Building rockets on the moon: A history of the Department of Aerospace Engineering at Mississippi State University, 1933--1960

The focus of this study is the emergence and subsequent growth of the Department of Aerospace Engineering at Mississippi State with special attention to the instrumental figures in the department's history and its role in the military-industrial-academic complex. Through the use of primary sources, particularly oral history interviews with subjects who were present throughout this period, the study provides clear insight into the department's growth.; Specifically, the overall objective of the study is to determine how and why such an efficient and influential staff of teachers and researchers could emerge in the face of opposition and out of a debt-ridden state such as Mississippi. The results of this research conclude that the department thrived due to the innovative minds it employed and their ability to acquire federal funding.