The NASA-AMES Research Center was founded by NASA in 1941 to conduct experiments in advanced avionics, space vehicle design, robotic exploration of the solar system, and space medicine.
Timeline
1941AN XB-28 model being prepared for wind tunnel testing in 1941.1943Construction proceeds on the 40- by 80-foot wind tunnel in 1943 while a Navy patrol blimp hovers in the background.1947First to fly faster than the speed of sound-on October 14, 1947-the XS-1 with then Captain Charles Yeager at the controls.1949The Reeves Electronic Analog Computer (REAC), the first electronic computing machine at Ames, was acquired in 1949 to perform control simulation analyses.1952H. Julian Allen, Ames second director and the originator of the blunt-body concept used for the first Earth reentry vehicles (Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo).1961The famed rocket-powered X-15 aircraft was flown by Ames-Dryden to an altitude of 354,000 feet and 6.7 times the speed of sound.1963An early reentry vehicle concept, the M2F2, being tested for low speed landing in the 40x80 wind tunnel.1965Pioneer spacecraft begins planetary exploration.19651968First digital fly-by-wire aircraft control system in the United States.1972Artist concept of a Pioneer spacecraft over Jupiter. Both Pioneer 10 and 11 flew past that planet and returned the first close-up pictures.1975First flight of Kuiper C-141 Airborne Observatory infrared astronomy platform.1976First oblique-wing research aircraft.1977The XV-15 tilt-rotor-the efficiency of a fixed-wing, turboprop aircraft with the vertical flight capability of a helicopter-achieves high speed forward flight with vertical takeoff and landing.1981The Dryden Flight Research Facility, with numerous runways several miles long on its dry lake beds, is a major Space Shuttle landing site.1985Ultraviolt image of Halley's Comet obtained by pioneer venus when the comet was close to perihelion.1989Launching of the Galileo probe, designed at Ames. To descend into Jupiter's atmosphere in 1995. 1990First lauch of the winded, 3-stage rocket Pegasus, from Ames B-52 aircraft. The first time a payload was launched by a privately developed space booster.1991One of a chain of sinkholes, whose detection by remote sensing imagery led to discovering the outline of a buried crater rim in the Yucatan Peninsula.1995Galileo Probe enters atmosphere of the giant planet Jupiter.From the guide to the NASA-AMES Research Center Publications, (Stanford University. Libraries. Dept. of Special Collections.)