy was responsible (science instruments and tracking, for instance) and which fell under the purview of the Department of Defense (logistics and launching).54 Tracking future satellites clearly sat on the civilian side of the program, and the group concurred that both radio and optical techniques would be essential. To better understand the optical tracking requirements, Whipple offered to research the issue, especially the question of how telescopes on the ground could spot orbiting satellites, and prepare a report for his colleagues. Today, accurate predictions from the World Wide Web can easily tell us when satellites will pass overhead, and we can go outside with a good chance of spotting one silently speeding past. But, in 1955, people like Whipple were probing the frontiers of what scientists knew. No one knew for sure exactly what such an object orbiting the planet might look like from the ground. Even if highly reflective, sunlight outshines satellites during the day and renders them invisible. However, when the sun sits just below the horizon, the reduced light it gives can still reflect off the metal skin of the satellite. A satellite, therefore, can shine like a star against the sky’s semidark background with a color, as Whipple predicted, “approximately white like sunlight.”55 As is the case today, dusk and dawn presented Moonwatch teams with the best windows of opportunity. How bright would the first satellite be? Whipple ’s calculations suggested that a satellite of the size he expected, when located some two hundred miles away, would appear to an observer on earth comparable at best to a fifthmagnitude star. This is about two and half times as bright as the dimmest star a person can discern in a dark sky. It was quite possible that it would even be dimmer if orbiting farther away. In short, Whipple’s estimates for his hypothetical satellite meant that people on the ground would have their work cut out for them when trying to spot it. Visual tracking, Whipple diplomatically acknowledged, should be done in conjunction with the radio-tracking methods the navy favored. However, the fragile electronic components on an orbiting satellite would be operating in a harsh environment of which little was known. Radio tracking might provide a general location of a satellite, Whipple said, but not a precise one. Moreover, one could not expect the batteries on a satellite to transmit a signal indefinitely.

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Even at this early stage, Whipple envisioned satellite tracking as a global effort, entirely desirable given the “international character of the satellite program.”56 While he never directly acknowledged it, Whipple ’s plan recalled the Smithsonian Institution’s first major project. In 1847, Secretary Joseph Henry requested weather reports from a network of volunteer observers, a task that the Weather Bureau took over when Congress established it in 1870. The global network of field stations for solar research established by Whipple’s predecessor, Charles Greely Abbot, offered an even more relevant historical precedent. From sites on remote mountaintops in places like California, Algeria, and Chile, Smithsonian staff collected data for years about the sun’s influence on the earth’s weather.57 Whipple’s report to the Satellite Panel surprisingly gave amateurs a starring role. Important “preliminary observational data,” he said, “can be obtained by semi-professional and amateur groups.” This included amateur astronomy groups, rocket clubs, and “other groups with considerable membership and some technical background.”58 In Whipple ’s initial plan, amateurs would contribute observations at two key times. Immediately after a country launched a satellite, amateurs would scan the skies and locate it. Once amateur teams had collected enough observations, technicians at the SAO would compute initial estimates for the satellite ’s orbit, and photographic stations operated by trained technicians would take over the tracking. Much later, when a satellite was about to reenter the atmosphere, amateurs would be called upon again—this time to watch for the object’s fiery demise. In Whipple’s original plan, however, professionally staffed stations would do all of the routine tracking duties. Whipple originally estimated that a comprehensive visual tracking program would cost around $4 million, far less than the radio-tracking system for which the navy requested about $7 million. Whipple ’s overall budget included funds for a dozen professionally staffed stations around the planet, a network of amateur groups, and the cost of administering the whole program.59 Of this amount, only a small fraction would go to organizing groups of amateurs and coordinating their activities. Nonetheless, Whipple insisted that amateur teams could make a valuable contribution. Compared to the cost for the sophisticated equipment needed to equip a global network of tracking stations, Whipple promoted the amateur program as a bargain.60

An Astronomical Engineer

Whipple’s idea generated interest among the other members of the Satellite Panel, and they asked him to prepare a formal budget request.61 With the start of the IGY only a year and a half away, Whipple urgently wanted start-up funds to get his optical tracking program underway. The National Academy concurred and, with an initial $50,000, Whipple got to work.62 When the Satellite Panel met again in November 1955, Whipple presented a more detailed description of his optical tracking program, right down to a schematic blueprint (fig. 2.2).63 The diagram reflected not only Whipple ’s careful planning but also his own experience as an engineer of networks and projects. The arrows running back and forth indicated ideal lines of interaction and information dissemination. However, in the hectic, harried opening weeks of the Space Age, the amateur groups, which appear relatively isolated in Whipple’s 1955 drawing, would assume a far more prominent role than anyone imagined. Who did Whipple imagine would be the most likely respondents to his call? Amateur astronomy groups were an obvious candidate. Groups like the American Association of Variable Star Observers and the Astronomical League, “many of whom have attained a high degree of proficiency in the observation of the skies,” had clearly demonstrated their value to professional scientists.64 Participation was not just limited to amateur astronomers, though. Whipple called attention to the “extensive network of the Ground Observer Corps.” While these aircraft spotters did not have “the extended sky watching experience of the bona fide amateur astronomer, the potential usefulness of [them] should not be overlooked.” Even the name Whipple initially gave to his amateur satellite tracking program—the Visual Observer Corps—suggested a close connection between aircraft and satellite spotters in Whipple’s mind. Moonwatch ultimately brought together not just people who were vigilant aircraft spotters or amateur scientists conversant with astronomy and telescopes. All kinds of enthusiasts wanted to participate under the aegis of the Smithsonian Institution, “widely known for its activities in the dissemination of scientific information” and having a long tradition of encouraging amateur participation in science.65 The amateurs taking part in the satellite spotting program would not just provide cheap labor for the professionals. Their activities would also “attract young people of scientific promise” and foster a “spirit of scientific

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PROFESSIONAL ASTRONOMICAL GROUPS

COMPUTING PREDICTIONS

COMMUNICATIONS PRED ICTIONS CENTER

PRESS

NRL RADIO STATION OPTICAL STATION AMATEUR GROUPS RADIO STATION OPTICAL STATION

Figure 2.2. Diagram showing Whipple’s plans for the SAO’s satellite tracking network as presented in November 1955.

cooperation.”66 Even at this early stage, Whipple considered the question of maintaining team morale, something which had bedeviled leaders of the Ground Observer Corps. Details like a rewards and recognition program to recognize outstanding amateur volunteers would help, although Whipple believed that, for most amateurs, “satisfaction of participation in a significant scientific program” would be motivation enough.67 In just a few pages, Whipple laid out the basic organization for what became Moonwatch. His proposal gave amateurs a central role in tracking the world’s first satellites, for only with their contributions would the professionally staffed stations have an informed idea of where and when to look. Knowing teenagers’ intense interest in science and space, he saw Moonwatch as a way of capturing their imagination and “directing their thoughts into scientific channels.”68

An Astronomical Engineer

Nonetheless, when 1956 began, a former truck driver named Elvis Presley commandeered the attention of most American teens and Whipple still faced two main challenges. He had to overcome the objections of skeptics who insisted that relying on amateurs was folly. Translating Whipple ’s grand plan into activity and enthusiasm among amateurs at the local level would be even more formidable. Primed with his belief that informed citizens around the world could organize and train themselves into a corps of satellite spotters, Whipple and his colleagues set out to enlist the disparate cultures of teenage space buffs, aircraft spotters, and amateur scientists for a common cause.

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3 Wanted: Satellite Spotters

Since 1883, when a prosperous engineer donated money for a community telescope to rival those in cities like Boston, Chabot Observatory has drawn amateur astronomers, science buffs, and other curious citizens from the San Francisco area. Anthony Chabot’s subsequent bequest in 1888 gave the observatory a permanent endowment and encouraged it to commission an even grander telescope—a twenty-inch refractor built by the famous instrument firm of Warner & Swasey. From the low hill where the telescope ’s domed enclosure sat, one could see the lights of San Francisco twinkling below. In October 1956, this inspiring vista eluded members of the East Bay Astronomical Association who had convened for their monthly meeting. Overcast skies also spoiled what club members hoped would be grand views of Mars, which was closer to the earth that year than it had been for some time. On a cloudless night, the club’s amateur astronomers would have seen the red planet as a pale ochre disk passing near the constellation Aquarius. Closer inspection might have even revealed tantalizing glimpses of the Martian polar caps and indistinct, random features that Giovanni Schiaparelli dubbed canali in the nineteenth century. While waiting for a break in the clouds, William Greenwood, a local engineer, stepped outside for a smoke only to discover he had left his cigarettes

Wanted: Satellite Spotters

at home. He bummed one from another astronomy enthusiast and the two men discussed the presentation Walter Marion, the observatory’s director, had just given. Marion, a member of the recently formed National Moonwatch Committee, spoke to the group about the Smithsonian’s plans to enlist amateur astronomers to locate satellites for the International Geophysical Year (IGY). Oakland, the men thought, was too far to drive for sky watching at dusk and, especially, at dawn. However, they opted for forming a team closer to their homes in nearby Walnut Creek.1 Twenty-five hundred miles away in Ohio, Richard Emmons organized his own Moonwatch team. That spring, Emmons had read about Fred Whipple’s plan to create a “world-wide corps of sky-watchers” in the popular astronomy magazine Sky & Telescope.2 The article immediately stirred Emmons’s enthusiasm. With some help from colleagues at Goodyear, Emmons began convening meetings of what was then called the Akron-Canton Satellite Tracking Group at his “Star Barn.” Meanwhile, in the city of Paterson, New Jersey, Philip J. Del Vecchio, a middle-aged science enthusiast, asked the Smithsonian for more information about satellite tracking. While possessing little formal education in science, Del Vecchio had studied “astronomy and the various physical sciences” on his own since boyhood.3 For years, he operated a volunteer meteorological station for the U.S. Weather Bureau and participated in his county’s civil defense group. When he learned that he was welcome to help spot satellites for the IGY, Del Vecchio and his teenage son, Robert, decided to participate. The father-son team was already charting and photographing sunspots with competently constructed homemade equipment. They were sure that satellite spotting would be just as engrossing. By the summer of 1957, his Moonwatch team began recruiting members. All across the United States and, later, the world, similar scenes unfolded as word spread about the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory’s (SAO’s) plan to enlist amateurs to spot satellites. Moonwatch—described by dozens of stories in national magazine articles and local newspaper columns—grew in popularity. Fred Whipple had confidently boasted to a colleague that “everybody and his brother” would want to participate in Moonwatch.4 But even Whipple and his fellow enthusiasts at the SAO were unprepared for the tremendous surge of enthusiasm their program generated.

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Whipple Meets the Skeptics Even as amateur scientists like Emmons were organizing local Moonwatch groups, Whipple fought a turf war over who would track the first satellites. Two issues formed the heart of this debate. First, scientists were divided as to whether satellite tracking by radio or visually with binoculars or telescopes would be more reliable. Second, some professional scientists closely associated with the IGY doubted that unpaid amateurs were up to the challenge of spotting the first satellites in an organized fashion. The tremendous technological feat of launching a satellite would be matched by the less heralded task of proving that it indeed had achieved orbit. Rocket technology in the late 1950s was still an imprecise craft, and Soviet and American engineers lacked the ability to completely control the final destination of their projectiles. After flinging an artificial moon into orbit there would come another “consuming and possibly embarrassing question—‘Where’d it go?’ ”5 Failure to find it was the anticlimactic “nightmare fear” that haunted the “most sanguine booster” of space exploration.6 As part of its research and development for the Vanguard project, the Naval Research Laboratory proposed tracking satellites by radio. The system’s name, “Minitrack,” came from its use of a thirteen-ounce transmitter, its small size made possible by American advances in electronics miniaturization.7 By combining a signal source and transmitter with a network of receiving antennae on the ground, engineers expected to be able to locate an orbiting satellite’s position with a fair degree of accuracy. The inclusion of then-novel radio tracking technology in the navy’s proposal for Vanguard in fact contributed to its selection over the Army’s project. Minitrack’s roots traced back to an earlier tracking system the army developed in the 1940s as well as to Cold War naval research into underwater acoustics and submarine detection. John T. Mengle, an expert on rocket tracking at the Naval Research Laboratory, compared Minitrack’s antennae to human ears. Because sound waves arrive at our two ears at slightly different times, we can locate the general location of the sound’s source. In similar fashion, “the listening units of the Minitrack system are pairs of receiving antennae, set a measured distance apart.”8 By comparing the phase of radio

Wanted: Satellite Spotters

waves from the satellite’s transmitter received separately at two locations—a technique known as radio interferometry—technicians could estimate the object’s location. However, scientists needed additional data to get an accurate fix on the satellite. Accomplishing this would be neither easy nor cheap, however. The requirements for Minitrack stations—the United States built fourteen in all— were stringent. Each station had several antennae in addition to buildings for electronics, telemetry, communications, and power. These facilities would sprawl over some two dozen carefully groomed acres. Meanwhile, technical requirements stipulated that the surrounding land not change in elevation significantly for miles in all directions. Each Minitrack station also required isolation from electromagnetic interference caused by power installations and airports. By the time the IGY began in July 1957, the Army Corps of Engineers had started building a network of Minitrack stations. These formed a “picket line” that ran down the East Coast of the United States, over to Havana and Antigua in the Caribbean, and down the western coast of South America. Additional stations appeared near San Diego, at the southern tip of Africa, and in the middle of Australia. Getting permission from these countries required months of concerted diplomatic efforts by the State Department. The cost was just as impressive. In the fall of 1955, the Naval Research Laboratory requested over $7 million for Minitrack and, by the end of the IGY, the program’s cost had more than doubled.9 This included $900,000 for a stylish building in downtown Washington, D.C., and a contract with IBM to use their sophisticated mainframe computers for orbital computations. Radio tracking had some advantages over optical tracking. The technique could, for instance, work at any time, regardless of sky conditions. Moonwatch teams and the SAO’s professionally staffed stations could only spot satellites at dusk and dawn in good weather. However, radio tracking as it existed in the 1950s gave a far less precise location than visually spotting a satellite and then photographing subsequent passages. Even in the 1960s, optical tracking was deemed superior to that era’s electronic sensors.10 Moreover, Minitrack depended on receiving a signal from a relatively fragile piece of electronics that had to endure the shock of launch. Scientists initially estimated that Minitrack had only a 50-50 chance of working. Engineers predicted the battery-powered transmitter on the Vanguard satellite, even if it

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survived the rough passage into orbit, would last less than two weeks.11 Finally, as one member of the Satellite Panel suggested, some citizens would have little faith in information gained from the “occult magic” of radio tracking and telemetry and would believe a satellite was orbiting only after seeing it.12 As novel, even mysterious objects, satellites required pictured proof. Whipple’s staff, after getting suggestions from Boston’s citizens, initially dubbed the observatory’s satellite tracking program “SPOT”—Smithsonian Precision Optical Tracking. As Whipple ’s original proposal for satellite tracking noted, amateur Moonwatch teams would simply provide a precise estimate for a satellite’s location. From that point on, a series of twelve stations around the globe would take over tracking and precision photography duties. At the heart of each of these twelve stations was a special instrument especially designed for the challenging task of capturing images of satellites streaking like bullets across the sky. For starters, the instrument had to be able to point quickly at any patch of the sky. Once aimed in the right direction, it had to be able to see a satellite as far away as 2,000 miles and as small as twenty inches in diameter, the size engineers planned for the first American satellites (Sputnik 1 was a few inches bigger). To complicate matters further, the device needed to steadily follow a satellite ’s movement and record its position and the exact time it was photographed. In the summer of 1955, Whipple discussed the requirements for a remarkable hybrid instrument with James Baker, the engineer who had designed Harvard’s meteor cameras. Baker worked out the complicated optical design for an instrument that combined a wide-field Schmidt telescope with a precision camera. Meanwhile, Whipple consulted Joseph Nunn, an engineer from Pasadena, California, about its mechanical design (fig. 3.1). As a result of this collaboration, these instruments, which formed the core of the SAO’s global network of satellite tracking stations, became known as Baker-Nunn cameras.13 Together, Baker and Nunn created an unprecedented design. After failed attempts and months of work, Baker invented an optics system that could meet the exacting requirements that satellite tracking imposed. Sunlight reflected from an overhead satellite would pass through three twenty-inch corrector lenses made of a special glass that helped correct optical aberrations. The light then hit a thirty-two-inch mirror and reflected to a piece of

Wanted: Satellite Spotters

Figure 3.1. One of the SAO’s Baker-Nunn cameras.

CinemaScope film. At the exact time that the optical system recorded an image of a passing satellite, the camera also photographed a precision crystal clock which noted the event down to the millisecond. Baker’s design could image and photograph an area of the sky as wide as 5 degrees by 30 degrees (for comparison, the full moon covers only about half a degree), enabling technicians to photograph a satellite against the background of stars. For the camera’s movement, Nunn opted for a triaxial mount that enabled the

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twelve-foot-tall instrument to swing swiftly in any direction. Once in place, its motion slowed to match the barely noticeable march of stars across the sky. Each of the twelve Baker-Nunn cameras cost some $100,000. The PerkinElmer Corporation in Connecticut fabricated the optics, and Boller and Chivens, a Pasadena company, built the rest of the camera. In all, Whipple initially estimated that his twelve cameras (plus modest funds for Moonwatch) would cost only about half of what the navy wanted for Minitrack. This included monies for the building and operation of the remote Baker-Nunn stations, the coordination of dozens of Moonwatch teams, and a computation bureau at the SAO in Cambridge to process all the data the tracking stations and amateur teams produced. Whipple’s enterprise employed almost three dozen people in Cambridge alone before the IGY even began. As the program grew increasingly complex and far-flung, Whipple needed someone to manage and coordinate the SAO’s entire satellite tracking program. In late 1955, Whipple lobbied astronomer J. Allen Hynek to accept the mission and, just before New Year’s Eve, telegrammed Hynek: “Money available. Hurray. Use your judgment on publicity.”14 Hynek relocated to Cambridge a few weeks later. Josef Allen Hynek was born in 1910 and died in 1986, years when Halley’s Comet appeared in the night sky. His parents emigrated to the United States from Czechoslovakia and raised their son in Chicago. After getting his bachelor’s degree in 1931 from the University of Chicago, he spent the next four years earning his doctorate while working at Yerkes Observatory. During World War Two, he left his position as professor of astronomy and physics at Ohio State University and helped develop proximity fuse technologies at the Applied Physics Laboratory run by Johns Hopkins University. After the war, Hynek returned to Ohio State and started to do astronomical research using instruments carried aloft by V-2 rockets. Through this work, Hynek became acquainted with Whipple. Hynek recognized the hold that space travel and flying saucers had on the American imagination. In 1948, officials at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, close to where Hynek taught at Ohio State, asked for his input regarding the growing number of flying saucer sightings. Four years later, Hynek got involved more deeply when the air force established Project Blue Book, its long-running UFO investigation program. Despite controversy and ridicule,

Wanted: Satellite Spotters

Hynek called for a more serious and objective study of the UFO phenomenon. His classification system for UFO encounters included “close encounters of the third kind” (a category used when people have a close view of a UFO or its alien occupants), which inspired Steven Spielberg’s 1977 film by that name. Hynek later served as a technical adviser for the movie and even gave a cameo appearance. In 1956, Hynek had far more earthly issues to contend with. Because of the delicate parts that had to survive harsh conditions in remote places, production of the extraordinarily complex Baker-Nunn cameras was proceeding more slowly than the SAO had anticipated. Management of the entire optical tracking program and its sizable budget required Hynek’s full-time attention, and his progress was constantly monitored by scientists on the U.S. National Committee for the IGY and administrators at the Smithsonian Institution. One of the first issues Hynek addressed was where the SAO would establish its Baker-Nunn camera stations. Initially, Whipple and Hynek thought that placing them near Minitrack stations would allow the SAO to save time and money. But the requirements of the satellite tracking cameras—namely, cloudless clear skies—differed from the radio tracking apparatus that could operate in any weather. In addition, the Baker-Nunn cameras performed better at high mountain sites, which were not suitable for Minitrack stations. Over the next eighteen months, Hynek traveled around the world to inspect locales where the SAO had proposed to put the Baker-Nunn cameras. In his regular “Scanning the Skies” columns published in the Columbus Dispatch, he told Ohioans all about his travels (including “celestial sabotage” in which clouds in Iran marred his view of a solar eclipse) as he toured satellite tracking sites from Asia to South America.15 Ultimately, the SAO placed only two Baker-Nunn cameras in the continental United States. One was near Organ Pass, New Mexico, overlooking the White Sands Missile Range, and the other was in Jupiter, Florida, close to where the first U.S. satellites would launch. Another went to the 10,000foot peak of Mount Haleakala on the Hawaiian island of Maui. The SAO scattered the remaining stations all over the planet—Spain, Japan, India, South Africa, Iran, Peru, Argentina, and an island in the Antilles near Venezuela. Only the tracking station located in Woomera, Australia, boasted both Minitrack and Baker-Nunn facilities.

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Popular accounts in newspapers and magazines described the navy’s Minitrack network and the Smithsonian’s optical program as naturally complementary systems—one was the ears while the other provided the eyes.16 However, before the IGY began, advocates for the two programs competed for resources and displayed considerable mistrust of each other. The conflict began in January 1956, when Homer E. Newell circulated a letter to members of the Satellite Panel. A prominent scientist at the Naval Research Laboratory who specialized in upper atmospheric science and astrophysics, Newell agreed with Whipple’s predictions of how bright an orbiting satellite would be and what it would look like to an observer on the ground. The two scientists also concurred that having a visual observing program would complement the Minitrack system. However, Newell took strong exception to the idea that unpaid and presumably untrained amateurs would perform as Whipple predicted. As the navy physicist bluntly said, “Amateur astronomers cannot be expected to serve this purpose satisfactorily.”17 Ironically, the Naval Research Laboratory undercut its own argument about amateurs’ supposed unreliability when it proposed “Project Moonbeam” in which, à la Moonwatch, groups of ham radio operators would listen for satellite transmissions. Newell proposed instead that the IGY program give his lab an additional $530,000 to build five outposts in the western United States that would provide rough orbital data. In other words, instead of relying on the amateur volunteers of Moonwatch, Newell and his colleagues wanted paid and professionally trained visual observers to supplement the navy’s already costly Minitrack system. Newell’s unflattering comments and demand for more funds opened a rift between the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory and the Naval Research Laboratory that never fully closed. Years later, when Moonwatch ended and Whipple recalled how “THEY said it couldn’t be done!” he surely had navy skeptics in mind. The turf war between Whipple and naysayers at the Naval Research Laboratory continued throughout 1956 as scientists there continued to snipe at the SAO’s plans for optically tracking satellites, and especially for enlisting amateurs. John P. Hagen, the lead navy scientist for Vanguard and a radio astronomer by training, said, “Suppose some joker flies a plane up to 60,000 feet and throws out a golf ball. Then the plane vanishes without a trace. Can you find the golf ball? That’s about the task in locating the satellite.”18 Time did

Wanted: Satellite Spotters

not improve Hagen’s view. A decade after Sputnik, he still told interviewers that Whipple’s plan for using amateurs’ eyes and telescopes to spot and track satellites had been unnecessary.19 Whipple courted a certain risk in disagreeing with navy scientists. Although the air force had taken over support of his meteor and astroballistics research in 1954, the navy had generously funded his research for years. Whipple had some $200,000 in contracts and grants from the Department of Defense for 1956 and was obviously cautious about any precipitous move that might burn bridges to future funding.20 Nonetheless, Whipple stuck to his guns. In December 1956, after Whipple and his colleagues had already put considerable effort into organizing Moonwatch, the Naval Research Laboratory again appealed for the creation of its own visual tracking program staffed with paid, trained observers. The Satellite Panel finally ended the debate and the navy’s overt attempts to take over Moonwatch’s mission. William Pickering, director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and a prominent member of the Satellite Panel, pointed out that navy observers receiving paychecks for their work would “adversely affect the morale of the unpaid volunteer observers of Moonwatch.” In fact, if the American IGY program had any additional funds for satellite tracking, these “ought to go into Moonwatch rather than the establishment of a new visual acquisition network.”21 Undoubtedly pleased with the outcome, Whipple assured his colleagues that “amateurs will help dependably at least in the early stages when glamour is new” and tactfully invited navy staff to cooperate with Moonwatch.22 Nevertheless, before Sputnik’s surprise appearance, the SAO still had concerns about Moonwatch’s treatment in the press as disparaging reports came in from the field. These articles suggested that Moonwatch, and optical tracking in general, would prove secondary, even unnecessary, compared to the novel yet unproven methods of radio tracking. After touring Moonwatch stations from Kansas to California, one SAO staffer reported that some amateur groups “are not really sold on this. Much like women, they know they are wanted but don’t feel needed.” Given the navy’s massive investment in Minitrack, some at Whipple’s institution wondered “how much this feeling has penetrated the Moonwatch program as a whole. Maybe [the navy] has undermined morale (innocently of course).”23

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Whipple’s colleagues worked to reassure doubtful members of the fledgling Moonwatch program and bolster morale. Amateur satellite spotters, the SAO insisted, were “vital, of course, because no one will say that Minitrack can be depended upon. . . . The fool-proof system of acquiring the satellite is Moonwatch.”24 Another letter from the SAO assured Walter S. Houston, an English professor and prominent amateur scientist in Kansas, “I’m sure your people are now on fire; Moonwatch IS important, and it can be vital. No one is at all certain Minitrack will function.”25 Houston, in a folksy newsletter sent to local amateur astronomers, captured the feelings of many Moonwatchers during the program’s early months: “Let’s be brutal. Moonwatch never had much love from the professionals. Satellites were going to be a quick ride to glory so why share it with a bunch of amateurs? They would not be needed, electronic stuff was much better. Ha!”26

Enter the Planetarium Man In the months after the United States and the Soviet Union announced plans to launch artificial moons, magazines and newspapers kept readers informed and entertained about the imminent dawning of the Space Age. Whipple, Hynek, and their colleagues did not think they would have to do much to promote amateur satellite spotting: “Virtually every human being with ordinary curiosity and a spark of scientific imagination will want to see the satellites.”27 However, if Moonwatch was going to produce scientifically useful observations and prove skeptics wrong, the thousands of interested amateurs expected to flock to the program needed to properly organize and train themselves. Fred Whipple believed he understood the capabilities of amateur scientists. This explains his willingness to gamble his observatory’s reputation by asking amateurs to help track the first satellites, a task of scientific, as well as cultural and political, importance. However, with regard to amateurs, Whipple was no Pollyanna. He also knew of their limitations and, at times, parochialism. For instance, he had observed with dismay the enmity and disputes among meteorite collectors. Finding the whole group “quarrelsome,”

Wanted: Satellite Spotters

Whipple agreed with a colleague’s assessment that “unadulterated scientific amateurism” hindered the full potential of their contributions.28 Nevertheless, Whipple’s integration of Moonwatch into his satellite tracking scheme makes clear his conviction that properly organized amateurs could rise to the challenge. Part of Whipple’s familiarity with amateur scientists came from his proximity to two entities that had strongly influenced amateur science, especially amateur astronomy.29 For decades, Harvard College Observatory housed the staff and associates of the American Association of Variable Star Observers (AAVSO). The AAVSO began in 1909 when William T. Olcott, a well-to-do Connecticut lawyer with an interest in astronomy, attended a public lecture given by Edward C. Pickering. Pickering, the director of the Harvard College Observatory, told his audience that amateur scientists could make valuable contributions to science. Pickering’s words caught Olcott’s fancy, and he began sending regular observations to Pickering and organizing local enthusiasts. Pickering naturally welcomed the free source of data and encouraged their activities. He donated the time of Leon Campbell, a Harvard astronomer, as well as some office space and modest financial support. In 1919, the group of amateur astronomers, with Campbell now serving as the official recorder of their work, formed the American Association of Variable Star Observers. Within five years, Campbell and other AAVSO members—now numbering several dozen—had recorded over 24,000 observations, raw data that professional astronomers used for their research. Like many other amateur astronomy clubs, the AAVSO claimed a diverse membership. Tradesmen, doctors, housewives, and teachers all formed the AAVSO’s rank and file along with a considerable number of overseas members. Presaging how Moonwatch would function, the AAVSO’s members sent their observations to Cambridge, where professional scientists evaluated and used them. Harvard continued its support for the AAVSO until 1953, when Donald Menzel asked the group to move as part of an overall reorganization of the observatory. After a few years of struggling to survive, the AAVSO rented a small office in Cambridge and set up shop. Although it has since moved to more spacious quarters, it remains one of the most important groups of amateurs doing serious scientific work.

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Sky & Telescope, the most widely read popular astronomy magazine, also called Cambridge home. First appearing on newsstands in November 1941, the magazine was based at Harvard College Observatory on Garden Street in Cambridge during the IGY. It even shared space for a time in the same building where the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory housed the Moonwatch program. Some of the world’s leading scientists (including Whipple) as well as respected amateur astronomers wrote feature articles for it. These presented complex scientific topics in clear language and helped Sky & Telescope reach tens of thousands of readers each month. Readers of Sky & Telescope were certainly intrigued when they learned they would have an opportunity to track an elusive new celestial object. The magazine reported in March 1956 that Whipple had recently spoken to the Institute for Aeronautical Sciences in New York City.30 An accompanying press release for Whipple’s talk announced that amateur sky watchers had “an unparalleled opportunity to be of significance to science” during the IGY.31 Amateur scientists and other interested citizens responded immediately. Stacks of letters seeking more information, for example, showed up at the AAVSO’s cramped headquarters on Brattle Street in Cambridge. A letter from an Iowan teenager, typical of the correspondence the AAVSO received, boasted: “I have a 12-inch, F/8 Newtonian reflector that is equatorially mounted. . . . I would use this instrument to its fullest advantage in observing the Earth Satellite when it is launched.”32 Whipple ’s own office received many similar letters. The strong positive public response to Whipple’s revelation of opportunities for amateur satellite spotters encouraged the SAO to promote the program at the grassroots level. This required guidance from someone known to amateur scientists and astronomy enthusiasts. In February 1956, Whipple and Hynek hired Armand N. Spitz to help coordinate what the SAO was still simply calling the “visual observing program.” Born in Philadelphia in 1904, Spitz worked there as a journalist in the 1920s.33 After his newspaper collapsed in 1932, Spitz hopped aboard a freighter determined to try something new. While crossing the Atlantic, a ship’s officer introduced the young man to celestial navigation and helped him build some basic instruments to reckon his position at sea. When his attempts to start a writing career in Paris did not materialize, Spitz returned to Pennsylvania.

Wanted: Satellite Spotters

In 1935, despite lacking any formal degrees in science, the self-taught Spitz began to work at nearby Haverford College as an assistant astronomer and lecturer. He also began broadcasting a regular radio show called My Stars that told listeners what vistas they could see in the night sky. In addition to his work at Haverford, Spitz—who was building a reputation as someone who could explain science to ordinary people—began a long association with the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia. He helped with public relations and lectured in the Institute ’s planetarium. His continuing radio (and, later television) appearances gave listeners the chance to hear him talk about astronomy and meteorology and promote planetarium shows. Science education, especially for children, interested Spitz and, in 1940, he published a book called The Pinpoint Planetarium. Besides explaining the science and mythology of the constellations to young readers, Spitz included several “star domes” in his book. Kids, after poking small holes in the indicated places, cut out the page, bent it into a bowl, and held it in front of a light. Their reward was the unique patterns on their walls or ceilings marking the stars and constellations at various times of the year. Like Richard Emmons, Spitz believed that small planetaria were effective tools to educate the public about science. A personal wish to project star images on the ceiling for Verne, his young daughter, also motivated Spitz. With a few hundred dollars in seed funding from a Philadelphia benefactress, Spitz experimented with designs for an effective, modestly priced star projector. When he ran into difficulties picking the right shape of the “star ball” from which pinpoints of light would shine, a conversation with Albert Einstein, ensconced in nearby Princeton, encouraged him to try a dodecahedron. Holes in the twelve-sided object’s sides served Spitz’s purpose, and, in 1945, he unveiled a prototype of what became his Model A projector. His device was revolutionary in several respects. The Model A’s many pinholes could project about one thousand of the brightest stars in the night sky. A small electric motor turned the unit to indicate diurnal motion and the whole device weighed only twenty-five pounds, meaning it could be easily transported and stored. Spitz also priced the Model A at $500, allowing him to seriously undercut other models on the market. Spitz formally premiered his invention in 1947 at Harvard College Observatory before a joint meeting of a local astronomy club and the AAVSO. In 1949 Spitz quit his other jobs and started Spitz Laboratories.

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He also cofounded the Amateur Weathermen of America and became close friends with Charles Federer, Sky & Telescope’s editor. By 1955, Spitz had sold scores of star projectors. Military interest in using his low-cost devices to train servicemen in navigation and astronomy also contributed to sales. By 1956, when he joined the SAO as a consultant, Spitz was well known in the amateur science and astronomy communities as an enthusiastic and tireless “interpreter of science.”34 His radio shows, planetaria, and familiarity with the amateur science community made the fifty-two-year-old Spitz, his handsome face set off by bright gray-green eyes, ideally suited to go out and promote the SAO’s program for amateur satellite spotters.

Promoting “PLORB” In the spring of 1956, Spitz embarked on a series of trips around the United States to help enlist the support of “amateur astronomers and other observers.”35 However, Whipple, Hynek, and Spitz had yet to agree on a name for their amateur program. One candidate they considered briefly was SEESAW, as in “I see it . . . I saw it.” However, by the time, Spitz began his recruitment drive, the three men agreed that Moonwatch was a more suitable code name for a program in which people would be looking for what were, in fact, new moons. Spitz used his strong connections within the amateur science community to form a national advisory committee for Moonwatch. Its members would, he hoped, raise public awareness for Moonwatch and help it organize more efficiently at the local level. To fill the committee’s roster, Spitz called on several of the most prominent members of the amateur astronomy community. One of the people Spitz turned to was Edward A. Halbach. An engineering physicist by training and enthusiastic amateur astronomer by avocation, Halbach was one of the forces behind the success of the Milwaukee Astronomical Society. While amateur in membership, the Milwaukee club attempted to do serious scientific research, in part by coordinating activities with professional scientists at nearby Yerkes Observatory.36

Wanted: Satellite Spotters

When Halbach became the director of the society’s observatory—a post he held for over three decades—he added variable star studies to its strong program of meteor and aurora observation. During the 1940s, Halbach led expeditions for groups like the National Geographic Society to observe solar eclipses, traveling as far away as Burma for months at a time. The participation of Halbach, along with Margaret Mayall (the AAVSO’s longtime director), Clyde Tombaugh (famed for his discovery of Pluto), and other prominent amateur scientists helped stimulate enthusiasm for Moonwatch among amateur sky watchers in key locations around the United States. Even Walt Disney helped Moonwatch get attention. For several months in 1956, Hynek and Spitz used a promotional cartoon that featured Donald Duck superimposed against a stylized globe. A cartoonist drew the internationally known character with an eye to a telescope, and a feathered finger pointed toward the sky, with “IGY” and “Moonwatch” prominently displayed.37 Throughout the summer and fall of 1956, as publicity about Moonwatch grew, scientists and administrators supervising the United States’ IGY efforts attempted to manage amateurs’ participation. America’s IGY leaders expressed their preference that professional scientists work directly with amateurs (presumably in the guise of advisers), that amateurs demonstrate technical competence, and that amateur activities be coordinated through official IGY channels, especially overseas.38 IGY organizers at the National Academy of Sciences also considered how professional scientists would react to amateur activities. Hugh Odishaw, the executive director for the American IGY effort, and National Committee members wanted professional scientists to be visibly associated with amateur programs. They believed this would reinforce public perception that the IGY was, first and foremost, a professional scientific undertaking rather than an engineering project. Odishaw reminded Hynek that professional scientists were a valuable resource to be tapped and urged him to encourage career scientists to work with and help train amateur groups that lacked formal scientific experience.39 Odishaw also insisted that the SAO’s publicity campaign convey the amateurs’ appropriate place. As he told Whipple, “The visual observer has an important, a significant role, but I don’t think he should feel his role is bigger than it is.”40

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Having staked his reputation on the SAO’s success in satellite tracking, Whipple was also invested in monitoring amateur participation in Moonwatch. He recognized that solitary professional astronomers probably had the background and equipment to track satellites with “quite surprisingly good results.” However, he was much less sanguine about encouraging this activity among “isolated observers who are non-professional. . . . How would we know who was good and who was not?”41 Moonwatch, he insisted, would best function with teams of amateurs, not lone observers, and the program retained this guiding principle for some time. As interest in the IGY grew among amateur scientists, Odishaw’s staff at the NAS worried that citizens would besiege their Washington offices seeking not only news and information but actually demanding to participate. Odishaw, therefore, tried to restrict participation to those with advanced skills. When a writer from Popular Mechanics contacted Odishaw’s office for a story on Moonwatch, his staff emphasized that, while it encouraged contributions from “amateur-professionals,” it did not want to see IGY scientific programs “overwhelmed with masses of uncalibrated data of various levels of professional worth.” Odishaw’s staff opted instead to steer the reporter away from the enthusiastic Hynek to “someone with restraint.” By taking this tack, Odishaw’s staff imagined that “we might better slant the story” and avoid the danger of “inviting all amateurs to come batter down our doors and overwhelm us with unnecessary data.”42 The international ambitions Whipple had for Moonwatch also concerned Odishaw and his assistant, S. Paul Kramer. Like Odishaw, Kramer (who had a background in military intelligence) was keenly sensitive to public relations. Kramer worked, for example, with the U.S. Information Agency to spread the message that the IGY was a civilian, scientific enterprise rather than a militaristic, engineering endeavor.43 Premature attempts by Whipple and his colleagues to mobilize amateurs, especially in the United States, might “give the [U.S.] satellite a nationalistic tone.”44 Concerned that the SAO was moving too quickly, Kramer insisted that the observatory postpone any further public announcements about Moonwatch’s international character. Expanding amateur involvement overseas would have to wait until the Comité de l’Année Géophysique Internationale, the international group that directed the IGY worldwide, first made an official announcement about amateur activities.45

Wanted: Satellite Spotters

Despite official signals to slow down, Whipple, Spitz, and Hynek still worked to inform amateurs about Moonwatch. All three men assumed that amateur astronomers would form the initial nuclei around which the entire Moonwatch program would coalesce. For weeks, they drafted a publication that would provide the first formal news about Moonwatch. Since it would reach thousands of amateur scientists interested in the program, it was vital that they strike exactly the right tone. As Odishaw, always aware of the IGY’s political dimensions, reminded Hynek after seeing an early draft, “the first in a series of publications . . . can set a pattern and, in effect, establish commitments” and, in this matter, Whipple concurred.46 The first Bulletin for the Visual Observers of Satellites appeared as a special supplement in the July 1956 issue of Sky & Telescope. In addition to clearly spelling out the basic scientific principles of satellite orbits, Whipple, Hynek, and Spitz noted Moonwatch’s potential importance while maintaining a certain caution. Whipple, for instance, did not wish to give enthusiastic amateurs the overly optimistic impression that they were the lynchpin of all satellite spotting efforts. Still, he reminded amateurs that, if radio tracking technology failed, then “the full weight of responsibility” for spotting the first satellites would “fall on the shoulders of the volunteer visual observers.”47 The first Bulletin made it clear that Moonwatch was a team activity. Little room existed for the “ ‘lone wolf ’ observer to contribute usefully to the program.”48 Whipple and his colleagues also emphasized that only serious volunteers available at a moment’s notice should join, as Moonwatch needed “skilled and reliable” volunteers who were “completely dependable.” Meanwhile, the responsibility for ensuring that the entire group was suitably trained and ready to perform fell to the team’s leaders. After investing considerable professional capital into the idea that amateur scientists and other trained citizens could make a significant contribution to the IGY, Whipple wanted to ensure he was not let down. After all, “if some visual observer fails to stay faithfully at his post,” the usefulness of the complex and costly Baker-Nunn stations all around the world would be impaired.49 More than anything, the Bulletin emphasized that, while Moonwatchers might be amateurs, they were also fortunate participants in an important scientific enterprise. Their commitment and hard work would demonstrate their capabilities and prove their inclusion worthwhile.

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The regular appearance of the Bulletin in issues of Sky & Telescope helped inform the amateur astronomy community about Moonwatch. A few months after the first Bulletin appeared, Whipple took the news to a much wider audience. “Can you play Moontracking, the new global science-sport?” Whipple asked the hundreds of thousands of people who read Saturday Review.50 His easy-to-understand article called for volunteers and placed their involvement squarely in the realm of research vital to understanding the planet, starting with scientists’ need to know things so basic yet elusive as the actual shape of the earth and the density of the upper atmosphere. When the IGY got underway on July 1, 1957, the SAO’s director said, “Men and women of all hues, creeds, and ideas will work together in a science so new it does not even have a name.” To remedy this deficiency, the puckish Whipple suggested that the first forays of humans into space should be called “PLORB”—his acronym for “the placing of artificial moons in orbits in space.” All humor aside, Whipple told his readers of the efforts by Hynek and Spitz (“the planetarium man”) to organize a “big MoonWatch,” which could turn out to be the greatest “scientific venture ever shared by the common man.” Not only could amateurs help spot the first satellites, but they could also witness the “death watch” of artificial moons when they spiraled back to earth. The professional astronomers, with their “superfine instruments,” would have to work with the “amateur watchers to learn just how it all turned out.”51 Whipple’s near-breathless descriptions of “research-for-peace” surely appealed to politically liberal and well-educated readers of the Saturday Review. How could any curious citizen not want to take part? One reader, however, raised a minor objection. Whipple’s appellation—PLORB—for the new science of satellites failed to capture the beauty and significance of the Space Age ’s opening. As their good-humored doggerel verse complained: Tis not too simple to absorb The appellation of the Plorb . . . Why couldn’t the lunar rocketeers have chosen a name With happier sound for a skyline game? . . . PLORB! . . . We need a brand new Keats To name with grace such stellar feats.52

Wanted: Satellite Spotters

Poetic protests aside, the inquiries amateur scientists and other curious citizens sent to the SAO, the NAS, and local astronomy groups quickened in the fall of 1956. The appearance of Whipple’s article in the Saturday Review coincided with a major meeting in September 1956 of the Comité de l’Année Géophysique Internationale in Barcelona. For several days, leading scientists and other delegates from countries that were participating in the IGY gathered to discuss high-level plans. They set aside a full day to talk about the IGY satellite program. At this meeting, Ivan Pavlovich Bardin, a metallurgist representing the Soviet Union, formally announced that nation’s goal to launch a satellite. While rumors and reports of Soviet plans circulated for months prior to Bardin’s declaration, the Western press, intently focused on the Vanguard program, paid little attention to them. In a similar fashion, Western observers missed Soviet announcements that the radio transmitter in their satellites would broadcast at a frequency of 20 and 40 megacycles. This differed from the Americans’ plan to use 108 megacycles, a frequency the navy’s Minitrack stations were built to receive. The Soviets chose their frequencies, in part, to allow amateur radio operators inside their borders to participate in satellite tracking, a real need given the relative paucity of tracking stations on Soviet territory and the complete lack of any beyond its borders.53 After Sputnik appeared in American skies, many scientists and politicians claimed that the Soviets had violated an agreement to use the higher frequency. This, however, was not the case. While scientists commented at the Barcelona meeting that the Soviets and Americans had agreed on the standardization of satellite equipment, this resolution was one that the Comité merely recommended, not required. Moreover, numerous articles in the Soviet journal Radio, a publication for amateur radio buffs, made clear Soviet intentions to use the 20 and 40 megacycle frequencies. The Soviets even sent a letter—misplaced, misfiled, or simply not properly transmitted—to Lloyd Berkner in August 1957 with the same news. Despite these notifications, the Western press interpreted the Soviet choice of radio frequencies as willfulness at best, duplicity at worst. The Barcelona meeting served as an international coming-out party for Moonwatch. As part of the all-day discussion of IGY satellite plans, Whipple formally described the Smithsonian observatory’s plan to observe satellites

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using the Baker-Nunn stations and Moonwatch teams. Naturally, Odishaw and his colleagues at the NAS carefully massaged Whipple ’s report to the IGY delegates (like all aspects of the politically sensitive satellite program) before the Spain meeting.54 Whipple’s statement in Barcelona promoted Moonwatch as an opportunity for “visual observers on a world-wide scale” and encouraged citizens around the world to participate.55 The Smithsonian’s leading astronomer emphasized that Moonwatch would be “instrumental in awakening a serious interest in science” among young people. Their inherent “space-mindedness,” as he phrased it, could make them especially valuable participants.56 Whipple maintained a realistic perspective about this mission in private, however. After his speech at Barcelona, Whipple received a poorly written letter from a young boy in Michigan that prompted Whipple to tell his secretary: “We try to encourage zeal for science—but this one will never make the grade.”57 Considerable press attention accompanied Whipple ’s appearance in Barcelona and helped attract volunteers. For instance, Walter Sullivan, a renowned science reporter for the New York Times, presented a three-part series on satellite tracking that highlighted amateur opportunities.58 Despite Whipple’s caveat that amateur participation rested on exacting, timeconsuming labor, hundreds of volunteers accepted his challenge and organized for action. In fact, as Sullivan reported, amateurs looked forward to their first “full-dress rehearsal”—a nationwide Moonwatch Alert organized by the SAO.59 G. Robert Wright, a Maryland meteorologist whose observing station was nestled in a suburban apple orchard, expressed confidence about the capabilities of his fellow amateurs. Wright, the chairman of Moonwatch’s National Advisory Committee, boasted, “That bird isn’t going to get past us.”60

4 Of Spacehounds and Lunartiks

In October 1956, as scores of letters from curious citizens and science enthusiasts arrived at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO), J. Allen Hynek needed someone to manage the blossoming enterprise. He turned to Leon Campbell, Jr., a middle-aged man who had grown up with the amateur science community. His father was a Harvard scientist who had directed the American Association of Variable Star Observers. For decades, his father encouraged amateur astronomers worldwide to participate in science by building instruments, educating fellow citizens, and producing data and observations useful to the professional science community.1 Like his father, Campbell Jr. believed that ordinary people could and should take part in science. Born in 1906, Leon Campbell (he dropped the “Jr.” after his father’s death in 1951) worked as a newspaper reporter in the Boston area after graduating from Boston University. During World War Two, Campbell directed the press corps for Admiral Chester Nimitz, the commander in chief for navy forces in the Pacific theater. When the war ended, Campbell, a slender, leanfaced man, returned to the editor’s desk of the Boston Post until Hynek recruited him to be Moonwatch’s “Supervisor of Station Operations.” His family background, connections to the amateur science community, and a facility for clear, direct, yet friendly communication made him an ideal fit for the

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job Hynek had in mind. Campbell started as an occasional consultant, but the growing popularity of Moonwatch landed him a full-time post at the SAO’s headquarters, where he walked the same corridors and ate lunch with people his late father had known. Campbell’s primary job was coordinating the organization of Moonwatch teams in the United States and overseas. However, as the opening of the IGY drew closer, his workload grew in step with the growing complexity of the Moonwatch program. While Armand Spitz traveled the country promoting Moonwatch, Campbell remained in Cambridge and provided a steady hand that guided the program into the Space Age. As “Mr. Moonwatch” for nearly five years, Campbell corresponded tirelessly with teams all over the world, in some cases writing people who had been his father’s close friends. His patient replies to enthusiastic amateurs provided advice and encouragement to some and chided others on their team’s performance. In the spring of 1957, Campbell’s inbox seemed fuller with each passing week. One day a curious item arrived on his desk that demonstrated how citizens’ enthusiasm for Moonwatch had spread far beyond the core community of amateur astronomers. The document came from Hapeville, Georgia, a small town tucked inside the highways surrounding the sprawling metropolis of Atlanta. For years, aviation had been central to Hapeville’s identity. A landing strip in the center of a nearby racetrack grew into a major airport before World War Two. The town continued to embrace flight as a path to prosperity when Delta Airlines based its corporate headquarters there. In February 1957, two students from the Forest Park High School were thinking beyond the reach of any airplane. They prepared a formal-sounding preamble which they sent to Campbell. It proclaimed their eagerness to aid “the National Academy of Sciences in the tracking of satellites and by visual observance with the efforts of some 46 other nations to make a significant scientific contribution in the study of the earth and its atmosphere in which the principal scientific institutions and leading geophysicists of the world are involved.”2 The teens christened their Moonwatch team the Spacehounds and welcomed “all who wanted to help open the door to Space a little wider.”3 However, the Spacehounds’ satellite spotting performance never rose beyond average, perhaps due in part to members’ reluctance to “be out of bed and at the observing station at least an hour before sunrise, sometimes even on cold mornings.”4

Of Spacehounds and Lunartiks

Farther north, professors from the Pennsylvania State University organized the Order of Lunartiks. Active team members received certificates of participation signed by the “Chief Loon” and “certified by Jupiter Pluvius, patron of Moonwatchers.”5 The Lunartiks racked up a more impressive observing record than the Spacehounds, but both groups managed to see the first Soviet satellites. Both groups also earned congratulations from President Eisenhower when he thanked “hard-working volunteer Moonwatch teams” around the world for their contributions.6 Modest-sized communities like Hapeville, Georgia, and State College, Pennsylvania, were a long way from the wood-paneled meeting rooms of the National Academy of Sciences or the campuses of major research universities where professional scientists prepared for the start of the International Geophysical Year (IGY). Nonetheless, from large urban areas to small towns, the SAO’s promotional campaign generated much media attention and motivated scores of amateurs to organize Moonwatch teams. In fact, mushrooming public interest caused some mild alarm at the SAO’s headquarters. Campbell and his staff increasingly found themselves overwhelmed by correspondence and interviews for radio and television shows.7 The SAO’s commitment to satellite tracking certainly created some distress among the Smithsonian Institution’s administrators who watched their observatory—for years, a place of modest achievement and ambition— plunge into a multimillion dollar program of global scope and political sensitivity.8 As eager groups of amateur scientists and other citizens organized satellite spotting teams all around the world, Moonwatch became the public face of Whipple’s ambitious IGY program.

Moonwatchers Answer the Call In 1831, when Alexis de Tocqueville visited the United States, he marveled at how “Americans of all ages, all conditions, and all dispositions constantly form associations.”9 Americans, the Frenchman observed, formed groups for tasks both momentous and mundane and, in doing so, displayed great skill “in proposing a common object for the exertions of a great many men

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and in inducing them voluntarily to pursue it.” In Tocqueville’s view, volunteer citizen groups even helped advance science, for, as he wrote, “the science of association is the mother of science; the progress of all the rest depends upon the progress it has made.” More than a century later, Tocqueville ’s observation still held truth. Americans in the 1950s were joiners. This was the golden era of civic participation when membership in clubs and associations rose to all-time highs.10 Whether people joined community groups, church organizations, or hobbyist clubs, 1950s life featured enthusiastic participation in volunteer associations. Moonwatch and other amateur science groups reflected this larger social phenomenon that peaked around the time of Sputnik’s appearance. Helping professional scientists spot and track the first satellites exemplified the “common object” that Tocqueville believed helped bind and guide Americans as they formed their varied associations. Seeing a satellite, after all, required teamwork. It was, as one Moonwatch leader said, “a victory for all observers.”11 By the end of 1957, enthusiastic amateurs had organized over two hundred Moonwatch teams around the world, with more than half of these residing in the United States. The leaders of these Moonwatch teams were crucial to their creation and their eventual success or failure. By helping organize and train their teams, a leader connected his or her group to the local community, national and international networks of Moonwatchers, other amateur scientists, and the SAO back in Cambridge. The composition of Moonwatch teams in the United States was relatively diverse, at least in terms of their members’ occupations. The caption of a newsletter cartoon seen by midwestern amateur astronomers noted, “The thing about Moonwatch that intrigues us is the considerable range of society it draws from. Old men shiver, junior high kids romp, local bankers rub elbows with the guy who sweeps out the bank.”12 Moonwatch, not surprisingly in an era when women and minorities were underrepresented in the sciences, appears to have primarily attracted white men.13 Nevertheless, scores of women actively participated in Moonwatch. Two women served on Moonwatch’s advisory committee, several women led successful teams, and many high school girls participated through groups like the Spacehounds. However, Moonwatch appears to have attracted few, if any, members from the African American community. To be fair, blacks in the 1950s faced

Of Spacehounds and Lunartiks

far more critical issues than organizing volunteer groups to do amateur science. In September 1957, newspapers around the world featured wrenching images of black teens in Little Rock, Arkansas, braving mobs of white bigots barely restrained by National Guardsmen. On October 5, 1957, Sputnik shared the front page of the New York Times with an article about southern politicians’ defiant stand against school integration. As one Dixiecrat assessed, the “two most vexing problems” threatening America were Soviet satellites overhead and blacks moving into white schools and neighborhoods—“moons and coons,” as he crudely put it.14 Like other popular magazines of the Sputnik era, the magazine Ebony, which catered to a well-to-do and upwardly mobile black audience, included space and science stories in addition to more conventional articles on current affairs and celebrities. After the first American satellites appeared, Ebony highlighted the role played by “over 1,000 Negroes” in U.S. space endeavors.15 A few months later, a young black woman wrote that a science career, perhaps as a nuclear physicist, was one path she was considering to help solve pressing international dilemmas.16 The public responded positively to these articles as whites and blacks alike wrote to say how these stories encouraged them. Similar features about blacks in science appeared throughout the IGY. None were about Moonwatch. Most instead offered human interest stories about African Americans who overcame daunting odds to achieve successful careers as scientists or engineers in national science facilities or corporate laboratories. Such stories, however, could not alter the unpleasant reality of the time— blacks and Hispanics were more poorly represented than Jews or Asian Americans, who were making major inroads into the postwar American science establishment. Nor do these optimistic articles disguise the fact that, in photographs preserved in archives and presented in 1950s magazines like Sky & Telescope, the people who made up amateur astronomy clubs and Moonwatch teams were mostly white. In only a few cases, such as Vioalle Hefferan’s Albuquerque team, do Hispanicized names appear on the roster. No single reason explains this lack of representation. Despite the other pressing issues that black communities faced in 1957, magazines and newspapers from the era affirm their interest in science and technology. Overall, of course, blacks earned less than their white neighbors, certainly an obstacle for participation given the considerable cost of outfitting a Moonwatch team.

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One factor could be that widespread participation in amateur science clubs was not as important a part of black postwar culture as it was for white Americans. A more ominous interpretation is such groups, implicitly or otherwise, made African Americans feel unwelcome.17 One could even argue that the poor treatment blacks had received in such “research” as the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment may have made them wary of getting involved.18 Nothing, however, in the historical record suggests Whipple or other Moonwatch leaders singled out blacks for special attention, encouraging or otherwise. Regardless of the reasons, Moonwatch in the United States primarily engaged the interest and participation of white, mostly middle-class people. Despite seeming homogeneity in class and race, each Moonwatch team emerged from local circumstances and conditions. Curious citizens from major urban areas, for instance, formed teams with goals and capabilities far different from those populated by die-hard amateur astronomers possessing years of sky gazing experience. If we look at the history and motivation of several individual teams and their leaders, a picture emerges that, while far from absolute, helps us appreciate how Moonwatch united different Cold War themes—the desire for civic participation, apprehension about vigilance, the “space-mindedness” of teens, and the dedication of amateur astronomers—in the service of science.

“Team Work and Good Citizenship” Nunz P. Addabbo was a name unfamiliar, if not downright hard to pronounce, for most people in Indiana. Moreover, Addabbo’s job as a civil engineer for the American Brass Company, a metallurgical firm associated with a multinational copper mining company, moved him around considerably throughout the United States and South America. In 1955, Addabbo relocated again, this time to Terre Haute, a small manufacturing city located near the Wabash River. He first found it hard to make friends in the closeknit midwestern community. By the time the Soviets launched Sputnik, however, the handsome engineer with a profile bearing a passing resemblance to Wernher von Braun had become a local celebrity.

