Southern California: Aerospace Capital of the World (Los Angeles, Anaheim: credit, neighborhood)

[Charles]

Hope everyone had a chance to see (or can see a repeat of) the Endeavor launch to the International Space Station (ISS) today. If not, find NASA-TV. Excellent video - Angelenos should be proud - a lot of that hardware is yours (ours). Shuttle development started in the early 1970s. Space Shuttle, SS Main Engines, ISS, avionics, thermal systems, solar arrays, etc. Much of that work originated in Canoga Park, Downey, and Huntington Beach. Most of that work has since moved to Houston.

Much of that (and heritage) technology originates in SoCal: Downey, El Segundo, Palmdale, Woodland Hills, Redondo Beach, Seal Beach, Burbank (Skunk Works), Canoga Park, Huntington Beach...the contributions of these and many other towns is endless. Think about Lockheed in Burbank, the legendary F-1 rocket engine (1.5 million pounds of thrust, kerosene & LOX) and the J-2 (liquid H2 & LOX) built at Rocketdyne Canoga Park for the Apollo moon missions, Hughes (now Boeing) satellites, TRW (now Northrop Grumman), Raytheon, Litton's (now Northrop Grumman) navigation systems. There is a lot of pride in SoCal aerospace folks. Teledyne, Autonetics (now Boeing Anaheim), just can't mention them all....

Recommended reading for all those SoCal engineers out there:

Amazon.com: Angle of Attack: Harrison Storms and the Race to the Moon: Books: Mike Gray

Amazon.com: Failure is not an Option: Mission Control from Mercury to Apollo 13 and Beyond: Books: Gene Kranz

Amazon.com: Flight My Life in Mission Control: Books: Christopher Kraft,Chris Kraft

Amazon.com: Wernher von Braun: The Man Who Sold the Moon: Books: Dennis Piszkiewicz

These books describe the challenges of the day to day activities of engineers working in Downey and El Segundo and the Apollo 1 fire disaster and also the challenges of Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo. If you are an engineer living in SoCal these days, read these books. Table tops, no Pentiums, config management is by hand, data centers were in buildings and rooms and not on hard drives....mind boggling...how in the heck did they ever put a man on the moon????

[Caliguy2007]

That's really interesting,and it's also nice to see a Coloradoan giving us Californians credit and not Bashing us

California in my opinion should've been the Headquarters for NASA and their Space Shuttle Launches.

[BeenAroundTheBlock]

I saw the launch from my backyard yesterday! Very cool!

[Charles]

Originally Posted by Caliguy2007

That's really interesting,and it's also nice to see a Coloradoan giving us Californians credit and not Bashing us

California in my opinion should've been the Headquarters for NASA and their Space Shuttle Launches.

I think Johnson Space Center (previously called Manned Spacecraft Center) was placed in Houston because (then) Senator Lyndon Johnson was from Texas - politics. Also, in order to get huge programs like Apollo funded, there has to be a certain amount of spreading of the wealth. Los Angeles had been (and still is) well represented as so many of the NASA contractors were in Southern California.

At one point Space Shuttles were to be launched at both Kennedy Space Center and Vandenberg Air Force Base. Some of the mammoth Delta IV rockets (using the Rocketdyne RS-68 booster) are launched from VAFB now. Might be something to check out someday.

Below, a night launch of a Delta IV rocket at Vandenberg.

[UB50]

I grew up near Kennedy Space Center so I thought the world revolved around that. Everyone scientific and all the smart people lived THERE!

I've been educated in the last bunch of years.

[Charles]

Niche post for aerospace folks. Just was made aware of this book. It explains how cities like Los Angeles, Seattle, New England, and Denver/Colorado Springs were able to make it big in the aerospace industry. I haven't read it yet but I have an ILL request on it. It's probably at LAPL or LA County Library.

Amazon.com: The Rise of the Gunbelt: The Military Remapping of Industrial America: Books: Ann Markusen,Peter Hall,Scott Campbell,Sabina Deitrick

Below is the best book I have ever read on aerospace in the Los Angeles region:

Amazon.com: Angle of Attack: Harrison Storms and the Race to the Moon: Books: Mike Gray

[Charles]

This means 15000 jobs for Southern California

Military contracts boost prospects for Northrop — and Southern California - Los Angeles Times

Use Bugmenot.com - login with these free web passwords to bypass compulsory registration for logins and passwords if necessary (you might have to try more than one)

It's a great time to be an engineer (until perhaps the election)

[Caliguy2007]

This is great news

Originally Posted by Charles

This means 15000 jobs for Southern California

Military contracts boost prospects for Northrop — and Southern California - Los Angeles Times

Use Bugmenot.com - login with these free web passwords to bypass compulsory registration for logins and passwords if necessary (you might have to try more than one)

It's a great time to be an engineer (until perhaps the election)

[JTGJR]

Welcome to my neighborhood . . . Northrup, Hughes, TRW, Raytheon, etc. El Segundo- daytime population 120,000 . . . nighttime population 16,700. We love those tax dollars too!

[Charles]

Originally Posted by JTGJR

Welcome to my neighborhood . . . Northrup, Hughes, TRW, Raytheon, etc. El Segundo- daytime population 120,000 . . . nighttime population 16,700. We love those tax dollars too!

Hughes? TRW? That's ancient history - the glory years - but I guess these are the glory years too.

I think the Hughes Research Lab up on Malibu Canyon Road retained the Hughes name. My dad worked for Hughes in El Segundo and Van Nuys in the 1960s. Thompson, Ramo, Wooldridge turned into Northrop Grumman, (Mission Systems I think).

Hughes Aircraft - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

TRW - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia