This Day in American History: NASA Is Created

ForAmerica
Jul 29
2 min read

On this day in 1958, America answered a Soviet satellite beeping overhead by creating an agency that would put a man on the Moon within eleven years.

President Eisenhower commissions Dr. T. Keith Glennan and Dr. Hugh L. Dryden as NASA's first administrator and deputy administrator, NASA photo

The launch of the Soviet Union's Sputnik 1 on October 4, 1957 -- the first artificial satellite ever placed in orbit -- caught the United States flat-footed and rattled the American public, who worried the same rockets that lofted satellites could just as easily deliver nuclear warheads. President Eisenhower moved fast. He directed the creation of a civilian space agency built around the existing National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, and after months of hearings led by Senate Majority Leader Lyndon B. Johnson, Congress passed the National Aeronautics and Space Act on July 16, 1958.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VV6QeZFaVSQ

Eisenhower signed the act into law on July 29, 1958, officially creating the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The bill deliberately designated it an "Administration" rather than an "Agency," giving NASA broader legal authority to coordinate with the military and other federal bodies. NASA opened for business two months later, on October 1, 1958, at the Dolley Madison House in Washington, D.C., with T. Keith Glennan as its first administrator and Hugh L. Dryden as his deputy.

One of NASA's first acts was standing up the Space Task Group to get American astronauts into orbit, which became Project Mercury. Just under three years later, Alan Shepard became the first American in space. Less than eleven years after Eisenhower's signature, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walked on the Moon -- a stunning turnaround from an agency that started as a scramble to answer a beeping ball of Soviet metal.

Also on this day:

1914 -- Transcontinental telephone service becomes operational, with a test call between New York and San Francisco.
1915 -- At 41, Honus Wagner hits an inside-the-park grand slam, a record for oldest player to do so that stood for 70 years.
1967 -- An accidental rocket launch aboard the USS Forrestal sparks a fire that kills 134 sailors, including future Sen. John McCain among the survivors.
1981: Britain's Prince Charles marries Lady Diana Spencer.

A beeping satellite scared a nation into building a space agency from scratch -- and eleven years later, that same nation put footprints on the Moon.

Source: NASA, Eisenhower Presidential Library