![]() ![]() Like most living rooms, the launches were big television events narrated by trusted CBS anchorman Walter Cronkite. But my memories picked up for the missions after. I was too young to remember the first few, including Apollo 11, when Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first men to walk the lunar surface. Smith recently posted a video to YouTube, bringing animated life to each mission emblem, I immediately felt the same rush I had as a kid when I held a patch in my hand. Robert Pierini was an engineer in the late 1960s and early 1970s with an electronics company in Milwaukee that developed the guidance system for the Apollo mission. Each time there was a scheduled launch, my two brothers and I could always expect our dad to come home with mission patches. That was exciting since he was in the business of putting men on the moon. I had the kind of dad who brought his work home with him. Delco’s Lunar Roving Vehicle first traveled on the surface of the moon in 1971 as part of the Apollo 15 mission, allowing astronauts to cover a larger area than all prior lunar landing missions.ĭavid Pierini, a technology writer and photographer, recalled a special connection to Milwaukee and memories of the NASA space program. In 1970, the division merged with Delco Radio and became known as Delco Electronics Division. It was an integral part of the success of NASA’s Manned Space Program program, competing against the Soviet Union in the race to space.ĪC navigation-guidance systems were used by NASA to steer the Apollo spacecrafts in earth and lunar orbits, lunar landings, and return flights to a predetermined point on earth. ![]() In 1965, the Milwaukee Operations became known as AC Electronics Division of GM. Over time the company’s operational divisions were separated, sold, and evolved. Air Force, and by 1957 the company was producing the guidance system for the Thor missile – the first ballistic missile in the United States. It began with 25 people manufacturing bomb sights for the U.S. The company played a key role for years in research, development, and production of electro-mechanical devices for military use and space exploration. Established in 1948 in a six-story plant on the northeast side, the Milwaukee operations of Delco Electronics – known as Delphi Electronics & Safety at its closing in 2008 – had a leading role in the field of precision guidance systems and automotive components.
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