New Moons Rising - GPS Declassified: From Smart Bombs to Smartphones - page 3

Fig. 1.1. Roger Easton ( upper right ) and Martin Votaw ( below, seated ) look on as the National
Air and Space Museum's David Devorkin opens the Vanguard tv-3 satellite in 2008, dur-
ing a fiftieth anniversary gathering. Chris Hagen, son of Vanguard Project director John P.
Hagen, points at the artifact. (Courtesy Roger Easton Jr.)
Bad Press
While Vanguard personnel busied themselves repairing the launch facility and
readying a backup rocket, the public reacted with panic. The incident plunged
the nation, already in a state of high anxiety following the Soviet Union's two
successful Sputnik launches, on October 4 and November 3, into a period of
humiliation, second guessing, finger pointing, and political jockeying. “Van-
guard Rocket Burns on Beach; Failure to Launch Test Satellite Assailed as Blow
to U.S. Prestige,” read the headline in the New York Times the next morning. 10
“Oh What a Flopnik!” chided the London Daily Herald . 11 “How about some