Circa 1983 I sat
in Mr. Garcia’s math class at Goddard Junior High in Midland. I wasn’t much of a student until well into
adulthood, so many hours of that class were spent staring out the window at the
Goddard Rocket. It was on the south side
of the building in those days,
painted white with an air force emblem on it.
The second floor classroom put me close enough to the rocket to see rivets, hinged control surfaces and access
panels. She was definitely real and definitely guided. As a young rocketeer I learned that forward fins only worked on guided missiles. I almost burned a vacant lot to the ground with a model rocket while familiarizing myself with stability.
Years later, I’m
still a rocket builder. Cold War era
machines fascinate me more than ever, and the Goddard rocket was moved to the
southwest corner of the football field.
It was nicely painted with school colors and affixed to the same display
mount. While I was researching info for a scale model rocket project, I ran across Andreas Parsch. He's the owner and operator of
DesignationSystems.net, a website dedicated to collecting information on
rockets, drones and missiles that I used for research. I went
through his site and couldn’t find a match for the Goddard rocket. I sent him an email photo and he quickly
returned an answer along with a link to a page on his site I’d overlooked.
The Goddard rocket
is GAM-63 RASCAL ( Guided Air-launched Missile, RAdar
SCAnning Link). It was an
early 1950’s nuclear capable weapons system designed to be launched from the B-36,
B-47 and B-52. The “captive carry”
launch system meant that it had to be attached to the underside of the bomber. The bottom fin folded so that the weapon
could be slid under the mother ship on a dolly, so our local example must have
lost this part somewhere in her travels.
The RASCAL didn’t
work out so well for the Strategic Air Command.
She was expensive, burned toxic fuels and the performance was
problematic. With one successful test
flight out of 65, she makes a better giant garden gnome than a tactical
weapon. Around 136 were produced and
were either tested, destroyed or pressed into junior high mascot service. MISD probably paid nothing for their rocket,
but I’m sure a study of the development costs would compare to a gold life-size
bust of Dr. Goddard himself. I’d like to
know more about how she made it to the football field.
I always loved
static military displays as a kid. I
miss the Odessa American Legion’s tracked artillery piece and Hawk missile and
Corpus Christi’s guns under the harbor bridge.
I suppose old military gear is no longer a fashion statement, but it
still impresses me. Fortunately there’s
an old practice bomb case from Midland Army Airfield that serves as a bird
condo in my back yard.
Here are some links to more info on the GAM-63. The first is cool 50’s military film:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GAM-63_RASCAL
Update: Here's the rocket from a 2003 Google Earth photo showing the original color and location:
Update: Here's the rocket from a 2003 Google Earth photo showing the original color and location:
Update: 1979 yearbook photo:
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| Photo courtesy Susan N. Freeman |
