Abstract
Ronald Reagan, an actor-turned politician, was elected U.S. president in November 1980. He brought to the presidency a belief in American exceptionalism, an optimistic view of the future, and a fascination with technological progress. Told that the U.S. civilian space program was at “crossroads,” there was a hope that Reagan would put it on a positive future path.
“Space truly is the last frontier.”
Ronald Reagan, handwritten diary entry, June 11, 1985
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Notes
- 1.
Richard Darman, Who’s in Control? Polar Politics and the Sensible Center (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1996), 28.
- 2.
Jimmy Carter: “Address to the Nation on Energy and National Goals: ‘The Malaise Speech,’” July 15, 1979. Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, APP, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=32596. Although this address became noted as “The Malaise Speech,” Carter did not use that word in his talk. The description of Ronald Reagan is from Steven Hayward, “Ronald Reagan: Conservative Statesman,” June 4, 2013, 4, The Heritage Foundation, Washington, DC, http://www.heritage.org/political-process/report/Ronald-reagan-conservative-statesman.
- 3.
These sentences were contained in the NASA transition team report prepared for president-elect Ronald Reagan by a team led by George M. Low. Letter from George Low to Richard Fairbanks, Director, Transition Resources and Development Group, December 19, 1980, with attached transition team report, papers of George M. Low, Folsom Library, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY. The quoted passages are from 3–5 of the report.
- 4.
Among these studies are Donald Baucom, The Origins of SDI: 1944–1983 (Lawrence, KS: University of Kansas Press, 1992); Frances Fitzgerald, Way Out There in the Blue: Star Wars and the End of the Cold War (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2001); Nigel Hey, The Star Wars Enigma: Behind the Scenes of the Cold War Race for Missile Defense (Washington: Potomac Books, 2006); Edward Reiss, The Strategic Defense Initiative (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992); and Sanford Lakoff and Herbert York, A Shield in Space? Technology, Politics, and the Strategic Defense Initiative (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1989).
- 5.
Andrew J. Butrica, Single Stage to Orbit: Politics, Technology, and the Quest for Reusable Rocketry (Baltimore, MD; The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2003), 13. For a discussion of Kennedy’s motivations in setting the lunar landing goal, see John M. Logsdon, John F. Kennedy and the Race to the Moon (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010). Ronald Reagan: “Remarks at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas,” September 22, 1988. Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, APP, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=34875.
- 6.
This study is, of course, not a comprehensive account of Ronald Reagan’s life or of the Reagan administration. There are a large number of books that provide such an account and assessment. Among these, I have particularly depended on: Richard Reeves, President Reagan: The Triumph of Imagination (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2005); Steven F. Hayward, The Age of Reagan: The Conservative Counterrevolution, 1980–1989 (New York: Three Rivers Press, 2009); H.W. Brands, Reagan: The Life (New York,: Doubleday, 2015); Lou Cannon, President Reagan: The Role of a Lifetime (New York: Public Affairs, 2000);W. Elliott Brownlee and Hugh Davis Graham, eds. The Reagan Presidency: Pragmatic Conservatism & Its Legacies (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2003); and Jacob Weisberg, Ronald Reagan (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 2016). The quote is from the last of these books, 34.
- 7.
The phrase “role of a lifetime” is the subtitle of Cannon, President Reagan; David Gergen, Eyewitness to Power: The Essence of Leadership, Nixon to Clinton (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2000), 244; Reeves, President Reagan, xiii, xvi.
- 8.
Oral history Interview with Howard Baker, August 24, 2004, Miller Center of Public Affairs, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA, https://millercenter.org/the-presidency/presidential-oral-histories/howard-h-baker-jr-oral-history-senate-majority-leader, 6–7.
- 9.
Cannon, President Reagan, 8.
- 10.
Reeves, President Reagan, xii-xiv; Hugh Heclo, “Ronald Reagan and the American Public Philosophy,” in Brownlee and Graham, eds., The Reagan Presidency, 17–37; Nancy Reagan with William Novak, My Turn: The Memoirs of Nancy Reagan (New York: Random House, 1989), 113.
- 11.
For a critical assessment of the Reagan presidency, see Haynes Johnson, Sleepwalking Through History: America in the Reagan Years (New York: Anchor Books, Doubleday, 1991).
- 12.
Howell Raines, “Reagan Sees Launching on TV at White House,” NYT, April 13, 1981, A11. Ronald Reagan: “Address Before a Joint Session of the Congress on the Program for Economic Recovery,” April 28, 1981. Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, APP, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=43756. “The President’s Vision,” The Washington Star, May 15, 1981, A13.
- 13.
Ronald Reagan, “The Building of America,” Popular Mechanics, July 1986, 107. Ronald Reagan: “Address at Commencement Exercises at the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colorado,” May 30, 1984. Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, APP, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=39979. Ronald Reagan: “Address Before a Joint Session of the Congress on the State of the Union,” January 25, 1984. Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, APP, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=40205.
- 14.
Ronald Reagan, The Reagan Diaries, edited by Douglas Brinkley (New York: Harper Collins, 2007), 334.
- 15.
Interview with Robert McFarlane, April 22, 2016.
- 16.
Cannon, President Reagan, 179, 40–42; interview with Edwin Meese, October 12, 2016; Ronald Reagan: “Address to the 42d Session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York, New York,” September 21, 1987. Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, APP, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=34823.
- 17.
Letter from George Low to Richard Fairbanks, Director, Transition Resources and Development Group, December 19, 1980, with attached transition team report, papers of George M. Low, Folsom Library, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY. The quoted passages are from 3 to 5 of the report and Low’s transmittal letter. Low was president of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in 1980. Other members of the transition team were Burton Edelson, COMSAT General; Frederick Haise, Grumman Aerospace; James Head, Brown University; Noel Hinners, National Air and Space Museum; Gerald Jenks, staff, U.S. House of Representatives; Gerald Kovach, staff, U.S. Senate; Robert Monks, The Boston Company; Richard Muller, Chrysler Corporation; Susan Perry, National Academy of Sciences; General Samuel Phillips, TRW; and John Young, American University.
- 18.
Ibid, 6; Howard McCurdy, The Space Station Decision: Incremental Politics and Technological Choice (Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1990), 41. For a discussion of John F. Kennedy’s approach to space, see John M. Logsdon, John F. Kennedy and the Race to the Moon (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010).
- 19.
For a discussion of the “Nixon space doctrine” and other aspects to post-Apollo decisions, see John M. Logsdon, After Apollo? Richard Nixon and the American Space Program (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015). The quoted passage is on p. 115.
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Logsdon, J.M. (2019). A Cowboy Comes to Washington. In: Ronald Reagan and the Space Frontier. Palgrave Studies in the History of Science and Technology. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-98962-4_1
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