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/vonBr
aun/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.