Atlas The ICBM (1957)

Atlas The ICBM by Lookout Mountain Laboratory, 1352nd Photographic Group Publication date 1957

[emmettturner]

5:55 “our B-52s, and on to the B-58.”

…and here we still have the B-52 in service in 2022.

[ericfermin]

My dad was a janitor at the Martin plant in Denver. He used to tell me great stories about his role is the design, testing, and manufacture of critical parts of this missile. I followed his great footsteps and today, proudly work in the custodial department in Hawthorne for SpaceX doing the same critical part in the space program that my father did. I hope my son (or daughter) caries on our family's legacy in the space program.

[HiSteOfMnd]

Man I love this type of historical documentary.

[a-a-ronbrowser]

Smoking on a pipe while guiding the massive rocket into place… the good ol days

[blurglide]

LOL- the part where they complain it takes a few years to develop an entirely new technology. They were SO fast back then!

[JAGRAFX]

I was enployed at Convair Division of General Dynamics in their Launch Vehicle Programs. We pretty much knew that the old "A-4" (political name "V-2) was an alcohol/LOX machine that was limited by design and low engine thrust. Convair began its MX-774 as a conceptual proof-of-concept project but was cancelled in the late 1940's. When re-energized as the Atlas; the newer machine would have had four booster engines plus the center sustainer. Subsequent nuclear weapon designs in the early 1950's permitted a much smaller warhead design which resulted in an accordant reduction in design capability with only two booster engines combined with the single sustainer and two small verneer engines for added stability and fine adjustment for targeting. We would visit the ultra-modern new manufacturing facility on Kearny Mesa in San Diego in mid-1958; many of us amazed at the oversll scope of what was to be one of the largest procurements ever attempted by the Air Force. A sense of urgency was present among us all. At some point Gus (Virgil) Grissom was asked to speak to us all on the vehicle final assembly floor. The self-concious Grissom could only blurt out the words: "Do good work." Those three words from the new astronaut rang through the packed assembly like lightning ⚡ with the audience of workers erupting in chears as well as just plain screaming just hearing the voice of one of the men who would eventually fly on one of our vehicles. What eventually became the annual "Do Good Work" pledge was signed by all employees. Atlas would eventually become a sub-obital & orbital workhorse and by the '70's an Atlas/Centaur launch vehicle would boost our first spacecraft to Jupiter as part of the Pioneer Project for NASA.

[Xaerorazor]

My grandfather (passed in ‘02)was with Convair and was a test engineer, he worked on heat shielding testing mainly, and did many tests for the Atlas and subsequent programs.

[Kidapollos]

The Congressional Record shows that on the day of that first successful flight, Dec 17, 1957 I believe, Gen. Schriever was testifying before Senator Johnson's subcommittee, and was asked if we had had a successful test of the Atlas. Just then an aide brought word of the successful test, and Schriever was able to answer with a resounding "yes."

[joeclark]

I love watching old press releases like this and imagining I’m living in that era and hearing about all of this for the first time

[johnt.]

Thanks for posting this. It shows how much today we take any technology for granted.

[Daud]

My late father worked on missiles (and later guided missiles) in South Africa. He was also worked on nuclear missiles that were built at the back of a shop which had a front of a motorcycle repair business. He would have enjoyed this documentary. Thank you for this upload. It is most interesting.

[drott]

Love the cigarettes. The mini-ICBM for your lungs.

[spaceranger]

One of the things that made Atlas a good launch vehicle was having all five engines (outboard, inboard, and vernier) light up at once so you could confirm everything was running before committing to launch. The "breakthrough" in warhead design was the Castle Bravo test in the Marshalls when it was discovered that the Teller-Ulam lithium deuteride design exploded with two and a half times the expected yield, causing a lot of unexpected damage and allowing the warheads to get to weaponable size. I read that the early launch failures were due to the turbopump bearings failing under the acceleration loads at launch.

[marcdonato]

My mom worked for RCA West Coast Missile and Surface Radar Division in Van Nuys CA in 1959/60. They did a lot of work for the Navy and Air Force back then...

[josephpiskac]

I grew up during the 1950s and I love the Atlas Rocket. Extremely unique design.

[ambrose]

The Russians kept pace by approving of the R-7 ICBM program in 1954 with the first launch in 1957 and operational deployment in 1959. We were just in the nick of time with Atlas.

[GamePlayShare]

Thanks for not putting a HUGE watermark like others do!

[danielneuenschwander]

My dad worked for GD Convair from 1955 to 1963, when he transferred to GD Pomona Division. During late 1961 & 1962 we were in Oklahoma based out of Altus AFB where he worked at various sites qualifying the Atlas missile installations prior to delivery to the USAF. Great memories of some of the trial runs they would do allowing the public to see the silo doors open, the rising of the missile fully fueled, and then lowering it back down. Thank the Lord we never had to fire those in anger or retaliation.

[kamakaziozzie]

Between the awesome acting chops of the lady at 2:45 and the fact they made sure everyone was smoking in those natural clips of everyday conversation, I’d say this is a pretty good representation of the 1950’s 👍

[BlueSky-ubfx]

Thanks, for keeping the parts outside of the 4:3 frame black! 👍👍