Of Spacehounds and Lunartiks

Addabbo’s Moonwatch team offers an excellent example of people drawn together not so much out of their innate appreciation and understanding of science—before Sputnik, Terre Haute had no amateur astronomy club—but because of civic duty and a desire to participate in a community activity. As one schoolteacher who joined the Terre Haute team said, Moonwatch presented a “fine display of teamwork and good citizenship.”19 In November 1956, Addabbo read about Moonwatch in an article written by Fred Whipple for Science Digest, one of many magazines published in the 1950s that popularized science and technology for the general public. He quickly contacted Edward Halbach, a leader of the Milwaukee Astronomical Society, to see how he could participate. Addabbo listed his strengths as a potential team leader. In addition to technical experience as an engineer, he had served as an airplane navigator for the military, taught courses on celestial navigation, and was a licensed amateur radio operator (fig. 4.1). Halbach encouraged Addabbo to organize a team in Terre Haute, and the engineer got to work. Knowing that members of the Ground Observer Corps might make good Moonwatchers, Addabbo first contacted the Vigo County Civil Defense Office. His recent arrival in the Terre Haute area and his interest in spotting satellites made local officials suspicious. Addabbo, wrote the director of the local Civil Defense Office, was “an entirely new resident in this area and we know little about him or his background.”20 Hynek quickly wrote on Addabbo’s behalf and assuaged their concerns, explaining that the engineer’s intent was indeed legitimate. Despite initial reservations about Addabbo, in April 1957 Leon Campbell officially registered his Moonwatch team. Sponsorship from a Terre Haute bank enabled Addabbo to purchase low-power telescopes and other necessary equipment. Meanwhile, Allis-Chalmers, a heavy-machinery company that, like Addabbo, had recently set up shop in Terre Haute, donated space and materials for a Moonwatch station. Gifts like these were crucial. Leon Campbell estimated the cost of a properly outfitted Moonwatch station at $2,000 or more. This is about what a brand-new Studebaker Silver Hawk, tail fins and all, cost in 1957. A photograph that survives from the summer of 1957 shows the full roster of the Terre Haute Moonwatch team. Forty men and women sit on benches or stand around their telescopes. The photograph’s label attests to the

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Figure 4.1. Nunz Addabbo, shown on the left, explaining Moonwatch to curious citizens.

diverse backgrounds that Moonwatchers had—secretary, accountant, heavy-equipment operator, plant foreman.21 One of their main members, Leo Deming, was a professional photographer, so the team’s activities were especially well documented and publicized in local papers. Another photo taken soon after the SAO formally welcomed Addabbo’s team into the Moonwatch program depicts the volunteers seated at two long tables and peering through the lens of their Satellite Scopes, an instrument especially made for Moonwatch by the Edmund Scientific Corporation. For $49.50, one could buy a Satellite Scope, complete with mounting, directly from the New Jersey company. Other companies in the United States and Japan made similar products. The specifications of these instruments resulted from Moonwatch team leaders and other amateurs testing more than thirty different designs in the field throughout 1956. The ideal telescope for satellite spotting was lightweight, inexpensive, small, and rugged with few moving parts (figs. 4.2 and 4.3). The Satellite Scope from Edmund, for example, featured a special eyepiece that gave a

Of Spacehounds and Lunartiks

Figure 4.2. Example of telescope especially designed for use by Moonwatch teams.

wide field of view. Meanwhile, its objective lens magnified the view to about five and a half times. Because using the telescope to look up for extended periods of time could give satellite spotters neck pains, Edmund Scientific designed their Satellite Scope so that users actually looked down and aimed their telescope at a fixed mirror. This mirror reflected what was visible in

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Figure 4.3. Schematic of a Moonwatch telescope.

the sky above and presented it to the observer. Arranging a group of properly outfitted observers in a line and overlapping their telescopes’ fields of view created, in effect, a virtual picket line across which any transiting satellite would have to cross (fig. 4.4). While many teams purchased commercially available instruments for satellite spotting, quite a few teams made their own telescopes. The SAO adopted and promoted, in fact, a simple design that a person already familiar with making tools for use in amateur science could put together. The parts for a homemade scope cost around thirty dollars, and the Bulletin for Visual Observers of Satellites (as well as more mainstream publications like Popular Mechanics and Popular Science) published detailed instructions to build one.22 Addabbo’s team started out observing from folding chairs with their telescopes temporarily mounted on cheap tables. Eventually they had the luxury of satellite spotting from one of the best equipped and most comfortable Moonwatch stations in the world. Visitors to the station would pull into the parking lot of the Allis-Chalmers company and see a large sign on top of the building that proudly announced “Terre Haute Moonwatch Group—Satellite Spotters—International Geophysical Year—Earth Satellite Program— Directed by Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory.” Besides the satellite observing room, the station had a small room that housed timing gear and

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Figure 4.4. Schematic of how a Moonwatch team’s members would form an optical fence.

shortwave radio equipment. Money raised from community sales, dues collected from team members, and contributions from local businesses gave Addabbo funds to install space heaters and electric lights. Eventually, the team acquired enough money to rent a small office where Addabbo and his teammates established a “fine library on all the latest publications dealing with satellites and missiles.”23 A close inspection of the Terre Haute building would reveal a good deal about how Fred Whipple and his colleagues imagined a typical Moonwatch team would function. A single-story corrugated steel building, hundred feet long and ten feet wide, aligned along a north-south line, served as the Terre Haute headquarters. Smithsonian staff who visited it described it as “outstanding,” an “armored dragon” as “formidable as a battleship.”24 A thirtyfoot tall mast with a long crossbar also aligned in a north-south direction— picture a giant “T”—jutted from the middle of the building. This mast served as a reference point and alignment aid for team members. The Terre Haute building sported sixteen observing locations, eight each on the building’s east and west sides. Portholes with hinged doors in the sides and roof allowed volunteer satellite spotters to be inside and still

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Figure 4.5. Members of the Terre Haute team manning their posts.

look outside (fig. 4.5). This differed from most other Moonwatch teams, which sat outside, exposed to wind, cold, and mosquitoes. Small tables at each observing location provided special touches that made satellite spotting easier and more efficient for Terre Haute members. When an observing session began, each Moonwatcher opened his or her porthole in the building’s side or roof. They placed their telescope on the table and aligned it so that the crossbar of the mast was visible in their eyepiece. After they fixed their telescopes in place with clamps, they were ready to start observing. Each of the posts had a red light to help observers see in the dark (while not ruining their night vision), star charts, and a push-button. The pushbutton was essential to the whole process of satellite spotting. In the procedure that Addabbo and other Moonwatch squads used, when team members pushed it, a bell rang. At the same time, the person shouted out a signal at three different times—when they saw a satellite enter their telescope’s field of view (for example, “In! Station Number Five!”), again when the satellite was hidden by the mast’s crossbar (“Meridian!”), and a third time when the

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satellite sailed out of their telescope ’s field of view (“Out!”). A team member tape-recorded the volunteers’ calls along with shortwave radio time signals broadcast by National Bureau of Standards in Maryland. After the observing session ended, the team would replay the tape and, using stop watches, get the sighting timed down to a tenth of a second before relaying the valuable information to the SAO in Cambridge. Addabbo and the other citizens who helped organize and run the Terre Haute team left no detail unconsidered. The team’s fine stationery featured space-age letterhead with a stylized image of a Moonwatcher peering through a telescope while satellites whirled overhead (fig. 4.6). Team members received membership cards (so did Whipple and Hynek as honorary members) as well as issues of The Orbit-uarian, the team’s semiweekly newsletter. The title reflected Moonwatchers’ mission to also spot satellites during their death spiral back to earth. The cartoon masthead gracing the group’s April 1958 newsletter showed a priest reading funeral rites over graves marked Sputnik I and Sputnik II which had fallen back to earth. For Addabbo, his role as the local Moonwatch leader translated into a “great deal of respect and honest feelings . . . the people here feel very strongly about him and the wonderful work that he has done in tying the youth and other people of the community into a very closely integrated scientific team.”25 The time-consuming and unpaid labors by Addabbo and his fellow Moonwatchers say a great deal about the enthusiasm with which most amateur scientists viewed the opening of the Space Age. One teenager on Nunz Addabbo’s team recalled how a childhood visit to Kitty Hawk Hill sparked his fascination with spaceflight. By helping track U.S. satellites, he “could now fulfill some of my responsibility as an American citizen by helping the Government, and I would be participating in an activity in which I was very interested.”26 Statements like this reveal how Moonwatching, for some, seamlessly combined civic duty and vigilance with enthrallment for science and space exploration. Newspapers in Terre Haute and neighboring towns regularly featured articles about the local Moonwatch team, which became a source of civic pride. Moonwatch helped provide “new links between people who were strangers just a little while ago,” something especially valuable to civic life in Terre Haute, which chronically suffered hard economic times in the 1950s.27 Other teams echoed similar sentiments about the role of Moonwatch in

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Figure 4.6. Detail from letterhead of the Terre Haute Moonwatch team.

enlarging the public sphere and enhancing civic participation and volunteerism. “One of the great contributions of Moonwatch,” one leader observed, is “the bringing together of people that never would have met, not only in the community, but nationwide.”28 Civic pride in Moonwatch was not limited just to actual participation. Local businesses, eager to appear on technology’s cutting edge, touted their support of satellite spotting teams. In Phoenix, for example, Valley National Bank bragged about its Moonwatch sponsorship in press releases picked up by city and regional papers. “Thanks to a banker’s enlightened attitude,” said one, members of the Phoenix Moonwatch team would watch for satellites from the roof of the bank’s twelve-story downtown building with equipment the bank paid for. Other announcements claimed that the bank’s support of Moonwatch had encouraged other businesses to follow suit; one press release even included the jingle: We were the firstest with the most In financing a satellite post, An unusual adventure you might possibly venture Even for a bank that’s always on the ball But being first is nothing new For Valley Bank’s “get-up-and-do!”29

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Ironically, Valley Bank’s own growth caused problems for the Moonwatch team it sponsored. When the bank erected a giant revolving neon sign on its building, the resulting light pollution from it and other downtown signs forced satellite spotters to move to a darker location. Other communities shared the spirit of civic engagement and participation during the IGY that translated into success for the Terre Haute team. Local chapters of national and international volunteer organizations often served as catalysts for Moonwatch teams. Rodney Faxon’s recruitment of his Chicago-based Moonwatch team, for instance, grew out of his aircraft spotting activities for the Ground Observer Corps. Donations from the Kiwanis Club and, later, Coyne Electrical School, a local technical institution, helped outfit Faxon’s team, which positioned itself on the roof of Chicago’s Edgewater Beach Hotel. Coyne ’s president explained the school’s sponsorship: “We recognize the value of the earth satellite tracking program not only as a civic service but also as a means of placing our technical skills at the disposal of the Ground Observer Corps.”30 Faxon’s interpretation of his civic duties went beyond aircraft and satellite spotting. He equipped his Moonwatch station, for instance, with kits to detect radioactive fallout and stood ready to relay the results to local civil defense authorities.31 Faxon’s integration of civil defense duties and Moonwatching illustrates how Cold War tensions were as much a part of the 1950s social fabric as interest in civic participation. The sheer number of advertisements in popular magazines like Life, Look, and the Saturday Evening Post featuring jet aircraft and atomic devices of all sorts helps illustrate the intermingling of civilian and military cultures in the 1950s. Meanwhile, a steady stream of articles in hobbyist publications like Popular Science and Popular Mechanics often equated modern science and engineering with the latest high-tech weapons like nuclear submarines and rockets. As Sergei P. Korolev, the Russian scientist who designed the missiles that launched sputniks, phrased it, “Rockets are weapons and science.”32 Given the parallels between satellite spotting and monitoring the skies for hostile aircraft, it is not surprising that members of the military community took considerable interest in Moonwatch. This attention existed at all levels of the military, from high-ranking brass in the Pentagon to personnel stationed at military bases and national laboratories. In the summer of 1956, Hynek wrote Charles E. Wilson, the secretary of defense, about securing

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military cooperation and participation in satellite tracking. Wilson’s office replied that it would be an “honor for the United States Air Force, through the Ground Observer Corps, to participate.” 33 To help aid “the significant scientific contributions you and your group are achieving,” the air force assigned Colonel Owen F. Clarke as its liaison to Moonwatch. Clarke, who was in charge of the Ground Observer Corps office at the Pentagon, attended meetings of Moonwatch’s National Advisory Committee and worked with Moonwatch staff throughout the IGY. Clarke and Spitz, for example, visited satellite spotting teams around the United States, taking advantage of Clarke ’s ability to requisition military transport on quick notice. Clarke also helped secure the cooperation of the Civil Air Patrol for Moonwatch training exercises and publicized the need for Moonwatch teams on air force bases.34 Clarke joined the rapidly growing Moonwatch effort at a time when the Ground Observer Corps was slowly standing down. With the adoption of improved radar warning systems throughout the mid-1950s, less need existed for the Ground Observer Corps to operate stations twenty-four hours a day.35 Already the Corps had branched out to activities that had less to do with air defense than with community service in general. Some Corps diehards saw satellite tracking as a new mission that, in addition to warning neighbors of dangerous weather, reporting unidentified flying objects, and helping aircraft in distress, might sustain their organization’s activities.36 Clear links existed between the air force, the Ground Observer Corps, and Moonwatch during its early months. Hynek and Campbell, in fact, helped select four air force bases in the southwestern United States to play a special role in locating satellites that were either lost or too faint to be seen with the standard Moonwatch telescopes. In February 1957, SAO staff met with scientists and engineers from the Vanguard project. The navy scientists had done calculations that predicted that their IGY satellites might rise to as high as 2,500 miles, well beyond the detection capabilities of the basic Moonwatch telescope. The Naval Research Laboratory and the Naval Gun Factory offered to provide dozens of “apogee telescopes” to strategically located Moonwatch teams at military bases in New Mexico, Arizona, and California as well as sites in South Africa (fig. 4.7). The high-powered telescopes had substantially greater magnification and light-collecting ability yet sacrificed the large field of view that the standard Moonwatch telescope provided. This meant that observers using the apogee scopes would have to

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Figure 4.7. Members of Moonwatch team in Capetown, South Africa, manning their apogee telescopes.

be more alert and carefully positioned to ensure that a faint satellite did not elude them.37 One of the places that received apogee telescopes was Holloman Air Force Base in Alamogordo, New Mexico, where astronomer Edwin P. Martz led the local Moonwatch team. Before World War Two, Martz had achieved recognition from astronomers for his color photographs of Mars. He gradually shifted his attention to the problem of optically tracking missiles in flight on which he worked at White Sands Proving Ground in Alamogordo after the war. Martz’s research shared common ground with Whipple’s interest in tracking meteors and satellites and brought the two men into contact. In preparation for the IGY, Martz generated a good deal of enthusiasm for Moonwatch among both military personnel at Holloman and local townspeople. Shortly before Sputnik appeared, he reported that his diverse team included over three dozen Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts, thirty airmen and officers, forty “adult engineers, technicians, and scientists,” numerous high school science students, citizens drawn from local churches and the

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Lions Club, along with other “townsmen and housewives.”38 Martz, eager to promote his Moonwatch team as a civilian rather than military endeavor, emphasized that his team was “just a bunch of would-be amateur astronomers ‘giving their all’ for SCIENCE!”39 This optimistic outlook may have stretched the credulity of some locals, considering that Martz possessed a high-level security clearance and studied the performance of some of the military’s most sophisticated weapons. Women also reached out to their communities and recruited local citizenry into amateur science and satellite spotting. In Baltimore, Sally H. Dieke used her position as an instructor at a local women’s college to initiate a Moonwatch team. Born in 1913, Dieke grew up in the suburbs of Washington, DC. In 1958, she earned her Ph.D. in chemistry from The Johns Hopkins University and married Gerhard Dieke, a prominent scientist and chair of the Hopkins physics department. In 1950, she decided to devote her attention to astronomy and took a position teaching that subject at Goucher College just outside of Baltimore. In the fall of 1956, after corresponding with a prominent local amateur astronomer from Moonwatch’s advisory committee, Dieke started a team. Funding from a local motor company enabled the purchase of ten Edmund Satellite Scopes, and Goucher College provided rooftop space for the team. When it came to filling her team’s roster, Dieke commented that she had “never seen such unquenchable enthusiasm!”40 After the Soviets launched Sputnik, Dieke could call upon more than fifty volunteers, from teens to retirees and from all professions (“clerks, engineers, teachers, tool and die workers”).41 Women made up about a third of her team, a figure that, while higher than average for the typical team, helps counter any idea that science and technology were exclusively male domains. The chief observer for the region’s Ground Observer Corps station became one of her first recruits. He, in turn, stirred up interest among scores of local aircraft spotters. Another man became a Moonwatcher after his daughter, a former student of Dieke ’s, encouraged him to build a small backyard observatory. As Dieke recalled, “Some of us volunteered because we were ‘space minded,’ some few (I fear) with the hope of getting their names in the newspaper, and others . . . perhaps of a sense of civic—or national—responsibility and a desire to be in on a new thing.”42 For many budding amateur scientists, these were reasons enough to join Moonwatch.

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“Boop-de-boop-boop . . . We’re the Girls from the Moonwatch Group!” Teens and young adults provided another important pool of enthusiastic volunteers from which Moonwatch drew. Fred Whipple understood that satellite tracking could help attract youngsters to science, at least as sympathetic and supportive citizens if not into actual careers. The baby boom that followed World War Two generated plenty of potential Moonwatch recruits in the form of teens with cash to spend on hobbies and fads. Teenagers’ involvement with science, some adults hoped, might also help them avoid social perils such as juvenile delinquency, which, at least in terms of media coverage, spiked in the mid-1950s.43 Like teenaged aircraft spotters in the Ground Observer Corps, young amateur scientists “gathering to practice with telescopes,” one editorial praised, “were more typical of the American teenager than sensational stories of holdups and killings.”44 A Moonwatch leader penned a jingle to recruit local Girl Scouts that illustrated adults’ optimism about the appeal of amateur science: “Boop de-boop-boop! We ’re the girls from the Moonwatch group. We don’t squint and we don’t blink and we don’t close our eyes to think—Our team saw the satellite!”45 The enthusiasm of young Moonwatchers dispelled any concerns that teens might prove fickle or unreliable. Leon Campbell even encouraged teams short on members to actively recruit teens. “The teenager,” Campbell observed, “turns out to be a most effective observer and . . . the problem of discipline is actually no problem at all.”46 Overall, the children and teens in Moonwatch took considerable pride in the adultlike responsibilities they shouldered as satellite spotters. In an era when Davy Crockett regalia became a multimillion dollar fad with American youth, teenaged Moonwatchers helped with the exploration of a real frontier. “You, as a Moonwatch observer,” one leader told her team, “may count yourself as a pioneer of a new age—the age of space travel.”47 In some communities, attempts to interest children in science began before they became teenagers. Since 1947, for example, Charlie Mary Noble used sky watching to educate children in Forth Worth, Texas, about science. Born in 1877 to pioneer parents, Noble taught in the public schools of Fort

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Worth for some four decades.48 During World War Two, she came out of retirement to teach officer trainees about celestial navigation. After the war, Noble’s Junior Astronomy Club, based at the Fort Worth Children’s Museum, attracted members from local junior high and elementary schools. Children hoping to join Charlie Noble ’s astronomy club didn’t simply show up for the museum’s weekly meetings. To become certified “Twilight Observers,” for instance, youngsters had to identify various types of clouds, keep an observations log, and answer a series of questions about astronomy and meteorology.49 Reflecting the nation’s panic about the state of its educational system in the wake of the first Soviet satellites, the Children’s Museum offered membership in its Junior Astronomy Club to children as young as three and four.50 The library Noble operated out of her Fort Worth home distinguished her club from others run by amateur scientists. Instead of books, she loaned telescopes. For fifty cents a week, a child could rent a good-quality reflecting telescope with a four-inch mirror—large enough to start doing some serious amateur astronomy. Local amateur astronomers initially expressed skepticism about Noble’s plan, believing that few kids would have the necessary patience or take care of the telescopes properly. The children’s response surprised them. One Fort Worth amateur noted that “the program has caused many Juniors to purchase their own telescopes” or even build ones bigger than they had first borrowed—the first step in what he called “that consuming desire that all amateur observers develop for better and better equipment.”51 Noble’s collection eventually included several Moonwatch telescopes. If these telescopes could speak, each would tell its own story about how it helped introduce children to sky gazing. Stories accumulated as Noble’s instrument collection grew. One Moonwatch telescope—identified only as #8 in correspondence with the SAO—was believed lost after floods hit the Fort Worth area in the late spring of 1957. It had been loaned to a young boy who, when told to evacuate his home due to a levee breech nearby, wisely placed it on a high shelf in his room. Caught by rising waters, the telescope floated out his window and bobbed along in its wooden case until someone fished it out and returned it, none too worse for wear, to Noble’s telescope library.52 While Charlie Noble’s roster of young sky gazers—the average age was about twelve—was unique in the Moonwatch program, several teams enlisted enthusiastic and serious high school students almost exclusively.

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For such groups to succeed, “a high IQ is not a prerequisite. A strong interest, a willingness to work and . . . the guidance of a devoted teacher” made all the difference.53 Of these teen-based amateur science groups, the one Vioalle Hefferan nurtured in Albuquerque proved one of the longest-lasting. Born in 1907 in Illinois, Hefferan grew up in Gallup, New Mexico.54 Her mother was one of the few women physicians in that remote desert region. Hefferan first learned to appreciate the joys of star gazing under clear western skies with her grandfather. The stars “always winked at me,” she recalled, “and teased me with their mysteries.”55 Hefferan moved to Albuquerque in 1928 to attend the University of New Mexico, where she was nominated to Phi Alpha Theta, an honorary association for historians. After graduating, she married and began teaching in small, hardscrabble New Mexico towns. Her husband died young and she returned to Albuquerque in 1941 but never remarried or had children of her own. Instead, she earned a master’s degree in history and poured her energy into her students’ lives. For decades she maintained an apartment within walking distance to the school where she taught. A photograph from 1945, found in her personal scrapbook, shows her with a friend (fig. 4.8), looking energetic and vivacious. Colleagues characterized her as possessing “a fine mind and a great willingness and the leadership of a classroom Napoleon.”56 At Albuquerque High School, Hefferan first taught history and geography. Looking for a new challenge in the early 1950s, she began to offer a general science course geared, at first, toward academic underachievers. Over time, her science students improved and she became increasingly interested in incorporating more astronomy into her teaching. In 1954, with the donation of an aged telescope that her students refurbished, she started an astronomy club at the high school. The roof of the school, four stories off the ground with a shoulder-high wall that blocked stray light, became the club’s headquarters for almost two decades. The “Dawn Patrol”—her school’s long-running club for young scientists—provided the raw clay for Vioalle Hefferan to form her astronomy club and, later, a Moonwatch team. Before satellites existed, her club trained their eyes on planets and nebulas. After her students read about the opportunity to spot satellites in Sky & Telescope, they wanted to try their luck at it. In January 1957, Leon Campbell officially welcomed the Albuquerque group into the Moonwatch fold. As Moonwatch was “anxious to

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Figure 4.8. Vioalle Hefferan and a friend, c. 1945.

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attract as many science students as possible,” Hefferan’s team with its roster of space-minded teens especially pleased him.57 Hefferan, always proud of her students, regularly forwarded news clippings about her team to Campbell, joking that the deluge of newsprint probably made Moonwatch’s supervisor see the Albuquerque team as “the proverbial dog you stop to pet . . . and can’t get away from.”58 With the supervision of Hefferan and other teachers, her group began building the equipment they needed.59 The club did most of its work on Thursday evenings—starting 7:30 sharp—in Hefferan’s classroom, where the astronomy club met. A student ham radio operator helped design their timing system, and several girls made waterproof covers for the club’s hand-built telescopes. Sponsorship from the Albuquerque National Bank and monthly member dues of twenty-five cents helped pay for equipment, operating costs, and the green and silver shoulder patches team members proudly sewed on school jackets. Her club eventually acquired enough money to buy a more powerful telescope. With its ten-inch mirror, the instrument was large enough for the young amateurs to do serious deep-sky observing. Hefferan recruited her team almost entirely from the ranks of her students (fig. 4.9). Maintaining the quality of team members presented a perennial challenge as new recruits needed to be trained as the senior members graduated. Her Moonwatchers helped drum up community interest and support with regular demonstrations and speeches at open houses. KOB-TV and radio shows regularly featured Hefferan’s students, and the local newspaper assigned a reporter to cover the team. Her students entered a Moonwatch exhibit at the 1957 State Science Fair, where students also used selfmade instruments to show people views of the sun’s surface.60 Hefferan eagerly introduced her students to science activities outside of the city. One summer they drove south, where scientists gave them a tour of a solar observatory at Sunspot, New Mexico. Then it was on to White Sands Proving Ground, where they witnessed test firings of army missiles. They then piled back into station wagons and headed for Las Cruces, New Mexico, to meet legendary amateur astronomer Clyde Tombaugh. Tombaugh and other experienced members of the Las Cruces Moonwatch team gave Hefferan’s students valuable tips to help them spot satellites. For instance, the Las Cruces folks encouraged Hefferan’s students to

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Figure 4.9. Hefferan and her Albuquerque Moonwatch team checking equipment at their rooftop station.

abandon the mast-and-crossbar technique (like the Terre Haute team used) and instead aim their telescopes directly on the field of stars overhead. This technique required memorizing seasonal constellations and becoming intimately familiar with star atlases, a practice Hefferan gladly encouraged (fig. 4.10). In addition to reporting their findings to the SAO, Moonwatchers would record their nightly observations in their logbooks. This modified approach to observing also gave Hefferan’s team greater flexibility by letting them point their telescopes in whatever direction was necessary rather than adhering strictly to a north-south or east-west line. In time, many other Moonwatch groups adopted this technique. Conversations with the Las Cruces team and other knowledgeable amateurs drove home the need for Hefferan’s team to continue practicing the craft of satellite spotting. In fact, team leaders all around the world and Campbell grappled with the issue of training Moonwatchers throughout 1957. Many teams came up with innovative solutions to the problem of getting enthusiastic amateurs to develop the patience and skills needed to

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Figure 4.10. Example of a Moonwatcher’s report sheet giving information on a satellite sighting.

recognize a flitting gleam of light streaking through a telescope ’s field of view. Hefferan’s team used both simple and high-tech training techniques. For starters, her students practiced spotting pebbles tossed across the line of sight of their telescopes. Moths attracted to lights on the school’s roof and the occasional meteor provided more targets. The students also erected two tall poles on the roof and suspended a small flashlight on a wire between them. As it moved, members tried to quickly spot the light with their telescopes. Exercises such as this familiarized the Moonwatchers with their timing and recording system—spotting a satellite did no good if one lacked the exact time of sighting. Indoors, on cloudy nights, Hefferan used an overhead projector on which she moved a black dot, similar to a satellite, through a sample star field and had her students fill out observation reports. Moonwatch teams all around the country developed their own homegrown tools and techniques for practicing. In North Canton, Ohio, Richard Emmons used his small planetarium to train members of his Moonwatch team. Three dozen people could fit under the dome onto which Emmons projected images

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of the stars and planets as well as a realistic image of a moving satellite. He also built a small moving model to show a satellite’s path in the sky. Emmons discovered that these practice sessions gave Moonwatchers “a valuable foretaste of the problems of [satellite] observations” such as learning to recognize basic constellations and how difficult a faint satellite would be to see.61 Using his planetarium and model, Emmons (fig. 4.11) gave local citizens and amateur science groups in Ohio a preview of what they could expect to see when real satellites crossed over their town: “A barely visible point of light emerges from the western twilight . . . it picks up speed and grows somewhat brighter. Passing north of the constellation Orion, it crosses the constellation Gemini . . . With slackened speed and diminished brightness it suddenly vanishes in the east near Arcturus, where it enters the earth’s shadow.”62 A transit across the entire sky took only six minutes and stunned viewers with its rapidity. Campbell and his colleagues at the SAO recognized the need to train members of Moonwatch in a more standardized fashion. In the summer of 1957, amateur astronomers gathered for the annual meeting of the Astronomical League in Kansas City. There they tested a prototype of the SAO’s “satellite simulator.” A tinkerer from New Jersey built three of these devices, and the SAO eventually sent them around the country to train Moonwatch teams. The satellite simulator was a cumbersome rectangular box large enough to require a table to rest on. To practice, observers sat under a lighttight hood and looked through a Moonwatch telescope integrated into the device. Electronic controls allowed the operator to alter the apparent size and speed of a simulated satellite for the viewer. For those teams which had abandoned the mast-and-crossbar technique, the operator could even add a simulated star field. Vioalle Hefferan’s team was one of the first groups to experiment with the simulator. They found it “entertaining but not very instructive” for people like her students who already had trained for months. But, as an “introductory training device,” she thought it would at least give neophyte observers “some idea of what to expect.”63 Teenagers filled the roster of other teams besides Hefferan’s. In 1956, the Millbrook School, located on rolling land in the Hudson Valley of New York, celebrated a quarter-century of preparing young men for Ivy League colleges. Neale E. Howard taught physics to Millbrook boys, many drawn from wealthy families in nearby Connecticut and New York City. Soon after his

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Figure 4.11. Richard Emmons, seated far right, and his Moonwatch team inside his planetarium.

arrival at Millbrook in 1945, Howard, an enthusiastic amateur scientist himself, started an astronomy club that met on Friday evenings. Millbrook students were not strangers to amateur science. Over the years, students had participated in bird banding, maintained a station for the Weather Bureau, and helped collect measurements on radio wave transmissions for the National Bureau of Standards.64 With Howard’s supervision, boys at Millbrook constructed an impressive observatory that housed a large telescope they designed themselves (fig. 4.12). “The boys made every bit of it in our blacksmith’s shop,” Howard told the New York Times, which featured the school’s Moonwatch team on the frontpage. “They even ground the 12½ inch mirror.”65 A large donation from a local philanthropist enabled the Millbrook team to buy ten Satellite Scopes, replacing the binoculars with which they had started their training. Ham radio electronics, stop watches, and a tape recorder rounded out their equipment. Other teams had to work much harder to get the money needed to gear up for Moonwatch. Brother Wendell Adam, a young math and science teacher from the Holy Cross High School in New Orleans, discovered that fundraising was a team leader’s hardest job. In the winter of 1956–57, Brother Adam solicited dozens of local businesses for donations to buy telescopes and electronic gear for his school’s Moonwatch team.66 By the time that New Orleans celebrated Mardi Gras, Adam and his team of two dozen high

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Figure 4.12. Students from the Millbrook School with their Moonwatch telescopes in front of the school’s observatory.

school boys (girls didn’t attend Holy Cross) had raised about a thousand dollars from local breweries, chemical plants, and other businesses.67 As was true for many teenaged members of Moonwatch, the idea of rockets and spaceflight excited Brother Adam’s group as much as Moonwatching itself. They devoured all they could on the IGY satellite program and gave presentations of what they learned to each other when the group met. Brother Adam’s personal views no doubt inspired them. He saw Moonwatch as a signal that “a new era is ahead of us. We have reached the last major frontier.”68 Even before Sputnik flew, one of Brother Adam’s young Moonwatchers confessed to J. Allen Hynek that he no longer wanted to be “an astrophysicist . . . cooped up in an observatory all of the time.” Instead, “astronautical engineering” now ranked high in the young man’s career plans.69 Teenaged fascination with rockets helped catalyze the formation of Moonwatch teams, including one in Arlington, Virginia. In September 1956, students established the Wakefield Rocket Society after their physics teacher, David W. Saltus, agreed to sponsor them.70 When Saltus got involved with Wakefield High’s rocket and Moonwatch clubs, he found something that

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transcended being a teacher. Like Brother Adam, Saltus was an admitted “space bug.” Too old to “ride a moon probe or be the first on Mars,” he instead looked forward to “contributing to what will be the greatest achievement of mankind.”71 Believing that “satellite launching was the highest expression of the rocket art,” the group quickly decided to start a Moonwatch team.72 At first, only boys made up the membership of the Wakefield Rocket Society. In fact, Peter Hagen, whose father, John, was lead scientist for the Naval Research Laboratory’s Vanguard project, served as one of the club’s first presidents. The elder Hagen, despite whatever official reservations his lab had about the abilities of amateur satellite spotters, helped secure sixteen small surplus telescopes for the club to use. On at least one occasion, John Hagen even joined his son, and together they watched for satellites passing overhead. It is not known whether he was also present when homemade rockets the club shot off from the banks of the Potomac brought local police out to investigate.73 After Sputnik appeared, Saltus encouraged a second group at Wakefield— the Girls Auxiliary Moonwatch Society, also known as the GAMS. All the teen Moonwatchers, as in Albuquerque, met for their observing sessions on the school roof and, despite the difficulty of observing in the cold and darkness, remained enthusiastic. One of them even interpreted his participation as a contribution to the “defense effort of the United States,” one of the few instances in which teens explicated the connection between their interests in space and science to national security.74 Others found themselves satisfied with “the feeling of delightful conspiracy of creeping out of the house” and the “peculiar sensation to be experienced when looking at the stars.”75 Like Brother Adam, Vioalle Hefferan, and other leaders of teen-based teams, Saltus’s first concern wasn’t that his students make accurate observations of satellites that professional scientists could use for researching topics such as the earth’s gravity field and physical shape. The “potential educational value” Moonwatch offered his students interested him most, and Saltus believed teens’ participation would help them “grow intellectually in the fields of Astronomy and Mathematics.” That teenaged amateur scientists, by taking part in Moonwatch and other science clubs, demonstrated solidarity with the larger scientific community also appealed to team leaders.76 Campbell, of course, recognized that satellite spotting stations staffed by teens might not make the most valuable scientific

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contributions. When one ambitious team leader wanted to recruit young children for Junior Moonwatch Teams, Campbell offered support but stressed that his main goal should simply be “getting them interested in science.”77 In a few cases, teens organized their own teams and took charge of local satellite spotting attempts. In 1956, for example, sixteen-year-old Dale P. Cruikshank from Des Moines, Iowa, read about Moonwatch in Sky & Telescope. He soon set out to organize a team. Despite articles in local papers and his membership in the Great Plains Astronomical Society, he failed to raise enough money to equip his team members. While his efforts to start a Moonwatch station fell through, Cruikshank’s enthusiasm for science remained undiminished.78 While an undergraduate at Iowa State University, he met Gerard P. Kuiper, a prominent astronomer at the University of Chicago. He followed the Dutch scientist to the University of Arizona, where he received his doctorate in 1968. Cruikshank went on to become an astronomer for NASA and helped author several hundred publications on planetary science. Efforts by two teenaged boys in Cleveland to start a Moonwatch team met with more success. Thomas W. Petrie and Thomas Van Flandern were students at Saint Ignatius High School when they learned about Moonwatch in Sky & Telescope. Intrigued, the two boys contacted Steadman Thompson, a leader of a well-established amateur astronomy club in nearby Columbus and a member of Moonwatch’s National Advisory Committee. Thompson encouraged the two boys to organize a team in Cleveland. A local newspaper sponsored them, and the city allowed the team—about three dozen people joined Petrie and Van Flandern—to set up their Moonwatch station in a public park alongside a Ground Observer Corps post.79 For Van Flandern, raised by a single mother who supported her family with help from welfare, Moonwatch helped open up a new world. His earliest childhood memories were of having a fascination with the sky and how it moved along with him as he rode in the backseat of the family car.80 Later on, as he recalled, he had to convince his mother to let him leave the house in the dawn’s wee hours in order to see constellations otherwise hidden from view. A summer job in grade school helped him buy his first telescope, a fourinch Dynascope reflector advertised in Sky & Telescope for $89.95. With it, he began to observe the planets and harder-to-spot objects in the deep sky. The teenaged Van Flandern demonstrated his acumen in state math competitions, performances that helped him win a scholarship for college.

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He especially liked calculating the orbits of comets and occultations of stars and planets by the moon. Taking pleasure in the reliability of such events, the possibility of predicting precisely when and where an artificial satellite would appear, and then actually observing it held great appeal for the teen. Van Flandern later recalled, “We had the feeling that we were doing something productive for society as well as building lives and careers for ourselves.”81 The motto of the Cleveland team’s newsletter (75 cents for adults, 35 cents for the special junior member rate) perhaps reflected the comfort the young man found in these predictions—“In Sputnik We Trust.”82

Exploiting a “Fine Grained Network” In 1955, Clair L. Strong contacted the National Academy of Sciences about what role amateurs could play in the IGY. Strong, author of the monthly column in Scientific American called “The Amateur Scientist,” pointed out that the strength of non-professional scientists flowed from more than their numbers and their enthusiasm. The amateurs’ “fine grained network,” as Strong called it, could certainly provide a backbone for activities like Moonwatch. This network of amateur science clubs and associations could also, Strong pointed out, facilitate the recruitment and training of new amateurs, generate enthusiasm for science, and help circulate news and information about the IGY.83 In January 1957, Scientific American began publishing Strong’s articles about amateur scientists and the IGY. “Whether you go in for short-wave radio, weather watching, skin diving, stargazing, mountain climbing, perusing the logs of old clipper ships or any of a host of similar avocations,” Strong told his readers, “a place for your talents can be found on some scientific team of the IGY. . . . There are simply not enough scientists available for the job. Hence, if the objectives of the IGY are to be fully attained, amateurs must lend a hand.”84 Over the next several months, Strong told his readers about the otherwise ordinary citizens who spent their free time observing aurora, recording earthquakes, launching model rockets, and, of course, spotting satellites.

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Moonwatch’s organization occurred at an opportune point in the development of amateur science, especially amateur astronomy. New discoveries made in the emerging field of radio astronomy and by scientists working at the grand 200-inch telescope on Palomar stimulated the public’s interest in astronomy. For instance, Walter Baade, an astronomer at the Mount Wilson Observatory, used the 200-inch to show that stars in the Andromeda Galaxy were farther away than scientists had previously believed, a discovery that effectively doubled the size of the known universe. At the same time, amateur interest in telescope making revived and coincided with the availability of quality, low-cost telescopes from companies like Edmund Scientific, Cave Optics, and Unitron. In response to these developments and as part of Americans’ overall proclivity for joining associations, the 1950s saw a rapid proliferation of local clubs devoted to amateur astronomy. By October 1957, over 150 astronomy groups met regularly in cities and towns across the United States and overseas. Unlike curious citizens or enthusiastic teens who had to organize their Moonwatch teams largely independently from one another, members of local astronomy clubs in the United States already had a social network of which they could take advantage. Moreover, regional and national amateur astronomy organizations helped foster connections between clubs and provided the means for sharing information and news. One of the major national groups was the Astronomical League. Formed in 1947, the Astronomical League was—and remains—a federation of amateur astronomy clubs that coordinated the endeavors of stargazers nationwide.85 A few years later, other amateurs formed a separate organization, the Western Amateur Astronomers, to serve clubs west of the Rockies. These groups sponsored regular conventions and helped the membership of local clubs grow. By 1957, for example, thousands of Americans were in clubs that met under the umbrella of the Astronomical League while hundreds more participated in the Western Amateur Astronomers network.86 In 1956, when Whipple officially launched Moonwatch, Grace C. Scholz was the president of the Astronomical League. A medical statistician by training, the forty-four-year-old Scholz had been an avid amateur astronomer for years and also one of Moonwatch’s national advisers. Her interest in satellites went beyond amateur science. Through Moonwatch, she and Armand Spitz began to spend considerable time together, and the two married in 1958.

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Scholz promoted amateur participation in satellite spotting at the League’s regional and national gatherings. In the summer of 1957, the League met for its annual convention in Kansas City. Moonwatch sat high on the program and Hynek, Spitz, and Colonel Owen Clarke attended. During the meeting, an air force pilot gave a talk entitled “How It Feels to Be a Simulated Satellite” and Steadman Thompson told attendees “Who Knows What about the Russian Satellite.”87 After visitors toured a spotting station that the Kansas City Moonwatch team had set up on the roof of the city library, Scholz emphasized the importance of Moonwatch in her annual address. “We are all aware that the world has become astronomy-minded,” she said, “Even the amateur today is looked upon as a source of information in this scientific field. This places a heavy burden of responsibility on every amateur who is ever called to act as a spokesman for astronomy.” Moonwatch, she said, was “the first real challenge that has been presented to amateurs.”88 While national groups like the Astronomical League helped provide a social infrastructure for Moonwatch across the United States, the actual organization of amateur astronomers took place at the grassroots level. Walter Scott Houston, for example, lived in Manhattan, Kansas, a short drive from where the League held its 1957 annual meeting. Houston, who became a legend among amateur astronomers, grew up in Tippecanoe, Wisconsin, where he learned to build both microscopes and telescopes.89 As a boy, he quickly managed to observe all 103 nebulae and star clusters in the original Messier Catalog, a rite of passage for many amateur astronomers. This helped spark his love for observing deep-sky objects. While earning a degree in English from the University of Wisconsin, he began a lifetime fascination with variable stars and started accumulating the 12,000-plus observations he sent to the American Association of Variable Star Observers during his lifetime. In the 1950s, Houston taught English at Kansas State University in Manhattan, a small town of about 15,000 people, where he lived in a converted red schoolhouse complete with cupola and brass bell. Located away from town lights, his yard gave him a good view of the night sky. In his spare time, besides indulging his passion for observing variable stars, Houston wrote a regular column for Sky & Telescope. He also published a regional newsletter called The Great Plains Observer that circulated to over one thousand amateur astronomers.

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When Fred Whipple announced Moonwatch, Houston, who had known Leon Campbell’s father through the AAVSO, decided to organize a team. The Kansas university professor felt optimistic about the capabilities of his fellow amateurs. “It seems to me,” he wrote a friend at the American Association of Variable Star Observers (AAVSO) “that the professional astronomers may have little understanding of the amateur and what he can accomplish.” Houston was also realistic about using amateurs, especially those in big cities where light pollution limited what they could see. “I have belonged to [big city] amateur clubs,” he explained. “Most of the members can’t find Uranus even when the planet is visible to the naked eye.”90 In addition to helping organize his Moonwatchers, Houston tried to give them and readers of The Great Plains Observer a sense of what they could expect when the first satellites went up. As he wrote, “Please don’t expect this to be a routine matter—Cambridge calls you about 5 p.m., you get the gang together and watch, the satellite comes over on schedule, you report, and go home to a bottle of Bud.” Spotting satellites, Houston warned, “will probably be much wilder than that.” Nevertheless, “the amateur has a chance to perform an outstanding scientific service.”91 Within a few months, Houston recruited more than two dozen people— teens, college students, and older adults—as satellite spotters. Photographs of his team show them bundled in heavy coats with Houston standing nearby, his trademark pipe at the ready. Houston helped overcome fund-raising difficulties by “giving satellite talks and begging for contributions” to the degree where he soon felt “qualified to act as a college president.”92 The real president of Kansas State University included Houston’s team in his school’s annual science research summary—an unusual honor for an English professor—and the physics department donated equipment to help the team get started. Eventually, Houston reported that “one of the men who ‘owns’ the town” was interested in Moonwatch, and the man’s “deep pockets” would add substantially to contributions from less prosperous citizens.93 Raising money to equip a Moonwatch team was, not surprisingly, one of the biggest challenges local organizers faced. One prominent amateur astronomer, however, managed to convince his employer to actually sponsor several Moonwatch teams around the country. Donald D. Zahner was a longtime astronomy enthusiast who, when not watching the night sky, worked as a sales and marketing executive for the Seven-Up soft drink company based in his hometown of St. Louis. In the fall of 1956, Zahner met Armand Spitz,

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an old friend, for breakfast. Spitz told Zahner he was concerned whether local Moonwatch teams could collect enough money to set up their stations and wondered if their hodgepodge assortment of gear might impede their operation. Zahner proposed that his company sponsor teams and help them acquire a standardized complement of basic Moonwatch gear. Seven-Up’s president was “immediately captivated by the idea,” and Zahner contacted local bottlers throughout the United States. “In 6 months or so,” he explained, “the attention of the world will be focused on a small metal ball wheeling through space some 200 miles above us.”94 For $1,000 they could sponsor a team while the resulting “deluge of publicity and civic prestige” would more than repay their investment.95 Within a few months, Seven-Up sponsored some fifteen Moonwatch stations around the country, and Zahner helped start more after the IGY began. Zahner led by example. He helped organize about three dozen people who established their St. Louis station, not surprisingly, in a building the soft drink company owned. By the time the IGY ended, Zahner’s team was, as Campbell noted, “one of our truly outstanding groups.”96 The teams that Houston and Zahner led were what one observer called “a one-man creation . . . the effect of a powerful personality on a nonastronomical community.”97 The experience these two men gained from thousands of nights spent looking at the night sky, when combined with their extensive social connections within the national amateur science network, spurred the success of their Moonwatch squads. In some cases, Moonwatch teams, like the one in Walnut Creek, California, were composed almost entirely of people like Houston and Zahner— die-hard amateur astronomers. In November 1956, a group of dedicated amateurs created the Mount Diablo Astronomical Society and made Moonwatch a division of their then-small club. While Moonwatch in Walnut Creek initially attracted a moderate number of members, the club’s satellite observing sessions eventually became the province of fewer than half a dozen devoted amateurs. Donald F. Charles and Jack A. Borde proved themselves two of the most active members of Walnut Creek’s small but prolific team. Charles grew up in New York City after his missionary family moved there from the Philippines. He became fascinated with astronomy, visited the Hayden Planetarium as often as he could, and read his father’s astronomy books. During World

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War Two, he learned celestial navigation and worked as a meteorologist. When the war ended, he finished college at the University of California at Berkeley, bought a small telescope, and joined national and regional groups like the AAVSO and Western Amateur Astronomers.98 Borde got interested in astronomy in part through his wife ’s curiosity about flying saucers. “I knew that if I was to sight and take pictures of flying saucers,” he told a newspaper, “I’d have to have a telescope.” As a result, he learned the craft of lens and mirror grinding and eventually built his own backyard observatory with a telescope sporting a ten-inch mirror.99 Both men, regular attendees of monthly amateurs’ meetings at nearby Chabot Observatory, had careers in science-related fields, a feature that blurs the distinction between amateur and professional. Charles worked as a chemist for the California and Hawaii Sugar Company, and Borde spent his days as a technician at what is now called the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory helping with particle physics experiments. Charles and Borde made a perfect Moonwatch duo. As the “hardware guy,” Borde built instruments used by the Walnut Creek team. Charles tried his hand at telescope making but found that he preferred—like young Tom Van Flandern in Cleveland—calculating satellite orbits and then going outside to see how accurate his predictions were.100 This group of hard-core Moonwatchers first set up in the backyard of another member (fig. 4.13). Later, frustrated by the limits of the standard Moonwatch telescopes for spotting faint satellites, Borde and Charles established observing posts in their backyards. From there, they peered through more powerful telescopes and kept tabs on one another in real time via telephone. Despite its small size—the club roster rarely claimed more than a dozen or so people—the Walnut Creek team generated substantial publicity for itself and the Moonwatch program in general. An open house in March 1957 attracted more than 250 visitors who examined the group’s homemade telescopes. An even bigger hit was the “satellarium” that Borde helped build (fig. 4.14). With the aid of some gears and pulleys, this device, much like an old-fashioned orrery, moved a globe-and-satellite combination to explain concepts—apogee, perigee, orbit—that would soon become part of the neophyte space enthusiast’s vocabulary. Borde and his colleagues painted the inside of their contraption black and added fluorescent stars while a simulated “sun” illuminated it from one end.

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Figure 4.13. Moonwatch team from Walnut Creek, California, in action.

The team achieved maximum crowd-pleasing effects by unveiling their satellarium show with a launch countdown and “space-movie sound track.”101 The Walnut Creek team displayed their invention to local schools and civic organizations, and it appeared on television and even in a department store window. The earth, according to one observer, appeared to be floating in space as the model artificial moon rapidly moved over it, “blinking on and off as it passed in and out of the sunlight.” Soon enough, the people in Walnut Creek and all around the globe would have the chance to look upward and see a real satellite flying over their towns.

“A Common Meeting Ground for All Nations” As Walnut Creek’s satellarium and Richard Emmons’s shows in his Star Barn demonstrated, an artificial moon knows no boundaries. Heedless of

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Figure 4.14. Walnut Creek’s “satellarium.”

Cold War tensions and territorial disputes, satellites launched during the IGY could be seen from every continent on the planet. Seeing them was, as Fred Whipple claimed, a “new global science-sport,” and he had long promoted the value of the participation in Moonwatch by amateurs from outside the United States. With encouragement from Whipple and aided by Hynek’s overseas trips, enthusiastic amateurs started dozens of Moonwatch teams overseas. If one scans the archive shelves where the Smithsonian Institution stores its Moonwatch records, the box labels read like the destinations of an exotic globetrotter—Cuba, Fiji, Greece, India, Iran, Zambia. There are even records from a Moonwatch team based on an ice island floating off Ellesmere Island in the Arctic Ocean. People overseas joined Moonwatch for many of the same reasons that Americans did: civic pride, youthful fascination with science and space, and the curiosity of amateur scientists. In some cases, amateurs’ desire to participate in a community activity transcended the local to encompass the global. Some participants overseas

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expressed hope that Moonwatch and the IGY in general would generate international goodwill and cooperation. One idealistic Moonwatcher from Australia wrote that astronomy “is one science which can provide a common meeting-ground for all nations, creeds, and ideologies.” Stargazing encouraged humility and a “general appreciation of humanity’s comparatively lowly place in the Cosmos” and if more people put aside “international bickering and discord,” then “one more step would be taken toward a better world understanding.”102 Another Moonwatch leader wrote Campbell from the Philippines after the IGY was underway. Aware of the political and military context in which nations launched satellites, he reported his initial surprise when “the Russians launched their satellites ahead of the Americans.” When the Americans finally managed to shoot more objects into orbit than the Soviets, he felt relieved and proud.103 As in the United States, people interested in science could read about satellite tracking in popular magazines, and many wrote Spitz or Leon Campbell for more information. A typical letter came from a missionary at an Episcopalian school in Liberia. How, he asked, could he put his “sea captain’s telescope” (a better telescope would arrive any week, he noted) to work for Moonwatch?104 Similar letters from all corners of the globe revealed the difficulties, similar to what American teams faced but exacerbated by local circumstances, of organizing amateur science groups overseas. One, of course, was the difficulty in securing adequate equipment. In addition to a suitable suite of telescopes, amateurs needed timing equipment and communications gear to make scientifically useful observations. Because Moonwatch was a team activity, amateurs overseas also needed to recruit a sufficient number of participants. One correspondent from the Belgian Congo argued that his remote location, rudimentary equipment, and lack of team members presented only a partial impediment to his participation. “Suppose,” he insisted, “the satellite came down on this part of the globe. Even the slightest information about it may be unique.”105 Nonetheless, the SAO stuck to its general policy of discouraging “lone wolf ” observers. The Smithsonian observatory, however, was especially keen to promote Moonwatch in countries where it planned to build Baker-Nunn stations. Amateurs in Argentina, Australia, Japan, and South Africa all organized active Moonwatch teams. The SAO’s interest in these teams went beyond public relations and its desire to encourage amateur participation. As one

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professional scientist in South Africa noted, “A satellite fired at midnight from Florida should be observable in the dawn twilight from Cape Town just a few minutes later.” Spotting the satellite immediately after it entered orbit would have “immense value” for the IGY’s science program.106 Eventually, with aid from the Astronomical Society of South Africa, amateurs established four Moonwatch stations in that region. Before satellite tracking became routine, Whipple favored having one or more Moonwatch teams nearby as a complement to the untested Baker-Nunn stations. Baker-Nunn personnel helped, in some places, to drum up local interest in Moonwatch and provided assistance with training and equipment.107 They could also help route field communications back to SAO headquarters in Cambridge. For instance, the SAO, in conjunction with the University of Tehran, established a Baker-Nunn camera station near Shiraz, a city in southwest Iran surrounded by arid mountains. Smithsonian personnel helped create a Moonwatch team largely made of students from a nearby high school that set up its station next to the Baker-Nunn outpost.108 Overseas, professional scientists helped establish Moonwatch stations in their own countries. For example, since South America hosted Baker-Nunn stations in Peru, Argentina, and off the coast of Venezuela, the SAO wanted Moonwatch teams to complement them. In late 1956, Whipple and Hynek began to collaborate with Teofilo Tabanera, a scientist from Buenos Aires. Tabanera was one of the leaders of the International Astronautical Federation, a group of societies interested in space science and exploration founded in 1951. The Argentinian worked to promote Moonwatch in South America, and amateurs established teams in countries like Chile, Brazil, and Peru. Tabanera also translated the Bulletin for Visual Observers of Satellites into Spanish and helped distribute it.109 Hynek, for his part, reported on Tabanera’s progress in his “Scanning the Skies” column.110 Privately, he was less sanguine. While touring South America, for instance, he gossiped to Whipple that quite a few of the local scientists he met were loafers (“real feather merchants,” Hynek said).111 Of the amateur scientists overseas who responded to the opportunity Moonwatch offered, the largest portion came from Japan. By the time the IGY began in July 1957, over two dozen groups had signed up for Moonwatch and more than seventy eventually took part. The organization of satellite spotting teams in Japan, compared to the United States, appears to

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have been more of a top-down effort. Japan’s IGY committee appointed Massasi Miyadi, the director of the Tokyo Astronomical Observatory, as their country’s Moonwatch coordinator. Miyadi enlisted the aid of the Astronomical Society of Japan and other national organizations to help recruit participants. Meanwhile, major newspaper companies in Japan offered generous sponsorship, a fact that helps explain the relatively large number of teams in Japan. In addition, a Tokyo instrument maker produced high-quality telescope models especially designed for Moonwatch that Japanese sponsors bought for their teams. Miyadi also simplified the operation of his country’s teams by having them send all their communications to his observatory, which then routed them—after checking their quality—to SAO headquarters. Compared to American teams, Japanese Moonwatch teams had more direct interactions with professional astronomers. The Tokyo Astronomical Observatory, located outside of Tokyo in the town of Mitaka, sponsored a group that, not surprisingly, proved to be one of the best-performing teams in Japan during the IGY. Professional scientists and physicians led at least a dozen Japanese teams while school teachers organized others. Moonwatch was popular among Japanese youth, and many teens, like their American counterparts, volunteered (figs. 4.15 and 4.16). The American military also took part. Members of the Army Map Service set up two stations on the flanks of Mount Fuji. In fact, Miyadi faced such a surge of interest in Japan that he confessed to Whipple there were “so many amateurs proposing to participate in the work that it is rather difficult for us to qualify them [all].”112 Regardless of whether the telescopes of a satellite spotting team were staffed by Iowan townspeople or Japanese teenagers, all Moonwatchers— along with most western scientists and the American political establishment— assumed that the United States would launch the first satellites. When Reader’s Digest imagined, for example, the launch of the first satellite, the adventure began with “a button . . . pushed in Cocoa, Florida.”113 Of course, as Sputnik so dramatically revealed, there was another satellite program well underway besides the navy’s ill-fated Vanguard project. And, just as the Soviets were readying the launch of their first artificial moons, so too were they making plans for satellite tracking behind what Winston Churchill so famously called the Iron Curtain.

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Figure 4.15. Japanese Moonwatch team practicing.

Figure 4.16. Teenaged members of Japanese Moonwatch team.

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The leader of the Soviet’s satellite tracking program was Alla G. Massevitch, a Russian astrophysicist whom Time magazine called “the moonfaced girl genius of Soviet science.”114 Born in the Caucasus region of Georgia in 1918, she graduated from Moscow University just before Hitler’s troops invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941. She worked in Moscow during the war on problems in nuclear physics and stellar evolution while her husband did metallurgical research. After the war, the Astronomical Council of the Academy of Sciences, which coordinated Soviet astronomy, offered Massevitch the position of vice-president. In early 1957, following the Soviets’ announcement that they would launch satellites, it asked Massevitch to organize tracking efforts. This order coincided well with her growing interest—like Whipple’s—in using satellite observations to study the atmosphere and to do geodesy.115 Interestingly, both Whipple and Massevitch developed similar systems to visually track and photograph their countries’ satellites. Massevitch oversaw the development of telescope-camera facilities that, like the Baker-Nunn instruments, could see and photograph a wide patch of sky. A map published in 1958 by the Soviet Academy of Sciences shows more than sixteen such photographic tracking stations scattered across the eastern and southern areas of the Soviet Union. While not formally part of the IGY research program, China also collected satellite observations for the Soviets.116 Massevitch and her Soviet colleagues also recruited teams of amateurs to man visual observing posts throughout the USSR. All told, Massevitch had about seventy stations at her disposal. The heads of the stations reported to Ashghabat, the capital of Turkmenistan, for training. One practice exercise found observers getting up at dawn, manning their small telescopes, and trying to spot a bright light carried up a faraway mountain ridge by one of Massevitch’s students. Years later she reflected, “It looks a little bit funny now, silly perhaps” how they calculated in advance the speed at which a hiker-with-lantern should trot along to simulate an orbiting satellite. Whipple and Massevitch corresponded and even met in person before the IGY began in order to share information about their respective programs. Whipple later remarked that the Soviets copied the Smithsonian’s system “lock, stock, and barrel” with one difference. While the two programs faced similar problems such as organization, funding, training, and maintaining observer morale, “there was a bit more compulsion” placed on the Soviet

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observers, Whipple suspected, “to get out early in the morning and late at night and make observations” than other teams faced.117

Testing Moonwatch In September 1956, soon after Whipple formally unveiled Moonwatch to the international science community in Barcelona, an unnamed source at the Smithsonian observatory boasted to the New York Times that if a “satellite were launched next week, we would be ready for it.”118 While entirely hubristic since the SAO’s network was just taking shape, thousands of amateur scientists and other enthusiastic citizens had established nearly eighty stations in the United States and more than three dozen groups overseas by the summer of 1957. Up to this point, however, these teams organized and trained largely independently from one another. For Moonwatch to work, it had to function as a system with an effectiveness greater than the sum of its parts. In early 1957, Whipple, Hynek, and Campbell decided it was time to test the readiness of Moonwatch teams in the United States with a series of nationwide drills. Individual stations would take part in “the largest organized astronomical observation ever to be made in this country.”119 Hynek remarked that these drills “will have more people watching the sky than flying saucers ever did.”120 With so many people looking up at once, the SAO speculated that the “mass observing session” might spot new natural objects in the sky, perhaps even a “tiny but as yet undiscovered moon.”121 But how would an imitation “artificial moon” be arranged? With aid from the air force and the Civil Air Patrol, the SAO arranged for aircraft to do a series of “flyovers” throughout the United States. To help simulate a satellite, some aircraft trailed a long length of clothesline to which a toilet plunger—referred to delicately in press coverage as a “rubber plumber’s helper”—was tied. When pulled along at slow speed at an altitude of about a mile and a quarter, the plunger, fitted with a small light bulb and a few batteries, looked and moved roughly as experts imagined an orbiting satellite would.122 At other times, individual Moonwatch stations arranged for flybys with local pilots. In New Orleans, police arrested one of these

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volunteer pilots after his low, slow passes over the city alarmed residents. On landing, the pilot, a lieutenant colonel in the local Civil Air Patrol, explained to authorities that he was flying an official mission for the Moonwatch training program. Unmoved, they booked him for drunken driving and cited his female passenger for loitering.123 Despite such mishaps and poor weather conditions across much of the continent—fewer than twenty stations enjoyed clear skies while others reported floods, downpours, and even tornado warnings—the exercise gave Moonwatchers the chance to gauge their readiness. More than 70 percent of teams in the United States took part in the first test on May 17, 1957. That Friday night, a half-hour after local sunset, teams convened and peered upward, hoping to sight aircraft lights or perhaps even a meteor. In Albuquerque, for instance, Vioalle Hefferan’s students met on the roof of their high school and, at precisely 7:18 p.m., started to monitor the sky. Like other teams, for the next ninety minutes they honed spotting techniques and made ready to report any worthwhile sightings to SAO headquarters. Back in Cambridge, Whipple, Spitz, and Hynek monitored progress of Moonwatch teams while SAO staff attended to the telephones. Massasi Miyadi joined them to help mark off stations on a big map as they reported in. A photograph from that night shows Hynek intently listening to a phone call while an assistant records data amid stacks of paper, coffee cups, and ashtrays. Portland, Oregon, checked in last at 1:30 a.m., and, after getting some sleep, SAO staff met to assess what the nationwide alert revealed. Overall, the results pleased Whipple and his colleagues, especially the fact that many stations, despite the inclement weather, participated. More than half of the Moonwatch teams in the United States described themselves as fully instrumented and ready for action. A second nationwide test generated even more news coverage and produced better results among the Moonwatch teams. Media excitement over the alerts even prompted some journalists to conclude that the United States had, in fact, already launched a satellite and was keeping it secret until the Smithsonian network located it.124 The national tests also uncovered some weaknesses in the national network. Getting correct time signals via shortwave radio stymied some groups while others reported troubles recording accurate positions and times. Some Moonwatch leaders also encountered delays assembling their members in

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short order. As Whipple and others knew, of course, the advance warning the SAO provided before the drill would be a luxury when the observing was for real. Whipple, to be on the safe side, suggested that all branches of the Smithsonian’s satellite tracking network, including Moonwatch, should consider themselves on a general alert after the IGY started on July 1. “Exciting thoughts, aren’t they?” he said.125 He had no idea just how thrilling things would soon become in Cambridge and at Moonwatch stations around the planet.

