National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Mining & Minerals - Evaluations / Off-World Exploration, Mining, & Technology

Date posted: 05/26/13

NASA vision: To reach for new heights and reveal the unknown so that what we do and learn will benefit all humankind. To do that, thousands of people have been working around the world and off of it for 50 years, trying to answer some basic questions. What is out there in space? How do we get there? What will we find? What can we learn there, or learn just by trying to get there, that will make life better here on Earth? President Dwight D. Eisenhower established the National Aeronautics and Space Administration in 1958, partially in response to the Soviet Union launch of the first artificial satellite the previous year. NASA grew out of the National Advisory Committee on Aeronautics (NACA), which had been researching flight technology for more than 40 years. President John F. Kennedy focused NASA and the nation on sending astronauts to the moon by the end of the 1960s. Through the Mercury and Gemini projects, NASA developed the technology and skills it needed for the journey. On July 20, 1969, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first of 12 men to walk on the moon, meeting Kennedy's challenge.