Electronics Research Center

During the Apollo era, the ERC helped foster NASA's electronics expertise, and also served as a hub for graduate and postgraduate training within a regional alliance of government, industry, and university organizations.

The Center took over the administration of contracts, grants, and other NASA business in New England previously housed at the North Eastern Operations Office.

Research at the ERC was conducted in ten laboratories: Researchers investigated such areas as microwave and laser communications; the miniaturization and radiation resistance of electronic components, guidance and control systems, photovoltaic energy conversion, information display devices, instrumentation, and computers and data processing.

Webb saw it as fulfilling a broader mission as part of the nation's Cold War struggle on the economic and intellectual battleground of the Space Race.

Between 1967 and 1970, NASA cut permanent civil service workers at all Centers with one exception, the ERC, whose personnel grew annually.

A thesis written for the MIT Sloan School of Management is the only known work that deals solely with the facility's closing.