5 Seeing History through a Small Telescope

The sprawling Baikonur launch facility, for years the heart of the Soviet space and ICBM programs, sits amid the barren steppes of Kazakhstan. It is a harsh and desolate location, buffeted by winds that sweep across the open plains. Temperatures regularly soar over 110 degrees during the day and plummet again at night, conditions that created more stress for the rocket engineers stationed there, and the equipment they labored over, in the summer of 1957. Even the name of what today is called the Baikonur Cosmodrome is a product of Cold War mistrust. The “real” Baikonur is a mining town some two-hundred miles to the northeast, but the Soviets chose this name to mislead Western intelligence services as to the complex’s true location. After the Soviets exploded their first nuclear weapon several hundred miles to the northeast of Baikonur in August 1949, the complex grew into a central component of the Soviet nuclear infrastructure. During the Cuban Missile Crisis, for instance, engineers at the facility hastily removed a planetary probe from a rocket to make room for a far less peaceful payload. Today a small park is tucked away at Baikonur near where a launch pad, once designated simply as Site 1, sat. A stone monolith rises from the earth,

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the black rocks around it providing some contrast to brown grass that stretches to the horizon. At its top rests a silver sphere. The antennas trailing behind it appear to glide through the nearby branches of small trees struggling to survive in the dry and sandy ground. On the night of October 4, 1957, this patch of desolate Soviet prairie was a hive of activity and anxiety. Giant floodlights illuminated Rocket No. 8K71PS perched atop a launch platform three stories tall made from salvaged bridge trusses. An enormous beast, the Soviet R-7 rocket measured some one hundred feet tall and more than thirty feet wide at its base. A multistage rocket with four booster engines strapped to the sides, the machine was also extremely temperamental. As late as July 1957, an R-7 test ended in an explosive shower of debris over the Kazakh plains, a mishap that caused much concern for Sergei P. Korolev, the Soviet’s chief rocket designer. At liftoff, 8K71PS weighed about 560,000 pounds. A volatile mixture of kerosene and liquid oxygen contributed about 90 percent of this weight. A near-negligible fraction came from a 184-pound polished aluminum ball nestled in the rocket’s nose. At twenty-eight minutes after midnight on October 5, Baikonur local time, the massive engines of 8K71PS snarled and burst into action. Slowly the rocket rose from the launch pad, ascended into the night sky, and tilted downrange. After a five-minute burn, the rocket and the silver companion it bore moved at nearly 18,000 miles an hour. When the upper stage reached some 140 miles and followed a trajectory roughly parallel to the earth, the engines shut down and the protective nose cone opened to allow a 22.8-inch metal sphere to tumble out. Together, the rocket body, the nose cone, and Sputnik 1 itself—the Soviets actually opened the Space Age with three potentially visible satellites—entered orbit. Four long, spring-loaded antennas popped into position and trailed the satellite. Two radio transmitters inside the pressurized metal shell, powered by seventy pounds of chemical batteries, began to chirp. Ninety-six minutes after the R-7’s engines had briefly turned night to day at Baikonur, Soviet engineers—much to Korolev’s relief—detected the radio signals. Each lasted three-tenths of second and was broadcast at 20 and 40 megahertz. The sound — beep, pause, beep—signaled a new challenge to amateur scientists around the world.

History through a Small Telescope

In many accounts, the start of the Space Age begins with a different sound—that of Lloyd Berkner clapping his hands. On the evening of October 4, scientists, journalists, and diplomats mingled, glasses of vodka in hand, in the ballroom of the Soviet Embassy. The Soviet and American scientists had convened in Washington to coordinate rocket and satellite plans. Several blocks away, a full-size model of the grapefruit-sized Vanguard satellite and a Moonwatch telescope were on display. Walter Sullivan, a journalist for the New York Times, later recalled that someone from the Soviet Embassy escorted him to a nearby phone. After the Washington news bureau told the science reporter about the launch at Baikonur, Sullivan made his way to Richard Porter, chair of the U.S. Earth Satellite Panel for the International Geophysical Year (IGY), and whispered, “It’s up!”1 The two men discreetly told Lloyd Berkner, the American representative to the international group managing the IGY. Berkner, in turn, clapped for attention and informed his colleagues that Sputnik had achieved orbit and offered his congratulations to the Soviets. Journalists rushed to commandeer telephones, and scientists scurried to the embassy’s roof with the vain hope of catching a glimpse of the Soviets’ new moon. The next day, newspapers around the world blared headlines like “Russ Satellite Circling Earth” and “Soviet Moon Sends Stocks Down.” Bar patrons soon joked about the new Sputnik cocktail made with vodka and sour grapes. And, in Washington, the Eisenhower administration pondered how to respond to the Soviet feat and fend off attempts by Democrats to exploit Sputnik for political purposes.2 These traditional stories, with their high drama, Capitol Hill political machinations, and public fascination flavored with a strong dose of anxiety, are indeed compelling. However, they mask another story, one that originated at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO) in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and rippled outward that night to Moonwatch teams around the planet. The news of Sputnik caught the professionally staffed tracking systems unprepared or off-guard. The lone Baker-Nunn camera in Pasadena was useless, having been disassembled for shipping to New Mexico. The navy had not finished building all of its Minitrack radio tracking facilities, and only two could communicate directly with Vanguard headquarters in Washington.3

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In any case, radio tracking could only provide a general sense of where the Soviet satellite was in comparison to the precision information offered by optical techniques. More seriously, the Minitrack stations were initially prepared to receive at the expected 108 megahertz frequency, not the lower 20 and 40 megahertz beeps that Sputnik broadcast. As one critic phrased it, “Sputnik caught Project Vanguard with its antennas down.”4 In the opening weeks of the Space Age, the amateur satellite spotters and radio hams found themselves pressed into service as the world clamored to know where Sputnik was.

“The Biggest Dry Run in the History of Science” Just as Lloyd Berkner and his colleagues adjourned to the roof of the Soviet Embassy, Fred Whipple was en route to Boston. He had just attended the IGY rocket and satellite conference in Washington. The Smithsonian astronomer had also endured a grueling meeting during which fellow members of the Satellite Panel grilled him about the SAO’s slow progress in implementing its network of Baker-Nunn cameras. Perkin-Elmer, the New England company responsible for fabricating the optics for the sophisticated instruments, encountered numerous delays, some self-inflicted as the company resisted allocating costly overtime hours or assigning high-level personnel to finish the job.5 Even luck seemed to be working against Whipple and the SAO. For instance, a ship carrying parts for the Baker-Nunn station in Japan caught fire at sea. And, as the program’s costs rose, the delivery schedule of the Baker-Nunn cameras slipped. As of October 1957, technicians in Pasadena had managed to complete and test only one of the Baker-Nunn cameras, and even this one had serious problems. At the meeting, Richard Porter told Whipple that he and the panel had “grave concerns” about the SAO’s difficulties, which appeared even more significant since many scientists believed the Soviets were on the verge of launching a satellite before the Americans. The panel members even considered terminating the entire optical tracking program in favor of the

History through a Small Telescope

Minitrack radio system because conservative forecasts predicted that the SAO’s Baker-Nunn network would not be fully operational before summer 1958. By this time, of course, the IGY would be almost over.6 Whipple lost his characteristic cool and reminded Porter and the other panel members that the entire Vanguard satellite program lagged behind schedule. Moreover, he contested recent news stories suggesting that responsibility for these delays rested solely with the Baker-Nunn program. After tempers calmed, the panel and Whipple agreed it would be unwise to cancel the Baker-Nunn program. Surely, the United States would launch more satellites after the IGY had ended and the Smithsonian’s stations would prove their value in time. While Whipple and the other members of the Satellite Panel did not discuss Moonwatch much, it did not escape their attention that the organization and implementation of the amateur program was proceeding more smoothly than the professional one. While Whipple brooded over these problems, the news from Baikonur reached J. Allen Hynek at the SAO about 6:15 p.m. as he prepared to go home. When he answered his office phone, a reporter from a Boston paper asked whether Hynek had “any comments on the Russian satellite.” Stunned, Hynek ordered the reporter to read the entire dispatch. “They’ve done it,” Hynek told his colleague. “There is a Russian satellite up.” Whipple would not land in Boston for a few more hours and Hynek pondered how to respond.7 After considering his options, Hynek picked up the phone. His calls to SAO staff and scientists returned several members of the Observatory Philharmonic Symphony, then rehearsing Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf nearby, to SAO headquarters. Those that arrived quickly were spared having to forge through the horde of press, radio, and TV people that soon besieged the building. Hynek also called Leon Campbell who earlier that day had driven from Washington to visit a local Moonwatch team run by the National Capital Astronomers, an amateur science club. That evening, the suburban Virginia team prepared for a scheduled training run in conjunction with a Civil Air Patrol flyby. Shortly after Campbell arrived at team leader Robert Dellar’s home, Hynek told Moonwatch’s director that the observing session that night would be for real. Campbell helped Dellar prepare his team for a dawn sky patrol while Hynek and other SAO staff frantically contacted as many Moonwatch leaders

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throughout the United States as they could find. The SAO contacted Vioalle Hefferan, for example, less than an hour after receiving the news about Sputnik. At Pittsburgh’s Allegheny Observatory, over five hundred people were attending an open house that featured a tour of the local Moonwatch station. “None of us realized,” the team leader recalled, “it would be in use before dawn.”8 Radio and television reports, meanwhile, notified Moonwatchers overseas who mobilized their teams. At Moonwatch stations around the world, amateurs readied for what Leon Campbell later called “the biggest dry run in the history of science.”9 Other amateurs besides members of Moonwatch staffed the front lines as the world struggled to learn what and where Sputnik was. In the United States the decades-old American Radio Relay League alerted thousands of amateur radio operators who monitored their shortwave receivers for the satellite’s signal.10 Over the next several days, articles in national and local papers often included photos of ham radio operators tuning in Sputnik’s signal. Very quickly, even those without expensive amateur radio gear could listen, too. At 8:07 on the evening of October 4, an RCA recording station in Riverhead, New York, picked up Sputnik’s signal and relayed it to an NBC studio in Manhattan, where technicians rebroadcast it. Its telltale call soon became familiar. In New Mexico, an “inebriated man came weaving out of an Albuquerque bar . . . saying ‘Beep-beep, I’m a satellite ’ ” as he maneuvered through traffic.11 While the public, sober as well as drunk, knew what the Soviet satellite sounded like, its location and appearance remained a mystery. When closest to earth, Sputnik was about 150 miles away, while its apogee placed it some 550 miles from the earth’s surface, all the while circling the globe once every ninety-six minutes. However, because Moonwatch teams expected the world’s first satellite to blast off from Florida, not Kazakhstan, many teams had oriented their telescopes to cover a north-south line best suited for satellites moving in a general east-west path. Sputnik, in comparison, moved in an orbit inclined 65 degrees relative to the equator. As a result, the satellite did not always pass through the imaginary arc in the sky that Moonwatch teams had trained to cover. Once Moonwatchers learned rough predictions of Sputnik’s orbit, they readjusted their equipment accordingly.

History through a Small Telescope

The surprise of Sputnik also affected the initial response of Moonwatch teams. Whipple and his colleagues had originally imagined that they would have ample time to alert amateur teams as to when exactly the United States would launch its satellite. Hynek and his colleagues spent hours that Friday night phoning Moonwatch leaders and trying to rouse them and their teams. “It was a little exasperating,” Hynek recalled, “to have to convince some that this was not a gag.”12 Despite the very short notice, the SAO managed to get about one hundred teams worldwide into the field that evening. The biggest trouble the teams faced was simple: the sky is very big and Sputnik was very small. More critically, Moonwatch teams had no predictions of location or time to guide them, so many looked up blindly in the hopes of spotting it by chance. While Moonwatch groups planned initially to observe at dusk and dawn, the Soviets had hinted that their first satellite might carry flashing lights. This prompted the SAO to encourage teams to maintain an all-night vigil if possible.13 By the morning of October 5, Whipple ’s staff had collected enough information to estimate that Sputnik would be visible the next day at dawn over Alaska. At 5:01 local time in the morning of October 6, Gordon Little, a British scientist at the Geophysical Institute in College, Alaska, reported the first official visual sighting.14 At least one other citizen in Alaska caught a glimpse of it, but this observation proved less useful. The man saw it through the open door of his backyard outhouse.15 The brightness of the object that Little reported—roughly equivalent to the planet Jupiter—caught SAO scientists by surprise until they realized that people were seeing the rocket body, not the much smaller Sputnik satellite itself. In fact, most Moonwatchers and the thousands of others who reported seeing Sputnik in the days to come actually saw the rocket carrier instead. As with many new developments in the history of science, the act of naming is an important first step toward understanding. The fact that the Soviets had put at least two objects in orbit caused some confusion among amateur and professional trackers alike. This prompted Whipple to suggest a nomenclature for naming satellites. As adopted by the National Academy of Sciences, the rocket body became known to scientists, Moonwatch teams, and space aficionados as 1957α1 while the smaller, beeping metal ball was christened 1957α2. The next satellite launched during 1957 would then become 1957β while the first one to appear the next year would be 1958α and so forth.

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For several years, scientists and Moonwatchers used Whipple ’s schema to designate satellites. Satellite sightings soon began flowing into SAO headquarters. Nunz Addabbo’s team in Terre Haute, for instance, reported one the night of October 4, but the SAO later discounted this as either an airplane or a meteor. Radio data trickled in from amateur operators while Minitrack stations began to pick up Sputnik transmissions once they had adjusted their equipment for the Soviets’ broadcast frequency. By supplementing the sometimes confusing data with news from Radio Moscow, the SAO predicted that Moonwatch teams in the continental United States would have several days respite as the satellite and the rocket body that preceded it by several minutes would not pass overhead during the critical periods of dusk and dawn until mid-October. As Walter Houston had predicted, the experience of what some called “Sputnik night” proved far wilder than anything his team had practiced for. In fact, October 4 caught his Moonwatch team “with its rompers well around the varicose veins.”16 He first heard about Sputnik from a Kansas television reporter who called in the late afternoon looking for information. Because most of his team’s gear didn’t arrive until after the Soviets launched Sputnik, Houston’s team was especially blindsided. “We had no tables ready, no heaters for dew, no meridian line, and no plan of operation,” he recalled.17 What Houston and his team did have was amateur radio equipment they could use to monitor the 20 and 40 megahertz bands. Anxious to do something, Houston’s team set up a receiving antenna. They picked up Sputnik’s signal and, after a few days, could predict roughly when it would pass over so they could prepare to see it. By monitoring the changing strength of the signal, they could also estimate how much farther westward each successive orbit would be. Other amateur groups learned similar tricks. Just as the Minitrack and the Baker-Nunn stations were to be the ears and eyes of the U.S. tracking program, cooperation between ham radio operators and Moonwatchers produced a synergy between the two groups of amateurs. In at least one case, the practice of amateurs combining radio techniques with their telescopic observations went too far, at least for Leon Campbell. A team leader in Cincinnati complained to Moonwatch’s director that his group couldn’t find the satellite visually and was instead relying only on radio techniques. This displeased Campbell as the batteries on the first artificial satel-

History through a Small Telescope

lites had short lifetimes and Moonwatchers were supposed to have honed their observing skills so they could spot a satellite whether it broadcast a radio signal or not. “It will be a sad day for Moonwatch,” he reprimanded, “when our teams depend on radio to guide them in the acquisition phase.”18 The Moonwatch teams that Hynek and his colleagues managed to contact spent the night of October 4–5 manning their stations, sometimes until dawn. In Columbus, Ohio, Steadman Thompson arrived at his local Moonwatch station around 8 p.m. to find “people scurrying around setting up scopes, arranging lights and buzzers, checking star maps, the tape recorder, time, etc.” After watching in vain for a few hours, the team used shortwave equipment in the hope of tuning in news from Radio Moscow. Just after midnight, someone reported a sighting—later determined to probably be a plane—and the local press arrived. Moonwatchers who had packed it in for the night streamed back to the station, and what had been managed disorder became chaos. Photographers and reporters interviewed everyone in sight while the phone rang ceaselessly. The heady experience inspired Thompson to ask his fellow amateur astronomers whether Moonwatch—“2500 funloving, freedom-loving American men, women, and young people”—was “ready to meet this challenge handed to us by the professionals? Judging by our experience, here in Columbus, we believe we will.”19 Moonwatch teams faced a modest amount of mayhem compared to the raucous situation in Cambridge. Whipple first arrived from Washington around 6:30 p.m. and he immediately drove to the observatory. He found “hordes of press, radio, and TV people . . . a blaze of lights” so intense that a concerned citizen thought the building was in flames and called the fire department. Hynek soon found their offices transformed into “a shambles of extension cords, cigarette butts, and used flash bulbs.”20 Whipple and Hynek were joined by their spouses who distributed coffee and sandwiches to SAO staff. The mob of reporters remained throughout the next several days, and the SAO thrummed with activity twenty-four hours a day. Dealing with reporters, as Hynek discovered, was “a terrible responsibility to bear. The slightest word to the press caused response and reaction.” Editors from major news magazines, for example, demanded to know where they could photograph the satellite. “Cost was no object,” said Hynek. “If I had said Tierra del Fuego, within minutes the Life crew would have been dispatched there.”21 To help handle the press, SAO staff converted a lounge

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into what reporters called their “satellite classroom.” The makeshift sign on the door reading “Astrophysical Press Association—Members Only and All Others” suggested the freewheeling atmosphere of the press briefings. At these gatherings, Whipple and Hynek took care to weigh their words with suitable qualifications. Mistakes and misrepresentations still occurred. When Hynek told the press that Sputnik’s orbit could not be explained solely by classical physics—atmospheric drag had to be taken into account— the Boston Herald translated this into a headline that read “Mysterious Force Grips Sputnik.” Sputnik, of course, provided more than just scientific drama. As historians have noted, it had tremendous political, military, and cultural ramifications.22 The singer Little Richard allegedly gave up rock and roll after seeing Sputnik while touring in Australia. Hynek’s own barber in Cambridge expressed a mixture of awe, admiration, and fear as he trimmed the scientist’s hair: “Most people realize that things in the sky were put there by God,” he told the astronomer. “Here is something that was brand new in the skies which although it wasn’t put there by God, must have been put there by someone awfully close to God.”23 Even some experienced sky watchers were taken aback by the satellite’s orbit. Consider the reaction of one Moonwatch leader in Tulsa: “It scared the bejesus out of everybody in sight,” he recalled. “How the hell did they get it into orbit with that kind of height?”24 Whipple ’s conjecture that Sputnik could broadcast coded messages only inflamed public anxiety and politicians’ recriminations.25 Speculations and observations—some made off-the-cuff—that Whipple and other SAO staff shared about Sputnik had implications for U.S. national security and prestige. Hynek was amazed, the Associated Press reported, at how blasé ordinary midwestern citizens he recently met were about Sputnik. “Their attitude seemed to be that we had lost the ball on the 40-yard line but would surely win the ball game,” he said. “It was a shocking mixture of complacency and superiority.”26 A wave of news stories framed Sputnik as dramas of defeat and dread and swept away any initial sense of complacency.27 After the Soviets launched Sputnik 2, a far larger and heavier satellite, on November 3, the Washington Post quoted an SAO administrator saying, “No matter what we do now, the Russians will beat us to the moon. . . . I would not be surprised if the Russians reached the moon within a week.”28 The next day, an unnamed

History through a Small Telescope

scientist wondered if the Soviets might explode a nuclear weapon on the moon to commemorate the fortieth anniversary of the October Revolution. Whipple even speculated that the Soviets could already have a rocket on the way to such a lunar rendezvous.29 Such was the level of general public concern, that when an unexpectedly bright aurora appeared over the northern United States and Canada, hundreds of people called the SAO to ask if the Soviets had in fact detonated a nuclear bomb on the moon. With public anxiety high, politicians from both parties staked out positions on space exploration. Senator Lyndon B. Johnson soon seized the political initiative on space and, just before Eisenhower’s 1958 State of the Union address, equated “control of space” with “control of the world.”30 Acutely aware of Sputnik’s political implications, Leonard Carmichael, the Smithsonian Institution’s secretary, reminded Whipple that even innocuous comments and musings were “open to grave misunderstandings.” He also insisted that SAO staff clear “all predictions and releases” about “American or other rocket or satellite launchings” with his office in Washington.31 While their comments did not have the same international audience that Hynek and Whipple commanded, Moonwatch team leaders became public information officers for their local communities (fig. 5.1). As volunteers, they found the month of the new Soviet moons hectic indeed. In less than a week, for example, California newspapers featured the Walnut Creek team five times. In Sydney, Australia, a local tennis club even canceled its night matches for a while to facilitate Moonwatchers’ work. Pittsburgh Moonwatchers weren’t so lucky. Photographers’ flashbulbs hindered their observing sessions and invitations to community events overwhelmed them. Kenneth Steinmetz, leader of a Denver team, sometimes received three dozen phone calls a day at his home, while Rodney Faxon’s group logged more than two hundred calls in a six-hour period from Chicagoans. Like many Moonwatch leaders, Steinmetz believed he had no choice but to do his best to explain Sputnik to the public. Otherwise, the team risked being “held up to public view as an assortment of idiotic children.”32 Public inquiries broached the bizarre at times, and teams received crank letters on topics “ranging from UFOs to the invention of anti-gravity machines.”33 In Indianapolis, scores of people called their local Moonwatch team leader after the rocket body accompanying the first Sputnik satellite appeared overhead. One citizen even claimed it flew by so close “she could

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Figure 5.1. Residents of Terre Haute learn about satellite spotting at one of the open house events in their community.

hear the motor running.”34 Indeed, after Sputnik’s launch, the number of flying saucer sightings spiked with more than seven hundred reported in the last three months of 1957.35 Sally Dieke, head of the Baltimore Moonwatch team, found the public’s demand for satellite information insatiable. “You can imagine our situation,” she confessed to Leon Campbell, “suddenly to have thrust upon us the duty of interpreting and predicting the appearance of a naked eye object for a community of something like a million people.”36 Despite her inherent reticence to engage the press—she was mortified when a newspaper described the insulated underwear she wore to keep warm during observing sessions— Dieke and other team leaders recognized Sputnik as an opportunity to educate the public and influence them “favorably toward scientific affairs.”37 By “making astronomy live for people,” satellite spotting brought amateur science “out of the realm of crack-pots and into everyday living,” giving the public “a new interest in the eternal firmament.”38

History through a Small Telescope

Even as they fielded requests for information from citizens and reporters, Moonwatch teams continued to monitor the skies at twilight and dawn for signs of Sputnik. By this point, most teams had canceled their training sessions. “After all,” said Campbell, “the Russians have solved that for us.”39 Due to the path of the satellite’s orbit, teams in Australia had the honor of making the first confirmed Moonwatch sightings of 1957α1. Two days later, on October 10, James Plato, an engineer for the Southern New England Telephone Company, was one of three Moonwatchers standing watch from the roof of the Teachers College in New Haven, Connecticut. At 6:23 a.m., he shouted into the chilly morning air, “I got it!” as the bright rocket body sailed into his telescope’s field of view and recorded the first confirmed U.S sighting.40 For the next two weeks, Sputnik’s orbit brought it within view of observers out at dawn and dusk in the United States and Japan, the two countries with the most teams. Blurry newspaper photographs provided people with a sense of what to look for, and Moonwatch teams contacted the SAO by letter, telephone, and telegram with their observation reports. Between October 10 and 16, for example, over four dozen teams from the United States, Australia, and Japan reported seeing one of the new satellites, and many of these groups recorded multiple observations. In all, over 130 teams (and countless other people around the planet) saw it before it reentered the atmosphere and disintegrated in early December. Despite the Moonwatchers’ training, the sight of the first satellites still surprised and thrilled them. Sputnik’s appearance so animated Vioalle Hefferan, coming as it did after several nights marred by clouds and rain, that “there would have been no data if student observers had not maintained their calm.”41 More than three decades later, Donald Charles from the Walnut Creek team still had a clear and vivid memory of standing in Golden Gate Park as the satellite’s rocket carrier passed silently overhead on a clear winter’s night. On the Oklahoma prairie, Caltech professor-to-be James Westphal monitored radio transmissions for the satellite ’s appearance. “All of a sudden, out of the earth’s shadow pops the booster. It was unbelievably bright, brighter than Venus, just unbelievable! We didn’t have the tape recorder going yet which was unfortunate because you never heard so many ‘oohs’ and ‘aws’ and ‘my gods.’ ”42 The shock of seeing the rocket shell was amplified even more because Westphal’s team had not known about the booster and were instead looking only for a faint moving spot of light.

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When Richard Emmons first saw 1957α1, the view rendered the longtime amateur astronomer speechless. He was so astonished that he just watched it sail by without shouting out to team members or recording any data. The next night, he was more prepared, and the SAO credited his team with the first confirmed sighting in Ohio.43 Emmons was not alone in having his surprise eclipse years of sky-gazing experience. Armand Spitz, who was slowly phasing out his Moonwatch activities now that the initial recruitment of members had ended, teased a team leader who had a similar experience: “You come along with beautifully accurate observations of right ascension and declination and don’t give any indication of time. . . . My friend, I’m not only heartbusted, shocked, and shamed, but even surprised.”44 The initial data Moonwatchers collected, some four-hundred reports in all, enabled the mathematicians at the Smithsonian observatory to calculate a preliminary estimate of the satellite’s orbit and issue a notice that the rocket stage’s orbit was shortening noticeably in preparation for its fiery reentry.45 1957α2, the much smaller aluminum sphere, proved far more elusive for Moonwatch teams. One team even christened it “Moby Dick” as they quickened to the thrill of the chase. Nevertheless, amateurs made more than three dozen confirmed observations of the small silver sphere before it finally burned up three months after its launch. Moonwatchers’ reports provided, according to an SAO report, “with very few exceptions, the only scientifically valuable visual observations.”46 Despite whatever reservations skeptics may have had before the IGY began, Moonwatchers were making meaningful contributions to one of the largest science enterprises in history.

Tracking Politics On October 27, 1957, the batteries inside the smooth polished sphere of 1957α2 finally died. Instantly, the importance of optical tracking—both with Moonwatch and the Baker-Nunn cameras—became even more critical. The silence of Sputnik’s radio transmitter rendered the multimillion dollar radio tracking stations and thousands of amateur radio sets around the world useless. Moonwatch, which Whipple and IGY planners originally conceived

History through a Small Telescope

just as a backup to the professionally staffed tracking stations, now stood as the only global source of satellite information. Despite the success Moonwatchers enjoyed and their now-essential role, professional scientists and IGY administrators still jostled with Whipple and his colleagues. Colleagues helping direct the IGY for the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) had long harbored skepticism about the value of amateur contributions to the IGY. They debated the long-term value of Moonwatch and criticized the SAO’s slow pace in getting the Baker-Nunn camera network functional. A few determined critics of the SAO even suggested that Moonwatch be canceled when the SAO requested additional funds to cover the program’s spiking costs. As Moonwatch teams from around the world began to report sightings of Sputnik 1 to the SAO, technicians at the Boller and Chivens factory in Pasadena were hard at work. Hoping to secure professional-quality photos of Sputnik and deflect criticism about delays with the Baker-Nunn instruments, Whipple ordered them to reassemble the camera. His observatory predicted Sputnik’s orbit would not place it over southern California until mid-October, so the technicians had a short grace period to get the $100,000 instrument prepared. At dawn on October 17, engineers in Pasadena swung the nine-foot-high camera toward the sky. The rocket shell appeared low on the southwestern horizon around dawn with the brightness of a large airplane light. In ninety seconds, it crossed the sky and disappeared. During its transit, the BakerNunn’s crew, despite being unfamiliar with using the camera under pressure, managed to take several pictures of it. The next day, newspapers around the world featured the first official photographs of an artificial satellite taken during the IGY.47 The lone Baker-Nunn camera, sitting in a parking lot in south Pasadena, represented only a stop-gap measure. For the next several days, it took photographs as weather conditions permitted until technicians disassembled it once more for shipping. Within a few days of its arrival at the Baker-Nunn station in Organ Pass, New Mexico, it went back to work. Whipple and Hynek brought other SAO resources to bear in their quest to implement some kind of professional tracking network, if only on an ad hoc basis. In New Mexico, the tracking teams fought bad weather and stubborn equipment while local Moonwatch teams aided them by providing rough predictions of

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when satellites would appear. Whipple also called into service some of the older “Super-Schmidt” telescopes used by the Harvard Meteor Project at Organ Pass and even shipped one of these wide-field telescopes to Argentina in the hope of getting some sky coverage in the Southern Hemisphere. Nonetheless, the surprise of the Soviet launches and repeated delays with the complex Baker-Nunn cameras caught the SAO shortsighted, so to speak. The difficulties the SAO experienced in implementing the Baker-Nunn stations exacerbated tensions between Whipple and the American IGY program that started long before Sputnik appeared. In April 1956, for example, Armand Spitz was about to travel around the United States to promote Moonwatch. He remarked to the Associated Press that the Soviets would probably reach space first, a widely circulated statement that Joseph Kaplan, chair of the U.S. National Committee, called “disturbing.” An internal NAS memo was much more blunt, calling Spitz a “two-bit publicity hitchhiker” who had to be carefully rebuked lest he go to the press and strike a “martyr pose.”48 Staff from the NAS called Whipple several times with the same message: “Shut the man up!”49 The furor from Washington surprised Whipple, who knew that Spitz was not reporting anything that American journalists couldn’t find in translated and unclassified Soviet publications. Although Whipple assured Hugh Odishaw, director of the American IGY effort, that “we are putting the real heat” on Spitz, he later confessed that he never told the planetarium maker about the angry phone calls.50 While Odishaw remained concerned about the IGY’s image and political sensitivities in general, Whipple’s overseers at the Smithsonian Institution worried about whether their observatory had gotten in over its head with the satellite tracking program. The Smithsonian Institution, after all, was the entity ultimately responsible to Congress for managing the millions of dollars from the National Science Foundation for the Baker-Nunn and Moonwatch programs. Failures or delays on the SAO’s part would reflect badly on the Smithsonian administration in Washington, which, of course, relied in part on congressional appropriations to operate. The technical complexity, cost, political ramifications, and the sheer scope of Whipple’s ambitions were a quantum leap beyond what Smithsonian administrators were used to. Even Leonard Carmichael, who selected Whipple as the SAO’s director in order to put the observatory on the cutting edge of science and technology, was nonplussed. Before the IGY even started, the

History through a Small Telescope

Smithsonian observatory already had about three dozen people working on the satellite tracking project, far more than the entire observatory employed before Whipple’s tenure began. By the first anniversary of Sputnik, this number had grown to over a hundred people. And Moonwatch, of course, relied on thousands of volunteer observers. While the sudden growth spurt of the SAO concerned Carmichael, the former psychologist-turned-administrator was also frustrated by the SAO’s abandonment of its long-standing program of solar radiation studies in favor of the ambitious and costly upperatmospheric, satellite, and space-based research Whipple favored.51 Because the scale and scope of the entire tracking program direction took the SAO in such new directions, the Smithsonian’s traditional administrative infrastructure was hard pressed to keep pace with sudden developments. Whipple frequently complained that an entrenched Smithsonian bureaucracy and a “veritable blizzard of memos” between Cambridge and Washington hindered the SAO’s efforts to nimbly respond to problems in the Baker-Nunn program.52 For example, approval for large expenditures came from Washington, forcing Whipple and Hynek to cajole contracting firms to provide services on credit. Even after the first Baker-Nunn cameras had entered service, Whipple still reported, “The acceleration in the satellite tracking stations program is simply terrific. The pressures are almost too much to bear but the results I think will be satisfactory.”53 On October 22, spurred by the launch of Sputnik, the Satellite Panel met at the National Academy of Sciences for a hastily arranged session. In the tense atmosphere of Washington that fall, all aspects of the Soviet space program were of interest. For instance, Richard Porter, the panel’s chair, brought up an incident from the summer of 1957 when Alla Massevitch and three other Soviet scientists had visited Cambridge and met with Whipple and his colleagues. Comparing satellite tracking plans in the United States and the Soviet Union provided the scientists with a natural topic of conversation and, as a diplomatic gesture, Campbell offered a Moonwatch telescope to the Soviets. A month later, Massevitch reciprocated with her program’s version. As Whipple recalled, the Soviet instrument was beautifully constructed, “a much better engineered job because ours had been designed to be inexpensive for the people to buy their own telescope.”54 Given ever-present Cold War tensions, Porter was no doubt concerned that an ambitious politician might even charge the American IGY program

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with aiding the Soviets. The rocket engineer suggested that the trade with the Soviets may have in fact been illegal and the National Committee of the IGY certainly had not approved it. Whipple reproached his colleagues for making an issue over “a $35 instrument” and pointed out the benefits of the trade that gave the SAO the opportunity to study hard-to-get Soviet equipment. However, because the National Committee was keeping the Soviet telescope “under lock and key,” his staff had no opportunity to give it much study except for a few hours, and this under escort. “We would like to consider this a piece of equipment to be investigated,” Whipple told the panel, “not a museum piece.”55 Years later, Whipple recounted this story to an audience of Moonwatchers. Hamming things up some, he noted that throughout the IGY the cloud of a prison term for giving away “classified equipment” hovered over him.56 Discussion at the meeting inevitably turned to the SAO’s slow progress in implementing its professional tracking program. Whipple and the panel discussed the enlistment of the older Super-Schmidt meteor cameras to help fill the optical tracking gap until the Baker-Nunn network became fully functional in mid-1958. Even this, the panel said, would not happen soon enough “to contribute much of value.” This left Moonwatchers having to go beyond their original objectives of simply providing backup acquisition.57 Because Moonwatchers filled a gap that no one had expected to exist, the SAO’s costs for running the program grew noticeably. The increases came not from activating Moonwatch ahead of schedule but because the volunteers were “kept in action for a longer period of time.” The phone calls, air mail, telegrams, and staff time needed to communicate with amateurs around the world required more resources than Whipple anticipated. His generous estimate that as much as $200,000 might be needed to cover the cost of amateur operations prompted William Pickering, from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, to ask “whether or not Moonwatch organizations should continue in operation.” Porter also pointed out that international participation in Moonwatch “was not a complete and unqualified success.” This raised Whipple’s hackles given the brakes American IGY officials had put on his initial efforts to recruit international teams, while the Smithsonian Institution’s failure to quickly transfer surplus observing equipment to overseas Moonwatch teams delayed things further.58

History through a Small Telescope

At this point in the debate, Athelstan Spilhaus, a geophysicist who sat on both the Satellite Panel and the overall U.S. National Committee, spoke up. Spilhaus, perhaps having a different perspective than engineers Pickering and Porter, pointed out that Moonwatch’s importance transcended the data its volunteers provided. “This is the one program,” the scientist from the University of Minnesota said, “where for comparatively little money you can get the ordinary person to play a part in the IGY, not only here, but all over the world.” Spilhaus told his colleagues how his own hometown had enthusiastically organized a Moonwatch team well in advance of Sputnik. Citizens there delighted in the chance to observe the Soviet satellite. “We must not just decide this on the technical details,” he concluded.59 Spilhaus’s comments give Whipple respite and enabled him to stem the tide of criticism toward the SAO’s tracking programs. Porter backed off, agreeing “the Moonwatch effort was something that we all wanted to put in place.”60 By the time the panel adjourned for lunch, Porter and his colleagues agreed to keep Moonwatch alive. Two weeks later, motivated by the recent Soviet launch of the much heavier and more sophisticated Sputnik 2, the Satellite Panel convened for another emergency session. Once again, Moonwatch appeared on the agenda. J. Allen Hynek stood in for Fred Whipple and took up the fight on behalf of Moonwatch. The director of the SAO’s Satellite Tracking Program reminded panel members that Moonwatch had “come in the back door, at first without any budget whatsoever.” Whipple had to fight to get $84,000 to sustain the amateur program through June 1959 despite “an alternate suggestion [from the Naval Research Laboratory] for $500,000 to do a smaller but similar job.”61 Hynek also reminded his colleagues that the SAO had never planned Moonwatch as a permanent tracking program operating full time. It was simply to serve as a backup, an extra source of information, a “check on Minitrack,” and a way to disseminate information to the public. Nevertheless, Moonwatch had grown in importance and size beyond what Whipple had originally envisioned. What Hynek wanted was direction from the panel as to “what operational level Moonwatch should be pegged,” especially given the delays with the Baker-Nunn system and the limited utility of Minitrack.62

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The extent to which Moonwatch had grown in popularity (as well as Hynek’s frustration with the panel members) is reflected clearly in the meeting’s transcript. Fully 99 percent of the inquiries the SAO received in the past month, Hynek said, concerned Moonwatch. As early as spring 1957, Hynek and Campbell realized that they already had enough teams, at least in the United States, to meet their basic needs.63 Still, news coverage and word of mouth among the amateur science community spurred more teams to form. After Sputnik’s launch, another flood of letters from potential volunteers arrived in Cambridge. Already some two dozen new teams in the United States alone awaited the SAO’s registration. “These teams have bought their own instruments,” Hynek explained, “and in view of the President’s coming fireside chats on educating the public to science and security, it would be a most inauspicious move to tell these 25 teams, ‘No, sorry, you can’t come in,’ because after all the public is paying for the IGY program and this is the public’s chance to get in on the act.”64 Given that Moonwatch was one of the most visible and popular aspects of the entire IGY program and, for the moment, the only organized effort available to visually track satellites, Hynek proposed two possible courses of action. One was to maintain the status quo, which he estimated would require an additional $115,000. Another more costly option was to expand Moonwatch into higher latitudes, mostly by encouraging more teams in Europe.65 Perhaps most importantly, Hynek noted that the SAO was already running low on funds to keep Moonwatch operating for much longer at any level. The scientists and managers who listened to Hynek’s presentation remained unsympathetic. Before considering what to do with Moonwatch, Porter and Odishaw lambasted Hynek on everything from the “cramped quarters” of Moonwatch to the way in which he and Whipple handled the press. In all, said Porter, it was a “very unprofessional looking operation,” what Odishaw referred to as “a confused circus.”66 The panel also criticized the SAO’s ability to effectively provide satellite information and predictions to amateur and professional scientists alike, which, they intimated, hindered the effectiveness of Moonwatch. On this score, they were right—correspondence between Moonwatch teams and Cambridge from this period was rife with complaints from volunteers about the inaccuracy and slowness of the SAO’s orbit predictions.

History through a Small Telescope

Throughout the remainder of the meeting, the panel’s disrespect for Hynek (a prominent scientist but not of Whipple ’s stature) was plain. Upset with the SAO’s failure to deliver the Baker-Nunn system on time—as director of the SAO’s satellite tracking program, Hynek was directly responsible for this—the panel made its displeasure clear. After Hynek’s appearance, Porter phoned Whipple, and, after acknowledging that the task facing the observatory was “larger and more difficult than originally contemplated,” demanded that Whipple hire a “competent management counselor” to assist the SAO.67 There was some irony in the panel’s litany of complaints as the scientists and engineers expressed respect and interest in Moonwatch both as a public relations tool and for the data its volunteers collected. Throughout the meeting, members described it as important to the “US-IGY program and national morale,” and Porter conceded that “without Moonwatch, we would have been in a pretty bad spot.”68 Nevertheless, it must have embarrassed the professional scientists and engineers, some of whom had publicly doubted the amateurs’ abilities, to now find that satellite tracking efforts in Western countries rested on contributions from volunteer citizens and amateur scientists. Perhaps Whipple’s colleagues also harbored resentment over the considerable publicity Moonwatch and the SAO’s satellite tracking received.69 Just a few weeks earlier, Life magazine featured Whipple and Hynek on its cover with the headline “U.S. Scientists Plot Orbit.” Whipple was shown analyzing reams of computer printout while Hynek traced out Sputnik’s orbital path on a giant globe (fig. 5.2). For those who knew that the SAO’s Baker-Nunn system would not be fully operational for several more months and that Hynek wanted more money to help plug the gap with amateurs, this international recognition must have seemed all the more galling. Moonwatch, it seemed to some, had them over a barrel. Despite the panel’s irritation, Whipple received news that Moonwatch would get an additional $25,000, which, on top of funds allocated to it 1958, was “a substantial expansion beyond the scope originally authorized by the IGY.” The memo stipulated that, once the Baker-Nunn cameras were in operation, Moonwatch would revert to the task originally designated: monitoring the sky for satellites immediately after their launch, helping the professionals locate them, and following their fiery demise. Whipple ’s hasty note to Hynek and Campbell was philosophical in its brevity: “It helps, anyway.”70

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Figure 5.2. Whipple (reading data) and Hynek (on the ladder) on the cover of the October 21, 1957, issue of Life magazine.

History through a Small Telescope

Dog Days On November 1, 1957, Leon Campbell’s telegram to Moonwatch team leaders read: “advisory rumor persists ussr plans to launch bigger satellite the daily worker under london oct 31 dateline states ussr plans to launch such satellite next week . . . all teams on alert beginning nov 5.”71 Two days later, another Soviet R-7 rocket lifted off from Baikonur with a 1,118-pound satellite. Inside a separate sealed cabin sat a three-year-old mongrel dog named Laika. For the next several hours, telemetry from the capsule indicated the dog was alive, even eating. After about seven hours, these signals stopped. Nonetheless, Soviet spokespeople, perhaps sensing a public relations backlash, held out hope for several days that somehow Sputnik 2’s passenger might still be alive and even rescued. Politicians and military leaders debated the significance of the newest Soviet space feat with renewed vigor. Eisenhower himself finally acknowledged privately that Americans needed to take “the weight of this thing” seriously.72 Americans, slowly getting used to the shock of the first Sputnik, again voiced doubts about the prowess of their rocket program and the state of national security. That the new Soviet moon carried a living passenger into orbit impressed people all the more, and jokes about what many called Muttnik and Dognik abounded. Some wags asked if Laika was really an Airedale while clever Germans punned that the U.S. satellite program should be called “Spaetnik”—one translation of “spaet” is “late”. Vioalle Hefferan recalled how a local parents’ group gasped in horror when a student called the new satellite “Orbitch.”73 Due in part to the serendipitous publication of Old Yeller a year earlier (Disney was readying to release the film version for Christmas Day 1957), Laika’s demise struck a powerful chord among animal lovers. Laika’s sacrifice only confirmed for many Americans (perhaps forgetting the widespread use of animals at U.S. nuclear tests) their impression of Soviet barbarism.74 In New York City, pet lovers brought their dogs to the United Nations headquarters decorated with signs reading “Send up Khrushchev” and “Pick On Someone Your Own Size.” Moonwatchers, as a group, generally viewed

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the Soviet satellites with excitement and an appreciation of the technological accomplishment they represented instead of the fear and dread ascribed to most of the public. However, even some satellite spotters were spooked by the thought of observing a satellite with a deceased dog aboard. In Chicago, civil defense volunteer-turned-Moonwatcher Rodney Faxon noted that he looked forward to the satellite’s eventual reentry as he “didn’t quite like the idea of a dead dog passing over my head so many times.”75 As the first sightings of Sputnik 2 trickled into Cambridge, Whipple and his colleagues scrambled to predict the object’s orbit and alert Moonwatch teams. Once again, news reporters mobbed the SAO for information about the satellite and its passenger. At first, radio data from amateurs and Minitrack incorrectly suggested the object might not travel over the United States at dusk or dawn for a month. Reports hinted that, as before, the R-7 rocket had boosted multiple objects into orbit which complicated the calculations. Finally, at the Tokyo Astronomical Observatory, Massasi Miyadi announced that Moonwatch observers had spotted two objects in the dawn sky over Tokyo and Sendai.76 The Soviets confirmed this by explaining their satellite had shed its nose cone when it exposed the scientific instruments it carried. Using visual reports from a scattering of Moonwatch stations and radio data, the Smithsonian observatory predicted Sputnik 2 would appear over parts of the United States at dawn on November 7. The New York Times featured a map showing its passage over North America and the times people could see it in their region. The next day, in New York City, members of the local Moonwatch team took their posts on the sun deck of the RCA building seventy stories above the Manhattan streets. They were led by longtime amateur astronomer Harry Bondy, “a bespectacled, bushy-haired machine designer” from Flushing. Mary Churns, a young statistical clerk from Brooklyn who received credit as the first New Yorker to sight Sputnik 1, joined the group as well.77 Elsewhere throughout the city, curious children and adults rose early and, with the full moon still hanging low in the sky, braved the cold, windy morning. Sputnik 2 burst into view several degrees above the southeastern horizon and just a minute earlier than the SAO had predicted. From the vantage point of the RCA building, it appeared to be over the East River. Moonwatchers and others could see it for nearly two minutes as it “rode swiftly, a tiny spot of yellow-white brilliance.” Amateur astronomers estimated that

History through a Small Telescope

its brightness was comparable, fittingly, to Sirius (the “Dog Star”) which sat in the dawn sky above the Empire State Building.78 Keen-eyed observers also noted the satellite ’s brightness varied with time, an indication of tumbling in orbit. In Fort Worth, Charlie Noble’s team of children and teens managed to spot the nose cone first seen by Miyadi’s crew. Another Moonwatch team, based in Whittier, California, took photos of Sputnik 2 as it passed overhead at dawn. Life ran the picture in a special issue devoted to Soviet space feats.79 The sight of this new moon over Gotham prompted the New Yorker to dispatch a writer to cover the object’s next appearance. The rooftop Moonwatch station, with “regular stars overhead and Con Edison stars underfoot,” appeared as “the flying bridge of a vast and nutty ship.” The team waited for the satellite to appear as predicted over Staten Island and travel close to the horizon before disappearing behind the Hoboken skyline. On this observing run, however, the team missed the satellite and instead treated the writer to a view of Jupiter over Queens. “You can always count on Jupiter,” Mary Churns said before the team disbanded to an all-night cafeteria to compare their results and phone them to the Smithsonian.80 A week after Sputnik 2’s launch, its batteries failed. Once again, Moonwatchers became the primary means to locate it and provide necessary tracking information. Aided to a large degree by reports submitted by Moonwatch teams—some five hundred by the end of 1957—Whipple and Hynek published an article on the first satellite studies in Scientific American.81 After the grilling the two had received by the Satellite Panel after the first appearance of Sputnik, beating the navy scientists responsible for Minitrack into print must have seemed a sweet victory. Their article presented preliminary scientific results and showcased the contributions from Moonwatch teams. These observations, combined with Baker-Nunn and radio tracking data, could help scientists better understand the density and temperature of the upper atmosphere, the shape of the earth and the variation of its gravitational field, and the effects of the ionosphere on the propagation of radio waves. Months before the Scientific American article hit the newsstands, Fred Whipple helped draft another article about Moonwatch. It predicted that amateur scientists would likely stand among the first people to “acquire the tiny space traveler.” As a result, Moonwatch itself would become part of

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“history . . . made at a small telescope.”82 Written for National Geographic, the rapidly unfolding events of autumn 1957 eclipsed the article ’s content and it never appeared in print. Whipple predicted correctly, however. Between October and December 1957, reporters worldwide produced dozens of articles, photographs, and radio stories about Moonwatch teams, making it perhaps the most widely reported amateur science activity to date. Hundreds of thousands of citizens who saw one or both of the Soviet satellites joined Moonwatchers as they kept watching the skies. What distinguished Moonwatchers was that they were not just passive observers but actively took part in the IGY’s research program. By volunteering in global efforts to spot the first satellites, serving as an interim tracking system (especially after the two Sputniks’ radio transmissions ceased), and informing and educating their neighbors about the new science of satellites, the amateur scientists of Moonwatch played an integral and visible role in the Space Age ’s opening days.

6 Amateurs Provide Strength on the Bench

On December 6, 1957, millions of television viewers watched as a slender Vanguard rocket began to rise off its Cape Canaveral launch pad. Two seconds later, it crumpled back to earth in a fountain of flame and debris. An engineer in the control room shouted “Duck!” as the emergency system dumped thousands of gallons of water on the platform. The six-inch sphere aboard the rocket survived the cataclysm and rolled into nearby scrub, still broadcasting at 108 megahertz. Engineers collected it and shipped it back to the Naval Research Laboratory, and the satellite-that-never-was sat out the International Geophysical Year (IGY) in a cardboard box.1 “Flopnik,” “Dudnik,” and “Project Rearguard” became punch lines as headlines like “Worst since Custer” flashed across newspapers. Seventhgraders in Kansas, eager to see the United States match the Soviets, collected dimes “to get a man-made moon into space before too long.”2 Much of the intense anxiety associated with America’s failure to quickly orbit a satellite was confined to political, military, and journalistic circles. The public, however, reacted in diverse ways. A Gallup poll taken after the Vanguard failure reported that “the sky would be black with U.S. ‘sputniks’ if one existed for every American who wanted to go up in an earth satellite.” Still, most

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Americans—many of whom had watched Vanguard’s fiery destruction— preferred not to take such a trip. As one person said, “I’m going up once— that’s to meet Jesus.”3 Popular songs reflected the mixed feelings people had about the new satellites. Consider “Sputniks and Muttniks,” a catchy ditty by Ray Anderson and the Homefolks. Anderson wrote the tune immediately after the Soviets launched Sputnik 2 into orbit. Its lyrics blended people ’s fears and fascination into a “masterpiece of hillbilly paranoia” as it connected new-fangled satellites to the escalating arms race.4 “They’re so ironic,” the song twanged, “are they atomic?” And if, as the song claimed, American scientists lagged behind their Russian colleagues, then people had best find shelter “somewhere Sputnik can’t find” because, as Anderson sang, “those funny missiles have got me scared.”5 Trumpeter Louis Prima captured a lighter side of Sputnik. His take on the Space Age told of a jilted man whose ex-lover was “fooling around with some space cat.” When he tried to woo her back, all he heard in return was a familiar “beep-beep-beep.”6 Between the launches of Sputnik 1 and the first successful American satellite four months later, lyricists copyrighted hundreds of space-inspired songs.7 Tunes like “Sputniks and Muttniks,” “Sputnik (Satellite Girl),” and “Beep Beep” were among the myriad ways people cashed in on the novelty of satellites. Sputnik, to the delight of merchants, appeared just in time for the holiday shopping season. “The young scientist, male or female, is the youngster most highly regarded this season,” and science and space-themed toys, industry observers reported, were “due to tumble down the chimneys by the score this year.”8 Likewise, telescopes, microscopes, and chemistry sets sold well. Teens eager to hear rock-and-roll songs like “Satellite Baby” might even receive one of the latest high-tech gadgets, a portable transistor radio. More intrepid people could build one from a kit Macy’s sold for $11.95.9 The satellite fad traveled far beyond music and children’s gifts. Pictures on more than a few fashion pages featured models showing off space-themed clothing. One photo from Time displayed a young woman flanked by two small kids, all wearing shirts or skirts with stylized satellite designs. Another photo captured a teenage girl eating a sundae in a local soda parlor, the top of it crowned by a round ball of ice cream decorated with Sputnik-like antennas. An ocean away, Italian leftists campaigned around Rome in a sleek

Amateurs Provide Strength

float, complete with a Sputnik, dog passenger, flashing lights, and a sign reading “Vota Comunista.” This vehicle, of course, reflected the broader trend of incorporating aerospace imagery into advertisements while the American automobile industry maintained its infatuation with rocket motifs and streamlined details.10 Disposable pop songs, toys, clothing, and sleek car designs—each of these “small things forgotten” illustrates how popular culture reflected and responded to the appearance of the first satellites.11 Although a Gallup poll noted that over 4 million people in the United States had seen a satellite with their own eyes, this still left some 97 million Americans who had missed the thrill.12 In other words—most Americans witnessed the start of the Space Age via these popular-culture expressions. Moonwatchers around the globe, of course, saw it all quite differently. And perhaps more than most, they hoped that soon there would be more satellites to spot and that the United States would launch some of these.13 Amateur scientists soon got their wish. By Saint Patrick’s Day in 1958, the United States had successfully launched two satellites, one put up by the army and a second smaller one launched by the navy. By the IGY’s conclusion in December 1958, more than a dozen orbiting objects had presented targets of opportunity to Moonwatchers. When Vioalle Hefferan planned to have her Albuquerque Moonwatchers spot ten different satellites in a single night, it reflected the swift transformation of the earth into a planet girded by an increasing number of artificial moons. Only a short time ago, amateur scientists would have sounded ridiculous for proposing a feat that Moonwatchers could now attempt to do on an almost regular basis.14

Amateurs Abound In 1961, three years after the IGY ended, a popular magazine observed that for decades the “human perimeter of the scientific community” had shrunk until it “embraced only those professionally qualified persons engaged full time in scientific work.” This tightening of boundaries meant that scientists had lost access to “a helpful and sympathetic public” while the term “amateur

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scientist” had been relegated to the pejorative. However, with the start of the Space Age, the trend was finally reversing—“the advent of nuclear fission and space rocketry seems to have opened up a new era of friendly interchange between the professional and amateur scientist.” Amateur astronomers epitomized how the “unsubsidized independent amateur is . . . making a solid contribution to modern scientific research.” No “ham-handed, unreliable amateurs,” these legions of enthusiastic and capable citizen-scientists were providing what any good sports team aspired to achieve: “strength on the bench.”15 The IGY presented budding amateurs and longtime experimenters with opportunities to build up social networks, enlist new members, and embark on new areas of study. It also motivated thousands of citizens interested in science and space exploration to join science clubs. When publicity and curiosity created by the IGY and the first satellites rippled through popular culture, a growing public interest in amateur science activity resulted. Clair Strong and his regular articles about amateur science in Scientific American helped fuel this burst of interest. Strong also wrote a book that presented a wide range of projects for novice and experienced amateur scientists. Vannevar Bush, the doyen of postwar science policy, contributed an introduction to what became a canonical work for amateur experimenters. Bush reflected on his own exploits as a tinkerer and suggested that amateurs’ activities countered the prevailing belief that modern science “is carried on by great groups in expensive laboratories.” Despite “the great rush into atomistics and nucleonics and space exploration,” the amateur scientist could still take part. “The world is being remolded by science,” Bush concluded, “It is worthwhile to have a part . . . in its transformation.”16 Months before the IGY officially began, Strong began to promote diverse activities that could enable amateurs to contribute to the worldwide scientific endeavor. One of the first topics he tackled was amateur seismology. In anticipation of “impressive seismic events during the IGY,” Strong described how amateurs built their own sensitive instruments to detect them.17 A stationery-store owner in Santa Barbara, California, for instance, built seismographs in his spare time, an activity that, according to the shop owner, “has kept me away from my television set for many a happy month.” He got results too. One day, for instance, he started to build a new detector around noon. Five hours later, Strong noted, he used it to bag a quake.

