Wernher von Braun
Dreams of Space

paul A. Schons

(originally published by the Germanic-American Institute in June, 2001)

When he died of cancer in his new homeland, the USA, on June 16, 1977 Wernher von Braun had achieved and surpassed his most impossible dreams from childhood. His dreams had been ignited at age 12 when he read a book by the leading expert on rockets in Germany, Die Rakete zu den Planetenräumen by Hermann Oberth (The Rocket to Planetary Space) along with the adventures written of by Jules Verne in From Earth to the Moon. His frustration in the more technical book by Oberth was that he could not understand the mathematics. Up to that time von Braun had been rather disinterested in math in school and was failing in the subject. As his dream of rockets to space stimulated him and set a life goal for him, he realized that he could achieve his dreams only with the aid of mathematics. He thus put himself seriously to the subject and began to excel. He would carry this through to a degree in mechanical engineering from the Berlin Institute of Technology and a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Berlin.

Von Braun's first experiment with rockets at age 12 had followed upon his readings. He found 6 large skyrockets and attached them to his childhood coaster wagon. He ignited them and was delighted to watch the wagon speed through the streets of Berlin finally exploding when the skyrockets were spent. The police were substantially less delighted with the entire matter. The young Von Braun was detained for a time before he was released to his father.

Despite a rather unappreciated beginning, the desire to propel with rockets never left him. It was in his plans through high school, the Institute of Technology and the University of Berlin. At about age 20 he joined the Verein für Raumschiffahrt (Society for Space Travel) and with like-minded friends began to do some serious experimentation with rockets. The society developed a sufficient status to be given a $400 grant from the army for the purpose of building and demonstrating a rocket. Although the first demonstration for the backers failed, sufficient promise was shown that by 1934 von Braun and army officer, Captain Dornberger, were supervising up to 80 engineers bulding rockets in a field south of Berlin.

It was just at this time that Adolf Hitler was elected to parliament and named Chancellor. The military drive of Hitler would both provide von Braun with funding and support for his projects, and, of course, would impel von Braun and all of Germany on a course toward disaster.

In the context of World War II von Braun would direct the rocketry project at Peenemünde on the Baltic coast in northern Germany. His team would develop, build and deploy the V-2 Rocket. (The "V" was designated by Hitler and stood for "Vergeltung", revenge.) The first V-2 rocket struck London on September 7, 1944. Von Braun is said to have remarked at the time, "The rocket worked perfectly except for landing on the wrong planet." He meant to imply that he would have much preferred to be building rockets for scientific purposes and space exploration. But as it was, the only funding available was not for science but for military application. In a situation similar to that of many scientists and other dreamers and builders in Germany in those times and in other cultures in other times, von Braun, in a Faustian dilemma, sold a goodly portion of his integrity for the funding to achieve his scientific goals. In an address to his own staff von Braun remarked in a mixture of enthusiasm and regret: "Let us not forget that this is the beginning of a new era, the era of rocket-powered flight. It seems that this is another demonstration of the sad fact that so often new developments get nowhere until they are first applied as weapons."

By the summer of 1945 it was more than clear that the end was near. Von Braun, though ready to give up the war, was not prepared to give up his dream. Rather than destroy data and documents as ordered, he moved and hid masses of information. Then with several hundred of his colleagues he set off with the intention of finding and surrendering to the American army. In a calculated risk he guessed (correctly) that his information and abilities would be as much in demand to the Americans as it had been in Germany. Finding Americans to whom he might surrender, however, was not such an easy matter. Although American intelligence officers were seeking German scientists and German scientists were seeking Americans, it took some time for von Braun to find an American unit to which he might surrender.

By June of 1945 von Braun and 126 of his staff were in the United States reconstructing, explaining and testing captured German V-2 rockets. His initial salary was $6.00 per day. There was a bit of confusion as to the status of the team in the early days. It was not quite clear if they were prisoners or guests of the USA. The German rocketry team referred to their own status in those days as “PoPs”, Prisoners of Peace. When the war-time alliance with the Soviet Union quickly turned into a cold war adversarial relationship, von Braun’s perceived value to his new homeland and his salary increased substantially. He became an American citizen in 1955.

Von Braun and his expanding team developed the first rockets for the United States. They launched the first American satellite in 1958 with the Jupiter-C rocket they had developed. In 1960 NASA was founded and von Braun became the director of the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. There he worked on the development of the Saturn I rocket which launched the Apollo spacecraft into earth orbit and the Saturn V which would launch Americans to the moon in 1969 in response to President Kennedy’s challenge. Shortly thereafter the team developed and launched the first space station, “Skylab”.

In 1970 von Braun moved to Washington, D.C. to head NASA’s strategic planning efforts. Within the next years, though, popular interest in space development waned, and funding was cut substantially. Still not having achieved his greatest dreams of reaching the planets and not ready to give up, he resigned from government service and joined Fairchild Industries in Maryland hoping that he might achieve in private industry that which he now felt he could not in the public sector. In 1977, though, cancer put an end to the dream. Werner von Braun died of the disease on June 16 in Alexandria, Virginia.