Creation of NASA

From 1946, the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) had been experimenting with rocket planes, such as the supersonic Bell X-1. In the early 1950s, there was a challenge to launch an artificial satellite for the International Geophysical Year (1957–58). An effort for this was the American Project Vanguard. After the Soviet space program launched the world's first artificial satellite (Sputnik 1) on October 4, 1957, the United States stepped up its own efforts. The U.S. Congress, alarmed by the perceived threat to national security and technological leadership known as the "Sputnik crisis", urged immediate action, while President Eisenhower and his advisers counseled more deliberate measures. This led to an agreement that a new federal agency based upon NACA was needed to conduct all non-military activity in space. The Advanced Research Projects Agency was also created at this time to develop space technology for military application. ==Transition from NACA to NASA==

From late 1957 to early 1958, the already existing National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) began studying what a new non-military space agency would entail, as well as what its role might be, and assigned several committees to review the concept. On January 12, 1958, NACA organized a "Special Committee on Space Technology", headed by Guyford Stever. Launched on January 31, 1958, Explorer 1, officially Satellite 1958 Alpha, became the U.S.'s first Earth satellite. The Explorer 1 payload consisted of the Iowa Cosmic Ray Instrument without a tape data recorder which was not modified in time to make it onto the satellite. On March 5, President's Science Advisory Committee (PSAC) Chairman James Killian wrote a memorandum to President Dwight D. Eisenhower, entitled "Organization for Civil Space Programs", encouraging the creation of a civil space program based upon a "strengthened and redesignated" NACA which could expand its research program "with a minimum of delay." Elements of the Army Ballistic Missile Agency, of which von Braun's team was a part, and the Naval Research Laboratory were incorporated into NASA. A significant contributor to NASA's entry into the Space Race with the Soviet Union was the technology from the German rocket program (led by von Braun) which in turn incorporated the technology of Robert Goddard's earlier works. Earlier research efforts within the U.S. Air Force In December 1958, NASA gained control of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a contractor facility operated by the California Institute of Technology. ==See also==