Amateurs Provide Strength

While amateur seismologists composed a relatively small community, Strong’s articles gently repeated a few basic and essential messages. He stressed, first and foremost, that most people already possessed the ability to do scientific research. If budding experimenters needed specialized instruments, Strong provided instructions for building them. Just as importantly, Strong glamorized amateur science as a fun and educational activity linked to a long and proud tradition in which amateurs made useful contributions to science. Strong also appealed to their responsibilities as fellow experimenters by reminding his readers that professional scientists were “counting on help from amateurs” to make the IGY a success.18 Even those science enthusiasts living where events like auroras and meteors might be uncommon or hard to spot could help by perusing historic records and newspapers for articles describing previous occurrences. Strong’s articles featured impressive amateur accomplishments. One amateur scientist in Brooklyn, for example, rigged an inexpensive radio receiver to monitor solar flares. Amateurs’ interest in this topic grew until a small network of people in the United States and Canada continuously studied solar activity. Professional scientists considered the amateurs’ results good enough to include them with data regularly recorded and distributed worldwide during the IGY. Members of the network were especially gratified to see that their observations correlated with those from professional stations and that, in some cases, their instruments picked up solar activity that would otherwise have been missed.19 Of all the amateur activities Strong described in his monthly column, astronomy and satellite spotting were the most widely covered. His articles coincided with a resurgence of public interest in amateur astronomy that began when the first satellites appeared. “There is no doubt,” one newspaper said, “that the advent of the sputniks . . . has stimulated unusual public interest in a hobby in which spectacular events have been more or less limited to an occasional eclipse or the appearance of a new comet.”20 The attention paid to Moonwatch by mainstream magazines like Time, the New Yorker, and Reader’s Digest during the IGY also contributed to increased public interest. Among all the IGY activities in which amateurs took part, Moonwatch stood out because of its scope, scale of organization, and relative standardization. Around the world, amateurs built or bought similar equipment,

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developed common observing techniques, and mobilized for the mutual purpose of spotting satellites. This standardization of purpose and practice was, of course, enabled by the global trajectory of artificial satellites. Unlike a seismic event or flurry of meteors, which only scientists in a particular locale could witness, satellites provided common objects for observation and study. Clubs devoted to amateur sky gazing and telescope making reported sharp increases in membership and inquiries. Those who saw a satellite for the first time often came down “with a psychological disease known as ‘space fever.’ ”21 If “space fever” was the disease, an “amateur with a telescope is an exultant spreader of contagion.”22 Interest in sky gazing wasn’t limited to people living under dark and cloudless night skies. A subway rider, one magazine wrote, heading to a remote part of the Bronx had a telescope tucked under his arm when he found himself surrounded by curious passengers. Pressing forward, they asked what he was carrying and what he would be looking at. His muttered reply that it was really a bazooka brought him some breathing room.23 Not surprisingly, a boom in telescope purchases accompanied public interest in astronomy and satellite spotting. As the title of an article in Popular Science suggested, “Suddenly Everybody Wants a Telescope.”24 Advertisements for items like a low-cost “genuine 150-power achromatic telescope” prompted some periodicals to ask readers to think about what they wanted telescopes for and cautioned them against being taken in by manufacturers’ claims. One consumer magazine even gave advice to would-be satellite spotters and warned them away from fancy instruments and toward basic binoculars or one of the Moonwatch-style telescopes on the market.25 Just as amateur scientists and other curiosity seekers wanted to see satellites, many people wanted to know more about how Soviet and American scientists put them up there. Moonwatching and model rocketry were natural partners, and interest in both rose during the IGY. In suburban Los Angeles, the Pacific Rocket Society organized a Moonwatch team and, with support from North American Aviation, built one of the country’s most elaborate stations.26 Amateur rocketry, made famous in Rocket Boys, Homer Hickam’s account of young experimentalists in rural West Virginia, flew to unprecedented heights after Sputnik. By some accounts, the number of amateur rocket clubs rivaled that of amateur astronomy groups.27

Amateurs Provide Strength

“All over the U.S., homemade rockets are fizzling, exploding, and—on rare occasions—soaring into the sky,” Time told readers as teenaged interest in rocketry became another national fad after Sputnik.28 The teens and teachers associated with the Wakefield Rocket Society in Arlington, Virginia, continued their experiments with rocket flights even as they kept up their Moonwatch sessions. Regular meetings, field trips, and guest speakers from government agencies rounded out the society’s schedule. Moonwatch created good publicity and interested potential patrons, enabling Wakefield members to look for more equipment to further their amateur rocket trials.29 With the explosion of interest in launching model rockets came real fireworks. Amateur rocketry required practitioners “equally proficient in handling explosive chemicals, differential equations, machine tools, and irate policemen.”30 The consequences of inexperience could be deadly. Accidents injured budding rocketeers throughout the United States, and a science teacher in Texas died when a launch went awry. Public concerns prompted statements from insurance companies and fire departments about the hazards errant missiles posed. For the American Rocket Society, youthful fascination posed a new challenge. “We are anxious to encourage the ingenuity and creativity these teenage clubs have demonstrated,” announced a Society spokesperson. “But at the same time, we are extremely apprehensive of the dangers involved.”31 After considerable discussion, the Department of Defense stepped in to offer guidance. Just as the aircraft spotters of Operation Skywatch represented volunteer mobilization for the Cold War, so too the Pentagon recognized the value of encouraging future missile designers and aeronautical engineers. In October 1958, the military announced a collaborative effort with the American Rocket Society for a ten-week course in amateur rocketry.32 The following year, the military, calling teenage rocketeers “a remarkable group of mathematicians,” distributed three booklets to some 2,600 rocket and science clubs. One of these, A Guide to Amateur Rocketry, was prepared by the U.S. Army Field Artillery School in Fort Sill, Oklahoma, in 1958. Written “to further assist our young scientists,” it became the classic handbook for rocket hobbyists.33 After the shock of Sputnik, journalists, academicians, and scientists spoke out about the need for improved science education and more scientists and engineers. As one observer phrased it, “Science and education have now

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become the main battleground of the Cold War.”34 Eager to act swiftly, the Eisenhower administration responded with the National Defense Education Act of 1958.35 While much of the federal funding went to support university programs and graduate student training, the promotion of amateur science activities—“strength on the bench”—among teens and young adults was another way to indirectly enhance national security and economic competitiveness (fig. 6.1). Even before Congress passed the Education Act, science reporter Walter Sullivan noted how the IGY had sparked excitement “among young people the world over.”36Senior Scholastic, a weekly current events publication for high school students, devoted an entire issue—fortuitously appearing only a few weeks after Sputnik 1 — to “the grand and masterful plan” of the IGY.37 It included suggestions for how teens could participate in activities like Moonwatch, amateur radio broadcasts, and aurora studies. Teenagers had other opportunities to try their hand at amateur science besides Moonwatch and rockets. For decades, the Boy Scouts’ merit badge program incorporated hands-on activities as a way of demonstrating competence in science and technology. Along with recognition for proficiency in aviation, bird study, invention, and electricity, “Astronomy” was included in the first series of badges scouts could earn. After Sputnik, the Boy Scouts introduced a new badge for Space Exploration.38 Richard Chappell had a much more intense IGY experience when, in 1956, the Boy Scouts and a national IGY committee selected him for Operation Deepfreeze. The eighteenyear old spent more than a year at the Antarctic in the company of a small group of scientists. There he helped make measurements of the ionosphere, plotted maps, and played the organ for the outpost’s Sunday church services. Upon his return, New York City’s famed Explorers Club made Chappell a member, and he expressed his intent to attend Princeton and study physics.39 Boy’s Life, the official Boy Scouts magazine, published dozens of articles by and about scouts interested in science and space exploration throughout the 1950s and 1960s. While some of these were science fiction stories written by teens (as well as veterans like Robert A. Heinlein), nonfiction articles about amateur rocketry, space technology, and Moonwatch provided popular topics for Boy’s Life readers. An Iowan scout, for instance, who hoped “to study either space medicine or rocket engineering,” contributed a history of

Amateurs Provide Strength

Figure 6.1. Young woman trying her hand at Moonwatching, c. 1958.

rocketry.40 Another issue featured a cover with a Sputnik-like orb over the United States as people with binoculars or telescopes watched it orbit overhead (fig. 6.2). A feature article told Boy Scouts about Moonwatch and how they too could “take part in a project of serious scientific importance.”41 After the article appeared, the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO) received more than a thousand letters from young adults eager for more

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Figure 6.2. Satellite spotters as depicted on the March 1958 cover of Boy’s Life.

information.42 Sprinkled liberally around these stories were advertisements for amateur taxidermy, mineral collections, wireless receiver kits, and even a “happy birthday” announcement from the Bell Telephone System recognizing the anniversary of the transistor’s invention.

Amateurs Provide Strength

Likewise, local organizations promoted teenaged interest in amateur science. In southern California, for example, a Pasadena physics professor started the Future Engineers of America in 1956. Within a year, the organization had over twenty chapters in southern California that brought together hundreds of “youngsters who build such things as rockets, solar batteries, telescopes, and radio-controlled airplanes.”43 Not surprisingly, the Future Engineers of America sponsored a Moonwatch station in the San Fernando Valley with support from a local congressional representative.44 At the ground-breaking ceremony, more than two hundred high school students and teachers watched as the holder of the world’s record for flying remotecontrolled airplanes towed a small satellite behind his model aircraft, symbolizing Moonwatch’s early training exercises.45 Taking advantage of the thousands of engineers and aerospace workers living nearby, leaders of the Future Engineers established a science center for young adults in the San Fernando Valley. With financial backing from the local Kiwanis Club, teen hobbyists constructed scientific instruments and studied cutting-edge technologies such as nuclear power plants, rockets, and digital computers. They could also sign up for classes taught by scientists from local companies and universities on everything from the biology of mammals to the theory of relativity.46 Within a few years, other science centers for teens opened in the Los Angeles area, all designed to encourage teens wanting to “delve into the space age.”47

Moonwatchers on the Go The number of Moonwatchers around the world peaked in 1958. By June, the SAO had registered 230 active teams with 8,000 people participating in the program. More than a hundred of these groups were overseas.48 For Leon Campbell and his colleagues, persistent public inquiries about the program had begun to take a toll. As spring turned to summer, Campbell decided to admit new teams only if they were ready to go into action or came from a region where Moonwatch coverage was sparse. Otherwise, his office was “simply swamped by the detail work and cannot cope.”49

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Campbell shared reservations with some Moonwatch leaders about the influx of what one amateur labeled “joy riders.”50 In Tucson, a team leader complained about those with “thrill seeking intent” who only wanted to glimpse a satellite instead of contributing to a team’s scientifically useful “precision sightings.”51 In Kansas, another amateur acknowledged that satellite spotting was something most people were drawn to for fun, not for science. However, he reminded his team that locating newly launched and hard-to-spot satellites could be just as exciting if “the kicks in seeing satellites is waning.”52 More people wanted to join Moonwatch after the United States finally managed to launch its first satellite. On the night of January 31, 1958, a fourstage Juno rocket jointly developed by the Army Ballistic Missile Agency and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory lifted off from Cape Canaveral. Seven minutes later, the eighteen-pound Explorer 1 plus the rocket stage it was attached to went into orbit. The satellite contained a suite of basic scientific instruments, their small size enabled by American advances in miniaturizing electronics. One tool aboard Explorer 1 was a modified Geiger counter designed and built by James Van Allen and a small team at the University of Iowa. The data Van Allen’s instrument collected resulted in one of the IGY’s first major scientific discoveries—radiation belts made of charged particles trapped by the earth’s magnetic field around our planet.53 The chance to see the first American satellite excited Moonwatchers, especially those in the United States. For weeks prior to the launch of Explorer 1 (or what scientists would officially call 1958α), Moonwatch teams had asked the SAO for hints as to when the Americans might match the Soviet accomplishments in space. With the news of Explorer 1’s launch, Moonwatchers eager to claim the first sighting of 1958α turned out to scan the sky. In Albuquerque, Vioalle Hefferan’s students, each flanked by a “relief observer,” spotted a steady light and reported it to the SAO. Calls from newspaper and television reporters followed jubilant back slapping. However, the next day, analysts in Cambridge announced that the timing of the Albuquerque sighting didn’t match either their predictions or reports from radio tracking stations. Hefferan conceded that her team “made headlines across the United States and abroad by sighting a plane 18,000 feet high.”54 Another team in Hefferan’s vicinity, however, did score a confirmed sighting of the new satellite. Edwin Martz in Alamogordo, New Mexico,

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reported that one of his team members saw it cross the field of view of his small telescope. The next night, Martz’s team repeated their feat, and Walter Scott Houston’s team in Manhattan, Kansas, backed up their sightings. Farther to the east, clouds spoiled the view for Richard Emmons, but his team recorded Explorer 1’s radio signals as it passed overhead. Relieved that the United States had matched the Soviets in deed if not in payload, President Eisenhower sent congratulations to Fred Whipple and his colleagues. “The Smithsonian Institution, through the Astrophysical Observatory in Cambridge,” Ike noted, “and through the hard-working volunteer Moonwatch teams in this country and all over the world, has been playing a key role in the satellite tracking programs.”55 Campbell, eager to let Moonwatchers know the president appreciated their contributions, relayed the message to Moonwatch teams around the world. Two more U.S. satellites (Vanguard 1 and another Explorer satellite) followed the launch of Explorer 1 in quick succession. The Soviet’s launch of Sputnik 3 on May 15, 1958, with the then-enormous payload of more than a ton and half, dwarfed all of these. Moonwatchers now had plenty of targets to look for at dusk and dawn. “The day is coming,” Kenneth Steinmetz predicted from Denver, “when satellites will be a dime a dozen and will be going overhead like streetcars.”56 The small size and faintness, however, of the first U.S. satellites— Vanguard 1, for instance, resembled a large grapefruit—proved a challenge to Moonwatchers. “Hells bells,” one amateur complained, “why couldn’t they put a larger one up there?”57 Some two hundred teams around the world turned out to try and spot 1958α but, by February 10, the SAO had only eleven confirmed sightings.58 For ordinary citizens around the world without access to a telescope, 1958α remained out of sight. As the new satellite’s orbit began to take it over other countries, Moonwatch teams in Japan, South Africa, and Australia added their observations as well. “Kangaroo amateurs . . . dressed sparsely in shirts and shorts” made early sightings of it from near Adelaide and communicated via ham radio to other teams across Australia.59 Contemporary observation reports confirm the difficulties Moonwatchers had in locating the new moons the United States lofted into orbit, and, by the end of the IGY, Moonwatchers had produced fewer than one hundred reliable reports of the first Vanguard satellite. For comparison, in the same period Moonwatchers recorded some 2,400 sightings of the more visible Sputnik 2.

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Gradually, Moonwatch teams, especially those equipped with the more powerful apogee telescopes, perfected their skills and managed to spot the faint U.S. satellites more often. Near dawn on March 21, 1958, a Moonwatch team at Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque scored a “hat trick” when it spotted Sputnik 2, Explorer 1, and the newly launched Vanguard sphere all within thirty-seven minutes.60 Reports such as these appeared in national newspapers and circulated within the Moonwatch network, adding the element of sport that Whipple had anticipated. Despite these successes, Campbell received a steady stream of criticism from Moonwatch teams. Like the disapproval expressed by some professional scientists and IGY administrators, perturbed amateurs disparaged the SAO’s inability to communicate more effectively with its teams. In Tulsa, Oklahoma, Moonwatch leader James Westphal grew disgusted with the time-consuming process of corresponding with the SAO and the observatory’s tardiness in providing orbital predictions to guide amateurs. Westphal, a recent graduate from the University of Tulsa, worked as a geophysicist in nearby oil fields. He took after his father, a “shade-tree mechanic of the first order,” by displaying a genius for building tools and instrumentation.61 Despite never having received a doctorate, he left Oklahoma for a professorship at Caltech. He went on to help build several innovative instruments for astronomical research, including a camera for the Hubble Space Telescope. Even before the IGY started, Westphal urged the SAO to adopt an earlywarning system that would alert amateurs about an impending launch or transmit the latest satellite news.62 Getting quick and reliable information was especially “a problem in small rural towns,” he noted, “where the delay between transmission, receipt, and delivery” of telegrams was considerable. Despite Westphal’s appeal, the SAO didn’t act on his recommendation. After the first two Soviet satellites appeared, he sent the SAO what he called the “facts of life” about Moonwatch. Comparing Moonwatchers to an army that won’t fight without food, he said the program would “find it very difficult to recruit and retain observing personnel over long periods of time at unpleasant hours without more interest and better communication with the Cambridge offices.” If the SAO failed to correspond better with its laboriously assembled and trained teams, Moonwatch “will decay, wither by slow death, or immediately die.”63

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Other teams directed similar criticism at the SAO. Geoffrey Taylor, leader of the Moonwatch team in Adelaide, Australia, confessed his bitterness to Campbell “about the small amount of encouragement we received from you people at the Smithsonian.” When predictions of satellite orbits did manage to make their way to more remote stations outside the United States, they were “almost always out of date and generally quite inaccurate.” Even more demoralizing to the Adelaide team was the SAO’s circulation of official observing logs that neglected a good number of the group’s data. “You can imagine,” Taylor chided, “how President Eisenhower’s letter rather got the raspberry after that.”64 Prominent scientists on the various IGY committees at the National Academy of Sciences also heard the drumbeat of citizens’ criticism. At a meeting in January 1958, Richard Porter informed Whipple that amateurs have complained “in ways that have reached my ears.” Whipple, while hesitant to pick up what he called “ancient threads,” defended his observatory by again reminding the committee members that Moonwatch “had never been anticipated by us [professional scientists] as a continuously observing program” which had to keep a global network of observers informed daily.65 Campbell responded as often and as soon as possible to complaints from Moonwatch teams. He frankly admitted that problems in SAO’s communication system “have been rising to haunt us.”66 He promised that, once the chaos from first satellites subsided, “we shall have some more time here to gather our wits and make closer and more often communications between headquarters and our Moonwatch teams. . . . We shall do better; you just wait and see.”67 Although it took time to iron out all of the problems, Campbell was good to his word. Not all amateurs directed their criticism toward the SAO. Some people also wanted better information about the IGY’s scientific accomplishments. Unless the IGY ceased being “a political football,” American taxpayers had “bought a pig in a poke.” The purported reticence of U.S. scientists and government officials contrasted with, according to one amateur astronomer in Colorado, “the efficient and accurate work of the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory” when scientists “working under tremendous pressure computed the orbits of the Sputniks correctly and made the information available quickly.” Messages like this clearly delighted beleaguered staff at the SAO, as evidenced by Campbell’s scrawled “This is us!” on this particular letter.68

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Maintaining Moonwatchers’ morale was another issue that kept team leaders and Campbell on their toes. Their concerns paralleled those expressed earlier by leaders of the Ground Observer Corps. Right after the IGY started, Richard Emmons asked why the volunteer Moonwatcher didn’t receive some “evidence of priority over his non-participating neighbor” who only read about the satellite program in the newspaper.69 Moonwatchers, as Emmons saw it, wanted to feel part of a select group. “To feel he is doing some real service to IGY,” another leader observed, “is a Moonwatcher’s greatest need.”70 The need for formal recognition seems to have been especially strong for amateur teams far removed from Moonwatch headquarters, which was situated near elite Cambridge universities. Regional differences, still strong in 1950s America, exacerbated potential misunderstandings. Walter Scott Houston noted “New England accents and syntax” discouraged some midwestern members when they phoned SAO staff. After visiting the Denver team, another prominent Moonwatcher reported that “western amateurs regard Boston as the seat of their problems and have as much love for New Englanders as the French do for the Bocce.”71 Nevertheless, when Houston recounted his observations of Explorer 1 to Whipple personally, he remarked that “no westerner could complain about eastern airs. He was kind, thoughtful, and extremely objective.”72 If enough amateur scientists continued to feel inferior to the professionals or, despite the successes they enjoyed in the wake of the first sputniks, their contributions were not welcome, Moonwatch would be in danger. To help forestall this, Campbell introduced initiatives to bolster amateurs’ morale. In January 1958, the SAO began publishing a regular newsletter. Containing both technical information as well as news and stories about Moonwatch teams, it helped create a sense of community among teams, especially those not connected to local astronomy clubs. The newsletter, which appeared every few weeks, also provided an incentive for teams to improve their performance and receive international attention from other amateurs. In more than one case, the newsletter reported, Moonwatch facilitated more than just sky gazing. Two Moonwatchers in Baltimore who were out to spot Explorer 1 shared a blanket to keep warm. They did not see the satellite but the evening was not a total loss as they soon announced their engagement.73 To help the SAO better understand the situation in the field, it hired Walter A. Munn. A former bomber pilot and lecturer at New York’s Hayden

Amateurs Provide Strength

Figure 6.3. Moonwatch pin given to team members.

Planetarium, Munn embarked on an extended tour of Moonwatch stations around North America. Over the next year and a half, he traveled some 70,000 miles, met with scores of teams, and even became an honorary citizen of Fort Worth after meeting with Charlie Noble and her team of young Moonwatchers. More importantly, Munn sent a steady stream of reports back to Cambridge that detailed team spirit, equipment, and membership. One means to boost morale would be for the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), representing the most eminent professional scientists in the United States, to officially recognize amateurs’ contributions in some fashion. When J. Allen Hynek updated IGY officials and scientists at the NAS in early 1958, he took care to emphasize that Moonwatchers “performed beyond the call of volunteer duty . . . they are getting up at five o’clock in the morning, in this cold weather; they have provided their instruments.”74 As a result of lobbying by Hynek, Moonwatch teams around the world received certificates of recognition from the SAO and the U.S. National Committee for the IGY. In addition, Convair, a division of General Dynamics, which built the Atlas ICBM, sent lapel pins to those Moonwatchers who had observed satellites. Small yet beautifully detailed, the pin (fig. 6.3) depicted

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amateurs under their trademark mast-and-crossbar with a satellite passing overhead. Some teams organized local awards ceremonies to complement this official recognition (figs. 6.4 and 6.5). It was also gratifying to Whipple, Hynek, Campbell, and Moonwatchers everywhere when the NAS formally acknowledged the “importance of volunteer programs” and began to report their activities in the IGY Bulletin, an NAS publication for professional scientists.75 Starting in December 1957, the IGY Bulletin regularly included news about Moonwatch, amateur radio tracking, and other efforts. The statistics that Leon Campbell maintained also reflected Moonwatchers’ nightly contributions. During the first twenty months since Moonwatch teams went on alert, amateurs made nearly 10,000 satellite sightings. More than 190 teams worldwide contributed at least one observation that the SAO deemed “scientifically useful.”76 While helping spot satellites served as one of the main contributions Moonwatchers made during the IGY’s opening months, their necessity as an interim tracking network became less critical as more of the SAO’s BakerNunn stations began operation. By July 1958, all twelve of the complex cameras had entered service. This meant that the SAO no longer relied on Moonwatchers for day-to-day tracking. However, amateurs continued to participate in IGY research. One of their activities was the “deathwatch” which Moonwatch teams maintained for satellites about to reenter the atmosphere and burn up. This mission was, in fact, one of the primary purposes Whipple originally envisioned amateurs fulfilling. In April 1958, Moonwatchers made their first attempt at spotting a dying satellite. The SAO predicted that Sputnik 2, after completing some 2,350 trips around the planet, would soon plunge to earth. A special bulletin put Moonwatch teams and Civil Air Patrol members on alert for the massive metal object’s last moments.77 Scores of Moonwatch teams turned out to observe the reentry and, because the date of its demise wasn’t fixed, many maintained their watch for several dusk and dawn sessions. The satellite ’s final orbit brought it within sight of at least three teams on the East Coast of the United States. On the evening of April 14, students at the Millbrook School in New York saw “a glowing red hot mass of burning metal” shooting south with a fiery tail extending as far as fifty miles behind it. A few minutes later, ship crews reported “a light of flame equal to the full moon” before the satellite and Laika’s body reached a final resting place in warm Caribbean waters.78

Figure 6.4. Awards banquet held for Terre Haute team members.

Figure 6.5. Nunz Addabbo giving award for Moonwatching to his youngest team member, nine-year-old Drake Deming.

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The SAO eagerly collected reports from Moonwatch teams and even dispatched a staff member who interviewed more than four dozen witnesses. These data allowed scientists to refine models of upper atmosphere air density and explore whether the behavior of reentering satellites—in 1958, a completely novel phenomenon—bore any resemblance to natural events such as fireballs generated by spectacular meteor falls. Most of the Moonwatch teams that turned out for the satellite deathwatch missed the spectacular sight. Nonetheless, the experience wasn’t a total loss for all. In Arlington, Moonwatchers who had been on the line since 3 a.m. felt the press of sleep. At dawn, the sky lightened and, in the quiet of a Sunday morning, one of the members murmured, “And now Apollo has risen and shoots his golden shafts at the stars.” The team, after enjoying the spectacle, quietly packed up gear, climbed down from the rooftop station, and headed for an early breakfast.79 Due to American satellites’ small size and the short lifetime of radio transmitters, tracking groups, professional as well as amateur, easily lost them in the sky’s vastness. Even with improved calculations, orbital predictions the SAO issued were faulty at times or varied as satellite orbits gradually decayed. As a result, locating missing satellites became another important mission for Moonwatch teams. Arthur S. Leonard established himself as one of the world’s most skilled Moonwatchers, especially when it came to predicting orbits and finding lost satellites. An expert at spotting faint satellites, Leonard offers an excellent example of someone whose professional career and abilities confound a clearcut definition of “amateur scientist.” Educated at the University of California at Berkeley where he received B.S. and M.S. degrees, Leonard went on to teach mechanical engineering there before working for aerospace companies and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. When the IGY began, the middleaged engineer was on the faculty of a University of California campus in central California. Leonard, an avid amateur astronomer, also served on Moonwatch’s national advisory committee and led the Sacramento Valley Astronomical Society. While Leonard founded a Moonwatch group, it would have been an overstatement to call it a team. Mostly it consisted of him, his wife Natalie, and their son Bill looking with their telescopes from the roof of the family’s house.

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What Art Leonard lacked in personnel, he made up for with mathematical prowess. Leonard combined careful and diligent observations—he would sometimes observe every night for a week or more—with his knowledge of orbital mechanics and high-tech tools of the era like programmable desk calculators. Consequently, Leonard’s calculations of satellite orbits rivaled those of his professional counterparts. As many of the more dedicated Moonwatchers were beginning to do, Leonard eschewed the standard Moonwatch telescope for more powerful ones with larger apertures. These enabled him to detect smaller and fainter objects. Leonard’s skill as a satellite spotter was evident on the night of June 16, 1958, when he spotted four different satellites within a five-hour period. He also developed a close working relationship with Donald Charles, Jack Borde, and other members of the Walnut Creek team, and the two groups kept in contact via ham radio. Through his observational proficiency and his accurate calculations of satellite orbits, Leonard became a legend within the close-knit Moonwatch community. One amateur, dissatisfied with inaccurate predictions generated by SAO staff and its “electronic brains,” penned a harsh note to Cambridge. “I’m sure that Art Leonard could give your mathematicians some pointers,” the disgruntled man suggested. “Why not get some money somewhere, pay your mathematicians, and send them to Davis, California for classes?”80 Leonard was especially tenacious in recovering lost satellites. In May 1958, Moonwatch headquarters announced that the rocket stage which carried the first Vanguard satellite (otherwise known as 1958β1) into orbit had not been sighted for several weeks. The SAO challenged its best-performing Moonwatch teams to locate it. For several weeks, Leonard and members of Walnut Creek team carried out a thorough search. He spotted the six-inch Vanguard sphere four times and yet the much larger and brighter rocket casing eluded him. Working with the idea that the actual satellite and the rocket had shared the same motion until the very end of the engine ’s burnout and knowing well the orbital elements of the Vanguard sphere itself, Leonard set to work. The fact that he could spot the small sphere but not the rocket suggested that the two objects had gone into different orbits and gradually separated.

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An unexplained sighting from Albuquerque in May 1959 provided Leonard with a clue he needed, and he borrowed a calculating machine from a local company to compute where the object should be. On the evening of May 9, just a few minutes after the time Leonard had predicted, the satellite “came serenely through the field” of one of his telescopes.81 Other teams in California and New Mexico using Leonard’s predictions soon reported similar sightings—1958β1 had been recovered. The Baker-Nunn cameras could now take over the task of regularly tracking and photographing it. Locating this lost satellite proved quite a coup for Leonard and the other amateurs involved. It prompted Hugh Odishaw, the executive director for American IGY efforts, to send personal congratulations to Whipple and the SAO staff. The sighting also had implications for rocket technology in general. Leonard’s conclusion, which rocket scientists agreed with in principle, was that the engine in the last rocket stage was still sputtering when it deployed the satellite it carried. As a result, it overtook the actual satellite and sailed into a higher orbit, risking a destructive collision—catastrophic if it had been a manned mission—in the process. Leonard quickly helped locate another lost American satellite and, more importantly, provided some useful information that encouraged engineers to investigate alternative techniques for deploying satellites. Amateurs did not recover all satellites as quickly as 1958β1. In July 1958, the United States launched a third Explorer satellite. Less than three months later, both of the radio transmitters on what was known among space aficionados as 1958ε had died. Moonwatch teams and Baker-Nunn stations had tracked the eighty-inch-long object intermittently but, by the end of 1958, it too was lost in space. The SAO issued an urgent bulletin to the best-performing Moonwatch teams asking them to try and reacquire it. On New Year’s Day in 1959, a woman on the Adelaide team called out “Yes!” and the object was found again. The recovery proved temporary, though. As Australian team members rhymed in “The Ballad of 58 Epsilon”: Smithsonian gloats over our success. They write us nice letters—we boast to the press Complacently rest on our laurels and then Those ungrateful Americans lose it again!

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The SAO issued yet another appeal to select Moonwatch teams. After six more months of coordinated searching, amateurs found 1958ε again, prompting the Australian amateurs to conclude their verse: How often we’ve said in the year that’s just passed “I’ll be glad when this damn thing has come down at last.” But I’m sure we’ll be sad when it obits no more, Unpredictable, exciting Explorer Four.82

Amateur Accomplishments When Whipple first proposed Moonwatch, many professional scientists maintained reservations as to whether amateurs could actually contribute anything worthwhile to the IGY. Amateur scientists, however, exploited opportunities the IGY presented and demonstrated that they could make a meaningful contribution to the world’s biggest scientific project. For several months, Moonwatchers’ participation proved especially critical to the success of the IGY’s satellite program. Leon Campbell’s assessment of Moonwatch—that “probably no organization of laymen in all history has contributed so valuably to a scientific program”—may be an overstatement that reflected his fondness for amateur science and his personal investment in the program.83 Nonetheless, Moonwatch provided ways for amateurs to earn respect from their professional counterparts and contribute both to a prominent Big Science endeavor and the opening of the Space Age. Satellite observations collected during the IGY provided the basis for a number of scientific publications. In April 1958, Fred Whipple showcased the synergistic efforts of the SAO’s Moonwatch teams and Baker-Nunn stations to members of the American Philosophical Society in Philadelphia.84 Whipple explained how the motion of artificial satellites was affected by the earth’s deviation from a perfect spherical shape and atmospheric drag. By establishing precise orbits of satellites, scientists could measure features such as the varying density of the atmosphere, the flattening of the earth as it rotated, and the extent of the bulge at the planet’s equator.

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The SAO’s director summarized some major scientific results from satellite observations. These included new estimates for atmospheric density for regions above 120 miles, heights inaccessible to sounding rockets. The data suggested air density was much greater than what scientists previously believed. SAO scientists also used Moonwatch observations of Sputnik 3 to conclude that solar particles, not radiation, heated the upper atmosphere.85 The observed reentry of satellites like Sputnik 2 gave scientists insights into how objects like meteors (and ICBM warheads) behaved as they passed through the upper atmosphere. Finally, Whipple predicted that continued satellite studies would eventually yield geodetic information ten times more accurate than what scientists currently knew about the earth’s shape.86 Whipple ’s sanguine belief in the possibilities afforded by optical and radio tracking of satellites was borne out less than a year later when scientists announced a revised perspective on the earth’s shape. News that the planet’s figure somewhat resembled a pear was hailed as another major discovery of the IGY.87 As the largest and most visible program of amateur science for the IGY, Moonwatch also strengthened the networks of amateur scientists both locally and around the world. Open houses and regional Moonwatch meetings provided an opportunity for amateurs to gather, exchange stories, and meet with the public. A hundred amateurs from more than fifteen Ohio towns, for instance, met at Richard Emmons’s Moonwatch station while a “Sputnik party” in nearby Columbus attracted some three-hundred people. “The throng stood in hushed silence for about 15 minutes,” the club’s president reported, “before we finally spotted it.”88 Art Leonard’s appraisal after a regional Moonwatch meeting in the Bay Area suggests that attendees saw these as far more than social gatherings. “It was more than a convention—it was a real work session,” Leonard wrote. “Every team on the Pacific Coast which has any prospect of amounting to anything had its team leader and top assistants there.”89 Members discussed topics ranging from how to improve ham radio communications to using orbital predictions for estimation of satellite velocities. Regional meetings and local gatherings like these set the stage for a series of national Moonwatch conventions the SAO convened in Cambridge as well as sessions on satellite spotting held at national meetings for amateur astronomers. Moonwatchers, of course, recognized they were only a fraction of those people interested in science and space exploration. “Our efforts at Moonwatch

Amateurs Provide Strength

may seem very puny,” a team leader in South Africa reflected, “in comparison with the vast projects of the International Geophysical Year. But this is not so.” As “diminutive but indispensable cogs in the army of human machines who do battle against ignorance,” Moonwatchers volunteered out of curiosity and civic duty and imagined themselves contributing to a greater good. The program fulfilled the need of amateurs “to do something constructive, albeit small, in the interests of scientific advancement” and it offered a chance to improve their own communities by learning, doing, and teaching.90 When the IGY ended, Moonwatch stood ready to enter a new phase. Many teams found themselves at a crossroads, asking whether the thrill of spotting the world’s first satellites had run its course or if they wished to continue their volunteer amateur science efforts. The death of Miss Charlie Noble in November 1959 symbolizes in some ways the end of Moonwatch’s intensely productive and highly publicized formative years. During the IGY, Moonwatchers on Noble’s team, all kids from her Junior Astronomy Club, established a respectable record. Reporters and inquiries came from The Saturday Evening Post, National Geographic, and Disney Studios while Lyndon B. Johnson personally congratulated the team. Noble ’s hometown honored her as a pillar of the community, the museum’s planetarium was named in her honor, and a fund in her name was set up to further amateur astronomy. Making scientifically useful observations of satellites was of secondary import to Noble, who saw Moonwatch above all as an opportunity to promote science and civic participation in her community. Gradually, Moonwatch became less about community involvement and the layperson’s enthusiasm about science and technology. In Fort Worth, for instance, Noble’s team disbanded soon after her passing. The motivation for Moonwatchers to be vigilant in the service of the state also diminished as the excesses of 1950s-era McCarthyism receded and fears of a Soviet attack by bombers (or satellites, for the imaginative or paranoid) faded. In the future, a surprise nuclear strike would happen with practically no warning, initiated by the flight of missiles similar to those that boosted Sputnik and other satellites into orbit. The wild ride that marked Moonwatch’s first few years ended and, as John F. Kennedy prepared to run for the presidency, the program stood on the brink of maturity and major changes.

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7 Moonwatch Grows Up

In 1962, four years after the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO) certified Nunz Addabbo’s Moonwatch team as one of the world’s best, the handsome engineer wrote Leon Campbell. Addabbo, who had left Terre Haute for a new job in Virginia, sought advice and encouragement for his plan to recruit another Moonwatch team. The SAO’s reply to Addabbo revealed much about how Moonwatch had changed in his absence. For one thing, the letter lacked Campbell’s familiar signature. The SAO had promoted Moonwatch’s original director to another position at the observatory in late 1961. The new director, Richard C. Vanderburgh, told Addabbo that times had changed from when amateurs were “the satellite tracking data source.” Now, as just one of many reliable systems, the SAO expected its amateur scientists to put a premium on performance. To assist them, the observatory sent its best volunteer teams hundreds of “apogee telescopes.” Their five-inch mirrors were about twice as big as those in the original Moonwatch telescopes, meaning they could collect four times as much light. This allowed observers to see fainter and more distant objects. Some teams equipped with these, or even more powerful instruments they built themselves, rivaled the performance of the Baker-Nunn stations. “Although the original glamour has worn off,” Vanderburgh acknowledged, “there still remains the fascination of personal contact with objects in space and the challenge of contributing effectively toward scientific progress.”1

Moonwatch Grows Up

The Smithsonian’s entire satellite tracking program experienced similar changes as it matured. At the end of 1959, J. Allen Hynek left the SAO to take a post as an astronomy professor at Northwestern University. Before his departure, Hynek wrote a heartfelt letter to a colleague at a remote Baker-Nunn station. No longer “in the pioneering stage,” satellite tracking had “taken its turn toward big business.” With National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) support running at $3 million annually, “it becomes terribly impersonal, each person with his cubby hole,” Hynek ruefully admitted, “This is the late, late show, and rather grim, and not the musical comedy we had when the show started.”2 Hynek’s words reflected his distaste for “bureaucracy and the museum mentality and, more broadly, for the Civil Service structure.”3 Even Fred Whipple was not immune to such feelings. A few months before Hynek’s departure, he lambasted the Smithsonian’s administrative intransigence in his own resignation letter but filed it away, unsent.4 Before leaving Cambridge, Hynek reminisced with Whipple that satellites used to be just “a gleam in the scientific eye.” Now satellite launches occurred so regularly that Hynek predicted people might call the next decade “the satellite sixties.”5 Events proved Hynek right, at least from a technological perspective: while most people remember the 1960s for their social and political unrest, during that time scientists and engineers wove satellites into a revolutionary new infrastructure that enabled communication, research, and surveillance from space. As rockets lofted hundreds of satellites, space probes, telescopes, and manned missions into orbit, the exploration of outer space transformed from radical to routine. During the same period, small teams and devoted individuals fashioned Moonwatch into their own network, a subculture even, devoted to the esoteric art of precisely recording the satellites orbiting the planet in ever-increasing numbers.

Whipple’s Astronomical Empire Satellite tracking helped make Fred Whipple a celebrity. After Sputnik, newspaper and television reporters sought him out for information of all kinds about satellites and space exploration. When a Life fashion reporter asked

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him to speculate about daily life in outer space or on other planets, Whipple— who corresponded with sci-fi writers like Arthur C. Clarke—offered some predictions. Magnetic shoes might be useful on future spaceships, for instance, while outfits with excess material floating about would be eschewed. “This simply becomes a matter for Dior,” he concluded, “not a scientific one.”6 Articles about Whipple highlighted his fondness for astronomical neckties, rose gardening, and bicycling to work (although, as one said, “he usually teaches with cigarette in hand”).7 In articles, speeches, and interviews, Whipple enthused about satellites and space exploration just as he did when he contributed to the famous Collier’s series in the early 1950s. In a college commencement address, for instance, he told students how they stood on the brink of a new frontier that “great telescopes in space” and manned expeditions would explore.8 Not all of his messages, however, were this Pollyannaish. At a gathering of broadcast executives and journalists, Whipple identified the “communication challenge” that reporting about space and satellites posed. He chastised the group for extolling the anti-intellectual and portraying the scientist as “a figure of fun, a clown, scratching his head among his test tubes or blinking dreamily through thick glasses into his telescope.” Such depictions weakened America’s national security, Whipple said: “If you ridicule the scientist, you indeed bite the hand that feeds you.”9 Whipple did not limit his promotion of space science and exploration to public presentations, nor did he allow his interests to be solely driven by scientific curiosity. Satellite tracking provided him an opening he exploited to pursue additional resources and an expanded scientific mission for his observatory. In the spring of 1958, when the Eisenhower administration asked the Bureau of Budget to formally draft a bill to establish a civilian space agency, politicians, military leaders, and scientists worked furiously behind the scenes to influence the process. Whipple, as the director of a rapidly growing astronomical observatory with a multimillion-dollar network of satellite tracking facilities, showed enormous interest in the mission of the nascent National Aeronautics and Space Administration. Whipple maneuvered to secure a role in the exploration of space for the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO) as part of the competition among institutions and agencies that one historian compared

Moonwatch Grows Up

to an old-fashioned frontier “land grab.”10 Through letters, personal contacts, and testimony to Congress, Whipple staked out areas in which the SAO might excel, including astrophysics, space-based astronomy, and atmospheric research. At the same time, he schemed to acquire funds to expand his observatory. For instance, after reading a draft of the legislation that would create NASA, Whipple wrote wealthy benefactors of the SAO and Harvard. Noting that his observatory led the world, thanks in part to Moonwatch, in tracking artificial earth satellites, Whipple requested donations to enable further expansion of the observatory’s research programs as well as its brick-and-mortar footprint in Cambridge.11 Despite earlier protestations about becoming an “operator,” Whipple oversaw the growth of a tremendous astronomical empire. In a pitch to McGeorge Bundy, a Harvard dean and later one of Kennedy’s “best and brightest,” Whipple explained that the era of space exploration required institutions like the SAO to think big. The exploration and study of space integrated a bundle of interrelated disciplines—“astronomy, physics, astrophysics, electronics, geophysics, nuclear physics, meteoritics, physical chemistry, solid-state physics, and others”—while space research programs “may, literally, encompass the globe.”12 Whipple had little at stake personally in securing scientific data from space. Instead, he wanted to establish the SAO as a central player in spacerelated research.13 The SAO’s network for satellite tracking provided the foundation for Whipple’s ambitions. Moreover, the SAO had gained hardwon experience from managing the Baker-Nunn network and scores of Moonwatch teams, giving it “a singular know-how and a feel” for largescale projects.14 In July 1958, Eisenhower signed the National Aeronautics and Space Act of 1958 and established NASA. The agency’s budget grew rapidly over the next several years and Whipple managed to secure a piece of the action for his observatory. The number of SAO employees reflects the observatory’s growth. When Whipple became the SAO’s director in 1955, the staff roster included only three scientists. By June 1958, this had increased sevenfold. The observatory’s complement of technicians, engineers, and administrators expanded in step; the SAO listed 180 people on staff by mid1959 and over 330 people four years later.15 The SAO’s budget tells a

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similar story. In 1960, for example, federal contracts and grants were worth several million dollars to the SAO. NASA’s contract for optical satellite tracking was about $4 million annually, monies that funded the two hundred employees who managed the Baker-Nunn stations, administered Moonwatch, and did extensive data analysis and computations of satellite orbits.16 Moonwatchers, of course, remained largely oblivious to the political jockeying of scientists and managers as the fledgling NASA organization took shape. Nevertheless, amateur scientists who had established Moonwatch stations wondered what would happen to their program after the IGY. Even before the United States launched its first satellites, Leon Campbell started receiving inquiries about the program’s future. Moonwatch’s director assumed scientists would still need amateur contributions after the IGY concluded. “Do you believe that the experimenting with earth satellites will be ended by December 31, 1958?” he asked one Moonwatch leader who wondered whether time spent building his station and training team members represented wasted effort. “I am confident,” Campbell said, “that the age of artificial satellites is most certainly here and that experimenting will go on at an increasingly greater rate.”17 As the United States and the Soviet Union launched more satellites, the public’s general interest and anxiety about them waned. The May 1958 launch of Sputnik 3—a massive object comparable in size to a 3,000-pound sports car—produced front-page stories, but less public hand-wringing and political mudslinging. The regular launch of satellites helped transform them from novel objects of dread and fascination to conventional tools for research, defense, and communications. Moonwatchers likewise anticipated that a gradual shift in public interest would result in, as one team leader predicted, “the men . . . being separated from the boys” in terms of who was a committed member of the program.18 The comment proved prescient. In mid-1959, NASA became Moonwatch’s primary patron and main source of funds. Moonwatch’s new era matched Hynek’s observation that satellite tracking had become “big business.” For the amateurs of Moonwatch, integration into national space exploration programs, an emphasis on ever-more precise observations, and a greater focus on amateur research became the order of the day.

Moonwatch Grows Up

Moonwatch Gets Serious Campbell, when he imagined Moonwatch’s future, believed amateurs would become increasingly involved in real scientific research. When the SAO announced in late 1958 that it would continue to use Moonwatch observations in its scientific publications and credit those amateurs contributing data, it also noted “research by Moonwatch teams themselves will be fostered.”19 Amateur scientists interested not just in the thrill of spotting satellites but in seeing their data used for research welcomed this news. Because the scientific value of Moonwatchers’ observations depended on their accuracy, Campbell and his staff evaluated and ranked all active Moonwatch teams. The SAO would encourage those with good performance records, adequate instrumentation, and demonstrated ability to remain in the program. The need for Moonwatchers to locate faint satellites was growing—by now the SAO acknowledged that the basic Moonwatch telescopes were not up to this task—so the observatory planned to provide scores of special telescopes with higher-powered optics to the best teams. Toward the end of 1958, Campbell updated his amateur scientists on the program’s plans and reminded them that, in the SAO’s original formulation, Moonwatch would expire at the end of June 1959. However, the contributions amateurs had already made promised that “Moonwatch has a future . . . that may be measured in years, rather than months.”20 By this time, however, all of the SAO’s Baker-Nunn stations were operational and doing the routine tracking duties that Moonwatchers had initially shouldered. Moonwatch’s mission would therefore have to change to what Whipple had originally planned: spotting satellites immediately after launch, helping find “lost” objects in unusual orbits, and taking part in deathwatches for reentering satellites (what Campbell broadly called “the observation of anomalies”).21 Early amateur observations of Sputnik 4, the Soviets’ prototype for a manned spacecraft, supported Campbell’s view. When the satellite ’s reentry cabin, complete with a dummy cosmonaut, separated from its service module soon after its May 15, 1960, launch, Moonwatch teams quickly spotted the discrete components.

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The best-performing Moonwatch teams also demonstrated that the SAO and NASA could rely on them for difficult assignments. In the fall of 1958, for instance, the SAO confidentially asked more than fifty Moonwatch groups from California to Japan to Iran to be on the alert for the launch of a special new satellite. This small inflatable object presaged the giant Echo 1 communications satellite NASA launched in 1960. While the prototype mission failed, the SAO praised the amateur teams for their dedication and their discreetness: “It is to the great credit of all these teams,” the SAO said, “that the confidential data furnished them was revealed in no form to unconcerned persons.”22 These special assignments excited many Moonwatch teams. Their secretive nature had the flavor of undercover or classified work and provided the chance for amateurs to have somewhat of an inside scoop with regard to the U.S. space program. In January 1959, Art Leonard met with Leon Campbell and Armand Spitz in Cambridge. Moonwatch’s future sat high on their agenda, and their discussions over the next few days assured Campbell that the new path he envisioned for Moonwatch was the right one. “The changing complexion of Moonwatch was apparent,” his notes say, as only the most serious and interested observers (whom the men called the “hard cores”) remained active on a regular basis. Campbell believed Moonwatch should still endeavor to keep the interest of as many people as possible as their “efforts might sometime serve if a national emergency or critical need arises.” The program could also continue to foster “interest among laymen (taxpayers) to support scientific progress.” But for Moonwatch to survive, Campbell suggested the program emphasize its “serious aspects” and “subordinate the popular” component.23 Leonard, Campbell, and Spitz agreed that smaller teams of enthusiastic and dedicated amateurs who “crave information” about the U.S. and Soviet satellite programs would gradually emerge from the shrinking rosters of Moonwatch teams. For devoted Moonwatchers to contribute more to scientific research, the SAO would “develop techniques and instruments” for these smaller groups and communicate better with them.24 As part of their plan to reorganize the program, the men agreed to divide Moonwatch’s teams into categories. The best-performing groups and those located in the most geographically important places—teams Campbell labeled “Prime A,”—would receive special attention, better equipment, and choice assign-

Moonwatch Grows Up

ments. The SAO classified other teams with lesser performance records as Standard, Special, or Reserve. In July 1959, NASA assumed the responsibility of funding the SAO’s entire satellite tracking program, including Moonwatch. By this time, Campbell had completed Moonwatch’s reorganization. Despite some thirty teams that dropped out when the IGY ended, Moonwatch still claimed nearly two hundred groups worldwide. Campbell designated about a quarter of them Prime A.25 In Albuquerque, Vioalle Hefferan received the good news that the SAO had identified her team as one of the elite Moonwatch groups. The decision left her students “stunned, elated, unbelieving.” Did Campbell know teenagers well enough, Hefferan asked him, “to appreciate such comments as ‘Cool, man cool! Wait till the papers see this . . . Do you think we can do the job they gave us?’ ” Campbell coolly replied, “Prime A. Repeat: Prime A.”26 Campbell and his colleagues at the SAO continued to evaluate Moonwatch teams. In May 1960, the observatory coordinated a special activity designated Operation 2050. It asked teams to observe a particular satellite over the course of several weeks “to indicate the effectiveness of their stations.”27 The SAO also started to use numbers called “residuals” as tools to evaluate the observational performance of its Moonwatch teams. A positional residual, for instance, was the difference between what an observer reported and where a satellite was predicted to be at a precise point of time based on data from Baker-Nunn stations, radar tracking, and increasingly capable computer programs. The SAO measured these residuals, for instance, in arc minutes or arc seconds. Spanning 1/60 and 1/3600 of a degree, respectively, these units of angular measurement are familiar to many amateur and all professional astronomers. The SAO also kept records of how good Moonwatchers’ reports were in terms of their timing accuracy. Dogged team members experimented with ways in which they could improve their split-second response between seeing a satellite and recording the time and position of observation. Having a record of small residuals became, in essence, one path for amateurs to secure bragging rights as to whose data was best. Operation 2050 showed, not surprisingly, that the ability of Moonwatch teams varied significantly. The best amateurs could, for example, record a satellite in the sky within five arc minutes of its actual location. The SAO

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also noticed a clear relation between the size of the telescope a person used and the accuracy of their observations. Moonwatch headquarters announced that the traditional stubby Moonwatch telescope with its two-inch aperture and lower magnification no longer met the SAO’s goals for highest accuracy. Taken together, the data Campbell and his staff collected suggested that well-equipped and trained Moonwatchers could achieve results as good as or better than other more expensive methods such as tracking by radar.28 As a result of their studies, Leon Campbell and his staff announced a further reduction in the number of active Moonwatch teams. The program dropped some 75 teams which had either been inactive or showed poor performance, leaving 135 teams worldwide. By the end of 1960, further reductions brought this number down to just 110 teams, only slightly more than half the number that existed a year earlier. The SAO explained the downsizing by noting “an efficiently operating network with high qualitative standards is essential. All Moonwatch teams will be encouraged to strive toward ever improved performance.”29 By achieving better accuracy, Moonwatchers could, in the words of one Smithsonian scientist, “become an equal partner in the family of stations entrusted with the tracking of satellites.”30 In June 1960, as Campbell considered which groups to drop from the program, leaders of a dozen teams traveled to Cambridge for the first annual Moonwatch conference. For two days, attendees met with SAO scientists and presented technical papers on their teams and their research. This first conference of team leaders signified Moonwatch’s transformation from a program that combined research with education and public engagement to one which emphasized “instrumentation, techniques, and procedures for obtaining more accurate observations.”31 The annual meeting in 1960, and those that took place in subsequent years, brought together a small yet skilled group of Moonwatchers, many with some form of advanced scientific or technical training. These leaders— people like Richard Emmons, Vioalle Hefferan, and Art Leonard—wanted Moonwatchers to make more “scientific” observations. The program’s focus shifted to quantifiable accuracy, observations taken in a reproducible and rational way, and the ranking of teams’ performance. This emphasis on rigor and accuracy (to be an “equal partner” among professional scientists) contrasted with Moonwatch’s multiple purposes during the IGY when the SAO encouraged socializing, civic outreach, public

Moonwatch Grows Up

relations, and education. Moonwatch was evolving into a program whose activities and goals increasingly belied the “amateur” status of its participants. The technical titles of the papers Moonwatch leaders presented at their annual meetings—“Terrestrial versus Celestial Coordinates for Moonwatch Observed Data” and “A Time Recording Method for Satellite Observations”— suggest an almost self-conscious attempt to appear scientific. The stress elite team leaders and the SAO put on quantifiable performance and the use of more powerful instruments also indicated Moonwatch’s intended shift toward quasi-professional status. In this new environment, little room existed for teams that served mainly to teach children about science and allow citizens an opportunity for civic participation. The SAO also reevaluated another central tenet of the original Moonwatch scheme—the necessity of fielding large teams of observers. While the emphasis on improved accuracy pleased Campbell, it was “disconcerting to note a tendency for some few Moonwatch stations to depart from the team concept.”32 He objected to the trend toward small or even one-person teams on several grounds. He believed teams should claim a membership large enough to respond to frequent tracking needs or sudden special assignments. His belief about the value of teams also reflected his broader interest in promoting serious amateur science—larger teams with experienced members could help new observers develop observing skills more efficiently and teach neophytes about amateur astronomy. While some of the best teams had industry sponsors and could draw upon computing support and input from members who were “professionals engaged in space-age work,” they often still had small rosters. Declining membership, in Campbell’s view, pointed “to the demise of the team. It is indicative of growing disinterest among members.”33 In his defense of Moonwatch’s team concept, Campbell neglected a glaring contradiction. In the past few years, a few small but experienced groups had established stellar performance and accuracy records. For example, despite Campbell’s entreaties, the Walnut Creek group consisted mostly of Donald Charles, Jack Borde, and a few other hard-cores who worked from backyard “substations” and coordinated observing sessions by phone.34 Perhaps the ultimate example of a successful “lone wolf ” observer was Russell Eberst. Seventeen years old when Sputnik appeared, Eberst first became interested in astronomy at a young age and taught himself about the

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night sky using his father’s binoculars. Starting in late 1958, Eberst tracked satellites from backyards in London and Scotland. He started each night’s observing by calculating, using British predictions, where and when satellites would pass over. After he had acquired a satellite using one of the surplus apogee telescopes provided by the SAO, Eberst noted basic information such as time and location. He also made an estimate of the object’s brightness and how quickly this changed—some satellites tumbled in space causing their brightness to vary significantly—and sent his observations to the SAO a few times each week. Eberst established himself as one of the very best satellite trackers in the world and the lack of team members presented no obstacle: “Since I worked alone, I appointed myself team leader, deputy, organizing chairman, secretary, and public relations officer. They were an extremely efficient bunch and I can truthfully say I never disagreed with any decisions they took.”35 Eberst’s solo approach to Moonwatch didn’t affect his performance. In a single night in 1972, he made 127 observations of some seventy-two transits of forty different satellites and, overall, recorded tens of thousands of lifetime sightings. That he worked under often cloudy skies and eschewed fancy equipment in favor of 7 × 50 binoculars and a stopwatch made his accomplishments more remarkable.36 While Moonwatch never abandoned the team concept, by 1962 a typical team had fewer than ten people. This attrition, the SAO believed, was due in part to “personal disinterest” as satellites changed from objects of wonder to a feature of the Space Age people took for granted. Another factor was the difficulty Moonwatch teams had in maintaining a single central observing site. If community or business sponsorship ended or member dues were insufficient, some teams abandoned their amateur activities. Campbell finally conceded that Moonwatch might have to allow “coordinated effort of individuals observing from their backyards.” However, he strenuously objected when one SAO scientist suggested that new “television techniques” could allow Moonwatch members at different locations to see and interact with one another.37 While “everyone seems to agree that the future status of Moonwatch is not clear,” Campbell wrote in late 1960, “that is very different from saying it doesn’t have any future status. What we want from Moonwatch is changing, and we must make up our minds soon.”38 A staff scientist working

Moonwatch Grows Up

with the program agreed: “These considerations are quite apart from the question whether or not we need Moonwatch observations. In making science accessible to the laymen, these steps must be taken by some kind of organization. I hope it will be us.”39 The tension between whether Moonwatch should aspire to serious science or focus instead on accessibility, education, and the “popular component” remained throughout the program’s lifetime. But momentum had clearly shifted in favor of the first option.

“A Highly Refined Art” Emphasis on Moonwatchers doing research and appearing “scientific” increased in January 1962 when Richard C. Vanderburgh took over as Moonwatch’s new director. Unlike Leon Campbell, Vanderburgh was less familiar with the traditions and communities of amateur science. As a young man, Vanderburgh flew for Pan American Airlines as a pilot and navigator. In his mid-thirties, he came to Moonwatch after spending three years in the field at Baker-Nunn stations in Hawaii and Iran. Vanderburgh assumed responsibility for Moonwatch when the program was still determining its purpose. As director, Vanderburgh encouraged Moonwatch’s shift toward greater accuracy and a more rigorous and scientific focus. Using it to promote participation in and education about amateur science and astronomy for the general public interested him less. “Visual satellite tracking is becoming more and more a highly refined art,” he told a team leader in Honolulu. “Some of our teams are producing transit observations comparable in accuracy to field measurements at photographic tracking stations. These teams have found it exciting and challenging to develop new methods, techniques, and devices to improve their observations.”40 In Vanderburgh’s estimation, of the fifty or so teams remaining in the United States only about thirty were especially active. A similar dwindling of teams had occurred overseas. In Japan, for instance, only about fifteen teams remained of the eighty or so that existed at Moonwatch’s zenith there, prompting Vanderburgh to consolidate them as one team.41

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At a Moonwatch conference in May 1962, William Liller, chair of Harvard’s astronomy department, and Fred Whipple welcomed visiting team leaders with talks that confirmed the program’s change toward a more research-oriented form of amateur science. Moonwatchers, according to Liller, were “pioneers” among amateur scientists and responsible for “constantly advancing the state of the art” of satellite tracking. Whipple himself praised the “continual improvement in observational quality and quantity being accomplished by the present day ‘hard core ’ of seasoned Moonwatchers.”42 The papers Moonwatchers presented at this and other amateur meetings illustrate their interest in advancing the state of the art by introducing new tools and techniques. A physician from Dallas, for example, described his team’s innovative satellite simulator which helped improve observers’ reaction times. Margaret A. Frisch, a team leader and doctoral student in chemistry at the University of Wisconsin, described how her team had obtained positional accuracies for satellites of better than 3 arc minutes. Inspired by a similar device Art Leonard had built, Jack Borde helped fashion a gadget he dubbed “Big Bertha” (fig. 7.1). This multiple-eyepiece instrument allowed up to six viewers to scan the sky with slightly overlapping fields of view making it easier to spot faint objects. While amateurs keenly interested in doing serious research hailed from diverse locales, many of them shared one feature in common—their “day jobs” involved some aspect of science or engineering. Art Leonard— engineer; Vioalle Hefferan—science teacher; Don Charles—chemist; Jack Borde—technician at a major national laboratory. And so on. While they still participated, although to a lesser degree, Moonwatch no longer engaged the curiosity of housewives, accountants, bankers, and blue-collar workers as it did during the IGY. Instead, the most active and visible members of Moonwatch often had professional training in some technical field. Richard Emmons offers an excellent example of how hard-core members of Moonwatch blurred the boundary between amateur and professional science and indeed pursued their putative “hobby” in ways that were hardly amateur. For several years, Emmons’s amateur science interests complemented his professional career. Emmons, for instance, worked as an engineer at Goodyear Aerospace Corporation near his home in Ohio. After the International Geophysical Year ended, Emmons’s Moonwatch team remained

Moonwatch Grows Up

Figure 7.1. Walnut Creek team members with their specially designed satellite spotting telescope nicknamed Big Bertha.

active although with a reduced roster of members. By the time Vanderburgh became Moonwatch’s director, the North Canton team Emmons led—now down to just about a dozen people—had logged some 2,100 observations of satellites.43 In the early 1960s, Emmons did research for Goodyear on radiation environments in cislunar space, the region between the earth and the moon. With pioneers like Yuri Gagarin and Alan Shepard flying early (and brief ) manned space missions, understanding the effects of the space environment was critical to launching longer missions. NASA’s launch of Echo 1 in August 1960 provided Emmons with an opportunity to study the space environment more closely. Echo 1, a hundred-foot diameter balloon made of Mylar film a fraction of an inch thick, functioned as a passive communications satellite that reflected microwave signals from one point to another. Appearing extremely bright in the sky, Echo 1’s large surface area prompted scientists to ask questions about whether micrometeors might damage or even puncture the satellite.

