Things (CIRCA 1541)
Of course, we Americans knew that, felt it in our marrow as we marched raucously across a continent. Historian Frederick Jackson Turner explained it to us in 1893, when he wrote of the closing of our Western frontier. "What the Mediterranean Sea was to the Greeks, breaking the bond of custom, offering new experiences, calling out new institutions and activities, that, and more, the ever retreating frontier has been to the United States."
At about the same time, Admiral Alfred Thayer Mahan explained, without saying it in so many words, that this nation's new frontier had to be the task of becoming a great world power. We were, of course, that and more by the time World War II ended. Presidential Science Adviser Vannevar Bush described the logical progression in a report to Harry Truman, "Science--The Endless Frontier." The U.S., through research and its rapid application to the lives of people, would conquer other realms. There were those stars that the quirky European philosopher Paracelsus had dreamed of dominating. Going into space was the obligation of America, an absolute writ of being--and staying--free.
Melvin Kranzberg, a professor of the history of technology at Georgia Tech, believes that the space triumphs of the past 25 years have sustained us when our wars and social experiments faltered and failed. Even the tragedies have intensified the experience. "We've got to go on," says Kranzberg. "Man's most abiding quest is the effort to understand himself in relation to the cosmos."
Fear, as well as the hand of God, has propelled us. If we did not go first, somebody else would. Somebody else almost did.
Washington was comfortable and smug on the night of Oct. 5, 1957, as its scientists gathered in planning sessions for the International Geophysical Year. They were certain they would dominate the global experiments. Along with experts from a dozen other nations, the Americans assembled at the Soviet embassy on 16th Street, sipping vodka. Walter Sullivan of the New York Times was called to the phone, and the news he heard changed the world. Sullivan hurried back to the party and whispered in the ear of Physicist Lloyd Berkner, who rapped on the table for quiet. "I am informed that a satellite is in orbit at an elevation of 900 kilometers. I wish to congratulate our Soviet colleagues on their achievement."
Old Washington hands can tell you that Sputnik changed the capital for good that night. There were suggestions that the U.S. declare a national emergency and conduct an all-out effort to catch up. "Know thine enemy" became the slogan of the day, and schools began offering courses in Russian. The race to conquer the heavens predated even the cold war; when Soviet and American troops entered Germany, they scanned their lists of prisoners for rocket scientists they could trundle home. But Sputnik launched the race right into the heart of the superpower rivalry, where it has remained ever since.