Sixty years ago next week, the hopes of Cold War America soared into the night sky as a rocket lofted skyward above Cape Canaveral, a soon-to-be-famous barrier island off the Florida coast. The date was Jan. 31, 1958. NASA had yet to be formed, and the honor of this first flight belonged to the U.S. Army. The rocket’s sole payload was a javelin-shaped satellite built by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. Explorer 1, as it would soon come to be called, was America’s first satellite. Against the backdrop of the 1950s Cold War, after the Soviet Union successfully launched Sputnik, Americans were determined to launch their own Earth-orbiting satellite. Flash back to events leading up to the successful launch of America’s Explorer 1, and the beginnings of America’s Space Age, as told through newsreel and documentary clips of the time. “The launch of Explorer 1 marked the beginning of U.S. spaceflight, as well as the scientific exploration of … Continue reading →