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Emmons decided to measure the satellite’s brightness—to make what are called photometric measurements—and look for changes over time. If the satellite’s surface had encountered a large number of small rock or dust fragments, these would abrade its surface and cause it to reflect light differently. In March 1964, he used a handheld instrument that he built himself to carefully measure Echo 1’s brightness as it passed over Ohio. In June he presented his findings to scientists attending the annual meeting of the American Astronomical Society. The data suggested that the surface of Echo 1 remained shiny after four years in space. Emmons’s study implied that the threat to satellites and other space vehicles from micrometeors and other debris was far less than scientists believed. Emmons’s research caught Fred Whipple’s attention. Years earlier, Whipple had considered the problem meteors and space debris might pose for space travel. Whipple (and the New York Times) noted Emmons’s results—“a fine piece of work”—at a major spaceflight symposium.44 Encouraged by his results and pleased to have been nationally noticed, Emmons received funding from NASA to carry out more observations (fig. 7.2). For four months, he and a small group from Goodyear observed other balloon satellites with a mobile 24-inch telescope NASA provided atop Palomar Mountain, an hour’s walk away from the iconic 200-inch Hale telescope.45 Emmons’s employment at a major aerospace company combined with his decades-long experience in amateur science provided him with an exceptional opportunity to do research and communicate his results through professional conferences and publications. One would be hard-pressed to argue that Emmons, working with modest NASA funding and equipment at one of astronomy’s most hallowed sites, operated as an amateur any longer. His time spent backyard observing, presenting planetarium shows, and Moonwatching gave Emmons skills and credibility that brought him respect and recognition from the professional science community. Emmons’s acumen and expertise, however, could not forestall the decline of his North Canton team. It disbanded in December 1965 as membership continued to drop. Undaunted, Emmons himself remained a devoted amateur scientist and solo satellite spotter for forty more years. Moonwatch’s integration into the growing U.S. space program also illustrates how the program’s activities often overlapped the boundaries between amateur and professional. During the 1960s, NASA and private firms

Moonwatch Grows Up

Figure 7.2. Richard Emmons with the twenty-four-inch Mobile Photometric Observatory in 1966.

constructed a complex infrastructure for exploring and using outer space. By 1965, for example, the United States had launched more than two dozen reconnaissance and early warning satellites while scores of other communication, weather, and research satellites flitted overhead. Monitoring this fleet of orbiting objects was both challenging and important for national security.

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In the United States, the air force’s Space Detection and Tracking System— part of the North American Aerospace Defense Command—identified and tracked satellites, American as well as Soviet, along with a growing assortment of man-made space debris. Based in Colorado Springs, the military’s Spacetrack Center processed thousands of observations a month to identify orbiting objects and predict their motion. Spacetrack received data from a wide array of sources, including a global network of sensors such as radar, Minitrack stations, and Baker-Nunn cameras operating at air force bases in Turkey, Norway, and the South Pacific.46 Observations from civilian posts, including several Moonwatch teams, added to this welter of information.47 As early as 1959, several Moonwatch teams in the western United States decided to undertake precision satellite spotting. North American Aviation, an aerospace company that already sponsored a Moonwatch team, and the air force helped support what became known as the Western Satellite Research Network (WSRN). The WSRN contributed only a small part to the vast infrastructure for space exploration that emerged in the era of the ICBM and the race to the moon. Nonetheless, Moonwatchers participating in the WSRN continued the Cold War imperative for watchfulness that began with the Ground Observer Corps. Added to this vigilance was the element of research essential to the shrinking yet dedicated company of Moonwatchers. Operated as an adjunct to Moonwatch, WSRN members included Richard Emmons, Art Leonard, the Walnut Creek team, Vioalle Hefferan’s highschool students in Albuquerque, as well as a few teams overseas. Overall, some two dozen Moonwatch groups contributed to this amateur offshoot of the national space surveillance system. Unclassified predictions of satellite transits from the air force aided the amateurs who reciprocated by observing especially faint satellites and recording their optical characteristics. WSRN members also used the data they collected, as the group’s name suggested, to research basic problems such as atmospheric density and satellite tumble rates.48 Like Moonwatchers, WSRN members presented their findings in technical papers and at regular meetings. The WSRN exemplified another aspect of Moonwatch’s emphasis on amateur contributions to professionals’ research and national needs. During his tenure as Moonwatch’s leader, Richard Vanderburgh envisioned a leaner amateur corps that would focus on patrols for reentering satellites and record

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the visual characteristics of objects hundreds or even thousands of miles away. He also hoped that these “hard-core” amateurs, stimulated by the possibility of doing basic research, would require less motivation and encouragement from Cambridge. As the Moonwatch Newsletter claimed (in somewhat high-handed fashion), flexibility in dealing with the needs of professional scientists distinguished true amateurs. “We hope that the field attitude is such that you will consider the privilege of association with the Smithsonian Institution and with internationally recognized scientists,” the SAO told amateurs, “sufficient reason for making Moonwatch your primary avocation.”49 Moonwatchers, in other words, should be content with the real reward of participation: “the personal satisfaction of having made a significant contribution toward scientific progress.”50 Remuneration and recognition figured less important. While this message may have sustained the remaining Moonwatchers, it was unlikely to attract droves of budding amateur scientists or curious citizens.

Great Balls o’ Fire At dawn on the morning of September 5, 1962, two policemen patrolling the streets of Manitowoc, a port city on the shore of Lake Michigan, noticed an object that looked at first glance like a piece of cardboard. About an hour and a half later, they drove by again and stopped to remove it from the roadway. They discovered a metal object partially embedded in the asphalt and too hot to touch without gloves. After some determined tugging, the two men moved the chunk of metal to the curb and drove away. After more than eight hundred days in space, Sputnik 4—at least twenty pounds of it—had come back to earth. A few weeks before the chunk of what was once a five-ton satellite sat in the Manitowoc gutter, the SAO predicted that Sputnik 4 would fall back to earth in early September. However, the SAO was unable to identify with any certainty the time or location of the satellite’s reentry. Because the dying satellite would pass over most of the world’s populated regions during its last few orbits, the SAO alerted some 750 Moonwatch teams, amateur

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astronomy groups, universities, and observatories around the world of its impending reentry. The SAO especially wanted vigilant and experienced Moonwatchers to take part in the deathwatch, a request that meshed perfectly with the program’s emphasis on observing satellite reentries. At the third Moonwatch conference in May 1962, in fact, Whipple noted that amateur sky patrols for satellites and meteors were ways in which “Moonwatch can make significant contributions.”51 With more satellites orbiting the earth every year, the odds that an observant group of amateurs might spot a returning satellite grew better and better. Despite the fact that water covered 70 percent of the planet, Whipple and other scientists even held out hope that amateurs could help recover actual satellite fragments for study. As scientists had little to no knowledge about what long-term exposure to the space environment might do, they were eager to locate samples. In response to the SAO’s alert, in the early morning of September 5, Gale V. Highsmith, an engineer who worked on Titan missiles, set up his observing gear atop a small hill near his home in Milwaukee. Highsmith brought a theodolite—a surveying instrument that could measure vertical angles—he had built from school protractors, a cheap low-power telescope, and the handle from a garden hoe. At 4:49 a.m., Highsmith saw Sputnik 4 appear on the horizon. Glowing orange, it flew nearly head on toward him from the northwest. The incoming object grew larger, like a “coiled, firespitting dragon,” until it broke into six separate fiery pieces that roughly formed a cross in the sky. Highsmith used his theodolite to track the most brilliant piece, which he estimated to be as bright as Jupiter, until it faded from view.52 He then rushed to phone Edward Halbach, director of the Milwaukee Astronomical Society and leader of the city’s Moonwatch team. Highsmith was not a lone witness to the display. Two other members of Milwaukee’s amateur astronomy group spotted the fiery debris from the club’s observatory some twelve miles away from Highsmith’s post. Other early risers—farmers, deliverymen, truck drivers—throughout Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Nebraska reported similar observations. A bus driver and his passengers, for example, saw some two dozen bright objects pass overhead while a woman tending livestock watched the blazing display from her barn door. People also reported sonic booms, sustained thunder, and detonations.

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The Soviet satellite’s reentry made the local news and, in the afternoon, the two policemen returned to inspect the piece of metal they had found earlier. They took the object to their station where workers from local factories inspected it. The blackened, disk-shaped hunk of metal wasn’t like anything they had ever seen before. The object then traveled to the newsroom of the Milwaukee Journal where a reporter telephoned Halbach who in turn notified the SAO. Early the next day, Highsmith and the metal fragment boarded a flight to Boston. Scientists at the SAO eagerly began examining the piece of metal after Whipple displayed the chunk at a press conference. Any initial skepticism— news of Sputnik 4’s reentry had produced all sorts of bogus scrap— diminished when a cut made in the metal exposed a bolt with threads spaced in standard European fashion. Incontrovertible proof that the metal was once part of an orbiting satellite came when SAO scientists melted a fragment and analyzed gases that had been trapped in the metal. They detected radioactive isotopes of argon and manganese that form only after sustained exposure to radiation such as cosmic rays and particles in the Van Allen belts. The analyses confirmed that what appeared to an uninformed eye as a charred cylinder welded onto a metal plate really belonged to Sputnik 4. The SAO dispatched Walter Munn to Wisconsin to see if other fragments turned up and to interview witnesses to the satellite’s death. His trip— occasionally bizarre and certainly exhaustive—took him 2,000 miles around rural Wisconsin, where he spoke with hundreds of people. Beads of oncemolten metal were found on a church roof, and a search of a golf course revealed a bronze spring and cauliflower-sized chunk of scorched metal. At least one local took advantage of the hoopla. His report that the falling satellite sheared a tree on his property prompted Munn to clear undergrowth for two hours before the alleged eyewitness “remembered” that the tree had fallen before Sputnik 4 had. Newspaper reporters trailed Munn as he observed scavengers scuba diving in Lake Michigan. On returning to SAO headquarters, thieves broke into his car and stole all his gear which, a few days later, inexplicably turned up, untouched, on a Cambridge sidewalk four blocks away.53 With fragments of the former Soviet satellite scattered over Wisconsin, the question naturally arose: who owned them? One Wisconsin man who claimed to have several more fragments demanded either $500 or ownership

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of the pieces. “I wouldn’t try to claim a whole spaceship from Mars but these are worthless now that they’ve made their scientific tests,” he argued. “I’d like to put them on display at the country club.”54 While the court did not uphold the lawsuit, the fall of Sputnik 4 occurred while the United Nations Commission on Peaceful Uses of Space was meeting. The committee debated issues ranging from a ban on “space warfare” to issues of liability for damage caused by reentering satellites. The U.S. delegate to the United Nations committee presented the Manitowok fragment as evidence that his group should focus on the “practical problems of space law.” Caught by surprise, the Soviets refused to accept the proffered piece of metal and it wasn’t formally returned to them until the following year.55 A month after the Soviets reclaimed their debris, President Kennedy gave Fred Whipple the highest award the government can give to its civilian employees. In advance of the ceremony, the Smithsonian prepared a biographical portfolio of Whipple ’s career that highlighted the value of Moonwatch teams and their central role in helping recover Sputnik 4.56 The citation from Kennedy, in turn, praised Whipple ’s “imaginative foresight and boundless faith in the possibilities of science” that resulted in the overall success of the SAO’s professional and amateur satellite tracking programs. The recovery of fragments from the giant Soviet satellite and Whipple ’s award brought media attention to the amateur program again. “Over a hundred new affiliates have joined our program,” Vanderburgh complained, yet “most of the people concerned are wholly untrained in observational astronomy or related basic disciplines.”57 Such an influx of inexperienced new amateurs at a time when the program wanted greater accuracy, performance, and professionalism stymied Vanderburgh. To help introduce newcomers to the program and standardize their activities, Vanderburgh oversaw the creation of a “Moonwatch Manual” in 1963. However, Moonwatch’s purpose remained unchanged. While amateurs might choose to use their time to inform the public, recruit youngsters to science, or search for new comets, novas, and meteors, these activities “should not detract the attention from the all important Moonwatch.”58 After the fall of Sputnik 4, Vanderburgh championed vigilance for satellite reentries as the major mission for Moonwatchers. However, he held that neophytes, who could easily scan the skies for flaming fragments, were not

Moonwatch Grows Up

up to the task of “critical tracking during pre-reentry phases.”59 Moreover, Vanderburgh recognized that Moonwatch’s “existence is not essential to the SAO’s satellite tracking program.” While some at the SAO believed that Moonwatch could still foster public interest and activity in science, he found this a “rather nebulous mission” that left him uncertain how to best allocate his small staff.60 At the same time, Vanderburgh grew more interested in new tasks Moonwatchers might do. Amateurs could, for instance, observe lunar occultations. When the moon just barely passes in front of a star or planet, one can watch (if properly positioned on earth) to determine a profile of the moon’s surface as the object repeatedly appears and disappears behind mountains, valleys, and ridges.61 Such a mission had potential value as the United States sped forward with its Apollo program and scientists eagerly studied the lunar environment. Alternative satellite tracking methods also intrigued Vanderburgh. As he told NASA, “My pilot, navigator, and satellite tracking experience lead me to believe that visual observing from aircraft can be a practicable and reliable means of tracking random reentries.”62 Vanderburgh himself flew many times on air force planes to see whether air crews could provide a “reliable and economic means of tracking low, unstable satellites” and found the results encouraging.63 Nonetheless, in June 1964, he conceded to Whipple that Moonwatch had “ceased to be an effective component of SAO’s Satellite Tracking Program.” Its future came down to one of purpose. If Moonwatch continued as a purely amateur science activity—an “effective instrument ‘for the diffusion of knowledge’ part of Smithsonian’s purpose”—then Smithsonian, not NASA, funds should support it. Vanderburgh himself supported the idea that Moonwatch strive to be a “productive asset to the scientific and/or engineering community.” But for this to happen, the SAO needed to provide the staff, funding, and standardized equipment that would support a hundred or more new stations around the world. Even more radical was Vanderburgh’s suggestion that the SAO pay Moonwatchers for “observations of acceptable quality,” thus completely eliminating a fundamental aspect of amateur science— motivation by interest and avocation, not money.64 In essence, Vanderburgh advocated that Moonwatch continue its trend of increased professionalization of performance and practice to its logical end.

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Surviving records haven’t preserved Whipple ’s thoughts on Vanderburgh’s proposition. However, less than three months later, the Moonwatch Newsletter announced Vanderburgh’s departure from the program. In the future, the Newsletter noted, Moonwatch would surely give amateurs a “new and fitting place within the broad Smithsonian purpose—‘the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men.’ ”65 It remained to be seen, however, if Moonwatch could successfully recombine a focus on real research with broad amateur participation.

Space Age Opportunities The excitement and funding accompanying the opening of the Space Age created many prospects for entrepreneurial scientists to build research programs. Fred Whipple, as we have already seen, used satellite tracking to secure resources to help make the SAO become the world’s largest astronomical enterprise. Other institutions followed similar paths as NASA generously supported the bundle of disciplines—solar physics, astronomy, meteorology, geodesy, and others—that formed the nascent field of space science. For example, researchers and civic leaders transformed Boulder, Colorado, from a “scientific Siberia” into what one scientist called “AstroBoulder,” making it a major locus of space science research.66 All across the United States, other universities followed suit and either expanded existing programs or started impressive new ones. In the vast portfolio of space science research, Moonwatch certainly remained a minor player. Nevertheless, in a few notable cases, the amateur program served as a nucleus around which a larger and more ambitious scientific enterprise crystallized. Consider the example of Edinburg, Texas, a small city in Hidalgo County at the southern tip of Texas. Nestled in a delta created by the Rio Grande River, scrubby oaks and chaparral mark Edinburg’s low country. Scattered hills don’t rise much above a few hundred feet but night skies are dark and dry air helps minimize cloudy skies. Edinburg had hosted a small college since 1927. In 1952, Edinburg College renamed itself Pan American College to better reflect its place on the U.S.-Mexican

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border and the multiethnic communities from which it drew students. Today, the school is a branch of the University of Texas. Around 1956, Paul R. Engle and his family came to Edinburg when he took a job as a flight instructor at nearby air base.67 Coming from Las Cruces, New Mexico, which had an active amateur astronomy scene, Engle began teaching science classes at Pan American College. The school built an observatory to house Engle’s sophisticated seventeen-inch telescope, which featured exquisitely polished Pyrex mirrors and a synchronized electric drive. By 1957, Engle had recruited some two dozen people to join the Magic Valley Astronomical Society. With sponsorship from Pan American College, the club fielded a Moonwatch team. During the IGY, the SAO ranked Edinburg’s team “Prime A,” and it was the first station to observe the nose cone and heat shields that accompanied Sputnik 3 into orbit. After the IGY ended, Engle’s Moonwatchers continued satellite spotting while he improved his professional credentials. In 1959, a letter from Leon Campbell helped Engle receive a fellowship from the National Science Foundation and attend a summer program on celestial mechanics at Yale. Engle’s success and the generous support that arrived with the launch of the first satellites encouraged him to pursue grander plans. Reflecting general national interest in space science, Pan American College soon offered its students the opportunity to earn an “Astro-Sciences” degree. Students could take classes in astronomy, aeronautics, rocketry, astrobiology, and space medicine that Engle designed to help ready “teachers for the Space Age, the development of an appreciation of the impact of the Space Age on our society, and the technical preparation of students.”68 With additional funds from the National Science Foundation, Engle organized summer programs. These attracted students from all over the United States who took courses and did laboratory work in the space sciences and astronomy. Students, for instance, could use Engle ’s seventeen-inch telescope, and a dozen Moonwatch telescopes, photographic dark room, and host of other tools rounded out their equipment. The local military base donated a Spitz-style planetarium that it had originally used to train navigators. After refurbishing the instrument (someone had unwisely painted it air force blue, which clogged the small pinholes through which light was projected), Engle and his students used it to teach courses and give educational shows that attracted thousands annually. The planetarium, judged by Whipple to be an

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excellent effort, was ready by the summer of 1963 when Engle and Pan American hosted Moonwatch’s fourth annual conference. Engle’s boldest idea was the development of an internationally operated observatory in Mexico. A small grant provided money to test the observing conditions for astronomy on Infiernillo Peak, a mountain some 170 miles south of Edinburg. Using cars and burros, students from Pan American and schools in Mexico traveled to the rugged 10,000-foot summit where a sixteen-inch telescope was located. Engle ’s ultimate goal was an even larger research telescope on Infiernillo Peak. Seed funding from the Research Corporation made it possible to purchase a forty-one-inch mirror blank from Corning Glass, which started the project.69 Eventually, the mountain site would, he hoped, support a full range of professional and amateur science activities from astronomy to geology, meteorology, and botany. Moonwatch’s modest resources, of course, were unable to fund and sustain Engle’s ambitious plans. Nevertheless, he valued the SAO’s amateur program as it stimulated interest in the sciences, particularly among young people. Engle particularly believed Moonwatch allowed amateurs to “contribute to science in a coordinated and systematic manner.” Even for people who weren’t active amateur scientists, Moonwatch made them more “interested in the sky,” helped them “develop a feel for the space age,” and even reduced the number of UFO sightings they reported.70 While Pan American College didn’t receive the prestige and largesse for Space Age research that went to places like Harvard, Caltech, and the University of Colorado, Engle leveraged Moonwatch into opportunities for his school that, while appearing modest to an outsider, were significant within their local context. Amateur science brought benefits to individuals as well as institutions. “Moonwatch is not always glamorous,” a teenaged girl wrote in 1959, “but it is always fun. Moonwatch not only teaches astronomy . . . but also good habits [such as] responsibility, patience, promptness, and helpfulness.”71 Written by Lenelle Howe, a ninth-grader from Terre Haute, Indiana, and an aspiring science fiction writer, her story of getting minor frostbite and accidentally setting her coat ablaze in service of satellite spotting won first prize in a Girl Scout writing contest. Moreover, it offered proof that the amateur science program was, as Fred Whipple predicted years earlier, “capturing the imagination” of youngsters and “directing their thoughts into scientific channels.”72

Moonwatch Grows Up

Moonwatch met Whipple’s hopes and expectations as newspapers ran many stories about teens and other young adults who built elaborate projects and entered science fairs. For example, a teenaged member of the Wakefield Rocket Society was lying in bed one night when airplane lights seen through his window inspired him to build a “satellite tracer.” Using a mounted piece of glass and a special pen, he could mark the path of passing satellites that were visible to the naked eye as a way to verify telescopic observations. “As practical as a can opener, as functional as the bobby-pin, but typical of these guided-missile days,” the modest invention won him a prize in a local science fair.73 Moonwatch experience and science fair prizes helped launch some teenagers into professional science careers. The Moonwatch team based in New York City proved an especially fertile ground for producing budding young scientists. In 1957, Jay M. Pasachoff was a fourteen-year-old from the Bronx. Classes at the Hayden Planetarium taught him the principles of amateur telescope building. Stephen J. Maran, another junior astronomer in Gotham, also took the Hayden’s classes. Both boys joined Moonwatch and observed satellites from the RCA Building. Pasachoff went on to earn his doctorate from Harvard and became an astronomy professor, while Maran took his degree from the University of Michigan and became a NASA scientist. In addition to their research careers, both men brought astronomy to the general public through eclipse expeditions, popular books, and public relations work. Pasachoff and Maran embarked on science careers at a time when generous funding supported research and, more importantly, parents and teachers encouraged boys to go into science and engineering. For women, however, becoming a professional scientist proved much more arduous. The biggest and best observatories like Mount Wilson in California did not even open their telescope domes to women until the 1950s, in fact, when pioneering astronomers like Margaret Burbidge broke down the doors. In the context of this gender discrimination, Jane Shelby’s story appears all the more remarkable. An amateur telescope maker since junior high, she joined New York City’s Moonwatch team in 1956 and planned to observe from its Manhattan site. However, she found the trek from her suburban home for early-morning sessions inconvenient, so she organized her own small team. Shelby not only tracked the first Soviet satellites, but her sharpness

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with trigonometry and celestial mechanics let her compute their height and velocity. Clair Strong featured her in his “Amateur Scientist” column, and a third-place finish in the Westinghouse Science Talent Search helped her attend Swarthmore College, where she studied science and philosophy.74 Jane Shelby met her future husband, David Richardson, at college. Sharing his fascination with protein structures, she first started doing biochemistry while working as a laboratory assistant at MIT. Together, they developed expertise in the new field of structural biology. In 1970, Shelby and her husband moved to Duke University where, despite not having a Ph.D., she became a noted professor of biochemistry. Their initial research focused on designing new proteins not found in nature. They developed new ways of visualizing the three-dimensional structures, at first by hand and then with increasingly sophisticated computer graphics they called “kinemages” (for “kinetic images”). In 1985, the MacArthur Foundation recognized Jane Shelby Richardson’s research with one of its renowned “genius grants.” When asked about the relation between her early interest in astronomy and her later studies in crystallography and protein structures, she noted that finding patterns in the multidimensional visualization of molecules was “a little like identifying constellations.”75 Jane Shelby transformed her Moonwatch experiments into career opportunities when keen interest existed in the United States to improve science education and increase the number of men and women going into research fields. Over time, the sense of crisis dimmed and NASA’s rapid expansion slowed, as indicated by the agency’s budget. Swollen with funds for the Apollo moon program, the apogee of the agency’s budget came in 1966. By the time Neil Armstrong and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin stepped out of the Eagle lunar module in 1969, NASA’s budget had shrunk by a third, a decline that continued through the 1970s. Despite a shift in national resources away from space exploration and Moonwatch’s own increased emphasis on performance, the amateur program still served to encourage young people toward science throughout the 1960s. This occurred in spite of the fact that almost all of the Moonwatch teams that primarily enlisted children and teens had faded away by the mid-1960s. Vioalle Hefferan’s team, #041 in the SAO’s logs, defied this pattern. After the SAO recognized her team with a Prime A ranking, her students kept up their activities. Continued support from a local bank allowed them

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to improve their rooftop station and mount the apogee telescopes the SAO provided. An Albuquerque citizen donated old refrigerators in which the astronomy club stored supplies. Her students also established a ham radio network that enabled them to participate in the Western Satellite Research Network. In the summers, Hefferan took her students on long field trips to observatories in Flagstaff and southern New Mexico. Throughout the 1960s, her hometown recognized her hard work with numerous awards. She spent a summer in Fort Worth at the Charlie Noble Planetarium learning about science education and saw her team featured nationally.76 Meanwhile, her predictions of satellite viewing times became a standard feature in the local paper. As she joked with Leon Campbell when the IGY ended, “The satellites have ruined my social life but stimulated everyday living.”77 As a young boy growing up in Albuquerque, Joel Weisberg followed Hefferan’s activities with keen interest. Born in 1950, Weisberg later remembered when his parents took him to Kirtland Air Force Base—his father was a member of the local Civil Air Patrol—to watch the first satellites pass overhead. Growing up in a city with a major military base also made an impression on the young boy. “I was a good Cold Warrior,” he recalled, and curiosity about the Soviet space program contributed to his desire to join Moonwatch.78 In 1965, Weisberg began regularly to attend weekly meetings of Hefferan’s astronomy club after he passed a rigorous summer training program. In addition to Hefferan’s science instruction, he learned to use the club’s growing store of equipment with help from John “Jack” Bartholdi, a local math teacher. Weisberg found their activities, which combined a traditional astronomy club with a strong educational component, enriching and enchanting. In addition to satellite spotting—Weisberg tracked objects for both the WSRN and the SAO—club members made grazing occultation measurements, observed planets, and hunted for deep-sky objects. The high school students also gave tours and presentations to local groups (fig. 7.3). Weisberg, in particular, remembered becoming an honorary Camp Fire Girl after his “Tour of the Heavens” talk at a summer camp. For years, a Campfire Girl emblem decorated the same jacket that also displayed Weisberg’s green and silver patch of the Albuquerque Moonwatch team (fig. 7.4). In the summer between his junior and senior years, Weisberg decided to set up a satellite tracking station in his front yard (fig. 7.5). The astronomy

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Figure 7.3. Vioalle Hefferan and a teenaged member of her team explaining the celestial sphere to visiting teachers at an astronomy workshop in 1960.

Figure 7.4. Patch worn by Hefferan’s Moonwatchers.

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Figure 7.5. Joel Weisberg as a teenager observing with his Moonwatch telescope, March 1968.

club loaned him some equipment and he set to work. His work was meticulous. He would only record an observation of a satellite if it passed in front of a star. He would then draw the star field and identify the individual star the satellite had occulted. However, when he sent his observations to the SAO, he discovered that something was terribly wrong. The residuals the

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observatory calculated said that Weisberg’s observations were consistently off by large amounts. Bartholdi swiftly wrote the SAO to resolve the glaring discrepancy. After vouching for Weisberg’s acumen as an observer (as well as the teen’s great distress at the alleged errors), Bartholdi suggested that the fault resided in Cambridge. The SAO confirmed Bartholdi’s hunch—the observatory had entered the wrong data for the young man’s coordinates in their computer program, a mistake that threw off all of his data. In reality, his work displayed uncommonly good accuracy. “It must have been very discouraging for the kid,” an SAO staff member apologized. “I admire his tenacity in keeping on in spite of such apparently bad results.”79 Vindicated, Weisberg used his data for his senior science fair project. His report, “The Observation of Artificial Earth Satellites,” described how he spotted an international mélange of U.S., Soviet, French, and British space objects.80 He used his data to make predictions of satellite orbits, which the local paper published. Weisberg won several awards for his project, including third place at the New Mexico State Science Fair. NASA paid for him and “Mrs. Hefferan,” as he still called her years later, to visit Denver, where he met other young amateurs and, to his delight, touched a Titan 3 rocket. His prize-winning work also enabled him to attend a major gathering of amateur astronomers in Las Cruces, where he traded stories with “Moonwatchers whose names are legends.”81 A tour of an air force facility with a sophisticated forty-eight-inch satellite tracking telescope rounded out the trip. Observatory staff showed the teen images of a Saturn 5 rocket in low orbit (likely part of the Apollo 6 mission) and the details visible “blew me away. It was infinitely more sophisticated than what I could do.”82 Weisberg highlighted his amateur science experience when he applied to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He joined the freshman class in the fall of 1968, but the transition to Cambridge and MIT’s relentless focus on science and technology proved tough for Weisberg. In addition to the rigor of class work, he became, as he put it, “radicalized” and joined other MIT students to protest the Vietnam War and picket campus facilities associated with defense work.83 His career goals and personal views soon shifted. He originally went to Cambridge wanting to design rockets and missiles. After exposure to the new ideas circulating on the MIT campus, however, he decided he did not want to do research with direct military connections. Pictures of Weisberg from this era document his metamorphosis

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from budding missile designer to astronomy major. Before MIT, photos in Hefferan’s scrapbook show a clean-shaven boy with well-groomed hair. A few years later, Weisberg stands next to his former teacher sporting long hair and an impressive beard. After finishing his undergraduate work at MIT, Weisberg continued to study astronomy at the University of Iowa. Especially interested in radio astronomy, he used the giant radio telescope at Arecibo to collect data for his doctoral research. Postdoctoral positions followed, and, in 1978, he began collaborating with Joseph H. Taylor as they studied binary pulsars and gravitational radiation, research for which Taylor shared the Nobel Prize in physics in 1993. Weisberg’s studies, in fact, of binary pulsar orbits derived from his earlier studies of satellite orbits in his Moonwatch days. Weisberg, after three years at Princeton as a physics professor, moved to Carleton College, a small but highly respected liberal arts school near Minneapolis. His post there, what he later called his “dream job,” let him combine teaching astronomy and physics to small groups of students with astronomical research. Weisberg, even as a student, expressed gratitude to the Moonwatch program for providing him with opportunities. He credited his amateur science activities for helping him stand out among other applicants and noted that “none of this would have been possible without the dedicated help of Mr. Bartholdi and Mrs. Hefferan and Moonwatch.”84 Decades later, when Weisberg reflected on his career, he still believed that Hefferan’s astronomy club and Moonwatch served him well. It taught him to do serious scientific observations, acquainted him with then-new tools such as computers, and provided a valuable intellectual and social outlet. Weisberg explained the benefits Moonwatch and amateur science gave to him (and other young people) with a simple yet accurate assessment: “Look at me now—I’m an astronomer.”85 Moonwatch had its heyday—as measured by public interest and the participation of citizens who were not hard-core amateur scientists—between 1956 and 1960. Nevertheless, the program continued to present amateurs with research and education opportunities for fifteen more years. However, during this time, Moonwatch lost much of its appeal to curious citizens and potential amateur scientists who were simply interested in catching a fleeting glimpse of a satellite. In the 1960s, team rosters in many towns distilled until

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only a few enthusiastic and capable individuals remained. Moonwatch, in short, became less of an activity that combined socializing and education with science. Instead, through the actions and wishes of its members as well as the SAO’s encouragement, the program evolved until it no longer claimed the same popular base of support. The skills displayed by Moonwatch’s remaining determined and devoted participants challenged an easy delineation of amateur scientists from their professional counterparts. While this blurring of boundaries gave the hard-core amateurs who remained faithful to Moonwatch the chance to do real research, the increased focus on highly skilled work came at the expense of public engagement and helped sow seeds for the program’s demise.

8 The Legacy of Moonwatch

One Albuquerque evening in June 1972, as the sun sank and the day’s heat slowly dissipated, Vioalle Hefferan left her apartment. She traveled east across town, perhaps passing Albuquerque High School along the way. After a short drive, Hefferan came to a house nestled in a suburban subdivision. More than a dozen teenaged members of the Albuquerque Astronomy Club came to the front door and welcomed their teacher for dinner. After teaching science to two generations of New Mexico teens, Vioalle Hefferan was retiring. Despite her impending departure from Albuquerque High School, Hefferan remained extraordinarily active. In addition to arranging regular field trips for her students, she escorted a young man to a NASA-sponsored Youth Science Congress where he received a $500 prize for his science club project. Hefferan also negotiated with the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO) for her club to keep telescopes the observatory loaned her group years ago. After clearing the dinner dishes—perhaps Hefferan brought some of her well-regarded enchiladas—her students presented her with cards and notes expressing gratitude for her time and enthusiasm. One student thanked Hefferan for taking the science club on an multiday tour of observatories in southern New Mexico. Another showed appreciation for a mathematics

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Figure 8.1. Charm bracelet given to Vioalle Hefferan in 1972 by her students. The charms represent icons of the early Space Age.

book he received as a graduation gift and told her how he would use it in his college engineering classes.1 They also gave her a small, gift-wrapped, jewelry box that cradled a charm bracelet (fig. 8.1) Each of the ornaments dangling from its silver links depicted a Space Age icon—an astronaut, a Titan rocket, a moon, a lunar module, an emblem of the Friendship 7 mission that took astronaut John Glenn into orbit. Less striking but no less important, the bracelet included an engraved tag that read simply: “Moonwatch 1956–1972.” Hefferan kept the bracelet until her death in July 1987. When she died, the bracelet and four giant scrapbooks overflowing with clippings about her teaching career and astronomy club passed to Joel Weisberg. He later gave them to her former Moonwatch colleague John Bartholdi and, when I was collecting research materials for this book, Bartholdi loaned these keepsakes to me. I kept the bracelet on my desk as a reminder that Moonwatch was fundamentally about individual and largely unknown amateur scientists.

The Legacy of Moonwatch

Each Moonwatcher had his or her own story, and their tales aren’t always found in the administrative memos and formal correspondence meticulously maintained at the Smithsonian Institution Archives. Hefferan’s bracelet, preserved more by chance than design, illustrates how our understanding of Moonwatch (and amateur science in general) is often based as much on ephemeral objects stored in closets and basements as on official documents preserved in archives. Hefferan’s bracelet hints at another story. The charms she wore around her wrist represented not only her tenure as a Moonwatch leader and science club supervisor but also, one could argue, the first and classic era of space exploration. When Whipple conceived of Moonwatch, satellites and space exploration were the stuff of science fiction. Hefferan recruited teenaged enthusiasts to Moonwatch in 1956 as Soviet and American scientists planned the first satellites. She remained with Moonwatch as the first humans orbited the planet, as robotic spacecraft sent back images of nearby planets, and—finally—when twelve astronauts set foot on the moon. In fact, 1972 signaled a sea change in space exploration. That year, as Hefferan celebrated her retirement, NASA launched the final Apollo missions to the moon and President Richard Nixon formally approved plans to build a reusable space shuttle system. To some observers, 1972 marked the point when people suspended plans to go somewhere in space—perhaps to permanent space colonies, perhaps to Mars and beyond—and decided instead to orbit in circles. Moonwatch itself ended less than three years after the last Apollo lunar mission. During these two decades, public attitudes toward science, technology and, in particular, space exploration changed considerably. Moonwatch first rode to success on soaring enthusiasm and expectations in the United States and abroad for space exploration and science. By 1975, however, public opinion reflected a more skeptical, even hostile, view toward science and technology.2 Dependent on public funding, interest, and support, Moonwatch’s past accomplishments and the continued participation of a small but devoted corps of amateurs were not enough to sustain it. And while Moonwatch’s end disappointed scores of devotees around the world, examining its final years provides perspective on the evolving nature of amateur science and indeed on the question of whether the successes Moonwatch enjoyed might be repeated again by other amateur groups.

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Moonwatch’s Last Gleaming After Richard Vanderburgh’s departure from Moonwatch, the program continued to emphasize smaller teams, push for improved accuracy, and, in general, encourage more “professionalism” from its amateur teams. The SAO recruited William P. Hirst as Moonwatch’s new “chief,” as the position was informally called. An established amateur astronomer from South Africa, Hirst had led the Capetown Moonwatch team since its founding in late 1957. His group was one of the best-performing teams overseas and Hirst himself straddled the border between professional and amateur astronomy. Since 1940, Hirst, a member of the Astronomical Society of Southern Africa, published frequent reports—over forty by 1950—in the organization’s monthly journal. A well-respected member of the South African science community, Hirst also met foreign astronomers from Harvard, Yale, and other schools when they visited South African observatories, where scientists could take advantage of good observing conditions and excellent views of the Milky Way’s center. Hirst firmly believed that amateur astronomers should “contribute something of real value to the progress of science.”3 While novices might enjoy gazing at familiar objects like Venus and Mars, Hirst encouraged devotees to challenge themselves and observe variable stars, comets, lunar occultations, and the like. “There is little object in making observations, however interesting,” he wrote in 1941, “that do not contribute something new.”4 After he joined Moonwatch as a team leader, Hirst maintained that amateur science should ideally produce new knowledge that professional scientists could use. When the SAO asked Hirst what projects his team might like to undertake when the International Geophysical Year (IGY) ended, he replied, “We want you to consider us at your service and not the other way around.” Hirst added that, in his opinion, people “joined Moonwatch not just for our own interest, but primarily for any help we can give in the advancement of science in general and space science in particular.”5 In 1965, Albert Werner joined Hirst at Moonwatch headquarters to help run the program. Before moving to Cambridge, Werner served on a Moonwatch team in West Palm Beach, Florida, which originally started as an

The Legacy of Moonwatch

offshoot of a local Ground Observer Corps group. During the IGY, the West Palm Beach team achieved one of the best records in the entire Moonwatch program, in part due to its location near and interaction with a Baker-Nunn station in the nearby town of Jupiter. Werner took over team leadership in 1960 and maintained a close relationship with SAO staff based in Florida. While both Hirst and Werner encouraged further improvements in accuracy and precision from their Moonwatch teams, Hirst made one significant change after he took over. The program’s practice of ranking teams based on their performance had, in the view of one team leader, “seldom achieved anything but resentment.”6 As Hirst discovered, some teams tried to boost their rankings by only reporting their best sightings and, in some cases, “specializing” in easy-to-track satellites like Echo 1. Others failed to report observations of satellites with unstable orbits—exactly the anomalies the SAO wanted data on—because they were unsure of their accuracy. To alleviate the competition and data cooking that team rankings encouraged, Hirst eliminated it. Under Hirst and Werner’s guidance, the number of Moonwatch teams rebounded. By July 1966, some 184 stations in twenty countries sent satellite data to Cambridge. Full demographic information on these stations does not exist, but the trend toward smaller teams continued as Moonwatch’s social and civic functions diminished. When Werner compared Moonwatch during the IGY to the situation in the mid-1960s, he noted, “The picture now is very different. Most of our observers comprise ‘one man’ teams and are amateur in name only. Many of them are actually professionals connected with universities, observatories, etc.”7 The continued shift toward quasi-professional status (“amateur in name only”) and the enlistment of more teams, even if they were solo operations, paid off, at least in terms of productivity. In 1966, for example, Moonwatchers reported an all-time record of 14,928 observations to Cambridge. Two years later, volunteer observers shattered this by racking up over 15,000 reports in just six months, many with a standard of accuracy comparable to the far more expensive Baker-Nunn stations.8 Moonwatch also began to participate, indirectly, with NASA’s Apollo program. In late December 1968, for instance, several Moonwatch teams observed Apollo 8, the first manned mission to orbit the moon as prelude to the Apollo 11 landing. A few well-positioned and keen-eyed observers even glimpsed clouds of gas and ice created when

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the Saturn 5s third stage vented excess fuel into space.9 Moonwatch had come a long way from the days when Spacehounds and Lunartiks scanned the skies in the hopes of spotting Sputnik. Lost in light of these impressive accomplishments, however, was Moonwatch’s connection with the average science enthusiast and the public in general. Both Hirst and Werner hesitated to publicize Moonwatch to a wider audience. When a writer approached Hirst about a possible magazine article on Moonwatch, he discouraged it on the grounds that his staff already received too many inquiries from people not qualified to take part.10 This reticence to engage with the public even extended to Moonwatchers’ potential interaction with their local communities. During the chaotic yet exhilarating months after the Soviets and Americans launched their first satellites, Moonwatchers helped connect curious citizens to the space program and professional scientists. A decade later, the launch of a new unmanned satellite was barely news. When one potential new team leader asked Werner how he should involve the citizens of his town, he was advised to tread lightly. “Unless individuals are truly dedicated to their hobby,” Werner warned, “they might not appreciate the seriousness of our effort and, therefore, disturb what might be an atmosphere conducive to observing satellites at a critical level.”11 Research and performance, rather than relating to general citizenry, were the order of the day. Moonwatch did reach out to one specific new group of people in the mid1960s: airline pilots. The practice started in 1963 with Herbert Roth, a Moonwatch leader from Denver who also worked for United Airlines. Because the reentry of a satellite is so bright and can be visible for a considerable length of time, Roth suggested to his employers that air crews monitor the skies for such events. The surveillance was casual at first but Roth gradually began to supply flight crews with information about predicted reentries. Roth named his enterprise the Volunteer Flight Officer Network and, in 1965, it became formally associated with Moonwatch. A small contract from the U.S. Air Force in 1969 helped support it. By 1975, Roth’s program—essentially a naked-eye version of Moonwatch conducted from airplane cockpits—enrolled air crews from over fifty countries. Today, ten heavy boxes at the Smithsonian Institution Archives bulge with satellite observations (over 4,000 in all) along with meteor sightings and the occasional UFO report employees from over 115 airlines sent in.

The Legacy of Moonwatch

In 1962, as John Glenn became the first American to see the earth from orbit, others were also beginning to see the planet from another perspective. In that year, Rachel Carson wrote in her now-classic book Silent Spring about “man’s assaults on the environment.” Carson’s book and other widely read works such as Barry Commoner’s Science and Survival (1966) and Charles Reich’s The Greening of America (1970) helped bring environmental issues to the attention of the public and politicians. Prompted by such works, the general media began to report on worsening environmental problems. The first Earth Day celebration and the establishment of the Environmental Protection Agency in 1970 reflected mounting public concern about ecological issues.12 These events and the media attention accompanying them competed with and contrasted to more triumphal stories about satellites and space exploration. The ecology movement inspired the SAO to monitor the terrestrial environment for natural events much in the same way that Moonwatchers patrolled the skies for satellite reentries and other anomalies. In 1968, the SAO established the Center for Short-Lived Phenomena, which operated out of the observatory’s offices in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Proposed as a way of keeping a finger on the planet’s pulse, the center relied on a network of hundreds of “scientific correspondents” scattered around the world.13 Like the chain of Arctic radar stations that stood ready to detect Soviet nuclear strikes, these observers formed what one press release referred to as a “scientific DEW [Distant Early Warning] line.” They noted environmental events like earthquakes, oil spills, meteor showers, and even a mass squirrel migration.14 The basic idea for the center harked back to the nineteenth century when Joseph Henry, the first secretary of the Smithsonian, established a system of volunteer weather observers. The center’s modern mission directly reflected growing public interest in environmental issues. Participants transmitted their reports via the same network that linked the observatory’s Baker-Nunn stations and Moonwatch teams with the SAO. The center, directed by a former Moonwatcher, looked to that program for “qualified observers” who might help, for instance, spot “transient phenomena on the moon (red spots, dust clouds, etc.) during the Apollo flights” along with events such as meteor falls.15 In Moonwatch’s last years, Albert Werner succeeded Hirst as the program’s director. Hirst returned to South Africa, where he continued to track

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satellites, making thousands of observations using a small telescope. Werner stayed in Cambridge and tried to guide the program through an increasingly difficult period. Despite Moonwatchers’ demonstrated abilities, the continual improvement of professional optical, radio, and radar tracking systems diminished the program’s utility to the U.S. space program. Recognizing this trend, Hirst encouraged Moonwatch’s amateurs to expand their observing sessions to include searches for “low-perigee” objects. Because they pass very close to the earth, these satellites remain closer to the horizon and appear to move faster, making them difficult for radar and camera systems to spot.16 Nevertheless, it became increasingly difficult to justify even the modest funding that NASA, the air force, and other organizations provided Moonwatch. Eager to find new patrons, Hirst explored other funding possibilities. For example, he proposed that the United Nations support Moonwatch. As Hirst pitched it, Moonwatchers demonstrated “an international spirit of friendship and camaraderie” in which professionals and amateurs worked together “toward a single goal on a ‘people to people ’ basis.” Moreover, for those space enthusiasts in developing countries, Moonwatch offered an opportunity to participate in an “international space science effort.”17 Despite Hirst’s efforts and Moonwatch’s relatively low costs—about $30,000 a year—no reliable source of funding emerged. The amateur program had lasted far longer than Whipple or anyone else had imagined but, by the 1970s, Moonwatch had started its own death spiral. In May 1975, Werner announced Moonwatch’s termination to the leaders of the hundred or so still-active stations. “The closing of Moonwatch,” he noted, “may come as a shock—but no surprise—in light of current funding trends.” As of June 30, 1975, after nineteen years and some 400,000 observations, the Moonwatch era came to an end.18 In his final letter of appreciation to Moonwatchers around the world, Fred Whipple acknowledged that times had changed as an increasingly hostile public scrutinized science. Nonetheless, Moonwatchers over the years had promoted international goodwill and advanced scientific knowledge through their “loyalty, perseverance, and meticulous care.”19 And through their “systematic observations” amateurs had successfully challenged the experts—“THEY said it couldn’t be done!”—who doubted their abilities. In his final tally, Whipple congratulated Moonwatchers as pioneering

The Legacy of Moonwatch

participants in the Space Age who stood as “charter members of the fraternity of the universe.” As a final gesture to its volunteers, the Smithsonian Institution set out to recognize all amateur scientists who had volunteered significant time to Moonwatch. In Albuquerque, for instance, Vioalle Hefferan prepared a list of all the teens who had served on her team since 1956. Her seven-page inventory speaks volumes about the impact of just this one team. In addition to recording her former students’ years of service, Hefferan also noted those who had gone into professional science careers, those who had built or improved the team’s equipment, and even a woman who met her future husband one evening atop the Albuquerque High School.20 Characteristically, Hefferan left her own name off the list. Nonetheless, a few months later, she received a diamond-adorned pin as recognition for her years of service. Other long-term Moonwatchers received similar tokens and valued them highly. Richard Emmons’s daughter recalled that Moonwatch provided one of life’s highlights for her father, and he almost always displayed his pin on his lapel. Other devoted amateur scientists shared Emmons’s feelings. “Words cannot describe my own personal sorrow and regret on the passing of this great organization, which I was part of for nearly 17 years,” wrote William J. Griffin from Lima, Ohio. Griffin especially valued amateur science because, he confessed, he had flunked out of college and never realized his goal of becoming a professional meteorologist. Griffin likened receipt of his Moonwatch pin to “winning the Medal of Honor.” His activities as an amateur scientist simply were, he said, his “greatest single contribution to life in my 42 years.”21

Why Did Moonwatch End? Moonwatch lasted far longer than Fred Whipple had ever expected—almost two decades. During this time, space exploration metamorphosed from the stuff of science fiction and nascent scientific investigation to an international enterprise with ties to national defense, global communications, and Big

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Science–style research. One constant throughout this revolutionary transformation was the interest and enthusiasm of Moonwatch’s amateurs. Many disparate factors accounted for Moonwatch’s success. Whipple ’s proposal initially tapped the tremendous public interest and enthusiasm for science and space that marked the 1950s. In addition to participants motivated by civic duty, Moonwatch successfully drew from the established amateur science community and, to a lesser degree, vigilant members of the Ground Observer Corps wishing to expand their volunteer activities. The most successful teams, in terms of performance as well as longevity, had competent and devoted leaders like Vioalle Hefferan, Walter Houston, Nunz Addabbo, and Richard Emmons. In many towns, community businesses or civic groups helped support local Moonwatch teams. Even to neophyte amateur scientists, Moonwatch’s initial objectives were clear—to spot satellites after launch and as they later plunged back to earth. Cold War exigencies in the guise of Sputnik 1 and 2 gave amateurs far greater responsibility than professional scientists had ever anticipated. Moonwatch provided fantastic opportunities for amateurs to actively participate in the classic era of space exploration that began with the IGY and ended with the Apollo program. In doing so, amateurs contributed real data and research. Likewise, the reasons for Moonwatch’s gradual demise are many and range from obvious to subtle. The lack of funding, brought about in part by NASA’s declining budget, certainly contributed a mortal blow. Despite occasional consideration, the SAO rejected any moves to turn its amateur volunteer program into a paid activity. And while business sponsorship provided essential support for many local teams, nothing suggests that the SAO considered cultivating a major corporate sponsor to finance the work of amateurs and take up the slack created as NASA support waned. Moonwatch also lost its strongest champion when Fred Whipple stepped down as the SAO’s director in 1973. In fact, scientists and administrators reorganized and renamed the entire observatory after Whipple ’s departure. Christened as the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, the new organization was a direct collaboration between Harvard College Observatory and the SAO that combined the two entities, long neighbors and frequent collaborators, under a single new director. It is no coincidence that the Center for Short-Lived Phenomena (admittedly an odd program for an

The Legacy of Moonwatch

astrophysical observatory) also did not last as the Center for Astrophysics’ new leadership defined its future research agenda. Other factors besides the lack of a reliable and willing patron to advocate for and support Moonwatch contributed to its demise. When Moonwatch came under NASA’s purview in 1959, it hitched its fortunes to the U.S. space program. NASA, a mission-oriented agency, had institutional goals and political obligations that fundamentally differed from those of the SAO. Moreover, both the SAO and its parent organization, the Smithsonian Institution, placed more emphasis on basic research and dissemination of data (“for the increase and diffusion of knowledge,” as James Smithson’s original bequest stipulated in 1826). Activities that Vanderburgh, Hirst, and Werner encouraged, such as observing satellite reentries, oriented Moonwatch toward producing results and demonstrating utility to its new patron. One could certainly make the case that NASA’s support of Moonwatch, while giving it a clear purpose and encouraging the program’s move toward producing “real” research, also served to diminish Moonwatch’s appeal to the average curious citizen. The steadily improving performance of other, more sophisticated satellite tracking techniques also reduced the need for amateur contributions. Joel Weisberg saw this firsthand when he visited a military-run observatory in New Mexico as a teen and marveled at its high-tech tracking telescope. He recalled being glad he hadn’t been aware of it when he started Moonwatching, as it might have been demoralizing. The capabilities of such facilities also suggested to him that some aspects of amateur satellite tracking in the Moonwatch fashion had become obsolete.22 Military technology for imaging satellites only improved over time. Starting in the 1970s, for instance, U.S. scientists and engineers developed a new classified technology called “adaptive optics.” Expensive and complex equipment enabled scientists to remove distortion caused by atmospheric turbulence. During the 1980s, as Cold War tensions increased, scientists and engineers used these new tools to photograph orbiting Soviet satellites with exquisite detail.23 The techniques and equipment for adaptive optics became available to civilian astronomers only after Cold War hostilities ended. While such tools were radically more advanced than anything amateur satellite spotters could do in terms of imaging satellites, the precision of amateurs in terms of spotting them remained competitive, generally speaking, with professional

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civilian and military stations. As one contemporary satellite buff boasted recently, “Though armed only with binoculars or small telescopes, stopwatches, and star charts, hobbyists regularly achieve the same accuracy as military space surveillance systems.”24 Before Sputnik, the public’s enthusiasm for space and science helped Whipple and his colleagues recruit eager amateurs to Moonwatch. Likewise, Moonwatch’s decline and demise coincided with the public’s growing distrust of technology and its seemingly unshakable hold on contemporary society.25 Cultural critics such as Jacque Ellul and Lewis Mumford critiqued the systems-oriented, establishment-run “megamachine” approach that nuclear power, NASA space programs, and the use of high-technology weapons in the Vietnam War exemplified. As Ellul wrote in 1963, sputniks and the space race “scarcely merit enthusiastic delirium.”26 While Ebony magazine trumpeted the accomplishments of African American scientists in the 1950s, its headline for the Apollo 11 mission—“A Giant Step for the Man”—reflected instead the hostility and anger of the late 1960s.27 At the same time, The Whole Earth Catalog (which first appeared in 1968) and E. F. Schumacher’s Small Is Beautiful (1973) echoed the counterculture ’s call for “appropriate” or “soft” technologies.28 Compared to the 1950s, skepticism and outright fear about technology and science provided an increasingly common theme for science fiction and films. Movies like Planet of the Apes (1968), A Clockwork Orange (1972), and Westworld (1973) presented a decidedly dark view of technology and its potential to warp and destroy humanity. Even the plot of Stanley Kubrick’s 1968 sci-fi masterpiece 2001: A Space Odyssey, which depicted space exploration as religious, even transcendent, featured technology run amok in the guise of the infamous HAL-9000 computer. It is difficult, if not impossible, to evaluate the effect that this broad cultural shift toward technological pessimism had on Moonwatch and its recruitment of new members and retention of old ones. Moonwatchers supported the space program in particular and science and technology in general. Even participants like Joel Weisberg, who modified his Cold War views after experiencing the radicalized culture of MIT in the late 1960s, maintained his lifelong fascination for space and science. One could imagine, however, other teens or young adults, circa 1970, exhibiting disinterest for a highly technical amateur science effort with overt connections to the air force and NASA.

The Legacy of Moonwatch

The fortunes of the amateur astronomy community reflect this. After more than two decades of sustained growth, public attention and club membership began to diminish in the late 1960s. Longtime members blamed “social and political distractions” for the change and observed that “as interest in the space program waned, amateur astronomical societies saw a steady decline in younger members.”29 This sagging interest, which continued until the 1980s, was especially damaging to Moonwatch as it relied upon amateur astronomers for support as well as membership. The Moonwatch program bears some responsibility for its own demise. After the IGY, a succession of directors acted in collaboration with leaders of the best Moonwatch teams to encourage the program’s emphasis on improved performance and greater accuracy. Moonwatch’s most active members attended conferences, wrote technical papers, developed new equipment, refined their techniques, and worked to contribute, if only in a minor way, to genuine scientific research. In other words, Moonwatchers endeavored to appear and act more like professional scientists. Desiring respect and wanting to contribute more to the work of professional scientists and NASA’s space program, Moonwatch’s activities after the IGY straddled the boundary between amateur and professional. If anything, Moonwatch tried to distance itself from the interested layperson who lacked prior skill or knowledge in amateur science. Moonwatching became an increasingly technical and specialized activity, and teams shrank until only the most devoted amateurs remained. As a result of its quasi-professional focus, Moonwatch’s leaders at the SAO and in the field did not engage a potentially large group of people who might have wanted to join Moonwatch. The SAO also stopped using Moonwatch to advance science education or public outreach. Even Vioalle Hefferan, one of the program’s most respected leaders, could not encourage Moonwatch to take a different tack. William Hirst rebuffed her suggestion that Moonwatch use the participation of teens like Joel Weisberg to generate publicity for amateur science. “Moonwatch doesn’t exist either for publicity or educational purposes whatever was formerly the case,” he explained, “We are a group of serious scientific workers and wish to remain like that.”30 As a result, Moonwatch became somewhat insular over time. In the interest of appearing respectable and “scientific,” its leaders eschewed reaching out to young recruits and promoting amateur science more aggressively

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through the media. While its activities enhanced Moonwatch’s reputation among professional scientists and engineers, it came with a price. It is not unreasonable to imagine a scenario in which Moonwatch, having emphasized more education and engagement with local citizens, would have been able to appeal to a larger base of advocates when the program needed support the most.

Amateurs after Moonwatch Devoted amateurs, of course, continued to observe satellites after Moonwatch ended. As Russell Eberst noted, “It was a case of Moonwatch leaving me rather than me leaving Moonwatch.” The networks that amateurs established and the social infrastructure astronomy clubs provided allowed the activity to continue. Spotting satellites remained, in Eberst’s view, “an activity amateurs could pursue in their neighborhood with little or no financial outlay, yet be contributing to the knowledge of our planet.”31 However, the political context in which amateur satellite spotters practiced their arcane craft has changed since Moonwatch first started. In 1957, amid the throes of the Cold War, Western scientists, politicians, and military leaders desperately needed information about the new Soviet sputniks. In response, the American government encouraged amateurs to be vigilant and recognized their contributions in turn. More than forty years later, with the Cold War over and the United States fighting the more nebulous threat of terrorism, some government officials sent a different message: instead of contributing to national security, amateurs who tracked top-secret reconnaissance satellites might actually be thwarting it. Ted Molczan was one of the initiates who took up satellite spotting in Moonwatch’s final years. Satellites first caught his attention in the summer of 1968 after the Canadian teen had failed his first year of high school. Despite an intense interest in astronomy and spaceflight, his first brush with algebra left him bewildered and he feared being shut out from a career in science or engineering. A self-described “child of the space age,” this harsh introduction to higher math was especially discouraging to Molczan, who followed U.S.

