The George C. Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) is the U.S. government's civilian rocketry and spacecraft propulsion research center. The largest NASA center, MSFC's first mission was developing the Saturn launch vehicles for the Apollo moon program. Marshall has been the agency's lead center for Space Shuttle propulsion and its external tank; payloads and related crew training; International Space Station (ISS) design and assembly; and computers, networks, and information management. Located on the Redstone Arsenal near Huntsville, Alabama, MSFC is named in honor of General of the Army George Marshall.

The center also contains the Huntsville Operations Support Center (HOSC), a facility that supports ISS launch, payload and experiment activities at the Kennedy Space Center. The HOSC also monitors rocket launches from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station when a Marshall Center payload is on board.

After the end of the war with Germany in May 1945, a program was initiated to bring to the United States a number of scientist and engineers who had been at the center of Germany's advanced military technologies. The largest and best-known activity was called Operation Paperclip. In August 1945, 127 missile specialists led by Wernher von Braun signed work contracts with the U.S. Army's Ordnance Corps. Most of them had worked on the V-2 missile development under von Braun at Peenemnde. Von Braun and the other Germans were sent to Fort Bliss, Texas, joining the Army's newly formed Research and Development Division Sub-office (Rocket).

For the next five years, von Braun and the German scientists and engineers were primarily engaged in adapting and improving the V-2 missile for U.S. applications; testing was conducted at nearby White Sands Proving Grounds, New Mexico. Von Braun had long had a great interest in rocketry for space science and exploration. Toward this, he was allowed to use a WAC Corporal rocket as a second stage for a V-2; the combination, called Bumper, reached a record-breaking 250 miles (400km) altitude.[1]

During World War II, the production and storage of ordnance shells was conducted by three arsenals nearby to Huntsville, Alabama. After the war, these were mainly closed, and the three areas were combined to form Redstone Arsenal. In October 1948, the Chief of Ordnance designated Redstone Arsenal as the center of research and development activities in free-flight rockets and related items, and the following June, the Ordnance Rocket Center was opened. A year later, the Secretary of the Army approved the transfer of the rocket research and development activities from Fort Bliss to the new center at Redstone Arsenal. Beginning in April 1950, about 1,000 persons were involved in the transfer, including von Braun's group. At this time, R&D responsibility for guided missiles was added, and studies began on a medium-range guided missile that eventually became the Redstone rocket.

Over the next decade, the missile development on Redstone Arsenal greatly expanded. Many small free-flight and guided rockets were developed, and work on the Redstone rocket got underway. Although this rocket was primarily intended for military purposes, von Braun kept space firmly in his mind, and published a widely read article on this subject.[2] In mid-1952, the Germans who had initially worked under individual contracts were converted to Civil Service employees, and in 1954-55, most became U.S. citizens. Von Braun was appointed Chief of the Guided Missile Development Division.[3]

In September 1954, von Braun proposed using the Redstone as the main booster of a multi-stage rocket for launching artificial satellites. A year later, a study for Project Orbiter was completed, detailing plans and schedules for a series of scientific satellites. The Army's official role in the U.S. space satellite program was delayed, however, after higher authorities elected to use the Vanguard rocket then being developed by the Naval Research Laboratory (NRL).

In February 1956, the Army Ballistic Missile Agency (ABMA) was established; von Braun was the director of the Development Operations Division. One of the primary programs was a 1,500-mile (2,400km), single-stage missile that was started the previous year; intended for both the U.S. Army and U.S. Navy, this was designated the PGM-19 Jupiter. Guidance component testing for this Jupiter intermediate range ballistic missile (IRBM) began in March 1956 on a modified Redstone missile dubbed Jupiter A while re-entry vehicle testing began in September 1956 on a Redstone with spin-stabilized upper stages named Jupiter-C. The first Jupiter IRBM flight took place from Cape Canaveral in March 1957 with the first successful flight to full range on 31 May.[4] Jupiter was eventually taken over by the U.S. Air Force. The ABMA developed Jupiter-C was composed of a Redstone rocket first stage and two upper stages for RV tests or three upper stages for Explorer satellite launches. ABMA had originally planned the 20 September 1956 flight as a satellite launch but, by direct intervention of Eisenhower, was limited to the use of 2 upper stages for an RV test flight traveling 3,350 miles (5,390km) and attaining an altitude of 682 miles (1,098km). While the Jupiter C capability was such that it could have placed the fourth stage in orbit, that mission had been assigned to the NRL.[5][6] Later Jupiter-C flights would be use to launch satellites.

The Soviet Union launched Sputnik 1, the first man-made earth satellite, on October 4, 1957. This was followed on November 3 with the second satellite, Sputnik 2. The United States attempted a satellite launch on December 6, using the NRL's Vanguard rocket, but it barely struggled off the ground, then fell back and exploded. On January 31, 1958, after finally receiving permission to proceed, von Braun and the ABMA pace evelopment team used a Jupiter C in a Juno I configuration (addition of a fourth stage) to successfully place Explorer 1, the first American satellite, into orbit around the earth.

Effective at the end of March 1958, the U.S. Army Ordnance Missile Command (AOMC), was established at Redstone Arsenal. This encompassed the ABMA and its newly operational space programs. In August, AOMC and Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA, a Department of Defense organization) jointly initiated a program managed by ABMA to develop a large space booster of approximately 1.5-million-pounds.thrust using a cluster of available rocket engines. In early 1959, this vehicle was designated Saturn.

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