An Illustrated Chronology of the NASA Marshall Center and MSFC ...

JANUARY - SEP'It,MBER 1960
1960
The Saturn project was approved on January 18 as a program of the highest national
priority (DX rating). A mockup of th_ Saturn booster was installed in the ABMA test
stand on January 4 to check mating of the booster and stand and to test servicing
metho&. This mockup was removed from the test stand and the complete test booster,
SA-T, wa_installed In its place during February 1960 [ 18].
During March the executive order transferring the Saturn program to NASA became
effective 119]. Later in the month two of Saturn's eight fint_tage engines passed an
initial static firing test lasting 8 seconds. This test was identified as number SAT-OI,the
first live firing of the Saturn te_t booster (SA-T); it occurred on March 18 [20]. In a
second test (SAT-02), on April 6, four engL,es were successfully static fired for 7
seconds. All eiMhtengines of the test booster were successfully fired on April 29 In _n
&second test [21 I.
In April NASA awarded Douglas Aircraft Company a contract to develop the second
stage for the Saturn rocket. Then in the following month NASA announced that
Rocketd._,nehad been _lected to develop the high-thrust J-2 engine. This engine, of the
type defined by the Sllverstein Committee in December t959, would burn liquid
hydrogen-liquidoxygen. It would be used In an advanced Saturn vehicle 1221.
The first 10 Saturn flight vehicles would be numbered from SA-I to SA-10. SA-10 would
be the prototype of the operational Saturn. On May 26 assemblyof the booSterstage for
the first Saturn flight vehicle began in Huntsville. On July 1 the Saturn program was
formally transferredto ti',e Gec.o'e C. MarshallSpace Flight Center (MSFC) [23].
On July I, 1960, formal transfer ceremonies at Huntsville, Alabama, officially opened
NASA's George C. MarshallSpace FHghtCenter [24].
On July 26 NASA signed a supplemental agreement with Douglas Aircraft Company
covering the second stage. Douglas would design, develop, and f_bricate the four-engine
S-IV stage. Contracts were let on August 10 with Pratt & Whitney to develop and
produce LR-119 engines; the Government would furnish these engines to the contractors
responsible for building the S-IV and S-V stages of the C-I vehicle. The LR-119, an
uprated LR-115 engine, was expected to generate 17 500 pounds of thrust [251.
On August 14 construction began on the mobile service structure for Launch Complex 34
at Cape C_averal [26].
O, September 8 the facilities of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration at
Huntsville, ,Mabama, were dedicated and designated as the George C. Marshall Space
Flight Center. President Elsenhower, Mrs. George C. Marshall,NASA Administrator T.
Kelth Glennan, and many other national, state, and local dJ_nitari_spartAcipatedin the
ceremony [27l.
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