Goddard Launches First Liquid Rocket: Space Age Begins

Robert Goddard launched the world's first liquid-fueled rocket from a farm in Auburn, Massachusetts, on March 16, 1926. The rocket, powered by liquid oxygen and gasoline, flew for 2.5 seconds, reached an altitude of 41 feet, and landed 184 feet from the launch pad. The entire flight lasted less time than it takes to read this sentence. Nobody except Goddard's wife Esther and two university colleagues witnessed it. The local newspaper did not cover the launch. Goddard had been ridiculed since 1920, when the New York Times editorial board mocked his suggestion that rockets could work in the vacuum of space, declaring he lacked 'the knowledge ladled out daily in high schools.' The Times printed a retraction in 1969, the day after Apollo 11 launched for the Moon. Goddard died in 1945 without seeing his vindication. His 214 patents formed the foundation of modern rocketry, and NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center bears his name. Wernher von Braun acknowledged that 'his rockets worked beautifully, and that was before we had any rockets at all.'