An ‘all-seeing flying eye’: V-2 rockets and the promises of Earth photography

Abstract

In 1950 National Geographic published one of the first large-scale images of the curvature of the Earth. Clyde T. Holliday of the Applied Physics Laboratory at Johns Hopkins University constructed the mosaic, which was taken from a camera affixed to a V-2 rocket launched from White Sands Proving Ground, New Mexico. Holliday crafted the image as a bellwether for two contradictory yet inextricable ideas: the promise of Earth photography in making life easier for everyday peoples and the militarization of space. Examining one pre-1960 rocket-based Earth image this essay offers a reassessment of Earth photographs as only environmentalist texts.

Acknowledgments

The author would like to thank Jennifer Tucker, Martin Collins, Colin Edgington, Nick Pino, Erik Loomis, Neil Prendergast, Neil Maher, and two anonymous readers.

Notes

1. Holliday, ‘Seeing the Earth from 80 Miles Up,’ 511–28; The Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) at Johns Hopkins University, which played a central role in early earth photography, first distributed ‘V-2 Rocket-Eye View From 60 Miles Up’ in a souvenir pamphlet titled ‘Columbus was right!’ See Poole, Earthrise, 58–9.

2. The APL explained that the image was approximately 800,000 square miles. National Geographic published the number of 1 million square miles. I have used the more conservative number. See the image itself and Holliday, ‘Seeing the Earth from 80 Miles Up,’ 524.

3. Holliday, ‘Seeing the Earth from 80 Miles Up,’ 524.

4. Ibid.

5. Other clear images include a north to south image shot from an Aerobee Rocket that accompanied ‘V-2 Rocket-Eye View From 60 Miles Up’ in the National Geographic article. See ‘Seeing the Earth from 80 Miles Up,’ 524–25. See also Hubert and Berg, ‘A Rocket Portrait of a Tropical Storm,’ 121.

6. People had attempted to shoot the Earth from kites, balloons, and by other means prior to the V-2 Shots. See Poole, Earthrise, 57–8, 60; DeVorkin, Science with a Vengeance, 3.

7. Other historians have offered a similar approach to rethinking the history of earth photography and its ties to environmentalism. Maher, ‘On Shooting the Moon,’ 526–31; Poole, Earthrise; Kirk, Counterculture Green.

8. DeVorkin, Science with a Vengeance, 144–45.

9. Bryan, The National Geographic Society, 261.

10. Cosgrove, Apollo’s Eye, 5.

11. See Poole, Earthrise; see Maher, ‘On Shooting the Moon.’

12. See DeVorkin, Science with a Vengeance.

13. Ibid., 144.

14. DeVorkin, Science with a Vengeance, 144–45.

15. On ecosystem ecology, see Kingsland, The Evolution of American Ecology, ch. 7.

16. Kirk, Counterculture Green, 34–5, 40–1.

17. See Poole, Earthrise.

18. Galison and Hevly, Big Science, 1–17.

19. DeVorkin, Science with a Vengeance, ch. 7.

20. Information Office, White Sands Missile Range, Fact Sheet: ‘V-2 Story,’ June 1972, Doc. 97.007.003, White Sands Missile Range Museum and Archives.

21. Holliday, ‘Seeing the Earth from 80 Miles Up,’ 528.

22. The APL and the NRL were participants in the much more complex alliance of military, private, and university based scientific groups known collectively as the V-2 Panel (later known as the Upper Atmosphere Rocket Panel). See Newell, Beyond the Atmosphere: Early Years of Space Science, 34, 36, 39–40; Ley, Rockets, Missiles, and Space Travel, 254; DeVorkin, Science with a Vengeance, ch. 6.

23. Robert Poole, Earthrise, 60–1; ‘Picture of the Week,’ 34, 35; Bergstralh’s photos were first published in Bergstralh, Photography From the V-2 Rocket at Altitudes Ranging Up To 160 Kilometers, Doc. 04.072.002, White Sands Missile Range Museum and Archives.

24. Holliday, ‘Seeing the Earth from 80 Miles Up,’ 528.

25. On the promise of nuclear energy at the dawn of the Cold War, see Boyer, By the Bombs Early Light, 107–30.

26. See generally Galison and Hevly, Big Science.

27. Poole, Earthrise, 61.

28. The American West was the center of US nuclear research, weapons development and storage, and waste disposal. The region was also home to numerous military bases, missile silos, military think tanks, and research laboratories. See Markusen et al., The Rise of the Gunbelt; Hevly and Findlay, The Atomic West.

29. Holliday,’Seeing the Earth from 80 Miles Up,’ 524.

30. On panoramic photography in the nineteenth century USA, see ‘A Brief History of Panoramic Photography,’ Library of Congress, accessed May 25, 2012, http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/panoramic_photo/pnhist1.html. An example of the construction of a cyclorama can be found in Boardman and Porch, The Battle of Gettysburg Cyclorama.

31. On Bierstadt and other western painters, see Boime, The Magisterial Gaze.

32. Nye, American Technological Sublime, see especially the introduction and ch. 9.

33. Holliday, ‘Seeing the Earth from 80 Miles Up,’ 512. By the mid-1950s scientists were using rockets to follow weather patterns. See Hubert and Berg, ‘A Rocket Portrait of a Tropical Storm.’

34. Nye, American Technological Sublime, 255–56.

35. Virilio, The Vision Machine, 59–60.

36. Aerial photography was used extensively during World War II. See Maslowski, Armed with Cameras; Colton, ‘How We Fight With Photographs,’ 257–80; Kodak had developed several versions of black and white infrared film prior to World War II and had created false-color infrared film during the war. The military used both. See Monmonier, Spying with Maps, 43–45; Lindgren, Land Use Planning and Remote Sensing, 18, 21; Rice, Digital Infrared Photography, 16.

37. Holliday, ‘Seeing the Earth from 80 Miles Up,’ 512.

38. Waldemar Kaempffert, ‘Rocket Outpost in Space, Like a Little Moon, Is Being Studied by the Armed Forces,’ The New York Times, January 2, 1949, sec. E, p. 9; ‘Scientists Working on “Space Ship,” Forrestal Report Gives Hint of Satellite Program,’ Reading Eagle (Reading, PA), February 16, 1949, p. 14; ‘Scientists Plan “Space Ship” Capable of 10,000 M.P.H.,’ Spokane Daily Chronicle (Spokane, WA), February 16, 1949, p. 11; ‘Rocket Soars 250 Miles, Nearly Becomes Satellite,’ The Pittsburgh Press, February 26, 1949, p. 1.

39. On the post-1960 desire to shoot the Earth rather than things out there, see Maher, ‘On Shooting the Moon,’ 526–31. On the abilities of post-World War II telescope, see Zirker, An Acre of Glass, especially chapter two on the Hale Telescope and Palomar Observatory.

40. Holliday, ‘Seeing the Earth from 80 Miles Up,’ 512.

41. On Bentham and the Panopticon, see Foucault, Discipline & Punish, 195–230.

42. Foucault, Discipline & Punish, 204.

43. Holliday, ‘Seeing the Earth from 80 Miles Up,’ 512.

44. Ibid.

45. Holliday, ‘Seeing the Earth from 80 Miles Up,’ 513.