Part 5: Chapter 18, Big Operator: James Webb's Space Age America Summary and Analysis

Webb, as NASA administrator, was charged with organizing the moon program, called the Apollo program. He had a staff of 6,000 in 1961 but this number was to grow more than tenfold due to the Apollo mission; this number would represent only ten percent of the total number of people working on the space program. The remainders were in the private sector. In order to undertake Apollo, NASA would need a manned flight center and the different directors would report to Associate Administrator Robert Seamans instead of their own center directors. Seamans' role was to promote functional integration of the different aspects of the project and the teams.

NASA received approval for its manned flight center and construction began in Houston. A little after this, Cape Canaveral...