Although Huntsville (Alabama) was founded in 1805 the area has been populated by Indians for hundreds of years prior to that. The city grew due to cotton and railroads but was fairly small until the US Army decided to build munitions plants near by. This helps balloon population and after World War II the Gulf Chemical Warfare Depot, Huntsville Arsenal and Redstone Ordnance Plant were combined into one with the name Redstone Arsenal (RSA). Several different usages of the land were tried post war (including auto manufacturing) before the Army chose RSA as the site to develop rockets and with the re-location of German Rocket Scientists to the area (including Wernher von Braun)  became a major research center. With the formation of NASA in 1960 RSA was transfered from the ARmy to the NASA and was renamed George C. Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) and lead the way to space earning Huntsville the moniker Rocket City, USA.

The Saturn 5 rocket which gave the U.S.A. the capability to go to the moon was developed here and the locals are rightfully proud of this fact. Since MSFC is still an active development site the U.S. Space & Rocket Center was created and serves as the official visitor center for MSFC. Although we have been to it several times I have been impressed be the improvements over the years, it has always had great space effort artifacts they have improved the organization and explanation of the displays. With the addition Saturn V Hall at the Davidson Center housing a real Saturn 5, more hands on exhibits and space artifacts (including Apollo 16’s Command Module) the center is a great visit for space enthusiasts. Amongst the nice additions this time were simulators where you could try to fly a Saturn 5 thru the final stages of going into orbit manually and try to dock the Apollo CSM and LM post Lunar landing. Also new this time were docents who worked on the Saturn 5 and I had a chance to talk with Alex McCool who worked on the Saturn 5, Skylab and the Space Shuttle. Very (Mc)cool.