Oct 30 1965
From The Space Library
U.S. Geological Survey, on behalf of NASA, had prepared geologic interpretative maps of approximately 3,000,000 sq, mi. of the moon's surface. These maps, prepared by astrogeologists at Flagstaff, Ariz, were part of a program to aid manned exploration of the lunar surface. Dr. Eugene Shoemaker, chief of the Astrogeology Branch, had been designated by NASA as the principal scientist for Project Surveyor spacecraft, He would make a geologic analysis of photographs of the lunar surface which would be made during a "soft" landing of instruments. (NYT, 10/30/65, 14)
NASA Administrator James E. Webb, in dedicating Boeing's new Space Simulation Facility at Kent, Wash, said NASA planned to increase its aeronautical research, Webb pointed out that while the industry-Government relationship sometimes appeared to be that of vender and buyer, it was actually a partnership with all of its problems. Significant influences on this partnership in recent years had included: the demand on industry for faster rates of technical advance; the increased complexity and technical difficulty of major programs with consequent delays and cost overruns; the decreasing volume of production work and increasing volume of research and development contracts; the steady increase in the requirements for technical and program management personnel; the requirement for Government to better define its objectives and requirements; the emphasis in the procuring agencies on increasing competition at all stages, including research and development; changes in contracting methods which offered more incentives but imposed more risk on contractors; and necessary increases in Government controls on configuration, quality, and on financial data in multiple contract, large and long-lead-time projects. (Text)
Application to "Spudnik 1" - a potato in orbit - of his theory of biological rhythms was explained by Prof. Frank A. Brown, Jr., biologist at Northwestern Univ. in an interview with the New York Times. About two thirds of the way to the moon, the earth's magnetic field and other earth-related forces that might help run the biological clock, including gravity, electrostatic fields, and barometric pressure, would be absent, he said. Suggesting that NASA orbit a potato, he added, "If the potato dies, it [the space program] better be checked before a marl is sent out there." (Wehrein, NYT, 10/31/65, 73)
U.S. would install new equipment costing an estimated $5 million at one of its three satellite tracking stations in the Pretoria area of South Africa. Arrival of the expensive new equipment was taken by observers as a sign that NASA officials were determined to hold on to the stations, Possibility that they might be closed had been raised last summer when Prime Minister Hendrik F. Verwoerd had said American Negroes could not be assigned to the stations. American officials insisted they had accepted no racial restriction on their personnel in South Africa. (NYT, 10/31/65, 12)
Telephone calls between two Moscow city exchanges would be routed soon over a three-mile-long laser beam, the newspaper Trud reported. The laser link, developed by the Soviet Central Scientific Research Institute of Communications, was already in experimental use. (NYT, 10/31/65, 26)
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