Jet Propulsion Laboratory (U.S.) Office of the Director.

Managed for NASA by the California Institute of Technology, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) is the lead U.S. center for robotic exploration of the solar system. JPL spacecraft have visited all known planets except Pluto. In addition to its work for NASA, JPL conducts tasks for a variety of other federal agencies.

JPL's main 177-acre site is at the foot of the San Gabriel Mountains near Pasadena, California, 12 miles northeast of Los Angeles. In addition, JPL manages the worldwide Deep Space Network, which communicates with spacecraft and conducts scientific investigations from its complexes in California's Mojave Desert near Goldstone; near Madrid, Spain; and near Canberra, Australia.

At the end of each year, JPL has sponsored awards ceremonies for persons or groups of people responsible for JPL's achievements for that year. This gives JPL employees an opportunity to congratulate their colleagues for a job well done. Also, awards are given to missions or projects, often at their conclusion. NASA has also made specific awards as well.

JPL has sponsored retirement parties for key individual engineers and scientists where their accomplishments have been recounted. JPL also sponsors groundbreakings and dedication ceremonies for new buildings as well as celebrating the anniversaries of major space flight projects.

From the description of JPL Awards and Dedication Ceremony Collection 1972-1998. (Jet Propulsion Laboratory Library and Archives). WorldCat record id: 733100295