JPL and the Space Age: Destination Moon

After the establishment of NASA in 1958, JPL's first major assignment was to explore the Moon, taking close up images before crash landing as part of a series of missions called Ranger. JPL, however, had grander plans. The laboratory, having built and helped launch the first U.S. satellite into space, wanted to explore not only the Moon, but nearby planets. JPL would be humbled by a string of early failures that threatened the lab's very future.

Courtesy of NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory on YouTube. Watch on YouTube ↗

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