Krafft Arnold Ehricke Papers Paul Silbermann 2014 National Air and Space Museum Archives 14390 Air & Space Museum Parkway Chantilly, VA 20151 [email protected] https://airandspace.si.edu/archives Table of Contents Collection Overview ........................................................................................................ 1 Administrative Information .............................................................................................. 1 Arrangement................................................................................................................... 21 Scope and Contents...................................................................................................... 21 Biographical/Historical note.............................................................................................. 2 Names and Subjects .................................................................................................... 23 Container Listing ........................................................................................................... 24 Series 1: Writings, Lectures, Appearances............................................................ 24 Series 2: Graphics.................................................................................................. 92 Series 3: Company Files...................................................................................... 112 Series 4: Reference Files..................................................................................... 154 Series 5: Miscellaneous Personal Files and Posthumous Material...................... 274 Krafft Arnold Ehricke Papers NASM.2003.0025 Collection Overview Repository: National Air and Space Museum Archives Title: Krafft Arnold Ehricke Papers Identifier: NASM.2003.0025 Date: 1949-1984 Extent: 124.9 Cubic feet Creator: Ehricke, Krafft, 1917-1984 Language: English . Summary: This collection is composed of Krafft Ehricke's files including Ehricke's published and unpublished papers as well as papers and works by others that Ehricke gathered, presumably as reference material. Administrative Information Acquisition Information Ingeborg M. Ehricke, Gift, 2003 Processing Information All metal fasteners (paper clips, staples, binder clips, etc) have been removed from the collection due to the significant amount of rust present. When materials in a single folder were originally fastened together in groups these groups have been separated within the folder by half-width sheets of legal paper (4¼"x14"). Newsprint and thermofax documents have been photocopied for preservation. Folded oversized materials have been flattened and filed separately in appropriately-sized containers in the same order. Multiple copies of documents in different files are identified as copy 1, copy 2, etc. Some materials, mainly relating to nuclear space propulsion, carry security classification markings. These documents have been reviewed and declassified by the National Archives and Records Administration's National Declassification Center and appropriately marked. All such documents have been returned to NASM's custody. Preferred Citation Krafft A. Ehricke Papers, Accession 2003-0025, National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution. Restrictions No restrictions on access. Page 1 of 275 Krafft Arnold Ehricke Papers NASM.2003.0025 Conditions Governing Use Material is subject to Smithsonian Terms of Use. Should you wish to use NASM material in any medium, please submit an Application for Permission to Reproduce NASM Material, available at Permissions Requests. Biographical Note Krafft Arnold Ehricke (1917-1984) was an engineer and scientist who made vital contributions to the American space program. Ehricke was considered "one of the few philosophers of astronautics" by the early 1960s (note 1) and until his death remained a visionary and public champion of the cause of space exploration and colonization. Ehricke was born in Berlin, Germany on 24 March 1917. He was inspired by Fritz Lang's 1929 science fiction film Frau im Mond (Woman in the Moon) and attempted to join the German rocket society, Verein für Raumschiffarht (VfR), but, denied membership due to his youth, he instead conducted his own experiments. He spent two years (1936-1938) fulfilling military service requirements in Germany's new Panzer Corps, then earned an Aeronautical Engineering degree (MS equivalent) from the Technical University of Berlin (1938-1940). With World War II underway, Ehricke was recalled to service and was wounded during the Blitzkrieg on the Western Front in 1940. While recuperating from his wound he took graduate courses in Celestial Mechanics and Nuclear Physics from the University of Berlin (1940-1941). He returned to duty in 1941 as an officer to participate in the German attack on Russia. In 1942 he was again wounded, but his earlier engineering work had come to the attention of Wernher von Braun and he was recruited into von Braun's rocket development team, a move he later credited with saving his life. Ehricke spent the next two years (1942-1944) as a propulsion engineer at Peenemünde, then became an ordnance lecturer in Köslin, Germany (now Koszalin, Poland) until the end of the war. In January 1945 Ehricke married Ingeborg Maria Mattull. As the Third Reich collapsed in May he returned to her in Berlin and went into hiding to escape being "recruited" by the Soviet Union. He was finally located by an American officer in 1946 and was reunited with von Braun and the other Operation Paperclip (note 2) scientists under United States Army auspices. In January 1947 Ehricke began work as a Research Engineer for the Research and Development Service of the United States Army Ordnance Corps at Ft. Bliss, TX, moving to Huntsville, AL, in 1950 when the Army transferred missile development from Ft. Bliss to Redstone Arsenal, AL. In 1952 Ehricke was recruited by Walter Dornberger (note 3), left government service for private industry, and moved to Buffalo, NY, to work as a Design Specialist at Bell Aircraft. For the next two years he worked on Bell's Orbital Glider project, a precursor to Project Dyna-Soar, the Air Force reusable boost-glide weapon system that itself prefigured NASA's Space Shuttle. In November 1954 Ehricke moved to San Diego, CA, to begin a decade-long career with what was then the Convair Division of General Dynamics. For several years he was a key figure in the development of the Convair's SM-65 Atlas ICBM and Atlas launch vehicle. NASA used the man-rated Atlas LV-3 for the orbital flights of the Mercury Program and as of this writing the Atlas V family of Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicles remains a mainstay of the United States launch vehicle inventory. Between 1959 and 1962 Ehricke directed the development of the Centaur booster, the first high-energy upper stage powered by liquid hydrogen. Although Centaur was not successfully launched until 1965, it eventually served as the upper stage for Atlas, Titan, and Delta launch vehicles and was the last stage for the Viking (Mars) and Voyager (Outer Planets) missions. During this time he also authored Space Flight, a two-volume textbook on celestial mechanics and launch vehicle design (note 4). In 1962 Ehricke became the director of the Advanced Projects Department of General Dynamics Astronautics, where he directed and contributed to studies of next-generation (Post-Saturn) launch vehicles and propulsion systems, planetary exploration programs, and post-Apollo space activities. Page 2 of 275 Krafft Arnold Ehricke Papers NASM.2003.0025 At the end of October 1965 Ehricke left General Dynamics to become the assistant director of Astrionics at the Autonetics Division of North American Aviation (note 5), later rising to become Chief Scientist in the Advanced Systems Department of North American Rockwell's Space Division (1968-1973) and Chief Scientific Advisor for Rockwell International's North American Space Operations (1973-1977). While at North American Ehricke was involved in some aspects of the Space Shuttle program but primarily worked advanced project studies, including studies relating to NASA's space station and deep space exploration programs, and culminating in a multi-year study of space industrialization which began in 1976. During this time he also acted as scientific advisor to the abortive Satellite Power Corp (1974-1976), which proposed using satellites to generate and transmit electrical power to the Earth. Ehricke retired from Rockwell in July 1977 and established Space Global Company with himself as president. Space Global was, in essence, a vehicle to promote space exploration and to promulgate his vision of a future space civilization, a concept he originally called the "Extraterrestrial Imperative" but later referred to as the "Open World Synthesis." The basic concept was relatively straightforward: because Earth's resources, although great, are limited, they place a limit on mankind's development. The only way to escape that limit is to move beyond the Earth and exploit the resources available in space. It was an argument for space exploration and colonization that Ehricke developed during the 1950s and 1960s, and finally crystallized in a manuscript he co-authored with Elizabeth Miller. Doubleday planned to publish the book in 1971, but then cancelled the project. Ehricke managed to get facets of the idea published in a number of technical journals, most notably in a four-part article in the Journal of the British Interplanetary Society (1979-1981), and gave numerous