Before the Moon Blog
Exploring the past, present, and future of space.
Tag: Lavelle Aircraft
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When Glenn Ecord joined NASA, he stepped into a program racing toward the Moon and fighting the limits of physics itself. “I came to NASA in 1966,” he said. “My first assignment was fixing pressure vessels that were failing. When one fails, it doesn’t just leak—it explodes.” Ecord spent 41 years in NASA’s Materials and…
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In June 1964, a young engineer named Gary Wayne Johnson packed his wife, their belongings, and their dreams into a VW Bug and drove to Houston. “That was about all we owned,” he laughed. “I’d just graduated from Oklahoma State. I changed my major from chemical to electrical engineering because I wanted to work in…
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In the quiet heart of Warminster, Pennsylvania, beneath the shadow of shopping centers and suburban streets, lies a history that once helped power the Space Race. Eleanor O’Rangers, President of the Southeastern Pennsylvania Cold War Historical Society, has dedicated her career to uncovering it. “Most people think of Bucks County as the birthplace of America,”…
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Long before the roar of the Shuttle’s engines filled the Texas sky, a young boy in Mississippi was standing on a dirt road, staring up at a moving star. “It was one of the early NASA satellites,” Stokes McMillan recalled. “I watched it glide across the sky, silent and bright. From that moment on, I…
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When you walk through the Mercer Museum in Doylestown, you’re not just looking at objects, you’re peering into the DNA of American invention. That’s where Clint Flack works as an Exhibit Specialist and Curator, installing exhibits, researching local history, and safeguarding the stories of Bucks County’s innovators. His perspective reveals how a quiet farming county…