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Wernher von Braun 1912-1977
Claudia Meegan
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• Dr.Wernher Magnus Maximillian Freiherr von Braun,
  was
• born on March 23,1912 in Wirstiz, Germany
  (province of Posen,German Empire) (now
  Wyrzysk,Poland)
• Born second of three sons
• Sigismund von Braun (1911-1998) German
  diplomat
• Wernher von Braun (1912-1977) rocket scientist
• Magnus von Braun (1919-2003) Chrysler Europe
  executive
• Activities composed music, wrote poetry, built
  an automobile out of old parts. Failed at math
  and physics
• Inspired to study physics after reading Hermann
  Oberths rocket into interplanetary space (die
  rakete zu den planetenraumen)
• At the age of 13, he got in very much trouble for
  attaching rockets to a red wagon and setting them
  off. Creating screaming flames and smoke, the red
  wagon launched five blocks into the town square
  where they exploded.
• His father was a conservative civil servant,
  Magnus Freiherr von Braun. Never favored a party
  but served as the minister of agriculture during
  the Weinmar Republic.
• His mother Emmy von Quistorp. Could trace both
  parents to European royalty.
• When Wirstiz became apart of Poland at the end of
  WW1, the von Brauns moved to Berlin.

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• Early education was in various boarding schools
  in Germany.
• Very much inspired by Hermann Oberths Rocket
  into Interplanetary Space (die rakete zu den
  planetenraumen)
• Earned bachelors in physics and aerospace
  engineering from the Technical University of
  Berlin at the age of 20.
• Earned doctorate in physics in 1934.
• Assisted Hermann Oberth in liquid fueled rocket
  motor tests.
• Joined the VfR- verein fur raumschiffahrt (space
  flight society)

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• von Braun was working on his creative doctorate
  when the National Socialist German Workers Party
  (NSDAP or NAZI) took over Germany
• Rocketry immediately became a national agenda.
• Walter Dornberger (artillery captain) arranged an
  ordnance department research grant for him.
• Dornberger liked von Braun and hired him on to
  head up the military rocket artillery unit as a
  civilian engineer.
• von Braun then worked next to Dornbergers
  existing solid-fuel rocket testing side at
  Kummersdorf (on the outskirts of Berlin)
• By 1934, von Braun and Dronberger had recruited
  a team of 80 engineers to build the new rockets
  in Kummersdorf on the outskirts of Berlin.
• von Braun was awarded a doctorate in physics
  (aerospace engineering) on July 27,1934 from the
  University of Berlin for his thesis About
  Combustion Tests (only public part of thesis)
• Actual full thesis Construction, Theoretical and
  Experimental Solution to the Problem of the
  Liquid Propellant Rocket (dated 4/16/24), was
  kept classified by the U.S. Army, later published
  in 1960.
• von Braun was employed by the German Ordnance
  Department and became the technical director at
  Peenemunde rocket center in 1937. Peenemunde was
  located in northern Germany on the Baltic Sea.
• Dornberger became military commander at
  Peenemunde with von Braun as technical director.
• In collaboration with the Luffwaffe, the
  Peenemunde group developed liquid fuel rocket
  engines for aircraft and jet-assisted takeoffs.
• Also developed the long-range A-4 ballistic
  missile and supersonic Wasserfall anti-aircraft
  missile.
• November 1937(December 1,1932), von Braun joined
  the Nazi party
• An office of Military Government, US document
  dated 4/23/1947 states that von b joined
  Waffen-SS (Schutzstaffel) horseback riding school
  in 1933, then NSP on 5/1/1937 and became a
  officer in Waffen-SS from May of 1940 until the
  end of the war
• The SS and Gestapo had detained von Braun and
  arrested him for crimes against the state because
  he dared to talk about building rockets, which
  would go into orbit around the earth and perhaps
  to the moon. Von Brauns team had plans on their
  design boards of even larger rockets with
  potential for orbital flight like the A-9 and
  A-10 were to be worlds first stage rocket. von
  Braun was imprisoned without knowledge for his
  crime in a Gestapo cell in Stettin (now Szczecin,
  Poland).
• Dornberger convinced the SS and Gestapo that
  without von Braun there would be noV2 and that
  Hitler would have them shot. The Gestapo released
  von Braun knowing that Germany was doomed, went
  back to Peenemunde and immediately assembled his
  team and prepared to surrender.
• Comments about NSDAP membership,
• I was officially demanded to join the national
  socialist party. At this time (1937) I was
  already technical director of the army rocket
  center at PeenumundeMy refusal to join the party
  would have meant that I would have abandon the
  work of my life. Therefore, I decided to join. My
  membership in the party did not involve any
  political activitiesin spring 1940, on
  SS-Standartenfauhrer (SS colonel) Maullerlooked
  me up in my office at Peenemunde and told me that
  Reichsfauhrer Heinrich Himmler had sent him with
  the order to urge me to join the SS. I called
  immediately on my military superiormajor general
  Walter Dornberger. He informed me that if I
  wanted to continue our mutual work, I had no
  alternative but to join.