The Legacy of Moonwatch

and Soviet space programs enthusiastically. “My life was Apollo,” he recalled. While other kids his age decorated their rooms with pictures of music or films stars, his served as a “shrine to the space program.”32 One evening in August, standing in his parents’ driveway in Hamilton, Ontario, Molczan saw a bright object—later he learned it was Echo 2— moving north to south. Molczan was determined to calculate its orbit so that he could see it again, and perhaps someday identify it. Molczan’s calculations served him well, and the next day, at just about the time he had predicted, there high in the southeast the object appeared again. “The experience had a profound effect on me. All of a sudden, I had a need and a desire to learn math. . . . I am certain that, except for ‘my satellite,’ I would have drifted aimless through another school year.”33 Molczan was hooked. His studies improved and he became an honors student. Excited by his success, over the next several years Molczan honed his observing skills as his enthusiasm for amateur astronomy and, especially, satellite tracking grew. He worked for years as a lone-wolf observer and concentrated on observing the balloon satellite PAGEOS (short for “Passive Geodetic Satellite”), launched by the United States in 1966 for geophysics research. In the late 1980s, he began to communicate with devotees like Eberst who continued satellite spotting after Moonwatch. Molczan became especially interested in monitoring clandestine spy satellites. By the time Molczan had taught himself to calculate satellite orbits, the United States had already launched dozens of classified reconnaissance satellites. The early ones took actual photographs and then released film canisters that U.S. operatives recovered.34 In the 1970s, the United States launched its first spy satellite with an electro-optical system. The KH-11 (KH stood for Key Hole) could relay images from space back to the ground in almost-real time. This made it especially valuable to U.S. intelligence agencies monitoring military developments in the Soviet Union and other regions. While the government carefully guards the technical details of spy satellites, the fact remains that they are large orbiting objects that reflect sunlight quite well. In other words, they present a tempting target for amateurs who know where to look. And given that the small yet skilled amateur community could correlate their observations with information the aviation magazines and industry newspapers published about launch times, it was relatively simple to identify the actual objects they spotted.

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Airmail, phone calls, and faxes facilitated rapid communication between amateurs following orbiting objects including spy satellites. Later, the introduction of electronic bulletin boards, email, and an electronic mailing list called SeeSat-L on the World Wide Web proved a genuine boon to the small community. These new tools picked up, in many ways, where Moonwatch stopped. They created, in effect, a virtual meeting room for amateur scientists interested in satellites to share information. SeeSat-L, for instance, enables amateurs from all over the planet to post observation results instantly, hash out differences and discrepancies, and report unusual sightings.35 The exact, almost obsessive, work of diehards like Molczan, Eberst, and others who contribute to SeeSat-L and other forums is a direct legacy of Moonwatch. Their endeavors, however, mostly derive from their fascination with calculating and disseminating the motion of satellites and depart significantly from Moonwatch’s original activities, which melded amateur science with civic participation and introduced young people and other curious citizens to science. While ostensibly amateurs, regular contributors to forums like SeeSat-L take Moonwatch’s emphasis on accuracy, reliability, and performance to a highly precise and logical end. In 1983, as tensions between the United States and the Soviets increased, two factors converged that presented a new mission of sorts to amateur satellite spotters. William Casey, the Central Intelligence Agency’s director, approved a program—code-named MISTY—to build a new stealth satellite that would be harder for the Soviets to detect. Patents filed in 1971 and 1990 described various schemes for suppressing a satellite ’s radar profile. Other devices onboard a “stealth satellite” could hide it from visible and infrared detection systems on the ground. Also, in June 1983, the United States decided to stop providing orbital information for most of its military and spy satellites. The decision to withhold orbital data (the British government followed suit) “unwittingly set a challenge to the amateur network to see if they could maintain reliable orbits for these ‘secret’ objects,” noted Russell Eberst. Molczan recalled that a “core group who had been among the most productive observers simply switched to tracking spy satellites” and started sharing their data more intently.36 The availability of personal computers enabled hobbyists to write their own programs to generate satellite predictions, calculate orbits, and rapidly disseminate the information.

The Legacy of Moonwatch

The interest these amateurs have in precisely following satellites is reminiscent of railway buffs who record train sightings. However, they represent a mere fraction of the band of the enthusiasts who once filled Moonwatch’s ranks. Today, Molczan estimates that only about six hundred people share their data on SeeSat-L. Of these, only about twenty continue to make regular and “precise positional observations.”37 Many of the best and most active observers, undaunted by cloudy skies, hail from the United Kingdom. Despite their small numbers, these amateurs found their seemingly innocuous hobby labeled a potential threat to national security. The controversy started on March 1, 1990, when NASA launched the space shuttle Atlantis with a new, billion-dollar satellite aboard. Newspapers widely covered the launch although the mission details remained classified.38 Although space experts initially believed the satellite that Atlantis carried was an advanced version of the KH-11, they later inferred it was one of the new MISTY stealth satellites.39 Eberst, Molczan, and a few other satellite observers tracked Atlantis and established a trajectory for the satellite it deployed. To their experienced eyes, the object seemed unusually bright, suggesting it differed from previous spy satellites, and they continued to track it. A few weeks after the Atlantis landed at Edwards Air Force Base, Soviet and American newspapers reported that the newly deployed satellite had malfunctioned and what remained of it would soon plunge back to earth. Statements issued by Pentagon and intelligence officials, the amateurs later suspected, were aimed to deceive experts in other countries. After the misleading malfunction reports appeared, Molczan monitored the sky, looking in vain for signs of debris or reentering material. But the satellite, or what supposedly remained of it, never appeared. Later that year, Eberst, observing from Scotland, noticed a very bright object where one should not be. A few other amateurs, communicating quickly via electronic messages and phone calls, spotted it, too. Molczan used the data Eberst and his colleagues supplied to trace the object’s trajectory back to the Atlantis mission. In late October, a reporter monitoring the amateurs’ electronic bulletin board discussions broke the story that the MISTY satellite, thought to have exploded, was in fact still intact. The Associated Press wire service picked up the story and, after a four-day spell of cloudy weather, amateur trackers caught the satellite making some small

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orbital maneuvers as it dropped its orbit by about thirty miles. Molczan later concluded that the moves were done to optimize MISTY’s position prior to the first Gulf War and the launch of Operation Desert Storm. Bad weather again curtailed tracking and, when the clouds finally parted, the stealth satellite had vanished.40 Despite its disappearing act, Molczan and other members of the SeeSat-L community maintained they had found MISTY. Yet the first stealth satellite, along with another supposedly launched in May 1999 by a Titan 4 rocket, remained elusive to the amateurs doggedly looking for it. Molczan’s own theory, which some intelligence experts corroborate, holds that once satellite programmers at the National Reconnaissance Office realized their stealth satellite’s cover had been blown, they took steps to hide it from the peering eyes of amateurs.41 As Molczan noted, the number of skilled amateur satellite spotters is small, and U.S. intelligence services know where they observe from. Controllers from the National Reconnaissance Office could utilize MISTY’s optical stealth capability to make it (and its successors) undetectable when passing over places like Ontario or Edinburgh.42 One spokesperson for the National Reconnaissance Office noted, “If we had our druthers, we would prefer that these things not end up on the Internet.” The stakes associated with knowing the whereabouts of spy satellites were high. Molczan, for instance, recalled receiving a phone call as the 1991 Gulf War began. The unnamed caller wanted information about the current orbits of classified reconnaissance satellites. Taken aback—the call came in the middle of the night—Molczan noted that he had no information to share as the satellites in question simply weren’t visible to active observers at the time. To this day, Molczan is unsure whether the caller was serious or a prankster.43 However small their numbers, the amateurs following spy satellites caused consternation for some in the intelligence community. In November 2000, a blue-ribbon congressional commission released a lengthy report on the status of U.S. spy satellite capabilities and the activities of the National Reconnaissance Office. When the commission unveiled its report at the National Press Club, cochair Robert Kerrey, a Democratic senator from Nebraska, charged that amateurs who track spy satellites and post their data on the Web aid terrorists and foreign governments wishing to hide illegal activities.44 “It’s no secret that other countries stop doing what they’re doing when the satellites

The Legacy of Moonwatch

are overhead,” said one U.S. intelligence official.45 For example, a British newspaper claimed India had evaded U.S. spy satellites as it readied a 1998 nuclear weapons test because it knew when they were overhead.46 Some reconnaissance experts scoffed at Kerrey’s claim. One physicist who had worked for the CIA claimed the predilection of national intelligence agencies to spend billions of dollars on systems that “a few hobbyists working part-time with $50 worth of Wal-Mart equipment” could detect posed a far greater problem.47 Regardless of whether amateur satellite spotters and the data they posted threatened national security, the MISTY incident brought attention to the once-obscure amateur community. It also revealed a climate decidedly different from the Cold War era when amateurs were encouraged and supported, not suspected. After the 1995 bombing of a federal building in Oklahoma City and terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, the U.S. government interpreted other amateur science activities as a potential danger. According to the Amateur Rocketry Society of America, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives had concerns that model rockets might be used by terrorists. After the passage of the Homeland Security Act in 2002, the society reported that “thousands of Americans had quit amateur rocketry” when the government demanded background checks, fingerprints, and registration fees.48 As the president of the Tripoli Rocketry Association, which enthusiastic teenagers first started in 1964, said, “This is a prime example of the government over-reacting to something that is not a threat. Children and adults alike have enjoyed this safe, educational hobby for more than 40 years without incident, and now all of a sudden we’re equated with terrorists.”49 Despite sympathetic politicians—one Wyoming senator proudly identified himself as one of the “rocket people” Sputnik inspired when he argued that model rocketeers be exempt from the new rules—rocketry groups are still battling regulations that would restrict amateur activities.50 Makers of hands-on science kits found themselves in similar predicaments. In 2003, for instance, police officers raided United Nuclear Scientific Supplies, a small company in the Sandia Mountains near Albuquerque.51 Officials claimed that chemicals the mail-order outfit sold to amateur scientists and schoolteachers could also be used to make explosives. At the same time, parental concerns have altered the composition of the typical child’s chemistry set. For example, the label on ordinary laundry starch in one kit warned,

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“Not Expected to be a Health Hazard.” Whereas the materials Mr. Wizard once used were able to entertain and educate millions of children, today’s chemistry sets have been stripped to the point where they can’t teach anything substantive about science. Instead, as one reporter ridiculed, today’s children get to “blow up balloons (with safety goggles in place).”52 The end result is a diminishing opportunity for do-it-yourself science. More than just lawsuit fears contributed to the demise of some traditional science kits. In 1992, the Heath Company announced it would close its factory doors. For more than four decades, tens of thousands of amateur electronics buffs used Heathkits to build everything from ham radios to televisions. Many Silicon Valley pioneers claimed to have “cut their teeth on Heathkits” as they learned “the lost art of soldering.”53 However, according to the company’s president, Heath couldn’t compete with an “instant-gratification society” and the ready availability of consumer electronics. “We were dealing with the electronically curious,” a Heath executive said. “Once they found computers it became all consuming, not only to their mind but to their pocketbook.” Even as the personal computer enabled devoted satellite spotters to keep in touch, the same equipment helped kill amateur electronic kits. Ham radio operators, moreover, lamented a decision by the Federal Communications Commission no longer to require Morse code proficiency as a prerequisite for an amateur license. Morse code, one observer predicted, would become like Latin, a dead language used only by enthusiasts. This situation seemed a far cry from the day when master tinkerers like Clair Strong dispensed guidance to eager amateurs wanting to build their own gear and develop the skills to use it well.54 Even a former Moonwatcher could not help notice that the social environment for potential amateur scientists might have changed. In 2005, the General Electric building reopened the observation deck that once provided a base for the New York City Moonwatch team. Jay Pasachoff reflected on how much satellite tracking had changed from when he gazed from that perch as a teen to watch for Sputnik. Today, he noted, “a 14-year-old would probably not be allowed to travel downtown on the subway” alone in the predawn hours.55 Can one link obstacles facing the current generation of would-be amateur scientists to a broader failure of the United States to compete in the global

The Legacy of Moonwatch

marketplace? The Task Force on the Future of American Innovation recently concluded, “Nations from Europe to Eastern Asia are on a fast track to pass the United States in scientific excellence and technological innovation.”56 Exaggerated or not, policy makers often buttress such warnings with statistics about the declining number of scientists and engineers trained in American schools and the sorry state of the public’s scientific literacy. In April 2005, top science and math teachers testified before Congress that hands-on activities offered students the best way to learn science.57 Bill Nye, known as the “Science Guy” for his award-winning shows on public television and heir-apparent to Mr. Wizard’s throne, offered similar advice: “Try some things,” he told budding scientists, “and then clean up after yourself.”58 To some observers, the failure to encourage amateur science and experimentation might even be responsible for a more general fear of science and reflect a “distrust of scientific expertise taking hold in society at large.”59 One newspaper columnist traced the unwarranted attention on amateur scientists to a larger political movement that amounted to “an unannounced but potent war on science.”60 If people feared science, he reasoned, “they can easily be persuaded to mock scientists or scientific theory” and ignore scientific consensus on such controversial and politically sensitive topics like evolution, stem cell research, and global warming. Compared to the difficulties facing some areas of amateur science like chemistry, electronics, and rocketry, amateur astronomy’s fortunes appear quite bright. After years of diminished activity, membership in the Astronomical League has doubled—the 1985 reappearance of Halley’s Comet gave a considerable boost—and enthusiasts buy more than a million home telescopes every year.61 Advanced and compact telescopes connected to devices with “go-to” computer programs, for instance, enable beginners to easily locate once-elusive celestial objects. Aided by improved technology, dedicated amateur astronomers “doing things that until recently would not have been thought to lie within their grasp” have demonstrated their expanding capabilities and accomplishments.62 At the same time, Time reported “that when you’re looking for lab assistants to collect good data at a bargain price,” amateurs offered an excellent resource to professional researchers.63 With the Internet facilitating the rapid dissemination of information, amateur observers can alert profes-

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sionals to the appearance of phenomena like a new supernova or asteroid. Consequently, some amateurs collaborate with professionals directly, and scientists have explored how to make the best use of amateurs in their astronomical research.64 In fact, long after Moonwatch ended, amateurs and professionals hailed it as a model for future amateur-professional collaboration and reflected that the long-lived program helped change the perception of what amateurs could contribute to professional science.65 These examples— and more exist for other disciplines like archaeology, ornithology, and meteorology—suggest that, in a world of hyperspecialized scientific research, amateurs still have a role to perform. Some public policy activists imagined that amateur participation could even transcend contributions to science. In 2004, Demos, a nonpartisan, nongovernmental organization for “everyday democracy” based in London, released a report on what it called the “Pro-Am Revolution.” Its study focused on the activities of so-called Pro-Ams, those “committed and networked amateurs working to professional standards.”66 Once derided as “anoraks”—British slang for people with extensive expertise in arcane areas—Pro-Ams contrasted with “large, hierarchical organizations with professionals at the top.”67 The report cited amateur astronomers as the example par excellence for how ordinary citizens can create “innovative, adaptive, and low-cost” modes of knowledge production.68 Seen more broadly, Demos concluded that the activities of amateurs could help improve local communities and promote “deeper social capital and healthier democracy” in the process.69 Indeed, the Demos report on Pro-Ams harmonized with the recasting of amateur scientists as “citizen-scientists” (perhaps a way to avoid the sometimes pejorative term “amateur”). The Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology, for instance, has run Citizen Scientist projects for years as partnerships between the public and professional scientists. Meanwhile, the Society for Amateur Scientists, founded in 1994 by MacArthur fellow Shawn Carlson, calls its newsletter “The Citizen Scientist.”70 It is too early to see if the new term catches on or whether amateur scientists fulfill the high hopes some experts hold. Nevertheless, Moonwatch—especially its initial incarnation with its focus on public membership, education, and community participation— certainly offers a model for ordinary citizens to engage meaningfully with science and interact with professional researchers.

The Legacy of Moonwatch

Could It Happen Again? Fred Whipple proposed Moonwatch in anticipation of the satellite launches expected during the International Geophysical Year. Moonwatch fully reflected a confluence of vigilance and civic participation alloyed with broad public enthusiasm for space and science and vibrant extant groups of amateur scientists. Like the first satellites, the IGY itself was fully embedded in the context and connected to the contingencies of the Cold War. Scientists’ research during the IGY, ambitious as it was, simply cannot be separated from the foreign policy and national security goals politicians and military leaders held for it. The IGY’s international cooperation, collaboration, and competition provided the backdrop against which Moonwatchers around the world manned their posts, making Moonwatch very much a product of the Cold War. At the same time, the IGY presented amateur scientists with an opportunity to interact with the professional science community. But first, Moonwatchers had to overcome professionals’ hostility and skepticism. Only with Whipple’s continued backing and Moonwatchers’ demonstrated capabilities were amateurs welcomed as partners in research, and this mostly because of the urgency Sputnik 1 and 2 generated. Moonwatch brought together groups of amateur scientists and curious citizens and provided them—no matter where they were in the world—with a common purpose. All around the world, amateurs built or bought similar equipment, developed common observing techniques, and mobilized for the mutual goal of spotting satellites. The very nature of artificial satellites enabled this standardization of purpose and practice. Unlike an aurora display or meteor shower, which only people in a particular locale could witness, satellites circling the globe were shared objects everyone could watch. I do not believe, however, that the IGY presented amateur scientists with a unique opportunity. As I write this, in fact, scientists and governments all over the world are making plans for three new international scientific programs. One of the most far-reaching and ambitious of these is an intense interdisciplinary effort to study what scientists call the “heliosphere.” The heliosphere is the region of space around the sun through which the solar

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wind flows. It encompasses all of the planets and extends well past Pluto. Building on the IGY’s legacy and its fiftieth anniversary, scientists from all around the world will participate in the International Heliophysical Year (or IHY) between 2007 and 2009. Together, they plan to undertake global and synoptic studies of the heliosphere ’s vast domain and the array of physical processes associated with solar activity. Two other programs of research and data analysis will coincide with the IHY. In March 2007, scientists inaugurated the start of the next International Polar Year (IPY) and began to investigate polar environments and ecosystems. Finally, in conjunction with both the IHY and the IPY, scientists will launch the Electronic Geophysical Year (eGY). The eGY provides a framework and infrastructure for processing, storing, and making available the terabytes of data geophysicists and polar researchers generate. All three of these concomitant international science enterprises build upon both the IGY’s research programs and the decades of space-based exploration that followed. As with the IGY a half-century ago, the political and international context of the IHY’s and IPY’s research programs is critical. Instead of a pervasive rivalry between nuclear-armed superpowers providing the setting, however, these new “Scientific Years” will begin amid continuing public and scientific concern about global warming and its devastating effects on the planet. Perhaps even more than the exploration of space that Sputnik and Explorer initiated, the stakes of scientists’ research have global and potentially permanent significance. In the United States, the landscape is even more contested as powerful domestic political and economic forces disregard the scientific consensus showing that the climate is changing because of human activity.71 Recently, American policy makers have recalled how Sputnik and the start of the Space Age had a galvanizing effect on young adults and encouraged them to study science and engineering.72 As one congressman told President Bush in 2005, “We need to be mobilized as we were after the former Soviet Union launched Sputnik.”73 Some politicians and scientists have suggested that China’s growing economic prowess might be such a catalyst, while others remain convinced that space exploration can still inspire American youth. The historical irony is poignant. Fifty years ago, the appearance of Sputnik over the United States caused widespread panic and sparked an escalation of

The Legacy of Moonwatch

the arms race. Today, politicians and policy makers almost seem to yearn for a similar destabilizing shock to reinvigorate America’s supposedly flagging scientific prowess. Perhaps the peril of global warming or accompanying calls for a “Manhattan Project” devoted to alternative energy will provide the potent and inspiring “Sputnik moment” that policy makers desire.74 What is the role for amateur scientists in this next round of international “scientific years”? Will curious citizens have the opportunity to learn about science that explicates global climate change and contribute to research in a meaningful way? The extent to which the IHY, the IPY, and eGY involve amateur scientists and encourage ordinary citizens to participate remains to be seen. However, some hopeful signs are noticeable. For instance, IHY organizers have signaled their intent to plan research activities with “amateur astronomy clubs, planetariums, science centers, [and] museums” with the goal of involving students.75 While only time will reveal the extent to which children and teens participate in such programs, the best-planned ones, like Moonwatch, have the potential to offer opportunities for active and meaningful participation. If we indeed live in any era of rampant public mistrust and misunderstanding of science, such participation becomes not only desirable but essential. It is not enough to simply watch scientists’ work via streaming videos sent over the Internet and experience the practice of science “virtually.” Rather than giving students another computer-mediated encounter to semiassimilate while multitasking, a better option is to provide opportunities for their direct, hands-on participation. Moonwatch, of course, offered amateurs more than just the active participation necessary to engage would-be researchers. It succeeded in exciting amateur scientists because they believed that professional scientists wanted and needed the observations they collected. Because they were actively involved and contributing information professional scientists asked for, young people around the world missed school dances, built equipment after school, and stood watch at dawn in the hopes of glimpsing something most ordinary citizens would not see. One hopes that those planning the new round of “scientific years” and other future, Big Science research projects find ways to link the contributions made by students and amateur science groups with the research activities and goals of professional scientists. If this happens, not only will

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amateurs have a chance to do hands-on work essential to generating interest and curiosity but they will have the reward of seeing their data—as Moonwatchers did—incorporated into a broader scientific enterprise with farreaching implications. The devoted amateurs of Moonwatch like Vioalle Hefferan, Richard Emmons, and thousands of others who helped observe the opening of the Space Age wanted to excite people’s enthusiasm for science. The stone engraving that marks Richard Emmons’s grave—he passed away in June 2005—testifies to this enthusiasm: “We lived,” it reads, “when men first walked on the Moon.”76 Amateurs did science (and still do it today) because they loved it. Moonwatch provided them an opportunity to experience science and bring it to the wider public. One can only hope that others will step up to the telescopes, microscopes, and ham radios to take their place. The health of science depends on public support and interest. Amateurs can help build this foundation and temper the tendency toward hyperspecialization that often estranges science from the broader public. The practice of science is too important to be left just to the professionals.

Explanation of Sources Used

I was fortunate to have had access to a wide variety of historical sources while writing this book. These included technical reports and published journal papers, formal and personal correspondence, oral history transcripts, and photographs. In addition, several people provided me with materials from their personal collections that would otherwise have been unavailable. Many more took the time to answer questions about Moonwatch and their experiences with the program. While the sources I cite in the notes are self-explanatory, I use the following abbreviations to indicate their provenance: • AAVSO—materials from American Association of Variable Star Observers, Cambridge, Massachusetts • CSLP/SI—papers of the Center for Short-Lived Phenomenon; at the Smithsonian Institution Archives (RU 607) in Washington, D.C. • FLW/HUA—papers of Fred L. Whipple at the Harvard University Archives (HUG 4876), Cambridge, Massachusetts • FLW/SI—papers of Fred L. Whipple at the Smithsonian Institution Archives (RU 7431) • FLW/SUPP/SI—supplement to the papers of Fred Whipple at the Smithsonian Institution Archives added 2004 (Accession Number 04-183) • IGY/NAS—papers of the International Geophysical Year at the Archives of the National Academy of Sciences in Washington, D.C. (with appropriate series indicated) • JAH/NW—papers of J. Allen Hynek, Northwestern University Archives, Evanston, Illinois • JW—Private papers of Joel Weisberg; loaned to the author by Weisberg. Copies in author’s possession. • MW/SI—Moonwatch papers at the Smithsonian Institution Archives (RU 255) • NBL/AIP—Niels Bohr Library at the American Institute of Physics, College Park, Maryland

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• OS/SI—papers of the Office of the Secretary, Smithsonian Institution (RU 50) at the Smithsonian Institution Archives • RE/SIA—private papers of Richard Emmons; loaned to the author by Jeanne Emmons Bishop and donated to the Smithsonian Institution Archives in 2007. Currently being processed. • SAO/SI—papers of the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, 1954–1966, at the Smithsonian Institution Archives (RU 188) • STP/SI—papers of SAO Satellite Tracking Program at the Smithsonian Institution Archives (RU 263) • VH—private papers of Vioalle Hefferan; loaned to the author by John Bartholdi. Copies in author’s possession.

Notes

Introduction 1. “Chicagoans Gaze Skyward but Baby Moon Eludes Them,” Chicago American, October 6, 1957: 4. 2. Information on Vioalle Hefferan’s Moonwatch team on the night of October 4, 1957, is drawn from an article she wrote in 1962: “Youth in the Satellite Age,” Griffith Observer 26, 1 (1962): 2–10. 3. Many scholars, including Gregg Mitman, Marcel LaFollette, and Bruce Lewenstein, have considered science popularization; see also pp. 37–45 in Jane Gregory and Steve Miller, Science in Public: Communication, Culture, and Credibility (New York: Plenum, 1998). 4. Quoted in Daniel J. Kevles, The Physicists: A History of a Scientific Community in America (New York: Vintage, 1987), 375. 5. Dedication of the Palomar Observatory and the Hale Telescope: June 3, 1948 (Pasadena: California Institute of Technology, 1948). 6. “Moonwatch, Indianapolis, Indiana: A Short History,” undated report (late 1958) by Wilhelm Garnatz; Folder “Team Histories, I-T,” Box 43, MW/SI. 7. John T. Mengel, “Tracking the Earth Satellite, and Date Transmission by Radio,” Proceedings of the IRE 44, 6 (1956): 755. 8. Ronald E. Doel, “Redefining a Mission: The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory on the Move,” Journal for the History of Astronomy 21, 1 (1990): 137–153. 9. From Constance McLaughlin Green and Milton Lomask, Vanguard: A History (Washington, DC: NASA History Office, 1969). 10. June 15, 1975, letter from Whipple to Moonwatchers; Box 45, MW/SI. 11. Robert A. Stebbins, “Amateur and Professional Astronomers: A Study of Their Interrelationships,” Urban Life 10, 4 (1982): 433–454, and Robert A. Stebbins, Amateurs, Professionals, and Serious Leisure (Montreal: McGillQueen’s University Press, 1992). My discussion of amateur astronomers

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12.

13. 14.

15.

16. 17.

and my conceptualization of amateur scientists in general was invaluably aided by Thomas R. Williams’s excellent thesis entitled “Getting Organized: A History of Amateur Astronomy in the United States,” Ph.D. diss., Rice University, 2000). I am also deeply grateful to Dr. Williams for many discussions about amateur scientists in general and amateur astronomy in particular. For a representative sample of this extensive literature, see Sally Gregory Kohlstedt, “The Nineteenth-Century Amateur Tradition: The Case of the Boston Society of Natural History,” in Science and Its Public: The Changing Relationship, ed. Gerald Holton and William Blanpied (Boston: D. Reidel, 1976), 173–190; Susan Leigh Star and James Griesemer, “Institutional Ecology, Translations and Boundary Objects: Amateurs and Professionals in Berkeley’s Museum of Vertebrate Zoology,” Social Studies of Science 19 (1989): 387–420; Elizabeth Barnaby Keeney, The Botanizers: Amateur Scientists in Nineteenth-Century America (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1992); Mark V. Barrow, A Passion for Birds: American Ornithology after Audubon (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1998). Studies that look especially at amateur astronomy include John Lankford, “Amateurs versus Professionals: The Controversy over Telescope Size in Late Victorian Science,” Isis 72 (1981): 11–27; Marc Rothenberg, “Organization and Control: Professionals and Amateurs in American Astronomy, 1899–1918,” Social Studies of Science 11, 3 (1981): 305–325; John Lankford, “Amateurs and Astrophysics: A Neglected Aspect in the Development of a Scientific Specialty,” Social Studies of Science 11, 4 (1981): 275–303; and Ken Willcox, “The Golden Age of Amateur Astronomy,” Mercury 24, 1 (1996): 32–34. Felicia R. Lee, “A Science Show Courts ‘Blue-Collar’ Intellectuals,” New York Times, October 3, 2006: B7. A point well made in Thomas R. Williams, “Criteria for Identifying an Astronomer as an Amateur,” Stargazers: The Contribution of Amateurs to Astronomy, ed. S. Dunlop and M. Gerbaldi (Berlin: Springer-Verlag, 1987), 24–25. A good introduction to this topic is Richard Smoke, National Security and the Nuclear Dilemma: An Introduction to the American Experience in the Cold War (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1993). Quote from Paul Dickson, Sputnik: The Shock of the Century (New York: Walker, 2001), 117. Personal communication from Luke and Betty Roberts, October 4, 2005.

Notes to Chapter 1

18.

A thesis articulated in, for example, Robert D. Putnam, Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2000). 19. “Brief History of Moonwatch Program by Mrs. Charlie Noble”; Folder 10, Box 43, MW/SI. 20. Quote from “Rooftop Drama: Bryn Athyn Moonwatchers Help World Track Satellites,” Philadelphia Sunday Bulletin, May 18, 1958; Folder 20, Box 5, MW/SI.

Chapter 1. Cultures of Observation 1. 2. 3.

4.

5.

6.

7. 8.

9.

Bosley Crowther, “Two Films Have Local Premiers,” New York Times, May 3, 1951: 34. Bill Warren, Keep Watching the Skies! American Science Fiction Films of the Fifties, vol. 1: 1950–1957. (Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 1982), 48. The Thing from Outer Space, directed by Christopher Nyby and Howard Hawks (RKO Radio Pictures, 1951). Information on this film and others discussed in this chapter comes from Bill Warren, Keep Watching the Skies!; Peter Biskind, Seeing Is Believing: How Hollywood Taught Us to Stop Worrying and Love the Fifties (New York: Pantheon, 1983); and Margot A. Henriksen, Dr. Strangelove’s America: Society and Culture in the Atomic Age (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997). Jack Lule, “Roots of the Space Race: Sputnik and the Language of U.S. News in 1957,” Journalism Quarterly 68, 1/2 (1991): 76–86. Also Paul Dickson, Sputnik: The Shock of the Century (New York: Walker, 2001). Curtis Peebles, Watch the Skies! A Chronicle of the Flying Saucer Myth (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1994), describes the formation of modern beliefs regarding UFOs. Charles K. Wolfe, “Jesus Hits Like an Atom Bomb: Nuclear Warfare in Country Music,” Country Music Goes to War, ed. Charles K. Wolfe and James E. Akenson (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2005), 102–125. Carl Mann (1958), “Satellite No. 2” (Jackson, TN: Jaxon). S. Mark Young, Steve Duin, and Mike Richardson, Blast Off! Rockets, Robots, Ray Guns and Rarities from the Golden Age of Space Toys (Milwaukie, OR: Dark Horse Comics, 2001). Howard E. McCurdy, Space and the American Imagination (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1997).

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10.

11. 12. 13. 14.

15.

16. 17.

18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27.

Randy Liebermann, “The Collier’s and Disney Series,” in Blueprint for Space: From Science Fiction to Science Fact, ed. Frederick I. Ordway and Randy Liebermann (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1992), 135–146. David R. Smith, “They’re Following Our Script: Walt Disney’s Trip to Tomorrowland,” Future, May 1978: 54–63, on p. 55. From Randy Liebermann’s “The Collier’s and Disney Series,” 142. January 10, 1956, letter from Whipple to Donald Michael; Folder “APO General Correspondence M-R,” Box 16, OS/SI. Cited in Denys Volan, The History of the Ground Observer Corps, ADC Historical Study no. 36 (Washington, DC: Aerospace Defense Command, Historical Division, Command Directorate of Information, 1968), 139. See, for example, Stephen J. Whitfield, The Culture of the Cold War (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1991), and Lisle A. Rose, The Cold War Comes to Main Street: America in 1950 (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1999), as well as essays in Peter J. Kuznick and Gilbert James, eds., Rethinking Cold War Culture (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 2001). Homer H. Hickam, Rocket Boys (New York: Random House, 1998), 19. Proposal by Whipple entitled “Optical Tracking and Scientific Analysis Program for Artificial Earth Satellites,” n.d. but sometime in late 1955; Folder “Initial Development of Optical Tracking,” Series 6.1, IGY/NAS. “Plane Observers Hailed by Truman,” New York Times, July 13, 1952: 9. From p. 156 of Volan’s The History of the Ground Observer Corps. This is recounted in “Blind Persons Help Spot Planes in Ground Corps,” New York Times, March 11, 1953: 24. “60 ’Saucer’ Reports Fly at Air Force in 2 Weeks,” New York Times, July 18, 1952: 5. “Plane Spotter Rewarded,” New York Times, December 9, 1952: 35. “Youth in the GOC,” Aircraft Flash 6, 6 (1958): 4–7 , 14. “Satellites: GOC Vols May Play Vital Role in Space-Conquering Adventure,” Aircraft Flash 5, 4 (1956): 6–7 , 9. “How City’s ’Eyes’ Guard Our Skies,” Chicago Daily News, January 4, 1958: 1. “Illinois Posts Win November-December Awards,” Aircraft Flash 6, 4 (1957): 12. December 6, 1956, letter from Faxon to Edward Halbach; Folder 1, Box 7, MW/SI.

Notes to Chapter 1

28. 29. 30. 31. 32. 33. 34.

35.

36. 37. 38. 39. 40. 41. 42.

Spencer R. Weart, “The Physicist as Mad Scientist,” Physics Today 41, 6 (1988): 28–37. “Satellites, Science, and the Public,” national survey conducted by the Survey Research Center at the University of Michigan, 1959. “Tinkerers,” New Yorker, December 31, 1960: 17–19. October 3, 1955, letter from Strong to Hugh Odishaw; Series 12.26, IGY/NAS. Quote from “Tinkerers.” Numbers from October 3, 1955, letter from Strong to Hugh Odishaw; Series 12.26, IGY/NAS. “Tinkerers.” Information on Emmons comes from several communications I had with him before his death in July 2005 as well as with his daughter Jeanne Emmons Bishop. I am especially grateful for unpublished reminisces written by Ms. Bishop and friends of Emmons after his death in 2005 which she provided to me. These were later published in a special 2005 issue of Horizon: Newsletter of the Wilderness Astronomy Club. As of August 2006, they were available at http://www.twcac.org/onlinehorizon/horizonpdf/emmons_horizon_part1.pdf#search=%22richard%20h.%20 emmons%22. A phenomenon discussed in a number of places, including Howard S. Miller, Dollars for Research: Science and Its Patrons in Nineteenth-Century America (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1970). Thomas R. Williams, “Albert Ingalls and the ATM Movement,” Sky & Telescope, February 1991: 140–143. Jordan D. Marché, Theatres of Time and Space: American Planetaria, 1930–1970 (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2005). “Toy Maker Plays His Life for Real,” New York Times, October 3, 1954: 27. “The Children’s Hour,” Fortune 50, 8 (1954): 68–69. J. F. Shanley, “Mr. Wizard’s Non-Secret Formula,” New York Times, February 20, 1955: X11. Albert Q. Maisel, ““Doc” Harrington’s Dawn Patrol of Young Scientists,” Reader’s Digest, November 1956: 142–146. This story is reprinted in Robert A. Heinlein, The Past through Tomorrow: “Future History” Stories (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1967), and the speech quoted here is from p. 197. See chapter 3 of De Witt Douglas Kilgore’s Astrofuturism: Science, Race, and Visions of Utopia in Space (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2003), for further discussion.

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Chapter 2. An Astronomical Engineer 1.

2. 3.

4. 5. 6.

7.

8. 9.

10. 11. 12. 13.

Fred L. Whipple, April 29, 1977 interview with David H. DeVorkin, NBL/ AIP. Material on Whipple’s life and background is drawn from this interview as well as numerous obituaries that appeared after his death on August 30, 2004, including Brian T. Marsden, “Fred Lawrence Whipple,” Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific 117, 838: 1452–1458. February 8, 1961, letter from Whipple to Shirley Thompson; Folder “T,” Box 5, FLW/SI. A point discussed in Ronald E. Doel’s Solar System Astronomy in America: Communities, Patronage, and Interdisciplinary Science, 1920–1960 (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 18–22. E. C. Bower and F. L. Whipple, “The Orbit of Pluto,” Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific 42, 248: 236. David H. DeVorkin, “The Harvard Summer School in Astronomy,” Physics Today 37, 7 (1984): 48–55. Robert H. Kargon, “Temple to Science: Cooperative Research and the Birth of the California Institute of Technology,” Historical Studies in the Physical Sciences 8 (1977): 3–32; Robert E. Koehler, Partners in Science: Foundations and Natural Scientists, 1900–1945 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991). My discussion of Whipple’s meteor work draws upon two excellent studies: David H. DeVorkin, Science with a Vengeance: How the Military Created the U.S. Space Sciences after World War II (New York: Springer-Verlag, 1992), and Doel’s Solar System Astronomy in America. P. 96 of Science with a Vengeance. Fred L. Whipple, April 29, 1977, interview with David H. DeVorkin; NBL/ AIP, 79. Whipple expressed similar thoughts decades earlier in a February 15, 1950, letter to A. H. Joy; Folder “J; 1940–1950,” Box 4, FLW/HUA. Also see p. 68 of Doel’s Solar System Astronomy in America. “10th Informal Memorandum from Harlow Shapley,” dated August 1946; Folder “HCO Council 1946–48,” Box 2, FLW/SI. Quote from James G. Hershberg, James B. Conant: Harvard to Hiroshima and the Making of the Nuclear Age (New York: Knopf, 1993), 554. Fred L. Whipple, “Meteors and the Earth’s Upper Atmosphere,” Review of Modern Physics 15, 4 (1943): 246–264. Peter Galison and Bruce Hevly, eds., Big Science: The Growth of Large-Scale Research (Stanford CA: Stanford University Press, 1992); James Capshew

Notes to Chapter 2

14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25.

26. 27.

28.

29.

and Karen Rader, “Big Science: Price to the Present,” Osiris7 (1992): 3–25. August 25, 1947, letter from Whipple to C. T. Elvey; Folder “E, 1940–1950,” Box 3, FLW/HUA. Allan A. Needell, “Preparing for the Space Age: University-Based Research, 1946–1957,” Historical Studies in the Physical Sciences 18, 1 (1987): 89–109. David H. DeVorkin, “Organizing for Space Research: The V-2 Panel,” Historical Studies in the Physical and Biological Sciences 18, 1 (1987): 1–24. Examples include Fred L. Whipple, “The Heavens Open,” in Across the Space Frontier, ed. Cornelius Ryan (New York: Viking, 1953), 132–144. Fred L. Whipple, “Meteorites and Space Travel,” Astronomical Journal 52 (1947): 132. Quote from a July 24, 1956, letter from Whipple to Leonard Carmichael; Folder “Carmichael, Leonard,” Box 1, FLW/SI. November 22, 1947, letter from Whipple to Richard Pratt; Folder “Meteor Photography, 1940–1950,” Box 5, FLW/HUA. May 25, 1956, letter from Whipple to Leonard Carmichael; Folder “Carmichael, Leonard,” Box 1, FLW/SI. Points well made by DeVorkin in Science with a Vengeance, 278. March 26, 1954, transcript; Folder “HCO Council, 1954,” Box 2, FLW/SI. Fred L. Whipple, “A Comet Model. I. The Acceleration of Comet Encke,” Astrophysical Journal 111 (1950): 375–394. The years 1950 and 1951 were especially fruitful times for comet research, and Whipple’s work meshed well with Jan Oort’s 1950 idea (first proposed decades earlier in another form by Ernst Öpik) of comet clouds about the sun and Ludwig Biermann’s 1951 interpretation that electrically charged particles from the sun (now called the solar wind) could interact dramatically with a comet’s tail. For instance, Whipple’s 1950 article about Comet Encke was named in 1999 as one of the most important papers to appear in The Astrophysical Journal. David H. DeVorkin, “Who Speaks for Astronomy: How Astronomers Responded to Government Funding after World War II,” Historical Studies in the Physical and Biological Sciences 31, 1 (2000): 55–92. Undated (c. 1946) Shapley memo entitled “Memorandum on the Support of Astronomical Research by the Office of Naval Research”; Folder “HCO Council 1946–48,” Box 2, FLW/SI. Whipple’s programs at Harvard was surpassed only by the solar physics research of his former adviser, Donald Menzel. See October 7, 1955, letter

257

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30. 31. 32.

33. 34.

35.

36.

37. 38.

39.

40. 41. 42.

from Whipple to Leonard Carmichael; Folder “Whipple, Fred 1954–55,” Box 24, OS/SI; and Doel, Solar System Astronomy in America, 72–73, 198–201. From Brian T. Marsden, “Fred Lawrence Whipple,” Publication of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, 117, 1457. September 27, 1955, letter from Whipple to Theodore Sterne; Folder “Sterne, Theodore,” Box 5, FLW/SI. From Hugh L. Dryden, “The International Geophysical Year: Man’s Most Ambitious Study of His Environment,” National Geographic, March 3, 1956: 285–298, and Walter Sullivan, “Exploring Our World,” New York Times, November 17, 1957: BR24. Walter Sullivan, Assault on the Unknown: The International Geophysical Year (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1961), 19. The story of the IGY’s origins has been told in numerous publications, and I am drawing upon several of these, including ibid.; Sydney Chapman, IGY: Year of Discovery (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1959); and Harold Bullis, “The Political Legacy of the International Geophysical Year” (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1973). Allan A. Needell, Science, Cold War, and the American State: Lloyd V. Berkner and the Balance of Professional Ideals (Amsterdam: Harwood Academic, 2000). Harvey Brooks, “The Scientific Adviser,” Scientists and National PolicyMaking, ed. R. M. Gilpin and C. Wright (New York: Columbia University Press, 1964), 76–77. Richard Witkin, “Satellite’s Flight to Help Map Earth Exactly,” New York Times, January 31, 1957: 1. “The Missile-Era Race to Chart the Earth,” Life, May 12, 1958: 124–138. IGY satellite geodesy is described in Deborah Jean Warner, “From Tallahassee to Timbuktu: Cold War Efforts to Measure Intercontinental Distance,” Historical Studies in the Physical Sciences 30, 2 (2000): 393–415. These efforts are discussed in chap. 11 of Bulkeley’s The Sputniks Crisis and Early United States Space Policy: A Critique of the Historiography of Space (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1991). “A New Moon in the Sky,” New York Times, July 30, 1955: 16. Russell Baker, “U.S. to Launch Earth Satellite 200–300 Miles into Outer Space,” New York Times, July 30, 1955: 1. “Questions and Answers,” New York Times, July 30, 1955: 8.

Notes to Chapter 2

43. Michael J. Neufeld, “Orbiter, Overflight, and the First Satellite: New Light on the Vanguard Decision,” in Reconsidering Sputnik: Forty Years since the Soviet Satellite, ed. Roger Launius, John Logsdon, and Robert W. Smith (New York: Routledge, 2000), 231–257. 44. “Minutes of the Special Meeting, Technical Panel on Rocketry,” March 9, 1955; reprinted in Exploring the Unknown: Selected Documents in the History of the U.S. Civil Space Program, ed. John M. Logsdon et al., vol. 1: Organizing for Exploration (Washington, DC: NASA, 1995), 299–300. 45. For historians’ debate on the satellite decision, see Constance McLaughlin Green and Milton Lomask, Vanguard: A History (Washington, DC: NASA History Office, 1970); Walter A. McDougall, The Heavens and the Earth: A Political History of the Space Age (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1985); Bulkeley, The Sputniks Crisis and Early United States Space Policy; and R. Cargill Hall, “The Eisenhower Administration and the Cold War: Framing American Astronautics to Serve National Security,” Prologue 27 (Spring 1995): 58–72. 46. Baker, “U.S. to Launch Earth Satellite 200–300 Miles into Outer Space,” 1. 47. R. Cargill Hall, “Origins of U.S. Space Policy: Eisenhower, Open Skies, and Freedom of Space,” in Exploring the Unknown, ed. Logsdon et al., 213–229. 48. May 9, 1955, press release; Folder “Whipple, Fred, 1954–55,” Box 24, OS/ SI. The story of SAO’s move is well told in Ronald E. Doel, “Redefining a Mission: The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory on the Move,” Journal for the History of Astronomy 21, 1 (1990): 137–153. 49. David H. DeVorkin, “Defending a Dream: Charles Greeley Abbot’s Years at the Smithsonian,” Journal for the History of Astronomy 21, 1 (1990): 121–136. 50. December 9, 1955, note in Box 24, OS/SI. 51. My thanks to David DeVorkin for teasing this fact out from his examination of records at the Harvard University Archives and sharing it. 52. Whipple discusses his strategy in his April 29, 1977, interview with David H. DeVorkin; NBL/AIP. 53. October 9, 1956, memo from Whipple to Theodore Sterne; Folder “Sterne,” Box 5, FLW/SI. 54. “Minutes of the First Meeting of the TPESP,” October 20, 1955; Series 4.10, IGY/NAS. 55. “Tentative Optical Observing Program for Earth Satellites” [n.d. but likely late October 1955] by Fred Whipple and Lyman Spitzer; Folder “Earth Satellite Program, 1955,” Box 13, OS/SI.

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56. Ibid. 57. DeVorkin, “Defending a Dream,” 121–136. 58. “Tentative Optical Observing Program for Earth Satellites.” 59. In generating this figure, Whipple relied on a strategy he had learned long ago. As he explained it, “Any honesty in the proposals was disaster. What you had to do was to figure out what it was really going to cost, then you had to put it in as a contingency fund to make the thing sound reasonable.” From Bulkeley, The Sputniks Crisis and Early United States Space Policy, 139–140. 60. Only $89,500 was initially allocated for the amateur observing program. See January 23, 1957, “Summary of Fiscal Information”; Folder “Project 30.9 Administration of Visual Observing Programs,” Series 6.1, IGY/NAS. 61. “Proposal for the Initiation of an Optical Tracking and Scientific Analysis Program for the U.S. Earth Satellite Program,” undated report (likely November 1955); Folder “Project 30.3 Initial Development of Optical Tracking,” Series 6.1, IGY/NAS. 62. “Minutes of the Second Meeting of the TPESP,” November 21, 1955; Series 4.10, IGY/NAS. 63. Ibid. 64. “Proposal for the Initiation of an Optical Tracking and Scientific Analysis Program.” 65. Ibid. Also see Daniel Goldstein, “ ‘Yours for Science’: The Smithsonian Institution’s Correspondents and the Shape of Scientific Community in Nineteenth-Century America,” Isis 85, 4 (1994): 573–599. 66. “Proposal for the Initiation of an Optical Tracking and Scientific Analysis Program.” 67. Ibid. 68. Ibid.

Chapter 3. Wanted: Satellite Spotters 1. “History of Moonwatch, Walnut Creek Station,” undated (but likely late 1957), by William Greenwood; Folder “Walnut Creek, 1957–59,” Box 23, MW/SI. 2. “Amateurs to Observe Satellites,” Sky & Telescope, March 1956: 203. 3. April 9, 1956, letter from Del Vecchio to Margaret Mayall; “Satellite Program Committee Correspondence,” Box 2, AAVSO.

Notes to Chapter 3

4. 5. 6. 7.

8.

9. 10.

11. 12. 13.

14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19.

May 10, 1956, memo from Whipple to J. A. Hynek; Folder “Hynek, J. Allen,” Box 2, FLW/SI. Alton L. Blakeslee, “Volunteers Organized to Watch for Satellite,” Los Angeles Times, June 9, 1957: A15. From p. 114 of Daniel Lang, “Earth Satellite No. 1,” New Yorker, May 11, 1957: 106–121. Described, for example, in John T. Mengel, “Tracking the Earth Satellite, and Date Transmission by Radio,” Proceedings of the IRE 44, 6 (1956): 755. John T. Mengel and Paul Herget, “Tracking Satellites by Radio,” Scientific American, January 1958: 23–29. A good description of Minitrack can be found in chapters 6 and 9 of Constance McLaughlin Green and Milton Lomask, Vanguard: A History (Washington, DC: NASA History Office, 1969). Figure from Walter Sullivan, Assault on the Unknown: The International Geophysical Year (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1961), 86. David N. Spires, Beyond Horizons: A Half Century of Air Force Space Leadership (Washington, DC: Air Force Space Command in association with Air University Press, 1998), 162. “January 28, 1956, Minutes of the 3rd Meeting of the TPESP”; Folder “3rd Meeting of TPESP,” Series 4.10, IGY/NAS. Comment by Athelstan Spilhaus reported in Green and Lomask, Vanguard: A History, 99. The Baker-Nunn devices are called telescopes in some documents and cameras in others. Both seem appropriate, but because the primary task of the instrument was to image a fast-moving satellite and photograph it, I use the latter term. December 30, 1955, telegram from Whipple to Hynek; Folder “Hynek, J. Allen,” Box 2, FLW/SI. J. Allen Hynek’s papers are archived at Northwestern University and contain a full run of his “Scanning the Skies” column. For example, John T. Mengel and Paul Herget, “Tracking Satellites by Radio,” Scientific American, January 1958: 23–29. January 25, 1956, letter from Newell to Satellite Panel; Folder “3rd Meeting of TPESP,” Series 4.10, IGY/NAS. Alton L. Blakeslee, “Volunteers Organized to Watch for Satellite,” Los Angeles Times, June 9, 1957: A15. From Green and Lomask, Vanguard: A History, 99.

261

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Notes to Chapter 3

20. 21. 22.

23. 24. 25. 26. 27.

28. 29.

30. 31. 32. 33.

34. 35. 36.

October 7, 1955, letter from Whipple to Leonard Carmichael; Folder “Whipple, Fred, 1954–55,” Box 24, OS/SI. “December 3–4, 1956, Minutes of the 9th Meeting of the TPESP”; Folder “9th Meeting of TPESP,” Series 4.10, IGY/NAS. “December 3, 1956, Minutes of the Tracking and Computation Working Group”; Folder “4th Meeting of Tracking and Computation,” Series 4.11, IGY/NAS. Recollections and report in March 3, 1957, letter from James Knight to Leon Campbell; Folder “Sacramento, 1956–58,” Box 18, MW/SIA. March 6, 1957, letter from Leon Campbell to Arthur Leonard; Folder “Sacramento, 1956–58,” Box 18, MW/SIA. Emphasis in original. March 6, 1957, letter from Leon Campbell to Walter Houston; Folder “Manhattan, KS,” Box 12, MW/SI. Walter S. Houston, “Opinions on the Moonwatch Program,” Great Plains Observer 3, 4 (August 1959): 4. Bulletin for the Visual Observers of Satellites, no. 1, July 1956: 1. A full run of these publications—which appeared periodically in Sky & Telescope—are in Folder 1, Box 61, of the MW/SI collection. May 2, 1949, and May 10, 1949, letters between Harrison Brown and Whipple; Folder “B, 1940–1950,” Box 3, FLW/HUA. Histories of the AAVSO and Sky & Telescope are presented in Leif J. Robinson, “Enterprise at Harvard College Observatory,” Journal for the History of Astronomy 21, 1 (1990): 89–103. “Amateurs to Observe Satellites,” Sky & Telescope, March 1956: 203. January 25, 1956, press release; Folder “Earth Satellite Program, 1956,” Box 13, OS/SI. February 28, 1956, letter from Cruikshank to AAVSO; “Satellite Program Observer Correspondence,” Box 2, AAVSO. Biographical information about Spitz comes from Brent Abbatantuono, “Armand Spitz: Seller of Stars,” Planetarian 24, 1 (1995): 14–22, and chap. 5 of Jordan D. Marché, Theatres of Time and Space: American Planetaria, 1930–1970 (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2005). From Abbatantuono, “Armand Spitz: Seller of Stars.” May 1, 1956, letter from Hynek to Spitz; Folder “Spitz, Armand,” Box 5, FLW/SI. Information on Halbach comes from chaps. 8 and 12 of Thomas R. Williams, “Getting Organized: A History of Amateur Astronomy in the United States,” Ph.D. diss., Rice University, 2000.

Notes to Chapter 3

37.

38. 39. 40.

41. 42.

43.

44. 45.

Sadly, I found no image of this cartoon in any of the archives I visited save for a grainy representation that appeared in an installment of Hynek’s “Scanning the Skies” column of July 1957. A December 12, 1956, memo from Whipple to Hynek asked if Disney had given formal permission to use Donald Duck as the symbol of Moonwatch: “It seems to attract quite a bit of attention and I think we might be able to make a move to obtain some assistance from Disney along with the request. In any case, we shouldn’t go any further with the gag unless we get his permission.” Folder “Hynek, J. Allen,” Box 2, FLW/SI. Discussed in W. Patrick McCray, “Amateur Scientists, the International Geophysical Year, and the Ambitions of Fred Whipple,” Isis 97, 4 (2006). July 26, 1956, letter from Odishaw to Hynek; Folder “IGY Office of Information, Volunteer Programs, Moonwatch,” Series 12.26, IGY/NAS. May 19, 1956, letter from Odishaw to Whipple; May 24, 1956, letter from Whipple to Odishaw; both Folder “IGY Office of Information, Volunteer Programs, Moonwatch,” Series 12.26, IGY/NAS. April 6, 1956, letter from Whipple to Hynek; Folder “Hynek, Allan,” Box 2, FLW/SI. May 22, 1956, memo on phone conversation originating in Odishaw’s office; Folder “IGY Office of Information, Volunteer Programs, Moonwatch,” Series 12.26, IGY/NAS. Concern over perceptions of military influence on U.S. IGY program: June 18, 1956, letter from Kramer to Odishaw; Folder “IGY Office of Information Chron. File Apr–Jul 1956,” Series 12.1, IGY/NAS, and Needell, Science, Cold War, and the American State, 333–336. On Kramer’s background and intent, see Fae L. Korsmo, “Shaping Up Planet Earth: The International Geophysical Year (1957–1958) and Communicating Science through Print and Film Media,” Science Communication 261, 2 (2004): 162–187, on p. 170. June 5, 1956, memo from Kramer to Odishaw; Folder “IGY Office of Information, Volunteer Programs, Moonwatch,” Series 12.26, IGY/NAS. Based on correspondence in the IGY/NAS files, Whipple and others at the SAO backed off on their organizing plans somewhat, at least with regard to amateurs outside the United States. As Whipple told Kramer, “We have not made steps to set up international relations because we have received a firm ‘No’ until very recently from your central committee.” July 18, 1956, letter from Whipple to Kramer; Folder “IGY Office of Information, Volunteer Programs, Moonwatch,” Series 12.26, IGY/NAS.

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46. 47.

48. 49. 50. 51. 52. 53.

54. 55. 56. 57. 58. 59. 60.

May 19, 1956, letter from Odishaw to Whipple; Folder “IGY Office of Information, Volunteer Programs, Moonwatch,” Series 12.26, IGY/NAS. April 6, 1956, letter from Whipple to Hynek; Folder, “Hynek, J. Allen,” Box 2, FLW/SI, and Bulletin for the Visual Observers of Satellites, no. 1, July 1956: 1. Bulletin for the Visual Observers of Satellites, no. 1, July 1956: 2. Ibid., no. 2, October 1956: 3. Fred L. Whipple, “Moontracking: The New Global Science-Sport,” Saturday Review, September 1, 1956: 37–39. All quotes from ibid. Verse from Persis Smith of Martin’s Creek, Pennsylvania; published on p. 41 in January 5, 1957, “Letters” section of the Saturday Review. For information on Soviet radio tracking plans, see Rip Bulkeley, “Harbingers of Sputnik: The Amateur Radio Preparations in the Soviet Union,” History and Technology 16, 1 (1999): 67–102. July 26, 1956, letter from Odishaw to Hynek; Folder “IGY Office of Information, Volunteer Programs, Moonwatch,” Series 12.26, IGY/NAS. “The Optical Program,” September 11, 1956, presentation by Fred Whipple, Barcelona; Folder “Sputnik Writings,” Box 16, FLW/SUPP/SI. Ibid. November 12, 1956, letter and reply from Daniel Callison to Whipple; Folder “C, General,” Box 1, MW/SI. For example, Walter Sullivan, “Amateurs to Aid Satellite Hunt,” New York Times, September 3, 1956: 29. Walter Sullivan, “Space Observers Plan Rehearsal,” New York Times, September 11, 1956: 23. Daniel Lang, “Earth Satellite No. 1,” New Yorker, May 11, 1957: 106–121.

Chapter 4. Of Spacehounds and Lunartiks 1.

The views of Campbell Sr. are discussed on pp. 247–252 of Thomas R. Williams, “Getting Organized: A History of Amateur Astronomy in the United States,” Ph.D. diss., Rice University, 2000. 2. February 28, 1957, preamble; Folder “Hapeville, Georgia,” Box 11, MW/SI. 3. “Two Old ‘Spacehounds’ Attending Forest Park School,” draft article by R. H. Grantham (undated but sometime in spring 1959); Folder “Hapeville, Georgia,” Box 11, MW/SI. 4. Ibid.

Notes to Chapter 4

5. 6.

7. 8.

9. 10.

11. 12. 13.

14. 15. 16. 17.

18. 19. 20. 21.

From “State College, PA,” file in Box 43, MW/SI. February 1, 1958, telegram from Alan Waterman to Moonwatch teams; Folder “Earth Satellite Program, 1958,” Box 14, OS/SI. Copy in Folder “Hapeville, Georgia,” Box 11, MW/SI. February 8, 1957, memo from Hynek to Whipple; Folder “Earth Satellite Program, 1957,” Box 13, OS/SI. Leonard Carmichael’s files as secretary of the Smithsonian Institution contain many letters and memos between the Smithsonian’s administrators expressing concern with the rapid growth of Whipple’s tracking program, including Moonwatch. From chapter 5, vol.2, of Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America. A phenomenon amply documented in Robet D. Putnam, Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2000); see esp. chap.3. “The Satellite Story,” April 12, 1957, script by Richard H. Emmons; Folder “North Canton, OH,” Box 14, MW/SI. Bulletin for the Visual Observers of Satellites, no. 8, March 1958: 8. Some of the tropes identified by Kristen Haring in her article, “The ‘Freer Men’ of Ham Radio: How a Technical Hobby Provided Social and Spatial Distance,” Technology and Culture 44, 4 (2003): 734–761, are manifest in Moonwatch correspondence although the latter appears to have been much more inclusive genderwise. “Race vs. Space,” Ebony, March 1958: 90. “Negroes Who Help Conquer Space,” Ebony, May 1958: 19–24. “How Serious Are Our Teenagers?” Ebony, October 1958: 95. The only evidence that supports this is an incident connected with a Chicago Moonwatch team in which the team leader allegedly harassed a black man who wanted to join the team. This report is balanced by the fact that the letter’s author was engaged in a feud with the team leader over the team’s management; see October 8, 1957, letter from Paul Kristofek to Fred Whipple; Folder “Chicago, IL, team of Rodney Faxon,” Box 7, MW/SI. James H. Jones, Bad Blood: The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment (New York: Free Press, 1993). Quote from Terre Haute Moonwatch History (c. August 1958); Folder “Terre Haute, IN,” Box 21, MW/SI. February 6, 1957, letter from J. P. Lowe to Hynek; Folder “Terre Haute, IN,” Box 21, MW/SI. Photographs and text from Folder “Terre Haute, IN,” Box 21, MW/SI.

