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In this German name, the surname is Freiherr von Braun, not Braun.

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Wernher von Braun
Von Braun in 1964
Born	Wernher Magnus Maximilian, Freiherr von Braun (1912-03-23)23 March 1912 Wirsitz, Posen, Prussia, German Empire
Died	16 June 1977(1977-06-16) (aged 65) Alexandria, Virginia, U.S.
Burial place	Ivy Hill Cemetery, Alexandria, Virginia^[1]
Nationality	German
Citizenship	United States
Education	Technische Universit\u00e4t Berlin (diploma) University of Berlin (PhD)
Occupation(s)	Rocket engineer and designer, aerospace project manager
Known for	NASA engineering program manager; chief architect of the Apollo Saturn V rocket; development of the V-2 rocket for Nazi Germany
Political party	Nazi Party (1937\u20131945)
Spouse	\n Maria Luise von Quistorp \n (m. 1947)
Children	3
Parents	Magnus von Braun (father) Emmy von Quistorp (mother)
Relatives	\n Sigismund von Braun (brother) \n Magnus von Braun (brother) \n
Awards	\n President's Award for Distinguished Federal Civilian Service (1959) \n Elliott Cresson Medal (1962) \n Wilhelm Exner Medal (1969)^[2] \n National Medal of Science (1975) \n

Military career
Allegiance	Nazi Germany
Service / branch	Allgemeine SS
Years of service	1937\u20131945
Rank	SS-Sturmbannf\u00fchrer (major)
Awards	\n Knights Cross of the War Merit Cross with Swords (1944) \n War Merit Cross, First Class with Swords (1943) \n
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Scientific career
Fields	Rocket propulsion
Institutions	Wehrmacht Army Ballistic Missile Agency Redstone Arsenal NASA Fairchild Industries
Thesis	Konstruktive, theoretische und experimentelle Beitr\u00e4ge zu dem Problem der Fl\u00fcssigkeitsrakete (1934)
Doctoral advisor	Erich Schumann
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Signature

Wernher Magnus Maximilian Freiherr von Braun (US: /\u02c8v\u025c\u02d0rn\u0259r v\u0252n \u02c8bra\u028an/ VUR-n\u0259r von BROWN,^[3] German: [\u02c8v\u025b\u0281nhe\u02d0\u0250\u032f f\u0254n \u02c8b\u0281a\u028an]; 23 March 1912 – 16 June 1977) was a German-American aerospace engineer^[4] and space architect. He was a member of the Nazi Party and Allgemeine SS, the leading figure in the development of rocket technology in Nazi Germany, and later a pioneer of rocket and space technology in the United States.^[5]\n

As a young man, von Braun worked in Nazi Germany's rocket development program. He helped design and co-developed the V-2 rocket at Peenem\u00fcnde during World War II. The V-2 became the first artificial object to travel into space on 20 June 1944. Following the war, he was secretly moved to the United States, along with about 1,600 other German scientists, engineers, and technicians, as part of Operation Paperclip.^[6] He worked for the United States Army on an intermediate-range ballistic missile program, and he developed the rockets that launched the United States' first space satellite Explorer 1 in 1958. He worked with Walt Disney on a series of films, which popularized the idea of human space travel in the U.S. and beyond from 1955 to 1957.^[7]\n

In 1960, his group was assimilated into NASA, where he served as director of the newly formed Marshall Space Flight Center and as the chief architect of the Saturn V super heavy-lift launch vehicle that propelled the Apollo spacecraft to the Moon.^[8]^[9] In 1967, von Braun was inducted into the National Academy of Engineering, and in 1975, he received the National Medal of Science.\n

Von Braun is a highly controversial figure widely seen as escaping justice for his awareness of Nazi war crimes due to the Americans' desire to beat the Soviets in the Cold War.^[10]^[11]^[5] He is also sometimes described by others as the \"father of space travel\",^[12] the \"father of rocket science\",^[13] or the \"father of the American lunar program\".^[10] He advocated a human mission to Mars.\n

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v t e NASA's George C. Marshall Space Flight Center (Huntsville, Alabama)
Directors	\n von Braun \n Rees \n Petrone \n Lucas \n Thompson \n Lee \n Bridwell \n Littles \n Griner\" \n Stephenson \n King \n Lightfoot \n Goldman\" \n Henderson\" \n Scheuermann \n
Projects	\n Space Shuttle Propulsion \n International Space Station \n Chandra X-ray Observatory \n Gravity Probe B \n Project Constellation \n Ares I \n Ares V \n Orion \n
NRHP sites	\n Neutral Buoyancy Simulator \n Propulsion and Structural Test Facility \n Redstone Test Stand \n Saturn V Dynamic Test Stand \n Saturn V Dynamic Test Vehicle \n
Other	\n Operation Paperclip\n list of scientists \n ABMA \n Redstone Arsenal \n Redstone Rocket \n U.S. Space & Rocket Center \n
\" acting director only

v t e Systems engineering
Subfields	\n Aerospace engineering \n Biological systems engineering \n Cognitive systems engineering \n Configuration management \n Earth systems engineering and management \n Electrical engineering \n Enterprise systems engineering \n Health systems engineering \n Performance engineering \n Reliability engineering \n Safety engineering \n Sociocultural Systems Engineering \n
Processes	\n Requirements engineering \n Functional specification \n System integration \n Verification and validation \n Design review \n System of systems engineering \n
Concepts	\n Business process \n Fault tolerance \n System \n System lifecycle \n V-Model \n Systems development life cycle \n
Tools	\n Decision-making \n Function modelling \n IDEF \n Optimization \n Quality function deployment \n Spare part \n System dynamics \n Systems Modeling Language \n Systems analysis \n Systems modeling \n Work breakdown structure \n
People	\n James S. Albus \n Ruzena Bajcsy \n Benjamin S. Blanchard \n Wernher von Braun \n Kathleen Carley \n Harold Chestnut \n Wolt Fabrycky \n Barbara Grosz \n Arthur David Hall III \n Derek Hitchins \n Robert E. Machol \n Radhika Nagpal \n Simon Ramo \n Joseph Francis Shea \n Katia Sycara \n Manuela M. Veloso \n John N. Warfield \n
Related fields	\n Control engineering \n Computer engineering \n Industrial engineering \n Operations research \n Project management \n Quality management \n Risk management \n Software engineering \n
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Authority control databases $\"Edit$
International	ISNI VIAF FAST WorldCat
National	Germany United States France BnF data Japan Australia Czech Republic Spain Portugal Netherlands Norway Croatia Greece Sweden Poland 2 Vatican Israel Belgium
Academics	CiNii Mathematics Genealogy Project
Artists	MusicBrainz
People	Trove Deutsche Biographie DDB
Other	IdRef NARA SNAC 2

Early life

German career

Involvement with the Nazi regime

Nazi Party membership

Membership in the Allgemeine-SS

Work under Nazi regime

Experiments with rocket aircraft

Slave labor

Arrest and release by the Nazi regime

Surrender to the Americans

American career

U.S. Army career

Popular concepts for a human presence in space

Religious conversion

Concepts for orbital warfare

NASA career

Career after NASA

Engineering philosophy

Personal life

Death

Recognition and critique

Summary of SS career

Dates of rank

Honors

In popular culture

Published works

See also

References

Sources

Additional reading

External links

Wernher von Braun

Talks

Wernher von Braun's Talks