N. F. Ness

Bartol Research Institute, University of Delaware, Newark

Webster's Third International Dictionary defines pioneer several ways: as a noun, "...one that begins or helps develop something new and prepares a way for others to follow," or as an active verb "...to open or prepare, as a way or a region, for others to follow, i.e., explore." It was my good fortune to become part of the pioneering efforts of the U.S. space program at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in 1960, soon after the space age began with Sputnik 1 being launched by the USSR on October 4, 1957. This paper will summarize important events of my participation in the exploration of space as they relate to studies of magnetic fields in interplanetary space, of the planets Mercury to Neptune and the Moon, of interactions of the solar wind with the planets, and of corotating magnetospheres with some moons of the giant planets. The most intense period in my career was the decade 1963-1973, when I was involved in 15 successful spacecraft launches. Table 1 lists all those spacecraft projects and their launch dates (1963 to 1977) for which I have been the original NASA principal investigator (PI) or a co-investigator for magnetic field studies.

J. Geophys. Res., 101, No. A5, 10497-10509, May 1996