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22. Richard F. Dempewolff, “How You Can Spot the Satellite,” Popular Mechanics, August 1957: 72–76, 234. 23. November 6, 1958, report by Walter Munn on the Terre Haute Moonwatch team; Folder “Terre Haute, IN,” Box 21, MW/SI. 24. For example, September 6, 1958, letter from Steadman Thompson to Leon Campbell, in ibid. 25. November 6, 1958, report by Walter Munn on the Terre Haute Moonwatch team. 26. From “Moonwatch History, Terre Haute,” August 1958; Folder “Team Histories, I–T,” Box 43, MW/SI. 27. September 6, 1958, letter from Steadman Thompson to Leon Campbell; Folder “Terre Haute, IN,” Box 21, MW/SI. 28. “Moonwatch, Indianapolis, Indiana: A Short History,” undated report (late 1958) by Wilhelm Garnatz; Folder “Team Histories, I-T,” Box 43, MW/SI. 29. Press releases in Folder “Phoenix, AZ,” Box 15, MW/SI. 30. October 9, 1957, press release from the Edgewater Beach Hotel; Folder “Chicago, IL, Team of Rodney Faxon,” Box 7, MW/SI. 31. “Illinois Posts Win November–December Awards,” Aircraft Flash 6, 4 (1957): 12. 32. From Walter A. McDougall, The Heavens and the Earth: A Political History of the Space Age (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997), 233. 33. August 6, 1956, letter from John McLaughlin to Hynek; Folder “NORAD, Misc.,” Box 42, MW/SI. Also, October 24, 1956, letter from Hynek to Hugh Odishaw; Folder 12, Box 10, JAH/NW 34. “Club Forum to Hear Talk on Satellite” and “Satellite Trackers to Gather,” both from the Arizona Republic, July 17 and July 18, 1957. 35 “Air Force Closing Observer Posts,” the New York Times, November 15, 1957: 4. 36. Denys Volan, The History of the Ground Observer Corps. ADC Historical Study no. 36 (Washington, DC: Aerospace Defense Command, Historical Division, Command Directorate of Information, 1968), chap. 9; also “Moonwatch: Satellite Tracking Station on Denver’s Natural History Museum,” Aircraft Flash 5, 11 (1957): 4–5. 37. “Apogee Moonwatch Stations,” Bulletin for Visual Observers of Satellites, no. 9, July 1958: 4–5. 38. September 21, 1957, letter from E. P. Martz to Leon Campbell; Folder “Alamogordo, NM,” Box 4, MW/SI.

Notes to Chapter 4

39. Ibid. 40. May 30, 1957, letter from Dieke to Hynek; Folder “Baltimore, MD,” Box 5, MW/SI. 41. “Contribution to Moonwatch History,” July 1958 report by Sally Dieke; Folder “Baltimore, MD,” Box 5, MW/SI. 42. Ibid. 43. James B. Gilbert, A Cycle of Outrage: America’s Reaction to the Juvenile Delinquent in the 1950s (New York: Oxford University Press, 1986). 44. “The Good Are Unpublicized,” Hartford Times, January 22, 1957. 45. April 17, 1958, letter from Edward Martz to Campbell; Folder “Alamogordo, NM,” Box 4, MW/SI. 46. August 6, 1958, letter from Campbell to Graham Kendall; Folder “Columbus, OH,” Box 8, MW/SI. 47. “Instructions for Moonwatch Observers,” November 1957 report by Charlie Noble and Jeff Collier; Folder “Ft. Worth, TX,” Box 10, MW/SI. 48. “Noble, Charlie Mary,” Handbook of Texas Online, http://www.tsha.utexas. edu/handbook/online/articles/NN/fno14.html (accessed January 2, 2006). 49. “Objectives of the Junior Astronomy Club of Ft. Worth,” May 14, 1958, report by Charlie M. Noble; Folder “Ft. Worth, TX,” Box 10, MW/SI. 50. November 13, 1957, letter from Mrs. William T. Kamenitsa to Hynek; Folder “Ft. Worth, TX,” Box 10, MW/SI. 51. “Noble Telescope Library,” June 1956 report by Thomas L. Gibson; Folder “Ft. Worth, TX,” Box 10, MW/SI. 52. June 3 and 6, 1957, letters between Noble and Campbell; Folder “Ft. Worth, TX,” Box 10, MW/SI. 53. Glen O. Ream, “Summer Camp—H.S. Satellite Trackers,” Christian Science Monitor, April 17, 1961: 7. 54. Information on Hefferan’s life is distilled from a variety of sources, including her 1987 obituary, newspaper articles about her Moonwatch team, and materials in her personal scrapbooks, which were graciously loaned to me by John “Jack” Bartholdi, an Albuquerque resident and longtime colleague of hers. 55. Vioalle Hefferan, “Youth in the Satellite Age,” Griffith Observer 26, 1 (1962): 2–10. 56. E. R. Harrington, “Sun, Moon, and Stars,” New Mexico Professional Engineer 19, 1 (1967): 20–21, 59–63.

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Notes to Chapter 4

57. January 8, 1957, letter from Campbell to Hefferan; Folder “Albuquerque Team of Vioalle Hefferan,” Box 4, MW/SI. 58. July 27, 1957, letter from Hefferan to Campbell; Folder “Albuquerque team of Vioalle Hefferan,” Box 4, MW/SI. 59. “Moon Watch Team Practices on Sputnik,” Albuquerque Public Schools Journal 8, 2 (1957): 1. 60. “Public Invited to View Forms on Sun’s Surface,” Albuquerque Journal, June 22, 1957. 61. Richard H. Emmons, “Satellite-Tracking Practice in a Planetarium,” Sky & Telescope, March 1957: 170–171. 62. “The Satellite Story,” April 12, 1957, script by Richard H. Emmons; Folder “North Canton, OH,” Box 14, MW/SI. 63. February 16, 1958, letter from Hefferan to Campbell; Folder “Albuquerque Team of Vioalle Hefferan,” Box 4, MW/SI. 64. A. G. Ingalls, “About Binoculars That Are Out of Line and a Telescope Built by a Group of Schoolboys,” Scientific American, July 1954: 92–98. 65. Ira Henry Freeman, “Millbrook Students Will Track ‘Moon’ with Homemade Scopes.” New York Times, January 18, 1957: 1, 22. 66. E.g., February 19, 1957, letter from Adam to John Tusson; Folder “New Orleans, Team of Bro. Adam,” Box 13, MW/SI. 67. March 3, 1957, letter from Adam to Campbell; Folder “New Orleans, Team of Bro. Adam,” Box 13, MW/SI. 68. “Material for a History of Moonwatch,” July 15, 1958, report by Brother Wendell Adam; Folder “New Orleans, Team of Bro. Adam,” Box 13, MW/SI. 69. September 19, 1957, letter from Albert Fisher to Hynek; Folder “New Orleans, Team of Bro. Adam,” Box 13, MW/SI. 70. “Moonwatch Team History,” undated (sometime mid-1958) report by David W. Saltus; Folder “Team Histories, A–F,” Box 43, MW/SI. 71. Ibid. 72. April 1959 edition of the Wakefield Rocket Society’s Research and Reference Bulletin; copy in Folder “Arlington, VA,” Box 4, MW/SI. 73. Discussed in Eloise Engle and Kenneth H. Drummond, Sky Rangers: Satellite Tracking around the World (New York: John Day, 1965), 106–107. 74. April 1959 edition of the Wakefield Rocket Society’s Research and Reference Bulletin. 75. Recollection of Peggy Hollingsworth, included in “Moonwatch Team History.” 76. “Moonwatch Team History.”

Notes to Chapter 4

77. April 1, 1957, letter from Campbell to Steadman Thompson; Folder “Columbus, OH,” Box 8, MW/SI. 78. March 17, 2004, personal communication between Cruikshank and the author. 79. “2 Boy Astronomers Start Operation Moonwatch,” Cleveland, Ohio, News, April 12, 1957. 80. Information on Van Flandern comes from the transcript of an oral history interview David DeVorkin did with him and Victor Slabinski on August 3, 2005; a copy is available in NBL/AIP. 81. Ibid. 82. From Cleveland team file, Box 7, MW/SI. 83. October 3, 1955, letter from Strong to Hugh Odishaw; Series 12.26, IGY/NAS. 84. C. L. Strong, “About Amateur Observations of the Aurora during the International Geophysical Year,” Scientific American, January 1957: 144–156. 85. See chap. 12 of Thomas R. Williams, “Getting Organized: A History of Amateur Astronomy in the United States,” Ph.D. diss., Rice University, 2000. 86. January 18, 2006, personal communication from Thomas R. Williams to the author. 87. “1957 Convention in Kansas City,” Astronomical League Bulletin 8, 3 (1957): 1. 88. “Report from the President,” Astronomical League Bulletin 8, 4 (1957): 1. 89. Information on Houston Comes from Dennis di Cicco, “Dean of the Deep Sky Turns 75,” Sky & Telescope, May 1987: 566–568. 90. Quotes from July 23, 1956, letter from Houston to R. N. Mayall; Folder “Satellite Program Observer Correspondence, 1956–1961,” Box 2, AAVSO. 91. “Moonwatch???” Great Plains Observer 2, 3 (1957): 3. 92. “Manhattan, Kansas, Moonwatch,” undated (mid-1958) report by Walter Scott Houston; Folder “Team Histories I–Z,” Box 42, MW/SI. 93. February 4, 1958, letter from Houston to Campbell; Folder “Moonwatch Program Kansas,” Box 11, AAVSO. 94. October 3, 1956, letter from Zahner to Moonwatch Advisory Committee; Folder “Satellite Program Observer Correspondence, 1956–1961,” Box 2, AAVSO. 95. November 26, 1956, letter from Zahner to Seven-Up Developers; Folder “Silver City, NM/St. Louis, MO,” Box 20, MW/SI.

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Notes to Chapter 4

96. March 12, 1958, letter from Campbell to Hynek; Folder “Silver City, NM/ St. Louis, MO,” Box 20, MW/SI. 97. September 8, 1958, letter from Steadman Thompson to Campbell; Folder “Manhattan, KS,” Box 12, MW/SI. 98. Background on Don Charles comes from a series of personal communications with him in July 2005 as well as the unpublished text of a talk given in 1990 to the Western Amateur Astronomers that he graciously provided; copy in author’s files. 99. Mary Soderstrom, “From Flying Saucers to Exploring the Universe,” Contra Costa Times, May 16, 1965: 14. 100. August 22, 2005, personal communication between Jack Borde and the author. 101. “History of Moonwatch, Walnut Creek Station,” undated (but likely late 1957), by William Greenwood; Folder “Walnut Creek, 1957–59,” Box 23, MW/SI. 102. March 17, 1959, letter and team history from G. E. Patston; Folder “Sydney, Australia,” Box 27, MW/SI. 103. July 14, 1958, letter from Ernest Calpo to Campbell; Folder “Team Histories I–Z,” Box 42, MW/SI. 104. January 28, 1956, letter from Reed Stuart to Campbell; Folder “Foreign Correspondence, 1956–61,” Box 25, MW/SI. 105. March 30, 1957, letter from Leon Vanloo to the SAO; Folder “Foreign Correspondence, 1956–61,” Box 25, MW/SI. 106. “Moonwatch in South Africa,” April 1957 report by Dr. David S. Evans; Folder “South Africa General Correspondence,” Box 37, MW/SI. 107. Teasel Muir Harmony, “Tracking Diplomacy: The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory’s Satellite Tracking Stations in India.” Paper presented at the 2006 Annual Meeting of the History of Science Society, Vancouver, B.C.; copy in author’s files. 108. See materials in Folder “Shiraz, Iran,” Box 33, MW/SI. 109. See materials in Folder “Argentina, Teofilo Tabanera Correspondence,” Box 25, MW/SI. 110. “South American Stations,” Bulletin for Visual Observers of Satellites, no. 6, May 1957: 1–2. 111. Undated airmail letter (likely early 1957) from Hynek to Whipple; Folder “Hynek, J. Allen,” Box 2, FLW/SI. 112. February 7, 1957, letter from Miyadi to Whipple; Folder “Japan, Correspondence with the Coordinator, 1956–70,” Box 34, MW/SI.

Notes to Chapter 5

113. Harland Manchester, “What Can We Expect of the Man-Made Moon?” Reader’s Digest, July 1956: 162–166. 114. “Sputnik’s Week,” Time, October 21, 1957: 50–51. 115. September 1, 1976, oral history interview with Alla Massevitch by Spencer R. Weart; NBL/AIP. 116. Map reproduced in Walter Sullivan, Assault on the Unknown: The International Geophysical Year (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1961), 71, while chap. 4 discusses Chinese activities. A later publication by Massevitch describes the basic satellite tracking cameras the Soviets deployed: A. G. Massevitch and A. M. Losinsky, “Photographic Tracking of Artificial Satellites,” Space Science Reviews 11 (1970): 308–340. 117. “Introductory Remarks,” June 18, 1960; Folder “STP-Moonwatch,” Box 117, SAO/SI. 118. Walter Sullivan, “Space Observers Plan Rehearsal,” New York Times, September 11, 1956: 23. 119. May 12, 1957, press release from the SAO; Folder “Test Alert #1,” Box 45, MW/SI. 120. Daniel Lang, “Earth Satellite No. 1,” New Yorker, May 11, 1957: 106–121. 121. May 12, 1957, press release from the SAO; Folder “Test Alert #1,” Box 45, MW/SI. 122. “Plumber’s Satellite,” Time, July 1, 1957: 58. 123. Reported in unidentified news clipping in Folder “New Orleans, Team of Bro. Adam,” Box 13, MW/SI. 124. May 22, 1957, letter from Lloyd Berkner to Whipple; Folder “Berkner, Lloyd,” Box 1, FLW/SI. 125. Reported be in June 18, 1957, memo from Whipple to Gerhard F. Schilling and noted on p. 51 of E. Nelson Hayes, Trackers of the Skies (Cambridge, MA: Howard A. Doyle, 1968).

Chapter 5. Seeing History through a Small Telescope 1.

Sullivan’s recounting appears in his book, Assault on the Unknown: The International Geophysical Year (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1961). Other accounts of the announcement of Sputnik that I have referred to include Robert A. Divine, The Sputnik Challenge: Eisenhower’s Response to the Soviet Satellite (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993); Walter A. McDougall, The Heavens and the Earth: A Political History of the Space Age

271

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Notes to Chapter 5

2. 3. 4. 5.

6. 7.

8. 9.

10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22.

(Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997); and Paul Dickson, Sputnik: The Shock of the Century (New York: Walker, 2001). Examples of headlines drawn from the Los Angeles Times. From chap. 11 of Constance McLaughlin Green and Milton Lomask, Vanguard: A History (Washington, DC: NASA History Office, 1969). Ibid., 192. From Whipple’s comments, described in “October 3, 1957, Minutes of the 12th Meeting of the TPESP”; Folder “12th Meeting of TPESP,” Series 4.10, IGY/NAS. Ibid. See also information given in chap. 9 of Green and Lomask, Vanguard: A History. Hynek’s recollections are recorded in an October 3, 1958, memo to SAO staff entitled “First Anniversary of Sputnik”; Folder “Historical Sputnik,” Box 4, FLW/SUPP/SI. August 4, 1958, letter from Charles LeRoy to Campbell; Folder “Pittsburgh, PA,” Box 15, MW/SI. Campbell said this in a number of letters to Moonwatch volunteers, including October 29, 1957, letter from Campbell to Arthur Leonard; Folder “Sacramento, CA, 1956–58,” Box 18, MW/SI. Also quoted on p. 1 of Great Plains Observer 3, 4 (1959). Described in Green and Lomask, Vanguard: A History, 193–194. From p. 2 of Vioalle Hefferan, “Youth in the Satellite Age,” Griffith Observer 26, 1 (1962): 2–10. Hynek memo, “First Anniversary of Sputnik.” From p. 40 of Fred L. Whipple and J. Allen Hynek, “Observations of Satellite I,” Scientific American, December 1957: 37–43. “First U.S. Glimpse: Time of Sighting Jibes with Data on Its Path,” New York Times, October 7, 1957: 1. Noted in Dickson, Sputnik: The Shock of the Century, 22. Great Plains Observer 2, 5 (1957): 1. Ibid. November 4, 1957, letter from Campbell to Elmer Rahmes; Folder “Cincinnati, OH,” Box 7, MW/SI. Steadman Thompson, “This Is Moonwatch,” The Reflector 8, 4 (1957): 2–3. Hynek memo, “First Anniversary of Sputnik.” Ibid. See, for example, Donald N. Michael, “The Beginning of the Space Age and American Public Opinion,” Public Opinion Quarterly 24, 4 (1960): 573–582;

Notes to Chapter 5

23. 24. 25. 26.

27. 28. 29. 30.

31. 32.

33.

34. 35. 36.

Jack Lule, “Roots of the Space Race: Sputnik and the Language of U.S. News in 1957,” Journalism Quarterly 68, 1/2 (1991): 76–86; and Divine, The Sputnik Challenge, for examples of how the public, the press, and politicians reacted. Hynek memo, “First Anniversary of Sputnik.” From transcript of 1982 oral history interview with James A. Westphal done by David H. DeVorkin; NBL/AIP. “Scientists Split on Soviet Signals,” New York Times, October 7, 1957: 17. Quote from p. 578 of Donald N. Michael, “The Beginning of the Space Age and American Public Opinion,” Public Opinion Quarterly 24, 4 (1960): 573–582. Lule, “Roots of the Space Race.” “Smithsonian Expert Says Reds May Reach Moon within Week,” Washington Post, November 4, 1957: 2. Walter Sullivan, “Scientists Wonder If Shot Nears Moon,” New York Times, November 5, 1957: 1. “Control of the World,” New York Times, January 9, 1958: 32. A sample of the articles and editorials that appeared in the latter months of 1957 and explored what Sputnik meant can be found in Richard Witkin, ed., The Challenge of the Sputniks (New York: Doubleday, 1958). November 4, 1957, telegram from Carmichael to Whipple; Folder “Earth Satellite Program, 1957,” Box 18, OS/SI. Quotes from February 12, 1958, letter from Steinmetz to Leon Campbell; Folder “Denver, CO,” Box 9, MW/SI. October 2, 1958, letter from Faxon to Campbell; Folder “Team Histories, A-F,” Box 43, MW/SI. November 11, 1957, letter from Charles LeRoy to Moonwatch Team Leaders; Folder “Pittsburgh, PA,” Box 15, MW/SI. March 17, 1959, letter and team history from G.E. Patston; Folder “Sydney, Australia,” Box 27, MW/SI. “First Progress Report of the Moonwatch Team of Picatinny Arsenal, Dover, NJ” (no date but likely early 1958); Folder “Team Histories, A–F,” Box 43, MW/SI. “History of the Indianapolis Moonwatch Team” (no date but likely mid1958); Folder “Team Histories, I–T,” Box 43, MW/SI. Carl Sagan, “Unidentified Flying Objects,” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, June 1967: 43–44. October 30, 1957, letter from Dieke to Campbell; Folder “Baltimore, MD,” Box 5, MW/SI.

273

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Notes to Chapter 5

37. 38.

39. 40. 41. 42. 43.

44. 45. 46.

47. 48.

49.

50.

51.

52.

November 14, 1957, and October 30, 1957, letters from Dieke to Campbell; Folder “Baltimore, MD,” Box 5, MW/SI. Quotes from February 12, 1958, letter from Steinmetz to Leon Campbell; Folder “Denver, CO,” Box 9, MW/SI, and “First Progress Report of the Moonwatch Team of Picatinny Arsenal, Dover, NJ.” October 20, 1957, letter from Campbell to Sally Dieke; Folder “Baltimore, MD,” Box 5, MW/SI. Walter Sullivan, “U.S. Teams Detect 3 Objects in Orbit,” New York Times, October 11, 1957: 1. “Youth in the Satellite Age.” James A., Westphal, September 14, 1982, oral history with David DeVorkin; NBL/AIP. “Information Concerning the History of the Akron–North Canton Satellite Tracking Group,” March 5, 1960, report; Folder “North Canton, Ohio,” Box 14, MW/SI. October 28, 1957, letter from Spitz to Edwin Bailey; Folder “Philadelphia, PA,” Box 15, MW/SI. Harvard College Observatory Announcement Card 1375, October 15, 1957. “Visual Observations of Alpha One Made by Moonwatch Stations during Lifetime of the Object,” December 17, 1957, report by Leon Campbell and J. A. Hynek; Box 11, AAVSO. “Southlanders Get View of Russ Rocket,” Los Angeles Times, October 18, 1957: 2. May 9, 1956, letter (and attached memo) from Kaplan to Spitz (copied to Whipple and Carmichael); Folder “IGY Office of Information, Volunteer Programs, Moonwatch,” Series 12.26, IGY/NAS. From p. 134 of Fred L. Whipple, “Recollections of Pre-Sputnik Days,” in Blueprint for Space: Science Fiction to Science Fact, ed. Frederick Ordway and Randy Lieberman (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institutions Press, 1992), 127–134. May 24, 1956, letter from Whipple to Odishaw; Folder “IGY Office of Information, Volunteer Programs, Moonwatch,” Series 12.26, IGY/NAS; also Whipple, “Recollections of Pre-Sputnik Days,” 134. Discussed in Ronald E. Doel, “Redefining a Mission: The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory on the Move,” Journal for the History of Astronomy 21, 1 (1990): 137–153. For example, November 19, 1956, notes by Whipple on meeting with “Keddy & Co.” and September 19, 1957, draft report by Whipple; both in Folder “SAO Administration, 1958–1988,” Box 1, FLW/SUPP/SI.

Notes to Chapter 5

53. 54.

55. 56. 57. 58. 59. 60. 61. 62. 63. 64. 65. 66. 67. 68. 69. 70. 71. 72. 73. 74. 75. 76.

March 3, 1958, letter from Whipple to Richard McCrosky; Folder “McCrosky, Richard,” Box 3, FLW/SI. Quotes from Whipple, “Recollections of Pre-Sputnik Days,” 134, and “Dr. Whipple’s Introductory Remarks to Moonwatch Conference,” June 18, 1960; Folder “STP-Moonwatch,” Box 117, SAO/SI. “October 22, 1957 Minutes of the 13th Meeting of the TPESP”; Folder “13th Meeting of TPESP,” Series 4.10, IGY/NAS. “Dr. Whipple’s Introductory Remarks to Moonwatch Conference.” “October 22, 1957, Minutes of the 13th Meeting of the TPESP.” Quotes from ibid. “Transcript of 13th Meeting of the TPESP, October 22, 1957”; Folder “13th Meeting of TPESP,” Series 4.10, IGY/NAS, 92. Ibid. From “November 6, 1957, Minutes of the 14th Meeting of the TPESP”; Folder “14th Meeting of TPESP,” Series 4.10, IGY/NAS. Ibid. May 22, 1957, memo from Campbell to Whipple; Folder “Smith, J. Hopkins,” Box 4, FLW/SI. “Transcript of 14th Meeting of the TPESP, November 6, 1957;”; Folder “14th Meeting of TPESP,” Series 4.10, IGY/NAS, 137–138. Cost estimates included in “November 6, 1957, Minutes of the 14th Meeting of the TPESP.” “Transcript of 14th Meeting of the TPESP, November 6, 1957,” 149–151. November 22, 1957, letter from Porter to Whipple; Folder “General Correspondence,” Box 16, OS/SI. “Transcript of 14th Meeting of the TPESP, November 6, 1957,” 154–155, 157. Noted in Green and Lomask, Vanguard: A History, 155. December 24, 1957, letter from W. L. Hole to Whipple and attached note; Folder “Budget Matters FY 1958 and Prior,” Box 34, SAO/SI. November 1, 1957, telegram to Walter Houston; copy in Box 11, AAVSO. Discussed in Divine, The Sputnik Challenge, 43–45. “Story of the Albuquerque High School Moonwatch Team,” August 1958; Folder “Team Histories A–F,” Box 43, MW/SI. “Barbarism with Sputniks,” New York Times, November 4, 1957: 28. From letter to Campbell and team history dated October 2, 1958; Folder “Team Histories, A–F,” Box 43, MW/SI. “New Object in Sky Reported by Tokyo,” New York Times, November 6, 1957: 12.

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Notes to Chapter 6

77. “The Object,” New Yorker, November 30, 1957: 44–45. 78. Quotes from “Satellite Rivals Sirius over City,” New York Times, November 8, 1957: 3. 79. Picture on p. 42 of the November 18, 1957, issue. 80. All from “The Object.” 81. From Whipple and Hynek’s “Observations of Satellite I.” Hynek, Campbell, and other SAO staff also prepared a number of other reports for distribution to the scientific community, such as Leon Campbell and J. Allen Hynek, “Visual Observations of Satellite 1957 Alpha 1 Made by Moonwatch Stations,” SAO Special Report no. 6 (Cambridge, MA: Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, 1957). Naval Research Laboratory staff published their results the following month: John T. Mengel and Paul Herget, “Tracking Satellites by Radio,” Scientific American, January 1958: 23–29. 82. Draft article (n.d., likely August 1957) not published; Folder “Whipple, Fred 1957,” Box 24, OS/SI.

Chapter 6. Amateurs Provide Strength on the Bench 1. Daniel Lang, “Moon in a Box,” New Yorker, December 28, 1957: 50–57. 2. “Give a Dime for a Satellite?” New York Times, November 8, 1957: 58. 3. Quotes from “5,100,00 Would-be Spacemen Volunteer for Satellite Trip,” Gallup Poll released December 19, 1957. 4. Bill Geerhart and Ken Sitz, Atomic Platters: Cold War Music from the Golden Age of Homeland Security (Hamburg, Germany: Bear Family, 2005), 110. 5. Ray Anderson and the Homefolks (1958). “Sputniks and Muttniks,” Nashville, Starday 342. 6. Joyce, Winn, and Prima, “Beep Beep (1957),” Capitol Records Single no. 3856. Prima’s novelty single hit the charts as the B-side to the far more popular “Buona Sera” and faded into relative obscurity. 7. Gordon Cotler, “Songwriters Blast Off,” New York Times, February 19, 1958: SM19. 8. Rita Reif, “Abundant Harvest of Christmas Toys Will Delight Children of All Ages,” New York Times, November 28, 1957: 54. 9. Ibid. The first transistor pocket radio debuted in 1954, and consumers were purchasing millions of them by 1958: see Michael Schiffer, The Portable Radio in American Life (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1991).

Notes to Chapter 6

10.

11.

12. 13.

14. 15. 16. 17.

18.

19.

20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25.

See, for example, chap. 4 of Joseph J. Corn and Brian Horrigan, Yesterday’s Tomorrows: Past Visions of the American Future (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1984). The phrase comes from a classic book by James Deetz: In Small Things Forgotten: The Archaeology of Early American Life (Garden City, NY: Anchor Press/Doubleday, 1977). Reported in “5,100,00 Would-be Spacemen.” Many of the former Moonwatchers I interviewed recalled their disappointment when Vanguard failed to launch as well as their desire at the time to see the United States succeed in orbiting a satellite. These feelings are also reflected in Moonwatchers’ correspondence from 1957 to 1958 as well as the histories prepared by several teams. April 29 and May 9, 1960, letters between Hefferan and Campbell; Folder “Albuquerque Team of Vioalle Hefferan,” Box 4, MW/SI. All quotes from Hallowell Bowser, “Strength on the Bench,” Saturday Review, September 25, 1961: 32. Quotes from Bush’s introduction to C. L. Strong, The Amateur Scientist (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1960). C. L. Strong, “Concerning Simple and Ingenious Devices to Record the Waves Made by Earthquakes,” Scientific American, July 1957: 152–162. The full run of “The Amateur Scientist” columns was made available on a CD-ROM issued in 2006 by Bright Science, ed. Shawn Carlson; other similar anthologies of these columns exist in printed form. C. L. Strong, “About Amateur Observations of the Aurora during the International Geophysical Year,” Scientific American, January 1957: 144–156. C. L. Strong, “How a Group of Amateurs Detected Flares on the Sun with Long-Wave Radio Receivers,” Scientific American, September 1960: 231–244. Donald G. Cooley, “Astronomical Number of Sky Watchers,” New York Times Magazine, January 26, 1958: 21. C. L. Strong, “Mostly about Ingenious Ways of Studying Artificial Satellites,” Scientific American, October 1958: 130–138. Cooley, “Astronomical Number of Sky Watchers.” Ibid. Hubert Luckett, “Suddenly Everybody Wants a Telescope,” Popular Science, May 1958: 95–97, 232. “Observing Satellites,” Consumer Bulletin, May 1958: 2, 30.

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26. “Moon-Tracking Station Readied at Canoga Park,” Los Angeles Times, November 25, 1957: B1. 27. “Army Aids Teen Rocket Clubs; Praises Ability in Mathematics,” New York Times, January 3, 1959: 4. 28. “The Young Rocketeers,” Time, January 1958: 50–52. 29. April 1959 edition of the Wakefield Rocket Society’s Research and Reference Bulletin; copy in Folder “Arlington, VA,” Box 4, MW/SI. 30. C. L. Strong, “About the Activities and the Trials of Amateur Rocket Experimenters,” Scientific American, June 1957: 174–186. 31. Martin Tolchin, “Teen-Age Rocket Groups Need a Parental Brake,” New York Times, December 12, 1957: 37. 32. “Rocket Studies Set,” New York Times, October 28, 1958: 16. 33. U.S. Army, A Guide to Amateur Rocketry (Fort Sill, OK: U.S. Army Field Artillery School, 1958), quote from the preface. 34. Thomas N. Bonner, “Sputniks and the Educational Crisis in America,” Journal of Higher Education 29, 4 (1958): 177–184, 232. 35. John A. Douglass, “A Certain Future: Sputnik, American Higher Education, and the Survival of a Nation,” in Reconsidering Sputnik: Forty Years since the Soviet Satellite, ed. Roger Launius, John Logsdon, and Robert W. Smith (New York: Routledge, 2000), 327–363; and John L. Rudolph, Scientists in the Classroom: The Cold War Reconstruction of American Science Education (New York: Palgrave, 2002). 36. Walter Sullivan, “Exploring Our World,” New York Times, 1957: BR24. 37. From p. 5-T of the October 25, 1957, issue of Senior Scholastic 71, no. 7. 38. My thanks to Connie Adams and Francisca Ordia at the Boy Scouts of America for assisting me with my requests for information about BSA activities concerning science and technology. 39. Chappell wrote a book about his experiences: Antarctic Scout (New York: Dodd, Mead, 1959). Also, “Polar Job Draws Scout to Science,” New York Times, December 26, 1957: 21. 40. Heinlein, best known for books like Starship Troopers, wrote a three-part story for Boy’s Life called “Tenderfoot in Space” which started in the June 1958 issue. Also, Steven C. Cross, “Voyage to the Stars,” Boy’s Life, May 1958: 64–66. 41. Raymond J. Schussler, “Memo on Moonwatch,” Boy’s Life, March 1958: 11, 70. 42. Reported in the May 14, 1958, issue of the Moonwatch Newsletter 1, 9: 3. The full run of newsletters is preserved at the Smithsonian Institution Archives (RU 255).

Notes to Chapter 6

43. “Engineers of Future Show the Way,” Los Angeles Times, December 22, 1957: A1. 44. “Science Center for Future Engineers Urged by Holt,” Los Angeles Times, January 5, 1958: SF2. 45. “Moonwatch Station Will Open Today,” Los Angeles Times, May 25, 1958: B13. 46. “Teen Science Center Opens in Van Nuys,” Los Angeles Times, August 31, 1958: SF1; “Special Science Series Set for Engineering Club,” Los Angeles Times, June 26, 1960: SF4; “Industry Pros Lend Hand to Tomorrow’s Scientists,” Los Angeles Times, January 21, 1962: G1. 47. “Teen Science Center Opens in Van Nuys,” Los Angeles Times, August 31, 1958: SF1 48. July 17, 1959, memo from Campbell to Whipple; Folder “Project Moonwatch,” Box 21, OS/SI. 49. April 1, 1958, memo from Campbell to Whipple; Folder “Moonwatch Program General,” Box 35, SAO/SI. 50. “Summary of Consultation with Arthur S. Leonard and Dr. Armand N. Spitz, January 19–21, 1959”; Folder “Moonwatch Correspondence 1959,” Box 125, SAO/SI. 51. “Tucson Amateur Astronomers Moonwatch Report,” undated (but likely sometime mid-1959) Folder “Team Histories, I-T,” Box 43, MW/SI. 52. June 9, 1958, letter from Phil Russell to Wichita team with attached note to Campbell; Folder “Wichita, Kansas,” Box 24, MW/SI. 53. Explorer 1 continued transmitting data until its batteries died on May 23, 1958. Nonetheless, Moonwatch teams could still try and spot it until its reentry in March 1970. 54. Vioalle Hefferan, “Youth in the Satellite Age,” Griffith Observer 26, 1 (1962): 2. 55. The actual message was relayed to recipients by Alan Waterman, the director of the National Science Foundation. Copy in Folder “Earth Satellite Program, 1958,” Box 14, OS/SI. 56. February 12, 1958, letter from Steinmetz to Campbell; Folder “Denver, CO,” Box 9, MW/SI. 57. “History of Moonwatch, Walnut Creek Station,” undated (but likely late 1957), by William Greenwood; Folder “Walnut Creek, 1957–59,” Box 23, MW/SI. 58. Harold M. Schmeck, “Army’s Satellite Is Hard to Sight,” New York Times, February 5, 1958: 12. 59. Moonwatch Newsletter, March 14, 1958, 1, 6: 1.

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Notes to Chapter 6

60. “U.S. Team Reports All 3 Satellites,” New York Times, March 21, 1958: 7. 61. From “Maverick Scientist and Instrument Builder James Westphal Dies,” September 14, 2004, press release from the California Institute of Technology; accessed April 12, 2006, at http://pr.caltech.edu/media/Press_ Releases/PR12581.html. 62. January 3, 1957, letter from Westphal to Spitz; Folder “Tulsa, OK,” Box 22, MW/SI. 63. December 2, 1957, ibid. 64. August 19, 1958, letter from Taylor to Campbell; Folder “Adelaide, Australia,” Box 25, MW/SI. 65. Quotes from “January 7, 1958, Minutes of the 15th Meeting of the TPESP”; Folder “15th Meeting of TPESP,” Series 4.10, IGY/NAS 66. December 9, 1957, letter from Spitz to Westphal; Folder “Tulsa, OK,” Box 22, MW/SI. 67. October 28, 1957, letter from Campbell to Walter Haas; Folder “Las Cruces, NM,” Box 12, MW/SI. 68. All quotes from Martin E. Williams, “What Have We Bought?” June 1958 newsletter of the Denver Astronomical Society, reprinted from the May 1958 issue of The Skywriter: Journal of the Colorado Springs Astronomical Society; Folder “Denver, CO, 1956–61,” Box 9, MW/SI. 69. August 7, 1957, letter from Emmons to Campbell; Folder “North Canton, OH,” Box 14, MW/SI. 70. August 19, 1958, letter from Taylor to Campbell; Folder “Adelaide, Australia,” Box 25, MW/SI. 71. September 10, 1958, letter from Thompson to Campbell; Folder “Denver, CO, 1956–61,” Box 9, MW/SI. 72. “Opinions on the Moonwatch Program,” Great Plains Observer 3, 4 (1959): 2. 73. Another couple spent their tenth wedding anniversary satellite spotting in Portland, Oregon; from April 18, 1958, and June 20, 1959, issues of the Moonwatch Newsletter. Similar stories appear in other issues. 74. From p. 46 of “February 12, 1958, Minutes of the 16th Meeting of the TPESP”; Folder “16th Meeting of TPESP,” Series 4.10, IGY/NAS 75. IGY Bulletin, no. 6, December 1957. The full run of this publication is in IGY/NAS records. 76. July 17, 1959, memo from Campbell to Whipple; Folder “Project Moonwatch,” Box 21, OS/SI. 77. Walter Sullivan, “Sputnik II’s Weight Put at 7,000 Pounds,” New York Times, April 13, 1958: 1.

Notes to Chapter 7

78.

79. 80. 81. 82. 83. 84.

85. 86.

87. 88. 89. 90.

April 1958 letter from J. Anthony Miller to Walter Munn; Folder “Millbrook, NY,” Box 12, MW/SI. Also, L. G. Jacchia, “The Descent of Satellite Beta One,” SAO Special Report No. 15 (1958). “Moonwatch Team History,” undated (sometime mid-1958) report by David W. Saltus; Folder “Team Histories, A–F,” Box 43, MW/SI. November 13, 1958, letter from Donald Charles to Campbell; Folder “Walnut Creek, CA, 1957–59,” Box 23, MW/SI. Arthur S. Leonard, “The Recovery of Satellite 1958 Beta One,” Amateur Scientist 1, 3 (1959): 15. “The Ballad of 1958 Epsilon,” written by Marion Frost; in Moonwatch Newsletter 4, 2 (July 31, 1959): 2 “Summary of Moonwatch Operations for 1960,” dated March 1, 1961; Folder “Moonwatch,” Box 33, SAO/SI. Fred L. Whipple, “The Optical Tracking of Artificial Earth Satellites,” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 102, 3 (1958): 215–220. The paper was reprinted with the same title in the July 18, 1958, issue of the journal Science. L. G. Jacchia, “Solar Effects on the Acceleration of Artificial Satellites,” SAO Special Report No. 29 (1959). Despite the press surrounding the news that the earth was “pear-shaped,” the overall early results of satellite geodesy were largely disappointing. It was only with the use of laser ranging and dedicated geodetic satellites in the mid-1960s that the results scientists hoped for materialized. See Deborah Jean Warner, “From Tallahassee to Timbuktu: Cold War Efforts to Measure Intercontinental Distance,” Historical Studies in the Physical Sciences 30, 2 (2000): 393–415. Robert K. Plumb, “Satellite Shows Earth Pear-Like,” New York Times, January 29, 1959: 17. Moonwatch Newsletter 2, 2 (July 25, 1958): 3. January 27, 1959, letter from Leonard to Campbell; Folder “Walnut Creek, CA, 1957–59,” Box 23, MW/SI. Quotes from September 26, 1958, edition of the Moonwatch Newsletter 2, 7: 2.

Chapter 7. Moonwatch Grows Up 1.

All quotes from June 26, 1962, letter from Vanderburgh to Addabbo; Folder “A,” Box 2, MW/SI.

281

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Notes to Chapter 7

2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8.

9.

10.

11.

12. 13. 14. 15. 16.

17.

Undated letter (but likely mid-1959) by Hynek quoted in E. Nelson Hayes, Trackers of the Skies, (Cambridge, MA: Howard A. Doyle, 1968), III. October 12, 1959, letter from Hynek to Whipple; Folder “SAO Administration, 1958–88,” Box 1, FLW/SUPP/SI. April 9, 1959, letter from Whipple to Leonard Carmichael; Folder “SAO Administration, 1958–88,” Box 1, FLW/SUPP/SI. December 14, 1959, letter from Hynek to Whipple; Folder “Hynek, J. Allen,” Box 2, FLW/SI. May 16, 1961, letter from Whipple to Shirley Thompson; Folder “T, Miscellaneous,” Box 5, FLW/SI. Sid Ross, “His World Is Outer,” Parade Magazine, June 22, 1959: 24. “On the Brink of Space,” commencement address delivered June 15, 1958, by Whipple at American International College; Folder “Whipple, Fred 1958,” Box 24, OS/SI. Fred L. Whipple, “A Communication Challenge for 1958,” Address given March 7, 1958, to Westinghouse Conference; Folder “Whipple, Fred 1958,” Box 24, OS/SI. David H. DeVorkin, “SAO during the Whipple Years: The Origins of Project Celescope,” in The New Astronomy: Opening the Electromagnetic Window and Expanding Our View of Planet Earth, ed. Wayne Orchiston (New York: Springer-Verlag, 2005), 1–20. March 29 and April 9, 1958, letters from Whipple to A. L. Loomis; Folder “L, General,” Box 3, FLW/SI. DeVorkin’s article “SAO during the Whipple Years” explicates the ways in which Whipple involved himself with the establishment of NASA. October 10, 1958, letter from Whipple to Bundy; Folder “SAO-CfA Historical,” Box 1, FLW/SUPP/SI. An interpretation, with which I agree, made by DeVorkin’s article, “SAO during the Whipple Years.” September 26, 1958, letter from Whipple to Leonard Carmichael; Folder “Carmichael,” Box 1, FLW/SI. Figures from Annual Report of the Smithsonian Institution. Reported on p. 94 of the Annual Report of the Smithsonian Institution for 1961. For staff, see November 24, 1959, letter from Kenneth Drummond to Leonard Cormier; Folder “SAO-CfA Historical,” Box 1, FLW/SUPP/SI. April 17, 1958, letter from Campbell to Richard Emmons; Folder “North Canton, OH,” Box 14. January 6, 1958, letter from Campbell to Thomas Petrie; Folder “Cleveland, OH,” Box 7. April 4, 1958, letter from Campbell to D M. May; Folder “Van Nuys, CA,” Box 22. All from MW/SI.

Notes to Chapter 7

18. 19. 20. 21.

22. 23.

24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29. 30. 31. 32. 33. 34. 35. 36. 37.

38.

June 9, 1958, letter from Phil Russell to Wichita team, with attached note to Campbell; Folder “Wichita, Kansas,” Box 24, MW/SI. Moonwatch Newsletter, 2, no. 10 (November 24, 1958): 2. Ibid., 1. “Moonwatch Capabilities,” September 30, 1960, report labeled “very rough draft” by Campbell; Folder “STP,” Box 4, FLW/SUPP/SI. Emphasis in original. Moonwatch Newsletter, October 28, 1958, 2, no. 9: 1–2. Emphasis in original. Quotes from “Summary of Consultation with Arthur S. Leonard and Dr. Armand N. Spitz, January 19–21, 1959” by Leon Campbell, dated January 23, 1959; Folder “Moonwatch Correspondence, 1959,” Box 125, SAO/SI. Ibid. Moonwatch Newsletter, May 5, 1959, 3, no. 8: 1. The other categories were Standard, Reserve, and Special. April 6 and 16, 1959, correspondence between Hefferan and Campbell; Folder “Albuquerque Team of Vioalle Hefferan,” Box 4, MW/SI. Moonwatch Newsletter, May 4, 1960, 5, no. 9: 4. Gustav A. Bakos, “A Comparative Study of Accuracy of Satellite Observations,” Bulletin for Visual Observers of Satellites, no. 12, June 1961: 1–5. Moonwatch Newsletter, July 19, 1960, 6, no. 2: 1. From Bakos, “A Comparative Study of Accuracy of Satellite Observations,” 5. “Smithsonian Conference of Team Leaders,” Bulletin for Visual Observers of Satellites, no. 11, August 1960: 1. Leon Campbell, “The Team Concept of Moonwatch,” Bulletin for Visual Observers of Satellites, no. 10, July 1960: 5–7. Ibid., 6. December 4, 28, and 31, 1959, correspondence between Campbell and Jack Borde; copies of letters courtesy of Jack Borde. September 11, 2004, personal communication between Russell Eberst and the author. Reported in the July 31, 1972, issue of the Moonwatch Newsletter. All quotes from October 31, 1960, memo from Gustav Bakos to Campbell; Folder “Moonwatch Program General,” Box 35, SAO/SI. Next to the television suggestion, Campbell simply wrote “No!” “Moonwatch Capabilities,” September 30, 1960, report labeled “very rough draft” by Campbell; Folder “STP,” Box 4, FLW/SUPP/SI. Emphasis in original.

283

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Notes to Chapter 7

39. 40. 41.

42. 43. 44.

45.

46.

47. 48.

49. 50. 51. 52.

October 31, 1960, memo from Gustav Bakos to Campbell; Folder “Moonwatch Program General,” Box 35, SAO/SI. February 7, 1962, letter from Vanderburgh to Robert Young; Folder “W–Y,” Box 3, MW/SI. April 12, 1962, May 16, 1962, and December 20, 1963, correspondences between Vanderburgh and M. Torao; Folder “Japan, Correspondence with the Coordinator, 1956–70,” Box 34, MW/SI. Moonwatch Newsletter, May 21, 1962, 9, no. 5: 1 Reported in July 1962 memo from Emmons to the SAO; RE/SIA. July 21, 1964, letter from Whipple to Emmons; RE/SIA. Walter Sullivan, “Analysis of Satellite Finds Slight Danger of Puncture from Meteorites,” New York Times, November 17, 1964: 16. Richard Emmons et al., “Photometric Observations of Artificial Satellites for Determining Optical and Physical Characteristics, I,” Astronomical Journal 72, 8 (1967): 939–944. See David N. Spires, Beyond Horizons: A Half Century of Air Force Space Leadership (Washington, DC: Air Force Space Command in association with Air University Press, 1998), 71–72, 161–162. See, for example, materials in Folders “NORAD, Ent AFB” and “NORAD, Misc.” in Box 42, MW/SI. Information on the WSRN appears in a number of places. Especially useful was a folder of material loaned to me by Jack Borde that included samples of WSRN conference proceedings and bulletins to members. See also G. A. McCue et al., “Western Satellite Research Network,” Sky & Telescope, August 1965: 88; and G. A. McCue et al., “Optical Characteristics of Artificial Satellites,” Planetary and Space Science 19, (1971): 851–867. Moonwatch Newsletter, July 23, 1962, 10, no. 1:1–2. From p.2 of Moonwatch Newsletter 10, 1 (July 23, 1962): 2; emphasis in original. Moonwatch Newsletter, May 21, 1962, 9, no. 5: 1. Highsmith’s account, as well as the observations he collected from over thirty other witnesses, appears in his May 5, 1963, report “Ball o’ Fire”; Folder 8, Box 49, MW/SI. Additional material is drawn from “Moonwatch and Sputnik 4,” Sky & Telescope, October 1962: 1, 203; and James C. Spry, “Death of Sputnik IV: Main Street, USA,” Civil Service Journal 3, 4: 6–10. My thanks to Dr. Charles Lundquist for providing me with a copy of the latter as well as other related materials.

Notes to Chapter 7

53.

54. 55.

56.

57. 58. 59. 60. 61. 62. 63. 64. 65. 66.

67.

Munn’s travails and additional information about Sputnik 4 appear in the September 1962 issue of the SAO News 2, no. 9. Copy in Folder 8, Box 49, MW/SI. “Sputnik Scrap Claimant Gets Court Airing,” January 7, 1963, issue of Milwaukee Sentinel. Copy in Folder 8, Box 49, MW/SI. J. Anthony Lukas, “U.N. Shown Fallen Piece of Sputnik,” New York Times, September 15, 1962: 1; “Piece of Sputnik Given to Moscow,” New York Times, May 12, 1963: 13. “Kennedy Honors Noted Astronomer,” New York Times, June 13, 1963: 21. Materials and announcements regarding Whipple’s award are in Folder “Whipple, Fred, 1959–64,” Box 24, OS/SI. February 28, 1964, memo from Vanderburgh to Jan Wolff; Folder “Grants,” Box 40, MW/SI. From July 1963 draft of “Moonwatch Manual,” Box 40, MW/SI. February 28, 1964, memo from Vanderburgh to Jan Wolff; Folder “Grants,” Box 40, MW/SI. April 17, 1964, ibid. October 31, 1962, letter from Vanderburgh to Phillip Russell; Folder “Wichita, 1961–65,” Box 24, MW/SI. July 30, 1963, memo from Vanderburgh to Leo Abernathy; Folder “Grants,” Box 40, MW/SI. R. C. Vanderburgh, “On the Visual Tracking of Two Bright Satellites from C-130-TYPE Aircraft,” SAO Special Report No. 146 (1964). Quotes from June 4, 1964, letter from Vanderburgh to Whipple; Folder “Organization Moonwatch, 1963–64,” Box 57, STP/SI. Moonwatch Newsletter 13, 6 (August 28, 1964): 2. Allan A. Needell, “Preparing for the Space Age: University-based Research, 1946–1957,” Historical Studies in the Physical Sciences 18, 1 (1987): 89–109. The phrases “scientific Siberia” and “AstroBoulder” come from Carol Knight, “Ike Liked the Labs: How a Scientific Siberia Became the Hub of U.S. Atmospheric Research” (http://www.research.noaa.gov/spotlite/ archive/spot_ike.html; accessed June 2005), and Remembering Walt Roberts (Boulder: UCAR, 1990), respectively. My thanks to Joseph P. Bassi, who is writing a dissertation at the University of California, Santa Barbara, on the history of space sciences, for noting this. Thomas R. Williams graciously provided background information on Engle. The activities of Engle and the Edinburg team are detailed in several folders in Box 9, MW/SI.

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68. “The Pan American College Observatory and Astro-Science Center and Its Programs,” March 1962 brochure put out by Pan American College; Folder “Edinburg, TX, 1962–65,” Box 9, MW/SI. 69. Progress on the project slowed, however, and even though the optics were polished, the actual telescope was not completed until 1984. It was ultimately located at Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches, Texas, and is still in operation. Information on the fourty-one-inch telescope was taken from: http://www.physics.sfasu.edu/observatory/ 41-inch/41hist.html (accessed June 2006). 70. All quotes from Paul R. Engle, “Moonwatch and Astronomical Education,” Moonwatch Newsletter, May 21, 1962, 9, no. 5: 5–8. 71. “Teener Likes Being in U.S. Moonwatch Program,” Terre Haute Sunday Tribune-Star, April 5, 1959. 72. “Proposed Optical Tracking and Scientific Analysis Program for the Artificial Earth Satellites,” undated report (likely late 1955 or early 1956); Folder “Project 30.3 Initial Development of Optical Tracking,” Series 6.1, IGY/NAS. 73. The quote comes from an undated news clipping in the “Arlington, VA” folder, Box 4, MW/SI; this file also contains the student’s essay about his project as well as a July 14, 1958, letter from Leon Campbell to Muradugh offering constructive criticism on the device. 74. C. L. Strong, “Mostly about Ingenious Ways of Studying Artificial Satellites,” Scientific American, October 1958: 130–138. 75. June 8, 2006, personal communication between Jane Shelby Richardson and the author. 76. Information on Hefferan’s activities is drawn from her personal scrapbooks, graciously loaned by her former colleague John “Jack” Bartholdi as well as my personal communications with Bartholdi and Joel Weisberg. 77. June 21, 1959, note from Hefferan to Campbell; Folder “Albuquerque Team of Vioalle Hefferan,” Box 4, MW/SI. 78. November 3, 2005, interview with Weisberg; conducted by the author in Northfield, MN. 79. February 29, March 11, and March 22, 1968, letters between William Hirst to John Bartholdi; Folder “Albuquerque Team of Vioalle Hefferan,” Box 4, MW/SI. 80. From Weisberg’s 1968 report, a copy of which he generously provided. 81. September 4, 1968, letter from Weisberg to Al Werner; Folder “Albuquerque Team of Vioalle Hefferan,” Box 4, MW/SI. 82. November 3, 2005, interview with Weisberg.

Notes to Chapter 8

83. 84. 85.

Dorothy Nelkin, The University and Military Research: Moral Politics at MIT (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1972). September 4, 1968, letter from Weisberg to Al Werner; Folder “Albuquerque Team of Vioalle Hefferan,” Box 4, MW/SI. September 15, 2004, personal communication between Weisberg and the author.

Chapter 8. The Legacy of Moonwatch 1. 2.

3.

4. 5. 6. 7. 8.

9. 10. 11. 12.

13.

Information on Hefferan’s retirement comes from several letters found in her personal scrapbook. The literature on the public’s response to and perception of science and technology in this era is too rich to be detailed here. One useful consideration is chapter 9 of Thomas Hughes, American Genesis: A Century of Invention and Technological Enthusiasm (New York: Penguin Books, 1989). W. P. Hirst, “The Useful Activities of Amateur Astronomers,” Monthly Notes of the Astronomical Society of South Africa 1, December (1941): 102–105. Ibid. December 2, 1962, letter from Hirst to Richard Vanderburgh; Folder “Capetown,” Box 37, MW/SI. Moonwatch Newsletter 13, no. 1 (November 30, 1964): 1. August 17, 1966, letter from Werner to Timothy Abel; Folder “A,” Box 2, MW/SI. Reported on p. 2 of Moonwatch Newsletter 16, 1 (January 30, 1967): 2; also, “Semi-Annual Progress Report—Moonwatch” for January 1, 1968, to June 30, 1968; Folder “Grants,” Box 40, MW/SI. “Apollo 8 Mission Completed,” Moonwatch Newsletter, January 31, 1969, 18, no. 1: 1–2. June 7, 1965, letter from Hirst to James Poling; Folder “O–Q,” Box 3, MW/SI. November 7, 1968, letter from Werner to Robert Adams; Folder “A,” Box 2, MW/SI. See, for instance, Zuoyue Wang, “Responding to Silent Spring: Scientists, Popular Science Communication, and Environmental Policy in the Kennedy Years,” Science Communication 19, 2 (1997): 141–163. The phrase comes from the title of reports issued by the Center in the 1970s. It was later adopted for a popular radio show that broadcasted stories about nature, culture, and science. Reports are in Box 6, CLSP/SI.

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14. “Smithsonian Establishes a ’Scientific DEW Line,” March 12, 1969, press release; Folder “Center for Short-Lived Phenomenon,” Box 39, MW/SI. 15. April 14, 1969, “Dear Colleague” letter in ibid. 16. Reported in Moonwatch Newsletter, March 31, 1975, 23, 2:1. 17. September 16, 1969, letter from Samuel Tishler to Donald Bowie; Folder “Internal Memorandum,” Box 41, MW/SI. 18. May 22, 1975, letter from Werner to Moonwatch; Folder “Test Alert #1,” Box 45, MW/SI and Moonwatch Newsletter 23, nos. 5, 6 (June 15, 1975). 19. June 15, 1975, letter from Whipple to Moonwatchers; Box 45, MW/SI. 20. September 24, 1974, letter and list from Hefferan to Albert Werner; VH. 21. June 15, 1975, letter from Griffin to Werner; Folder “G,” Box 2, MW/SI. 22. From November 3, 2005, interview with Weisberg; conducted by the author in Northfield, MN. A similar telescope is described in the June 1963 issue of Sky & Telescope. 23. Graham Collins, “Making Stars to See Stars: DOD Adaptive Optics Work Is Declassified,” Physics Today 46, 2 (1992): 17–21, as well as sections in chaps. 5 and 6 in W. Patrick McCray, Giant Telescopes: Astronomical Ambition and the Promise of Technology (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2004). 24. January 26, 2006, personal communication between Molczan and the author. 25. See, for example, Everett Mendelsohn, “The Politics of Pessimism: Science and Technology circa 1968,” in Technology, Pessimism, and Postmodernism, ed. Yaron Ezrahi, Everett Mendelsohn, and Howard Segal (Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic, 1994), 151–174. 26. From Ellul’s essay, “The Technological Order,” in The Technological Order, ed. Carl F. Stover (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1963), 96. 27. From the September 1969 issue of Ebony, 58. Also, chap. 9 of David E. Nye, Narratives and Space: Technology and the Construction of American Culture (New York: Columbia University Press, 1997) describes public views toward the Apollo program, while the epilogue of Joseph J. Corn’s The Winged Gospel: America’s Romance with Aviation (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2001) discusses the “space gospel.” 28. Carroll Pursell, “The Rise and Fall of the Appropriate Technology Movement in the United States, 1965–1985,” Technology and Culture 34, 3 (1993): 629–627. 29. Developments noted by Chuck Allen, president of the Astronomical League from 1998 to 2002, in “Important Moments in League History,” Reflector 49, 3 (1997): 4–5. See also chap. 12 in Thomas R. Williams, “Getting Or-

Notes to Chapter 8

30. 31. 32.

33.

34.

35.

36. 37. 38. 39. 40.

41. 42. 43. 44.

ganized: A History of Amateur Astronomy in the United States,” Ph.D. diss., Rice University, 2000. March 22, 1968, letter from Hirst to Hefferan; Folder “Albuquerque Team of Vioalle Hefferan,” Box 4, MW/SI. September 11, 2005, communication between Eberst and author. Quotes and information about Molczan from Patrick Radden Keefe, “I Spy,” Wired, February 2006: 129–133, and personal communications between Molczan and the author. June 24, 2006, personal communication between Molczan and the author. Also posted on electronic bulletin board (accessed July 24, 2006) at http:// groups.google.com/group/sci.astro.satellites.visual-observe/browse_ thread/thread/8bc373f2e19f2ad/ea33b6296a9f9e74?lnk=st&q=molczan +Echo&rnum=1&hl=en#ea33. Jeffrey T. Richelson has written a number of books detailing U.S. spy satellite programs; especially useful for the discussion here are America’s Secret Eyes in Space: The U.S. Keyhole Satellite Program (New York: HarperCollins, 1990), and The Wizards of Langley: Inside the CIA’s Directorate of Science and Technology (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2002). Walter Nissen and Bart De Pontieu first established SeeSat-L in December 1994. As of 2006, it could be accessed at http://www.satobs.org/seesat/ seesatindex.html. Keefe, “I Spy,” 131; January 26, 2006, personal communication between Molczan and the author. January 26, 2006, personal communication between Molczan and the author. See, for example, Warren Leary, “After Delays, Shuttle Launched on Secret Mission,” New York Times, March 1, 1990: B8. The events described here are drawn from Jeffrey T. Richelson, “Satellite in the Shadows,” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, May/June 2005: 26–33. I am grateful to Ted Molczan for his detailed recounting of the events surrounding the MISTY identification; August 31, 2006, personal communication with the author. According to contributors to the SeeSat-L, at least three other U.S. satellites have done similar disappearing acts. A theory presented in Keefe, “I Spy.” August 31, 2006, personal communication between Molczan and the author. Vernon Loeb, “Panel Report Reveals Satellite Details,” Washington Post, November 24, 2000: A41.

