Werner Von Braun

Childhood

• He was born in 1912 in Wirsitz Germany.

• He studied Calculus and Trigonometry in high school to learn how rockets work.

• When he was a teenager he joined the Society for Space Travel.

• They built experimental liquid fuel rockets.

• After high school he enrolled at the Berlin Institute of Technology

• In 1932, he started to design missiles for the German army.

• He earned a Ph.D. in aerospace engineering in 1934.

The German Army

• During World War II Von Braun was the head of a rocket team that developed the V-2.

• The V-2 was a missile that traveled at speeds over 3,500 miles per hour.

• Von Braun surrendered 500 workers at the V-2 Missile Complex when the Allied forces captured it.

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Library/Giants/vonBraun/vonbraun_3.html

Controversy

• In April, Arthur Rudolph, chief engineer of the V-2 factory, decided to use concentration camp prisoners. The concentration camp prisoners started to work at the V-2 complex in June of 1943.

• The power hungry Heinrich Himmler, commander of the SS (Nazi Police force), decided to take command of the V-2 plant. When Von Braun resisted, he was thrown in jail. Himmler stated that he tried to sabotage the operation.

• The United States had no idea what to do with Von Braun after his surrender because he was granted an honorary rank by the SS in 1940.

Controversy

• Von Braun’s friends and followers said that he didn’t follow the Nazi party. They used his incarceration as an example. They also said that he accepted his role in the SS because he was afraid of what Himmler might have done to him if he did not accept. They also said that the benefits of being in the SS were, research funding and promotions.

• The United States space program decided to allow the German scientist into the space program after Von Braun confessed that he heard about prisoners being killed at one of the missile complexes called Mittlewerk.

After World War II

• After the war, 116 of Von Braun’s scientists worked for the United States army.

• The developed guidance systems for missiles.

• Von Braun became a U.S. Citizen in 1953.

U.S. Army• The Von Braun team developed the ballistic rockets called

Mercury Redstone, Redstone, Juno, and the Saturn 1B, while working for the Army.

U.S. Army

• When the Soviet Union launched Sputnik in 1957, the United States went into a state of panic because they thought they were losing the space race.

• Von Braun and his “rocket team” developed the Vanguard. It flew only four feet off of it’s launch pad and blew up.

• Von Braun then erected the Jupiter-C that carried the United State’s first satellite, Explorer-1.

• Then in 1961 Von Braun’s team developed the Juno-1 that took Alan Shepard into space.

NASA

• In the 60’s President Kennedy decided to beat the Soviet Union in the Space Race by landing Americans on the Moon.

• Von Braun became director of NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center(MSFC).• Von Braun and (MSFC) developed the Saturn V rocket.

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Library/Giants/vonBraun/vonbraun_4.html

The End of Von Braun’s Career

• In 1972 he became Vice President for engineering and development at Fairchild Industries, Inc.

• In 1975 he became founder the National Space Institute.

• He died on June 16, 1977.

Use of Mathematics

• When developing his rockets he used trigonometry, calculus and physics.

• Von Braun had to use Isaac Newton’s law of thrust, force = mass x acceleration. He needed this law to develop propellants and nozzles for his rockets. If his rockets were too heavy for the force that the fuel was giving off, he needed this law to figure out how powerful the fuel needed to be.