John Bruce Medaris
John Bruce Medaris (12 May 1902 – 11 July 1990) was an officer in the United States Army during World War II and post-war government administrator overseeing development of ballistic missiles.
Under his supervision, Wernher von Braun and the German rocket team brought to the USA through Operation Paperclip developed the Jupiter missile in 1958.
After the Battle of Kasserine Pass, now a colonel, Medaris led the effort to secure emergency resupply while his ordnance teams worked to repair tanks and guns.
During the Battle of Normandy he dealt with an exploding ammunition dump and severe shortages after a storm destroyed the Mulberry harbour constructed off Omaha Beach.
Medaris estimated his crews would need 500 tons of welding rod to outfit the armored divisions and persuaded the general and Pentagon to supply them.
Finally, Medaris was responsible for selecting the location for the main ordnance dump that supplied the Allied assault across the Rhine River into Germany.
After the Korean armistice in July 1953 Medaris turned his attention to the newest category of ordnance – guided missiles – only to be frustrated that the Army seemed to be losing out to the other services.
He was contemplating retirement a third time when the Army promoted him to two-star general and asked him to take command of the 1,600 scientists and engineers at the Redstone Arsenal effective 1 February 1956.
A distinguished delegation including Secretary of Defense Neil McElroy was visiting Redstone Arsenal on 4 October when news flashed that the Soviets had launched Sputnik 1.
"[citation needed] On 3 November the Soviets launched Sputnik 2 with a payload of 1,100 pounds, proving they now had the capability to visit nuclear destruction on North America.
Senator Lyndon B. Johnson presided over sensational hearings to inquire how it was the United States was losing the "space race" to the Soviet Union.
The Huntsville team assembled the Juno launch system, which was a Redstone with small upper stages, at Cape Canaveral only to be thwarted by high winds until the evening of 31 January 1958, when the countdown was completed and the rocket arced perfectly into the night.
Ninety minutes later, confirmation came from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory's radar station in California that Explorer 1, America's first satellite, was transmitting from orbit.
He advocated tirelessly in favor of keeping the ABMA team intact within a single, unified military and civilian space program so as to minimize redundancy, bureaucracy, and waste.
The Eisenhower administration chose instead to divide the space program between military and civilian agencies and among the armed services restricting the Army to short-range rockets.
In July 1958 Congress created a new agency, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, and gave it responsibility for all scientific programs and non-military launch vehicles.