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45. 46. 47.

48. 49. 50.

51. 52. 53. 54. 55. 56.

57.

58. 59. 60.

Keefe, “I Spy,” 133. Martin Kettle, “U.S. Tested and Found Wanting,” Manchester Guardian, June 7, 1998: 6. The source was Allen Thompson, who in 1995 published a paper pointing out the vulnerability of satellites to observation. See Allen Thomson, “Satellite Vulnerability: A Post–Cold War Issue,” Space Policy 11, 1 (1995): 19–30. From http://www.space-rockets.com/aircraft.html (accessed July 28, 2006). From http://www.nar.org/NARfrompres030729.html on the Web site of the National Association of Rocketry (accessed July 28, 2006). From March 27, 2003, speech by Sen. Mark Enzi (R-WY); available at http://www.space-rockets.com/enzispeech.html (accessed August 8, 2006). At the present time, final legislation is delayed pending the outcome of several lawsuits; see Patricia Leigh Brown, “A Cult of Backyard Rocketeers Keeps the Solid Fuel Burning,” New York Times, October 14, 2006: A1, A9. Steve Silberman, “Don’t Try This at Home,” Wired, June 2006; available at http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.06/ (accessed July 30, 2006). Ibid. Lawrence Fisher, “Plug Is Pulled on Heathkits, Ending a Do-It-Yourself Era,” New York Times, March 30, 1992: A1. Miguel Helft, “A Fading Signal,” New York Times, December 27, 2006: C1. Jay Pasachoff, “Midtown Stargazer: A Boy and the Cosmos,” New York Times, March 17, 2005: A30. Audrey T. Leath, “America’s Science and Technology Leadership at Risk, Group Warns,” FYI: The AIP Bulletin of Science Policy News, no. 32 (March 17, 2005); accessed September 29, 2005, at http://www.aip.org/ fyi/2005/032.html. Audrey T. Leath, “Top Science and Math Teachers Testify before Science Committee,” FYI: The AIP Bulletin of Science Policy News, no. 59 (April 22, 2005); accessed September 29, 2005, at http://www.aip.org/ fyi/2005/059.html. From Nye’s Web site, http://www.nyelabs.com/ (accessed July 21, 2006), which also provides scores of home experiments for children. Silberman, “Don’t Try This at Home.” Jon Carroll, “Daily Datebook,” San Francisco Chronicle, June 2, 2006: E16. See also Chris Mooney, The Republican War on Science (New York: Basic Books, 2005).

Notes to Chapter 8

61.

62.

63. 64.

65.

66.

67. 68. 69. 70. 71.

72.

Kate Murphy, “The Stars Look Down and More of Us Look Back,” New York Times, February 26, 2006: B6. Also, Chuck Allen, in “Important Moments in League History,” notes that, after years of stagnation, membership in the Astronomical League had climbed to 13,500 people and over two-hundred clubs. Timothy Ferris, “Seeing in the Dark,” New Yorker, August, 1998: 55–61. Also, Timothy Ferris, Seeing in the Dark: How Backyard Stargazers Are Probing Deep Space and Guarding Earth from Interplanetary Peril (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2002). Jeffrey Kluger and David Bjerklie, “Calling All Amateurs,” Time, August 11, 1997: 68. For example, the papers in John R. Percy and Joseph B Wilson, eds., Amateur-Professional Partnerships in Astronomy (San Francisco: Astronomical Society of the Pacific, 2000). James Cornell, “The Moonwatch Program: A Model for Amateur Contributions to the ISY,” in Stargazers: The Contributions of Amateurs to Astronomy, ed. S. Dunlop and M. Gerbaldi (Berlin: Springer-Verlag, 1987), 181–182. From p. 9 of Charles Leadbeater and Paul Miller, “The Pro-Am Revolution: How Enthusiasts Are Changing Our Economy and Society” (London: Demos, May 2004). Accessible (July 2006) at: http://www.demos.co.uk/ files/proamrevolutionfinal.pdf. Ibid., 12. Ibid., 13–16. Ibid., 49. Quote from the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology’s Web site at http:// www.birds.cornell.edu/LabPrograms/CitSci/ (accessed July 31, 2006). See, for instance, Spencer R. Weart, The Discovery of Global Warming (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003); and Gale E. Christianson, Greenhouse: The 200-Year Story of Global Warming (New York: Penguin Books, 1999). The 2006 release of the documentary film An Inconvenient Truth presented attempts of former vice-president and future Nobelist Al Gore to educate the public about the dangers of global warming. See, for example, comments made April 20, 2006, by John Marburger, President George W. Bush’s science adviser, to the American Association for the Advancement of Science. As of August 3, 2006, his comments were at http://www.aip.org/fyi/2006/054.html. See, also, the recent controversial report Rising above the Gathering Storm: Energizing and Employing America for a Brighter Economic Future Washington, DC: National Acad-

291

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73.

74.

75. 76.

emies Press, 2006), as well as President George W. Bush’s 2006 State of the Union Address about the American Competitiveness Initiative. From May 3, 2005, letter from Rep. Frank Wolf (R-VA) to President George W. Bush; available at http://www.aip.org/fyi/2005/064.html (accessed August 7, 2006). For instance, comments made by Secretary of Energy Samuel Bodman at a 2006 AAAS Forum on Science and Technology Policy; available at http://www.aip.org/fyi/2006/053.html (accessed August 7, 2006). Also, Thomas L. Friedman, “A Million Manhattan Projects,” New York Times, May 24, 2006: A27. United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs, “Putting the ‘I’ in the ‘IHY’ ” (Vienna: United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs, 2006), 13. November 13, 2005, communication between Jeanne Emmons Bishop and the author. The Astronomical Society of the Pacific also has an annual prize named in Emmons’s honor.

Index

Note: Page numbers in bold indicate illustrations. AAVSO (American Association of Variable Star Observers). See American Association of Variable Star Observers (AAVSO) accuracy: of amateur scientists, 219–20, 233–34, 243, 248; data cooking and, 227; emphasis on, 197, 226, 238; of orbital predictions, 128, 185; residuals as measure of, 197, 219–20; telescope quality linked to, 198; of timing methods and techniques, 197 Adam, Wendell, 119–20 “adaptive optics,” 233–34 Addabbo, Nunz, 98–105, 100, 146, 183 advertising, 29, 107, 167, 174 Africa, Moonwatch in, 131–32, 188–89, 226 African Americans, 96–98, 234 The Aircraft Flash (magazine), 29–31, 32 air force: as funding source for Whipple ’s Super-Schmidt camera project, 56; Moonwatch and, 108, 125, 136, 178, 230; as parent organization for GOC, 27, 29–30, 108; satellite research linked to the, 7; Space Detection and Tracking System of the, 206; UFO research and the, 78–79; visual observation from aircraft, 211, 228; Western Satellite Research Network and the, 206 Akron-Canton Satellite Tracking Group, 73 Alamogordo, 176–77; Moonwatch team at Holloman Air Force Base, 108–9; White Sands Proving Ground, 56, 79, 109, 115 Alaska, 145 Albuquerque: Kirtland Airforce Base Moonwatch team, 178; Moonwatch in,

98, 113–15, 116, 118, 137, 151, 167, 176, 197, 218, 223–24, 231; “Sputnik night” mobilization and, 1–3, 144; team patch, 218 Aldrin, Edwin “Buzz,” 216 Allegheny Observatory, Pittsburgh, 39, 144 amateur scientists, 11–13, 34, 204–5; Campbell as proponent of, 93–94; children as, 41–43, 241–42, 247; classified information and, 196; contributions of, 6, 41, 83, 86, 125, 142, 153, 169, 187–88, 226; current activity among, 11, 245, 247–48; demographics of American, 34–35, 83, 96–98, 111; fields pursued by, 86, 123, 168–69, 229, 244; as IGY participants, 34, 88, 89, 123, 153, 157, 167–68, 169, 182; limitations of, 82–83; motives of (See motivation); NASA and cooperation of, 11; NAS attitude toward, 34; “Pro-Ams” as, 244; “Project Moonbeam” and ham radio operators, 80; as quasi-professionals, 197–98, 202, 211, 227, 235, 243–44; regulations and restrictions on, 141–42; Smithsonian and encouragement of, 69; social environment for, 34–35, 105–6, 241–43, 244, 247–48; in Soviet Union, 135–36; as talent pool, 21, 68, 123–24, 168, 232; Tocqueville on, 96; Whipple’s confidence in, 9–10, 68–71, 81–83, 88, 163–64, 212. See also Moonwatch, as amateur science “The Amateur Scientist” (Scientific American column), 38, 123, 168, 216 Amateur Weathermen of America, 86

294

Index American Association of Variable Star Observers (AAVSO), 69, 83, 93, 125–26 American Philosophical Society, 187 American Radio Relay League, 144 American Rocket Society, 171 Anderson, Ray, 166 Antarctica, 4, 59, 172 apogee telescopes, 108–9, 109, 178, 190 Apollo 13 (film), 13 Apollo program, 211, 216, 225, 227–28, 234, 237 Arecibo radio telescope, 221 Argentina, 79, 131–32, 154 Arlington, Moonwatch in, 171, 184 Armstrong, Neil, 216 army: satellite programs of the, 64, 167 Astounding Stories (magazine), 48 Astronomical League, 69, 118, 124–25, 243 Astronomical Society of Japan, 133 Astronomical Society of South Africa, 132 Atlantis (space shuttle), 239 atmospheric studies, 148, 163, 184, 187–88; meteors and, 51, 52; radio propagation and, 59, 163; rocketry and, 54–55 atom bombs. See nuclear weapons “Atomic Power” (song), 21 auroras, 59, 62, 87, 123, 149, 169, 172 Australia, 8–9, 75, 79, 131, 148, 149, 151, 177, 179, 186–87 Baikonur Cosmodrome (Sputnik launch site), 139–40 Baker, James G., 55, 66, 76 Baker-Nunn cameras, 77; administration of program, 155; cost of system, 78, 194; delays in implementation of, 79, 141, 142–43, 153, 155, 156, 157, 159; design of, 76–78; location of stations, 8–9, 79, 131–32; Moonwatch’s role vis à vis, 89, 91–92, 131–32, 159, 163, 186, 187, 195, 227; Soviet system similar to, 135; Spacetrack and, 206; successful use of, 153, 182, 186, 195 Baltimore, Moonwatch, 110, 150, 180 Bardin, Ivan Pavlovich, 91 Bartholdi, John “Jack,” 217, 220, 221, 224

batteries for satellite radio transmissions, 140, 146–47, 152, 163 “Beep Beep” (song), 166 Berkner, Lloyd V., 59–60, 63, 91, 141 “Big Bertha,” 202, 203 Big Science, 5, 51–52, 53, 58, 187, 234, 247 Boller and Chivens, 78, 153 Bondy, Harry, 162 Bonestell, Chesley, 24 Borde, Jack A., 127–28, 185, 199, 202 Boulder, scientific community in, 212 Boy Scouts, 30, 109, 172–73 Boy’s Life (magazine), 172–74, 174 Bradbury, Ray, 22–23 The Buchanan Brothers (musical group), 21 Buhl Planetarium, Pittsburgh, 39 Bulletin for Visual Observers of Satellites, 89–90, 102, 132 Bundy, McGeorge, 193 Burbidge, Margaret, 215–16 Bush, Vannevar, 168 Caldwell, Millard, 26–27 Cambridge: direct observation in, 50, 51, 56; as SAO headquarters, 1, 8–9, 65, 83–84, 137, 177, 178, 185, 188, 193, 207; science community in, 65, 83–84, 180; “Sputnik night” at, 143–45, 147 cameras. See Baker-Nunn cameras; Super-Schmidt cameras Campbell, Leon, Jr., 175; AAVSO and, 83; declining size Moonwatch of teams and, 199–200; on Moonwatch as success, 187; role at Moonwatch, 9, 93–95, 99, 131, 161, 179, 194; teen participation encouraged by, 111, 121–22; on Zahner, 127 Cape Canaveral, 133, 165, 176 Captain Video and His Video Rangers (television show), 23 Carlson, Shawn, 244 Carmichael, Leonard, 65, 149, 154–55 Carson, Rachel, 229 cartography, 6–7 Casey, William, 238 Center for Short-Lived Phenomena, 229, 232–33

Index certificates of recognition, 181–82, 183 Chabot, Anthony, 72 Chabot Observatory, 72, 128 “chaff,” 52–53 Chapman, Sydney, 59 Charles, Donald F., 127–28, 151, 185, 188, 199, 202 Charlie Noble Planetarium, Fort Worth, 189, 217 charm bracelet given Hefferan by her students, 224, 224–25 Chicago, Moonwatch in, 31, 107, 149 children: as amateur scientists, 41–43, 241–42, 247–48; astronomy and science education for, 9, 42, 85; as audience for popular culture, 27, 43; as Moonwatch members, 109, 111–13, 122, 163, 189, 199, 216; as “space minded,” 20, 162; toys with science or space themes for, 23, 33, 41, 166–67. See also teens China, 135, 246 Churns, Mary, 162, 163 citizen scientists, 13, 244–45. See also amateur scientists civic duty: amateur science and, 96; civil defense as community effort, 26–31; as motive for participation, 16–17, 121–23, 180, 189, 226, 231–32; science as patriotic fulfillment of, 43, 107–8; teens and, 111, 121 Civil Air Patrol, 136–37, 143 civil defense, 20, 26–31, 99, 107–8, 121 civil rights movement, 96–97 Clarke, Arthur C., 54, 192 Clarke, Owen F., 108, 125 Cleveland, Moonwatch in, 123–24 climate change, 246–47 A Clockwork Orange (film), 234 clubs: American proclivity for, 95–96; astronomy and science, 1, 34, 43, 112, 113, 170–71, 235; civic responsibility and membership in, 99; local amateur astronomy organizations, 14, 36, 41, 124, 170; as pool of amateur scientists, 68, 123–24; regional organizations of, 36; rocketry, 170–71; science club

membership, 168, 170. See also specific organizations Cold War, as context: for amateur science, 236, 238–39; for civic duty, 30; for civil defense, 20, 26–31; for IGY, 15, 17, 61, 129–30; for Moonwatch, 98, 107, 129–30, 155–56, 189, 232; for perception of Soviets, 27–31; for popular culture, 19–20, 27, 44; for satellite development, 15–16, 27, 233–34; for science education, 171–72; science fiction and anxieties of, 44; for scientific research, 66, 74; for UFO sightings, 15. See also space race Collier’s (magazine), 5; series on space exploration in, 24–25, 26, 192 Columbus, Moonwatch in, 147 comets, 36, 243; Whipple as expert on, 8, 24, 49, 50, 53, 56–57, 64 comics, 22–23 Comité de l’Année Géophysique Internationale, 61, 88, 91 Commoner, Barry, 229 communication: Internet or World Wide Web as tool for, 11, 67, 238, 240, 243–344; within Moonwatch network, 3, 132, 158, 178–79, 180, 229; Morse code and ham radio, 242. See also media Conant, James B., 52 Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology, 244 Corning Glass, 214 Cruikshank, Dale P., 122 Cuban Missile Crisis, 139 data: accuracy of, 197–98, 219–20, 243, 248; “cooking,” 227; Moonwatch and collection of, 7, 88, 152, 157, 184, 195, 198, 220, 227, 232; recording methods, 117, 199; reporting systems, 117, 137; semi-skilled workers and collection of, 50, 68; sharing among amateur scientists, 238–39, 240 The Day the Earth Stood Still (film), 19–20 deathwatches, 9, 11, 90, 105, 159, 182–83 deep-sky astronomy, 115, 122, 125, 217 Dellar, Robert, 143–44 Del Vecchio, Philip J., 73

295

296

Index Del Vecchio, Robert, 73 Deming, Drake, 183 Deming, Leo, 100 Denver, Moonwatch in, 149 Department of Defense: amateur rocketry and, 171; as funding source, 55–58, 81, 206; interest in scientific research, 55; military participation on Moonwatch teams, 108–9, 133; navigation and astronomy training in, 86; as research organization, 52, 220–21; satellite projects of, 64–65, 74, 165–66, 167, 176, 206; surplus equipment of, 5, 200, 213. See also specific branches of Des Moines, Iowa, 122 Dieke, Gerhard, 110 Dieke, Sally H., 110, 150 Disney, Walt, 25 Disney company, 25–26, 87, 189 dogs, 30, 161–62, 182 East Bay Astronomical Association, 72 Eberst, Russell, 199–200, 236–39 Ebony (magazine), 97, 234 Echo satellites, 196, 203–4, 227, 237 ecology, 229 Edinburg, TX: astronomy in, 212–14 Edmund Scientific Corporation, 100–102 education: amateur science as opportunity for, 34, 121, 123, 169, 231, 247–48; astronomy in science curriculums, 113; Astro-Science degree programs, 213; children and science, 85, 111–12; Cold War and emphasis on science, 171–72; decline in scientific literacy in U.S., 242–43; hands-on science, 18, 172, 241, 243, 247–48; Moonwatch and interest in science, 92, 111; National Defense Education Act (1958), 172; planetaria and, 24, 31, 39, 85; postwar emphasis on science, 11, 17–18; press briefings as, 148; science centers and, 175; Smithsonian institutions and, 69; training for Moonwatch teams, 82, 108, 115–18, 126, 136–38, 143, 151, 210 Einstein, Albert, 35, 85

Eisenhower, Dwight D., and administration of, 8, 26, 158; Moonwatch recognized by, 177; NASA created by, 192–93; national politics and the space race, 141; satellite launch projects and, 63–65; science education supported by, 172; space exploration as political issue and, 149 Electronic Geophysical Year (eGY), 246–47 Ellul, Jacque, 234 Emmons, Phyllis, 38, 39 Emmons, Richard H., 10, 35–36, 38–41, 73, 117–18, 152, 177, 180, 202, 231, 248; pictured, 37, 39, 119, 205 Engle, Paul R., 213–14 Entertainment Comics (EC), 22 environmental issues, 229, 246–47 equipment: access to, 12, 33, 131–32, 241; amateurs and interest in, 112; binoculars, 200; ham radio gear, 2, 115, 146–47; homebuilt, 5, 41, 115, 247; military surplus, 5, 60; for Moonwatch, 102, 115, 119, 196, 200, 211, 213; for planetaria, 40–41, 85–86; provided by SAO, 196–97; “satellarium,” 128–29, 130; satellite simulators for training, 118, 202; “satellite tracers,” 215. See also Baker-Nunn cameras; instruments; kits for “do-it-yourself ” science Explorer satellites, 176–77, 186 fashion, 166, 191–92 Faxon, Rodney J., 31, 107, 149, 162 Federer, Charles, 86 films, 13–14, 19–20, 27, 44, 234 Florida: Baker-Nunn camera station in, 79, 227; Cape Canaveral in, 133, 165, 176; Moonwatch in, 226–27 flying saucers. See UFOs Fort Worth, Moonwatch in, 111–12, 163, 181, 189 Fort Worth Children’s Museum, 112 Franklin Institute, Philadelphia, 85 Frisch, Margaret A., 202 Fuchs, Klaus, 33

Index funding: for “Big Science,” 53; business sponsorships, 99, 106, 115, 126, 181, 206, 214, 216–17, 232; community support of local Moonwatch teams, 99, 102–3, 119, 126, 153, 216–17; conflicts within scientific community over, 57–58, 80, 157; cost of equipping a Moonwatch team, 99; decline in, 232; Department of Defense as source of, 55–58, 75, 81, 206; dues, 102, 115; of IGY in US, 62; NASA as source of, 191, 194, 232; for SAO, 17, 157–58, 159; for space exploration, 216; for tracking systems, 68, 157–58; Whipple’s expertise in, 66, 155, 193 Future Engineers of America, 175 Gagarin, Yuri, 203 gender: discrimination in science, 215–16; Moonwatch membership and, 96, 110, 111, 121; technology and appeal to young men and boys, 30. See also women and girls General Dynamics, 181 geodesy, 6–7, 60–61, 163, 187–88, 237 geophysics, 59 Gernsback, Hugo, 48 Gilbert, Alfred C., 41–42 Girls Auxiliary Moonwatch Society (GAMS), 121 Girl Scouts, 30, 109, 111, 214 Glenn, John, 229 global warming, 246–47 Great Depression, as context, 49 The Great Plains Observer (newsletter), 125–26 Greenwood, William, 72–73 Griffin, William J., 231 Ground Observer Corps (GOC), 15–16, 27–31; membership in, 111; members recruited to Moonwatch, 69, 99, 107; as model for Moonwatch, 27–28, 30, 69; Moonwatch assisted by, 108 A Guide to Amateur Rocketry (U.S. Army), 171 Gulf War, 240

Hagen, John P., 80, 121 Hagen, Peter, 121 Hagerty, James C., 63 Halbach, Edward A., 86–87, 99, 208–9 Hapeville, Georgia, 94 Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, 16 Harrington, Eldred “Doc,” 43 Harvard College Observatory, 50, 57–58, 232; AAVSO and, 83 Harvard Meteor Project, 55–56 Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, 232 Harvard University, Cambridge (Mass.): astronomy department of, 49–50, 202; funding research and, 57–58; Harvard College Observatory, 50, 57–58, 232; as home of SAO, 193; Meteor Project, 55–56; Radio Research Laboratory, 52–53; as Smithsonian affiliate, 65 Hawaii: Baker-Nunn cameras in, 8, 77, 79 Hayden Planetarium (New York), 24 Heath Company and Heathkits, 242 Hefferan, Vioalle: as Moonwatch leader, 2, 10, 113, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118, 137, 167, 176, 202, 216–17, 231, 235, 248; retirement of, 223–24; “Sputnik night” mobilization and, 1–3, 144; on Sputnik, 151, 161 Heinlein, Robert A., 43, 172 heliosphere, 245–46 Henry, Joseph, 229 Herbert, Don, 43 Hickam, Homer, 27, 170 Highsmith, Gale V., 208–9 Hiroshima, as context, 21, 38 Hirst, William P., 226–30, 233, 235 Holloman Air Force Base Moonwatch team, 109 Holy Cross High School, New Orleans, 119–20 Homeland Security Act, 241 Houston, Walter Scott, 82, 125–27, 146, 177, 180, 232 Howard, Neale E., 118–19 Howe, Lenelle, 214

297

298

Index Hynek, J. Allen, 107–8, 157, 160; criticisms of, 158–59; on media response to Sputnik, 147; press and, 143, 147–48; on readiness drills, 136; role in Moonwatch, 9, 79, 88–89, 93, 99, 120, 125, 153–54, 191; on Sputnik launch, 143; UFO research of, 78–79 ICBMs, 65, 181, 206 IGY. See International Geophysical Year (IGY) IGY Bulletin (NAS publication), 182 Ingalls, Albert G., 38 instruments: access to, 5, 10, 33, 35, 39–40, 112, 131; built by amateur scientists, 40–41, 115, 128, 168–69, 190, 202, 204, 208; cost of equipping a Moonwatch team, 99; theodolites, 208. See also telescopes interdisciplinary research, 50–52, 193, 245–46 international cooperation, 59; Baker-Nunn tracking stations and, 79; Infiernillo Peak observatory project and, 214; during International Polar Years, 59, 60; Minitrack, Naval Research radio tracking system and, 75; Moonwatch and, 88, 92, 130–33, 156, 175, 179; as motivation for participation, 69–70, 130–31; satellite tracking and, 68; Soviets and, 135, 155; space research and, 17 International Geophysical Year (IGY), 4–5; amateur scientists as participants in, 4–5, 34, 84, 87, 88, 89, 123, 157, 169, 172, 187; Cold War as context for, 15, 17, 61, 129–30; cost of, 59; described, 58–59; funding of, 61–62; inception of, 59–61; Moonwatch as part of, 17, 60–61; organizational structure of, 61, 62–63; political and national security aspects of, 60–61, 89, 154, 179–80; satellite launches during, 4–5, 61, 63, 91; satellite tracking and, 63; U.S. National Committee of, 157; Whipple and, 58 International Heliophysical Year (IHY), 246–47

International Polar Years (IPY), 59, 60, 246–47 Invaders from Mars (film), 44 Iran, 132 Japan, 100, 131–33, 151, 162, 177, 196, 201; members of Moonwatch team in, 134; SAO camera stations in, 79, 142 Jet Propulsion Laboratory, 81, 156, 176 Johnson, Lyndon B., 149, 189 Juno rockets, 176 Kansas City (Missouri): Astronomical League’s annual meeting in, 118, 125; Moonwatch team of, 125, 146 Kaplan, Joseph, 24, 62–63, 154 Kennedy, John F., 189, 210 Kerrey, Robert, 240 KH-11 (Key Hole) satellite, 237 Kimball, Ward, 25 kinemages, 216 Kirby, Fred, 21 Kirtland Airforce Base, Moonwatch at, 178 kits for “do-it-yourself ” science, 5, 20, 33, 39–42, 85, 166, 174, 241–42 Korolev, Sergei P., 107, 140 Kramer, S. Paul, 88 Kubrick, Stanley, 234 Kuiper, Gerard P., 122 Laika, 161–62, 182 Las Cruces, 56, 115–16, 213, 220 Leonard, Arthur S., 184–86, 184–87, 188, 196, 198, 202, 206 Leonard, Bill, 184 Leonard, Natalie, 184 Leuschner, Armin O., 49 Ley, Willy, 24, 25 Life (magazine), 5, 60–61, 159, 160, 163, 191–92 light pollution, 107, 126 Liller, William, 202 Little, Gordon, 145 Little Richard (Richard Wayne Penniman), 148 locating “lost” satellites, 184–87, 195

Index “lone wolf ” observers, 36, 88, 89, 131, 199–200, 227 Los Angeles, Moonwatch in, 170 “low-perigee” objects, 230 lunar landing, 227, 234 lunar occultations, 211 Lunartiks, Order of (Pennsylvania University Moonwatch team), 95 Magic Valley Astronomical Society, 213 Manhattan, Kansas, Moonwatch in, 125–26, 177 Manhattan Project, 52 Mann, Carl, 22 manned space flight, 25, 191, 192, 195, 203, 227–28, 229 Maran, Stephen J., 215 Marion, Walter, 73 Martz, Edwin P., 109–10, 176–77 Massevitch, Alla G., 135–36, 155 mast-and-crossbar technique, 103, 104, 116 Mayall, Margaret, 87 McCarthy, Joseph, 27 media: amateur scientists information sources for, 11, 36, 95, 164; educational press briefings at SAO, 148; enthusiasm for space related stories, 137, 149; local media and Moonwatch, 11, 95, 105, 115, 149, 215; morale damaged by, 81–82; national coverage of Moonwatch, 137, 143, 159, 178, 210; popularization of science by, 24, 36; publicity and promotion of Moonwatch in, 73, 79, 99, 164, 169, 210, 215; satellite programs as reported by, 16, 20, 91, 137, 144, 151, 162, 165–66, 169, 209, 239, 241; as source of information about amateur science, 14, 97; space exploration as reported by, 20–21, 24, 61, 80, 82, 133 membership: in AAVSO (amateur science organizations), 83; in astronomy clubs, 235; of children, 109, 111–13, 122, 163, 189, 199, 216; decline in, 199, 200, 201, 204, 221; gender and, 96–98, 121; as “hard-core,” 241–42; as inclusive and diverse, 99–100, 109–10, 121, 202; “lone

wolfs” and, 36, 88, 89, 131, 199–200, 227; peak Moonwatch numbers, 173; race and, 96–98; as restrictive or selective, 175–76, 191–92, 228; of teens, 1–3, 2, 17, 69–71, 118–23, 121, 173–74, 214–15, 231. See also recruitment of volunteers Mengle, John T., 74 Menzel, Donald H., 49, 83 “meteor bumpers” on satellites, 54 meteors, 24, 50, 52, 54, 188, 203–4 Mexico: Infiernillo Peak observatory, 214 Millbrook School, Hudson Valley, 118–19, 182; observatory and students at, 120 Milwaukee: Moonwatch in, 11, 208–9; Sputnik reentry observed from, 208–9 Milwaukee Astronomical Society, 86–87, 99, 208 Minitrack, Naval Research radio tracking system, 67, 74–75; cost of system, 78; delays in, 141–42; frequency for reception, 91; limited utility of, 157, 163; location of stations, 79; as unproven, 82 MISTY stealth satellite program, 238–41 Miyadi, Massasi, 133, 137, 162 Mobile Photometric Observatory, 205 Molczan, Ted, 236–40 Moonwatch, as amateur science: amateur science community and, 11, 73, 83, 124–25, 188; as catalyst for science careers, 212–14, 215, 217–21, 231; civic life and community aspects of, 16, 36, 102, 188, 227, 232; Cold War as context for, 98, 107, 129–30, 155–56, 189; contributions of, 163, 164, 182, 187, 188–89, 198, 204, 222; cooperation between teams, 115–16; facilities for, 102–4, 106; ham radio operators and, 115, 146–47, 217; IGY and, 73, 91–92; as international effort, 88, 92, 130–33, 156; legacy of, 11, 17–18; “lone wolfs” and, 36, 88, 89, 131, 199–200, 227; members attitude toward Soviet satellites, 6, 161–62; payment and, 211, 232; quasi-professionalism and, 197–98, 202; skepticism and, 9–10, 71, 80–82, 152–53, 245; WSRN and, 206–7

299

300

Index Moonwatch, as organization: amateur science and (See Moonwatch, as amateur science); business sponsorship and support of, 99, 106, 115, 126, 181, 206; Campbell’s role in managing, 93–94; communication between SAO and local teams, 3, 132, 158, 178–79, 180, 229; conferences of, 198, 208; cooperation between teams, 115–16; costs of program, 68, 78, 153, 156; criticisms of, 156, 158–59, 179, to 157; downsizing of, 198, 199; evaluation and ranking of teams, 195, 197, 213, 216, 227; funding for, 99, 102–3, 119, 126, 153, 157, 216–17, 230; GOC as model for, 27–28, 30, 69; grassroots mobilization and, 125; growth of, 94–95, 158; leadership of local teams, 96, 109–10, 127, 198, 232 (See also specific individuals and Moonwatch teams); longevity of, 11, 221, 231–32; membership in (See membership); military interest in, 107–10; missions of (See Moonwatch missions); morale in, 70, 81–82, 135, 178, 180–81; NASA as parent organization of, 194, 197, 204–5, 211, 230, 233; National Advisory Committee of, 86, 92, 107–8, 122; newsletter for, 180; popularization of science and, 159, 196, 211, 214–15, 221–22, 235; practice “Alert” sessions, 92, 136–38; publicity for and promotion of, 89, 90, 94–95, 154, 228; ranking and evaluation of teams, 227; recognition of members, 180, 181–82, 183, 231; recruitment for (See recruitment of volunteers); regional meetings of, 188; reporting systems used in, 117, 137 (See also communication under this heading); scope of network, 136, 169; “Sputnik night” mobilization of, 1–3, 143–48; standardization of practices and, 169–70; structure of, 8, 27, 36, 73, 84–85, 86, 125, 169; success of, 10–11, 47, 143, 152–53, 158–59, 163, 179, 231–32; team orientation of, 88, 89, 199, 227; termination of, 225, 230–31, 236; Vanderburgh as director of, 190, 201,

203, 206, 210–12; Whipple’s conception of, 9–10, 64, 179 Moonwatch missions: Baker-Nunn stations and, 89, 91–92, 131–32, 159, 163, 186, 187, 195, 227; Center for Short-Lived Phenomena and, 229–30; classified projects trusted to, 196; deathwatches and reentry observations as, 9, 11, 182–83, 195, 208; education as, 11, 18, 92, 149–51, 210, 217, 235; locating “lost” satellites as, 184–87, 195; publicity and public relations, 201, 235; as quasi-professional science, 198, 201–2, 221, 235; spotting satellites, 76, 195–96, 210–13; tracking satellites as, 8, 157, 182, 233; training for, 82, 108, 115–18, 126, 136–38, 143, 151, 210 morale, 70, 81–82, 135, 178, 180–81 Morse code, 242 motivation: civic duty or sense of community as, 16–17, 110, 121–23, 180, 189, 226, 231–32; curiosity as, 82, 98, 189, 217; education as, 34, 121, 123, 231; international cooperation as, 69–70, 130–31; scientific interest as, 6, 33–35, 69–70, 98, 105, 217, 226, 231; space exploration and, 120–21, 217; thrill seeking or recreation as, 176 Mount Diablo Astronomical Society, 127 Mount Wilson Observatory, 124 Mr. Wizard (television show), 43 Mumford, Lewis, 234 Munn, Walter A., 180–81, 209 music, 21–22, 166, 167 My Stars (radio program), 85 NASA. See National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) National Academy of Sciences (NAS), 153, 154, 181–82 National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA): amateur scientists and, 11; budget crunch at, 216; Eisenhower administration and establishment of, 192–93; as funding source, 191, 194, 204, 216; as parent organization of

Index Moonwatch, 194, 197, 204–5, 211, 227–28, 230, 233; SAO and, 192–93, 197; Whipple and satellite tracking for, 17; Youth Science Congress sponsored by, 223 National Capitol Astronomers, 143 National Geographic (magazine), 87, 189 National Geographic Society, 13, 87 National Moonwatch Committee, 73 National Science Foundation (NSF), 57, 213 national security, 132, 148; amateur science as potential threat to, 236–41; civil defense and, 20, 26–31, 99, 107, 108, 121; classified information, 156, 196; IGY and foreign policy, 60; orbital data withheld to protect, 238–39; satellite tracking and, 205–6, 233; science and, 17, 33; science as foundation of, 192; science education linked to, 172; “space warfare” issues, 210 Naval Research Laboratory: Moonwatch and, 80, 81, 108–9, 157; Vanguard project of, 64–65, 74, 165–66, 167. See also Minitrack, Naval Research radio tracking system navy: Whipple’s research funded by, 55–56, 57. See also Naval Research Laboratory Newell, Homer E., 80 New Haven, Moonwatch in, 151 New Orleans, Moonwatch in, 119–20, 136–37 New York City, 162–63, 215, 242 New Yorker (magazine), 163, 169 New York Times, 92, 141, 162 Noble, Charlie Mary, 111–12, 163, 181, 189, 217 North American Aviation, 206 North Canton, Ohio: Emmons’ “Star Barn” at, 39, 41, 42; Moonwatch team, 73, 117, 203, 204 NSF (National Science Foundation), 57, 213 nuclear weapons, 139, 148–49, 189; ambivalence toward science and technology linked to, 21–22, 33; civil defense and, 15–16, 26–31; Hiroshima, 38; ICBMs, 65, 181, 206; on the moon,

148–49; popular culture and, 20, 107; rocketry and, 15–16, 65, 140, 149; rocket technology and, 65 Nunn, Joseph, 76–78, 79 Nye, Bill “The Science Guy,” 243 Oak Ridge station, 50 observational techniques: constellation orientation, 116; mast-and-crossbar, 103, 104, 116 observatories: Allegheny Observatory, Pittsburgh, 39, 144; Chabot Observatory, 72, 128; Harvard College Observatory, 49–50, 57–58, 232; Infiernillo Peak observatory, Mexico, 214; Millbrook School, Hudson Valley, 119, 120; Mobile Photometric Observatory, 205; Mount Wilson Observatory, 124; Palomar Mountain observatory, 5, 124, 204; Sunspot, New Mexico, solar observatory, 115; Tokyo Astronomical Observatory, 133; Yerkes Observatory, 86. See also Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO) Odishaw, Hugh, 62–63, 87–89, 92, 154, 158, 186 Olcott, William T., 83 Operation Deepfreeze, 172 Operation Moonwatch. See Moonwatch Operation Skywatch, 28–29 orbital prediction, 3, 7–8, 67, 68, 74, 75, 128, 237; accuracy of, 128, 185; appeal of, 122–23; communication of, 158, 178–79; computer computation of, 75, 238; data reliability of Moonwatch, 152; geodesy and, 60; “lost” satellites and, 184–86; radio transmissions and, 146; SAO and provision of, 158, 178–79; SAO’s plan for, 70; as significant scientific problem, 67; spotting and, 144–45; for Sputnik, 144–46, 162 The Orbit-uarian (Terra Haute newsletter), 105 Organ Pass, New Mexico, 79, 153–54

301

302

Index Pacific Rocket Society, Los Angeles, 170 PAGEOS, 237 Palomar Mountain observatory, 5, 124, 204 Pan American College, Edinburg, Texas, 212–14 Pasachoff, Jay M., 215, 242 Pasadena: Baker-Nunn cameras at, 141, 142, 153 Paterson, New Jersey, 73 Pearl Harbor, as context, 15, 16, 27–28 Pennsylvania State University, 95 Perkin-Elmer Corporation, 78, 142 Peru, 132 Petrie, Thomas W., 122 Phoenix, Moonwatch in, 106–7 photography: as astronomical research tool, 73; history of Moonwatch documented in, 100; meteoric studies, 50–51; as research instrument, 52; Super-Schmidt cameras, 55–56, 64, 154, 156. See also Baker-Nunn cameras Pickering, Edward C., 83 Pickering, William, 81, 156 The Pinpoint Planetarium (Spitz), 85 pin to recognize Moonwatch members, 181, 181–82 Pittsburgh Moonwatch, 144 planetaria: Charlie Noble Planetarium, Fort Worth, 189, 217; as educational facilities, 85; Emmons and, 39–41; equipment for, 213; kits for children, 85; movement in US, 39; science education and, 31; space travel and, 24; “Star Barn” constructed by Emmons, 41, 42; as training tool, 117–18 Planet of the Apes (film), 234 Plato, James, 151 PLORB, 90 Pluto (“Planet X”), 35, 49 politics: current science policy, 246–47; IGY as political issue, 89, 179; science and technology as political issues, 158; space exploration as political issue, 141, 149, 194; “war on science” linked to, 243 popular culture: advertising, 29, 107, 167, 174; Cold War and, 19–20, 27, 44;

Disney and space exploration in, 25–26; fashion, 166, 191–92; films, 13–14, 19–20, 27, 44, 234; Laika and, 161; music, 21–22, 166, 167; nuclear weapons and military images in, 20, 107; science and, 5–6, 97, 192; Sputnik and, 21–22; UFOs and, 21. See also science fiction popularization of science: by amateur scientists, 41; equipment or science kits and, 39–40; media and, 12, 24, 36, 97, 99, 133, 168, 169, 191–92, 215, 229; popular enthusiasm for space exploration and, 18 Popular Mechanics (magazine), 88, 102, 107 Popular Science (magazine), 34, 35, 107 Porter, Richard W., 66–67, 141, 142–43, 155, 157–59, 179 postwar period as context for science, 5–6, 11, 17–18, 33, 60 Prima, Louis, 166 professional scientists: amateurs as distinct from, 12–13, 34–35; amateurs as quasi-professionals, 197–98, 202, 211, 227, 235, 243–44; attitudes toward participation of amateur scientists, 10, 12; Moonwatch as catalyst for careers of, 212–14, 215, 217–21, 231; popular culture and portrayal of, 192; social reputation and status of, 5, 192, 243 Project Blue Book, 78–79 Project Moonbeam, 80 Project Moonwatch. See Moonwatch Project Orbiter, 64, 66 public opinion of science and technology: as ambivalent, 21–22, 33, 98; environmental issues and, 229; as hostile, 21–22, 192, 225, 230, 234, 243; satellites and, 148, 165–67, 169 race, 96–98, 234 radar, 52–53, 108 radio: amateur radio operators, 34, 91; ham operators and satellite tracking, 2, 10, 142, 144; ham operators as part of Moonwatch, 115, 146–47, 217; Minitrack, Naval Research radio tracking system, 74–75, 157; Morse code and ham

Index operators, 242; as new technology, 76, 166, 174; “Project Moonbeam” and ham operators, 80; radio astronomy and telescopes, 221; Radio Research Laboratory at Harvard, 52–53; research on, 59; satellite batteries and radio signals, 146–47; science fiction programming on, 23; science programming on, 36, 85; Sputnik transmissions, 140, 144, 146, 152; tracking systems, 7, 163 (See also Minitrack under this heading); transmitters on satellites, 67, 75–76, 91; wave propagation studies, 59, 163 radio astronomy, 124, 221 Radio (magazine), 91 RAND, 54 Reader’s Digest (magazine), 133, 169 recruitment of volunteers, 28–30, 33, 44, 69, 82, 84, 86–91, 92, 126, 173; as discouraged or restricted, 191–92, 228, 235–36; from GOC, 69, 99, 107; international, 131, 133; for Moonwatch, 26, 44, 89; Sky & Telescope and, 73, 84; teens, 111 Red Oak, Iowa, 47 Red Shadows (Cold War propaganda), 27 reentry: airline pilots as observers of, 228; Moonwatch mission to observe, 208, 210–11; as opportunity for scientific research, 188. See also deathwatches Reich, Charles, 229 religion, 16, 21, 48, 148, 166 “Requiem” (Heinlein), 43 residuals, 197, 219–20 Richardson, David, 216 Roberts, Charles E., 16 Rocket Boys (Hickam), 27, 170 rocketry: Aerobee rockets, 56; amateur rocketry, 27, 43, 170–71, 241; Amateur Rocketry Society of America, 241; astronomical research and, 78; atmospheric studies and, 51, 54–55; Boy Scouts and, 172–73; German rocket technology, 54; government regulation of, 241; IGY and, 61, 142; as imprecise craft, 7, 74; military applications of, 7, 15–16,

65, 107, 140, 176; missile technology and space exploration, 23–24; Moonwatching as partner to, 170, 186; nuclear weapons and, 15–16, 65, 140, 149; Operation Skywatch and, 30; popular culture and, 24–26, 167; satellite launches and, 64–65, 139–40, 161–62, 165, 186, 191; Soviet, 139–40, 149, 161–62; teens and enthusiasm for, 120–21; Whipple’s research and, 51, 53, 54–56 Rockets: The Future of Travel beyond the Stratosphere (Ley), 24 Roth, Herbert, 228 Ryan, Cornelius, 24, 25 Sacramento Valley Astronomical Society, 184 Sagan, Carl, 17 St. Louis, Moonwatch in, 127 Saltus, David W., 120–21 San Fernando Valley, Moonwatch in, 175 San Francisco, 72. See also Walnut Creek, Moonwatch in SAO. See Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO) “satellarium,” 128–29, 130 “Satellite Baby” (song), 166 “Satellite No. 2” (song), 22 “Satellite Panel” of IGY, 62–63, 66–67, 69, 80, 155, 157; Moonwatch and, 141–42, 157; tracking systems and, 76, 81 satellites, artificial: communication, 3; deathwatches during reentry of, 9, 11, 90, 105, 159, 182–83; Department of Defense and, 165–66, 167, 176, 206; Echo satellites, 196, 203–4, 227, 237; emotional and psychological reactions to, 148, 194; global positioning, 4; GOC and observation of, 31; IGY and planned launches of, 61, 91; locating “lost,” 184–87, 195; magnitude (brightness) of, 67, 80, 163; military applications for, 3, 15–16, 54, 64–65; MISTY stealth satellite program, 238–41; national security and, 189, 205, 233; nomenclature used for, 145–46; as novelty, 3; nuclear weapons

303

304

Index satellites (cont.) and, 15–16; number of, 167, 177, 191; orbital predictions for (See orbital prediction); orbiting telescopes, 3; ownership of recovered fragments, 209–10; PAGEOS, 237; public opinion and interest in, 148, 165–67, 169; radio transmissions from, 67, 184; RAND feasibility study, 54; as routine technology, 191, 194; scientific applications for, 6–7, 65, 163; size and weight of early, 64, 76, 140, 177, 194; spying and, 27, 33, 237–41; U.S. launches of, 165–66, 167, 176. See also spotting satellites; Sputnik satellites; tracking satellites satellite simulators, 118, 202 Saturday Review (magazine), 90 “Scanning the Skies” (newspaper column), 79, 132 Scholz, Grace C., 124–25 Schumacher, E. F., 234 science: government support of, 158; popular attitudes toward, 33 science, popularization of: amateur participation and, 11; postwar period as context for, 5–6 Science Digest (magazine), 99 science fairs, 11, 115, 215, 220 science fiction: Cold War as context for, 44; comics, 21, 22–23; in magazines, 48; popularity of, 22–23, 43–44; popularization of science and, 19–21; public opinion about science and technology reflected in, 234; radio programs, 23; teens and children as audience for, 43–44, 172; Whipple and, 45, 48, 54, 191–92 Scientific American (magazine), 34, 38, 123, 163, 168 SeeSat-L, 238, 239, 240 seismology, 168 Senior Scholastic (magazine), 172 Seven-Up, 126–27 Shapley, Harlow, 49, 50, 51, 57–58

Shelby, Jane, 215–16 Shepard, Alan, 203 “shooting stars.” See meteors Sky & Telescope (magazine), 86, 97, 125; Bulletin for the Visual Observers of Satellites in, 89–90, 102, 132; Moonwatch publicized in, 73, 84, 89–90, 113, 122 Skywatchers, Ground Observation Corps and, 28–29 Small Is Beautiful (Schumacher), 234 Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO): amateur scientists and data collection for, 68; archives of, 13–14; criticisms of, 178–79; ecological research projects of, 229; growth of, 78, 193–94, 212; Hynek’s role in, 78–79; NASA and, 192–93; NRL as rival of, 80; organizational structure of, 191; reorganization of, 232–33; as research institution, 65–66, 155; response to Sputnik launch, 141–42, 143; solar radiation studies of, 155; tracking responsibilities of, 153–54, 156 (See also Baker-Nunn cameras); Whipple as director of, 8, 45, 65–66, 212 Smithsonian Institutions: amateur participation in science encouraged by, 69; archives of, 130; Institution Archives, 14–15; as parent organization, 95, 154, 211, 231, 233. See also Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO) social life: civic life and American ideology, 20, 107; IGY and social networks, 168; juvenile delinquency as social issue, 20, 30, 111; Moonwatch as social experience, 188, 189, 198, 221, 222, 227; social aspects of amateur science, 34–35, 105–6, 241–43, 244. See also civic duty; clubs Society for Amateur Scientists, 244 solar research, 155, 169, 188, 245–46, 246–47; solar observatory at Sunspot, New Mexico, 115 South Africa, 131–32, 188–89, 226 South America, 75, 154; Baker-Nunn camera stations in, 79, 132; Moonwatch in, 131–32

Index Soviet Union: amateur scientists in, 135–36; Cold War and, 15–16, 27–31, 55, 133; nuclear weapons development by, 139; space race and, 22, 65, 91, 131; telescopes made in, 155–56; tracking program in, 135–36. See also Sputnik satellites Space Detection and Tracking System, 206 space exploration, 225, 231–32; Boy Scouts and, 172; film depictions of, 13–14; government interest in, 26; international nature of space research, 17; as political issue collect, 149; in popular culture, 22–23; popular enthusiasm for, 23–24, 26; as routine, 191; satellites and, 7; teens and enthusiasm for, 20–21, 25–26, 92, 94, 98, 105, 111, 120–21; visual imagery of, 24–25 “Spacehounds” Moonwatch team of Hapeville, Georgia, 94–95 space race, 131, 133, 141, 148–49; Laika and Sputnik 2, 161–62; Vanguard failure during, 165–66 Space Race: The Untold Story (television documentary), 13 space science, 53–54, 212 Space Track, 206 “space warfare,” 210 Spilhaus, Athelstan, 157 Spitz, Armand N., 9, 84–86, 89, 94, 108, 124, 125, 131, 137, 152, 154; planetaria manufactured by, 39–40 Spitz Laboratories, 39–40, 85–86 “SPOT” (Smithsonian Precision Optical Tracking), 76 spotting satellites: difficulty of, 177; errors during, 176; first Sputnik sightings, 145, 151; “hat tricks” or multiple sightings, 178, 185; “optical fence” strategy for, 102; optimal time for, 67; precision of, 206; process for, 104–5; as public recreation or entertainment, 162; as security breach, 236–41; size and magnitude of satellites and, 80–81; training for, 82, 115–18, 126

“Sputnik Baby” (song), 22 “Sputnik hop” (popular dance), 22 “Sputniks and Muttniks” (song), 166 Sputnik satellites: amateur rocketry inspired by, 27; “beep beep” associated with, 15, 144, 166; booster rocket for, 140, 145, 149–50; deathwatches for, 11; emotional reactions to, 148; first sightings of, 151; international politics and, 149; Laika as passenger, 161–62, 182; launch of, 1–2, 9, 31, 139–40; media coverage of, 16, 20, 91, 144, 147, 151; monument at Baikonur Cosmodrome, 139–40; Moonwatch teams and, 1–3; orbital predictions for, 144–45, 146, 162; physical description of, 140; radio transmissions from, 10, 91, 140, 146, 163; recovery of fragments from, 207–10; reentry of, 11, 105, 151, 182, 208–9; response to news of launch, 141; sightings of, 162–63, 178; songs about, 21–22; spotting by Moonwatch teams, 145; Sputnik 2, 105, 161–63, 178, 182; Sputnik 3, 188—reentry of, 188; Sputnik 4, 195, 207–10—reentry of, 11, 208–9 spying and spy satellites, 27, 33, 237–41 Spy in the Sky (film), 27 “Star Barn” in North Canton, Ohio, 41, 42, 73, 119; as training tool, 117–18 State College, Pennsylvania, 95 stealth satellites, 238–41 Steinmetz, Kenneth, 149, 177 Strong, Clair L., 33–34, 123, 168, 216 structural biology, 216 Sullivan, Walter, 92, 141, 172 sunspots, 73 Super-Schmidt cameras, 55–56, 64, 154, 156 Sykes, Roosevelt, 22 Tabanera, Teofilo, 132 Taylor, Geoffrey, 179, 221 Taylor, Joseph H., 221 teens: as civic minded, 30, 105, 121; juvenile delinquency as social concern, 20, 30, 111; as leaders of Moonwatch teams,

305

306

Index teens (cont.) 122–23; as Moonwatch members, 1–3, 2, 17, 70–71, 118–23, 173–74, 214–15, 231; rocketry and, 170–71; science as interest of, 11, 17, 33–34, 41–43, 70, 172; science fairs and, 11, 115, 215, 220; as Skywatch volunteers, 30; as “space minded,” 20–21, 25–26, 92, 94, 98, 105, 111, 120–21 telescopes: access to, 124, 170; accuracy of data linked to quality of, 198; apogee telescopes, 108–9, 109, 178, 217; “Big Bertha,” 202, 203; binoculars as alternative to, 200; as “classified equipment,” 155–56; cost of, 100, 102, 124; Hale Telescope (Mount Palomar), 5–6; homebuilt, 2–3, 34–35, 36, 38, 39, 40, 102, 115, 119, 124, 128; orbiting, 4; popularity of, 243; provided by SAO, 190, 196–97; radio, 221; rentals for children, 112; SAO provision of, 217, 223; Satellite Scopes, 100–102, 101, 102, 119; Soviet, 155–56; SuperSchmidt, 154; telescope building movement, 36, 38 television, 23, 25–26, 43, 243 Terre Haute, Moonwatch in, 98–100, 102–6, 104, 214; awards ceremonies for, 183; letterhead design for, 106; open house attendees, 150 terrorism, 236, 240, 241 “The Citizen Scientist” (newsletter), 244 theodolites, 208 “There Will Come Soft Rains” (Bradbury), 22–23 The Thing from Another World (film), 19–20 Thompson, Steadman, 122, 125 Time (magazine), 169, 171, 243 timing methods and techniques, 104–5, 115, 117, 137–38, 197, 200 Tocqueville, Alexis de, 95–96 toilet plungers, as surrogate satellites, 136 Tokyo Astronomical Observatory, 133 Tombaugh, Clyde, 35, 87, 115–16

Tom Corbett, Space Cadet (television show), 23 Tomorrowland (Disneyland attraction), 25–26 toys, space and science themed, 23, 33, 41–42, 166–67 tracking satellites: from aircraft, 211; amateurs’ role in, 2, 68–71; comparison of radio vs. optical systems, 67, 68, 74, 75–76, 79, 80, 141–43, 163; costs of systems for, 68, 75; geodesy and, 60–61; as international effort, 68; Minitrack, Naval Research radio tracking system, 157; Moonwatch and, 8, 157, 182, 233; NASA and, 191; national security and, 205–6, 233; need for, 58, 66; obsolescence of Moonwatch, 233; photographic tracking stations (See Baker-Nunn cameras); preparedness for Sputnik launch, 141–42; radar for, 198; radio systems for, 7, 67, 91, 152 (See also Minitrack, Naval Research radio tracking system); SAO and responsibility for, 8–9, 17, 47, 152–54, 156 (See also Baker-Nunn cameras); “Satellite Panel” of IGY and responsibility for, 76, 81; “satellite tracers,” 215; Soviet systems for, 91, 133, 135–36, 155–56; Space Detection and Tracking System, 206; “SPOT” program, 76; visual systems for, 7–8, 63, 67, 201; weather as factor in, 79, 137. See also Minitrack, Naval Research radio tracking system training: drills, 136–38, 143; for Moonwatch, 82; “Moonwatch Manual” for, 210; “satellarium” for, 128–29, 130; satellite simulators for, 118, 202; in satellite spotting, 115–18; of Soviet satellite spotters, 135–36 transistors, 5–6, 166, 174 Tripoli Rocketry Association, 241 Truman, Harry S, 30, 53 Tulsa, Moonwatch in, 178

Index 2001: A Space Odyssey (film), 234 Tyson, Neil deGrasse, 13 UFOs, 15, 21, 30, 78–79, 128, 150, 228 Ulam, Stanislaw, 38 United Nations, 161, 210, 230 United Nuclear Scientific Supplies, 241 Van Allen, James A., 59–60, 176 Van Allen belts, 4, 176, 209 Vanderburgh, Richard C., 190, 201, 203, 206, 210–12, 226, 233 Van Flandern, Thomas, 122–23, 128 Vanguard Project, 108, 142, 143, 165–66, 177, 185; cooperation with Moonwatch, 121; Minitrack radio tracking system and, 74–75 variable star watchers, 34. See also American Association of Variable Star Observers (AAVSO) Venezuela, 132 vigilance, 20, 21, 44, 98, 105, 189, 236 Volunteer Flight Officer Network, 228 von Braun, Wernher, 24, 25, 54 Wakefield Rocket Society (Arlington), 120–21, 171, 215 Walnut Creek, Moonwatch in, 73, 127–29, 129, 149, 151, 185, 199, 203 Watch Mr. Wizard (television show), 43 weather: amateur observers, 229; amateurs and weather observation, 34, 86; as factor in tracking efforts, 79, 137; IGY research related to, 59 Webb, Jack, 29 Weird Fantasy (comic), 22 Weird Science (comic), 22 Weisberg, Joel, 217–21, 219, 224, 233, 234, 235 Werner, Albert, 226–28, 229–30, 233 Western Satellite Research Network (WSRN), 206–7, 217 Westinghouse Science Talent Search, 216 West Palm Beach, Moonwatch in, 226–27

Westphal, James, 151, 178 Westworld (film), 234 “When You See Those Flying Saucers” (song), 21 Whipple, Fred L., 46, 160; administrative duties, 137; as astronomer, 24; awards and honors, 45, 53, 177; awards and honors for, 210; childhood of, 45, 47–48; comet studies, 56–57; confidence in amateur scientists, 9–10, 68–71, 81–83, 88, 163–64, 212; cultivation of young people’s interest in science, 111; as director of SAO, 17, 154–55, 156; education of, 47–49, 49–50; as “engineer at heart,” 45–47, 69; fundraising expertise of, 55, 57–58; on government advisory panels, 53; Houston on, 180; IGY and, 58, 62–63; managerial and organizational skills of, 49, 53, 58, 69, 81–82; marriage and family life of, 49; media relations and, 178, 191; meteoric studies by, 50, 54, 55–56; Moonwatch as conceived and established by, 8, 44, 47, 68–71, 73, 182, 245; on Moonwatch as success, 230–31; networking in scientific community by, 49, 53; organizational and management expertise of, 212; promotion of Moonwatch by, 99, 163–64, 187–88; radar countermeasures developed by, 52–53; on religion, 48; as research astronomer, 45–46, 48–49, 65–66; retirement of, 232; as SAO director, 192–93; SAO professional tracking network developed by, 153–54, 156 (See also Baker-Nunn cameras); Satellite Panel and, 69, 142–43; as science educator, 24, 25; science fiction and, 45, 48, 54, 191–92; scientific reputation of, 190–91; Smithsonian administration and, 191; on Soviet tracking network, 135–36; space exploration encouraged by, 24, 26, 54; space science research by, 53–54; tension with American IGY, 154 White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico, 56

307

308

Index Whittier, Moonwatch in, 163 The Whole Earth Catalog, 234 Wilson, Charles E., 107–8 “window,” 52–53 Wisconsin: Moonwatch in, 11, 208–9; Sputnik 4 fragments recovered in, 208–10 women and girls: gender discrimination in science, 215–16; Girls Auxiliary Moonwatch Society (GAMS), 121; Girl Scouts, 30, 109, 111, 214; as leaders of

Moonwatch teams, 110, 111–15; as Moonwatch members, 173, 214; role in research astronomy, 50 World War II, 15, 16, 27–28; as context for scientific research, 51–53, 60, 74 World Wide Web, 11, 67, 238, 240 Wright, G. Robert, 92 Yerkes Observatory, 86 Zahner, Donald D., 126–27