SS-Schutzstaffe V2-Vergelstungswaffe
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• When the soviet army was 160km from Peenemunde,
  in the spring of 1945. von Braun assembled his
  planning staff and discussed who to surrender to.
  They soon realized
• the Russians frightened most of the scientists.
• The French would treat us like slaves.
• The British couldnt afford a rocket program.
• That left the Americans.
• Von Braun lead 500 of his people through war torn
  Germany to surrender.
• May 2,1945upon finding an American private from
  the US 44th infantry division. Von Brauns
  brother, a fellow rocket engineer, Magnus.
  Approached the solider and said in broken English
  My name is Magnus von Braun, and my brother
  invented the V2. We want to surrender.
• The Americans were well aware on how important
  this catch was. Von b had been on the top of the
  black list for some time.
• June 19,1945.two days before the scheduled
  handover of the area to the Soviets, US Army
  Major Bob Stover (chief of jet propulsion of the
  research and intelligence branch of the US Army
  ordnance in London) and his colleague LT.Col.
  R.L.Williams took von b and his department chiefs
  by jeep from Garmisch to Munich. The group then
  flew to Nordhausen and were then evacuated to the
  American zone in Witzenhausen. The next day von
  Braun was recruited to join the US under
  operation over cast.
• June 20, 1945.US Sectary of State Cordell Hull,
  approved the transfer of von Braun and his team.
  The American public wasnt notified until October
  of that year.
• operation overcastoperation paperclip
• paperclips were used to indicate those who had
  been selected for transfer.

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The Mars Project, Urbana, University of Illinois
Press, (1953). With Henry J. White,
translator. First Men to the Moon, Holt, Rinehart
and Winston, New York (1958). Portions of work
first appeared in This Week Magazine. History of
Rocketry Space Travel, New York, Crowell
(1975). With Frederick I. Ordway III. The
Rocket's Red Glare, Garden City, N.Y. Anchor
Press, (1976). With Frederick I. Ordway
III. Project Mars A Technical Tale, Apogee
Books, Toronto (2006). A previously unpublished
science fiction story by Dr. von Braun.
Accompanied by paintings from Chesley Bonestell
and von Braun's own technical papers on the
proposed project. The Voice of Dr. Wernher von
Braun, Apogee Books, Toronto (2007). A collection
of speeches delivered by von Braun over the
course of his career.
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It is difficult to say what is impossible, for
the dream of yesterday is the hope of today and
reality of tomorrow Robert Goddard Nicht
aflesen Ihre Pantoffeln Tazen-Wernher von Braun
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Knight Cross of the War Merit Cross in
1944 Elected Honary Fellow of the B.I.S. in
194944 Deutsches Bundesverdienstkreuz in
1959 Smithsonian Langley Medal in 1967 NASA
Distinguished Service Medal in 1969 National
Medal of Science in 1975 Werner-von-Siemens-Ring
in 1975 Civitan International World Citizenship
Award in 197045
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Apollo space program director Sam Phillips was
quoted as saying that he did not think that
America would have reached the moon as quickly as
it did without von Braun's help. Later, after
discussing it with colleagues, he amended this to
say that he did not believe America would have
reached the moon at all. The von Braun crater on
the moon was so named by the IAU in recognition
of von Braun's contribution to space exploration
and technology. Von Braun received a total of 12
honorary doctorates, among them (on January 8,
1963) one from the Technical University of Berlin
from which he had graduated. Von Braun was
responsible for the creation of the Research
Institute at The University of Alabama in
Huntsville. As a result of his vision, the
university is one of the leading universities in
the nation for NASA-sponsored research. The
building housing the university's Research
Institute was named in his honor, Von Braun
Research Hall, in 2000. Several German cities
(Bonn, Neu-Isenburg, Mannheim, Mainz), and dozens
of smaller towns have named streets after Wernher
von Braun. The Von Braun Center (built 1975) in
Huntsville, Alabama is named in von Braun's
honor. Scrutiny of von Braun's use of forced
labor at the Mittelwerk intensified again in 1984
when Arthur Rudolph, one of his top affiliates
from the A-4/V2 through to the Apollo projects,
left the United States and was forced to renounce
his citizenship in place of the alternative of
being tried for war crimes.46 A science- and
engineering-oriented Gymnasium in Friedberg,
Bavaria was named after Wernher von Braun in
1979. In response to rising criticism, a school
committee decided in 1995, after lengthy
deliberations, to keep the name but "to address
von Braun's ambiguity in the advanced history
classes." An avenue in the Annadale section of
Staten Island, NY was named for him in 1977.
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Dr.Verg von Tiesenhousen, a member of Operation
Paperclip
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