Eberhard Rees

Infobox scientist
name = Dr Eberhard Rees

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image_size = 200px
caption = March 27, 1970 photo
birth_date = birth date|1908|04|28
birth_place = Trossingen, Germany
death_date = death date and age|1998|04|02|1908|04|28
death_place = DeLand, Florida, United States
field = Aerospace engineering
alma_mater = University of Stuttgart
Dresden Institute of Technology (1934)
doctoral_advisor =
work_institutions = 1939-1945: HVP
1945-1960: ABMA
1960-1973: NASA
spouse =
children =
footnotes = Fellow of the American Rocket Society (1959)

Dr Eberhard Friedrich Michael Rees was a German rocketry pioneer and the second Director of the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center. After being assistant manager of a steel mill in Leipzig, Germany,cite web |work=MSFC Center Directors Biographical Sketches & Photo Gallery |url=http://history.msfc.nasa.gov/management/center_directors/pages/rees.html |title=Dr. Eberhard Rees |accessdate=2008-04-29 |publisher=Marshall Space Flight Center History Office] Rees arrived at the Army Research Center Peenemünde in the Spring of 1939cite book |last=Braun |first=Wernher von |authorlink=Wernher von Braun |coauthors=Ordway III, Frederick I. & David Dooling, Jr. |title=Space Travel: A History |year=1985 |publisher=Harper & Row |location=New York |isbn=0-06-181898-4 |pages=p170] and managed V-2 rocket fabrication and assembly. He served as Wernher von Braun's deputy from World War II through the Apollo program.

Rees was in the first group of Operation Paperclip rocket scientists brought to the US by the Army Ordnance Corps, arriving at Logan Field on October 2, 1945 and serving first at Aberdeen Proving Grounds, then Fort Bliss in 1946cite book |last=Ordway |first= Frederick I., III |coauthors=Sharpe, Mitchell R. |title=The Rocket Team |series=Apogee Books Space Series 36 |year=1979 |publisher=Thomas Y. Crowell |location=New York |pages=p288,351-355,391] and in 1950, Redstone Arsenal. After serving as Deputy Director of Development Operations for the Army Ballistic Missile Agency, Rees became the Marshall Space Flight Center Deputy for Technical and Scientific Matters in 1960 and directed the Lunar Roving Vehicle program.cite web |last=Wright |first=Mike |title=Eberhard Rees Was Marshall's Second Center Director |url=http://history.msfc.nasa.gov/management/rees_article.html |work=Management |accessdate=2008-04-29 |publisher=Marshall Space Flight Center History Office |quote=With Skylab we are not concerned primarily with flying a spacecraft. We are concerned with the important aims of living and working in Earth orbit and conducting the experiments that will eventually lead to many beneficial results]

On March 1, 1970, Rees was appointed to the position of Director of the Marshall Space Flight Center,cite web |last=Storey |first=Angela D |url=http://marshallstar.msfc.nasa.gov/4-8-98.pdf |format=pdf |title=Former Marshall Director Rees Dies |work=Marshall Star |date=1998-04-08 |accessdate=2008-04-29 |publisher=MSFC Public Affairs Office] from which he managed Skylab space station development and retired in 1973. [cite news |work=The Huntsville Times |title=Space Flight Center directors |date=2001-07-22 |page=J23]

On April 2 1998, Rees died in a DeLand, Florida, hospital at the age of 89.cite news |work=The Huntsville Times |title=Rees turned rocket visions into reality |date=1998-04-03 |first=Martin |last=Burkey |quote=Dr. Eberhard Rees, Wernher von Braun's deputy from World War II Germany to the manned lunar landings, died at 3:10 a.m. Thursday in a Florida hospital. He was 89. Rees' colleagues described him as the cautious, common-sense, day-to-day manager who turned the legendary rocket team leader's vision into reality. "He was the guy behind von Braun that made a lot of it happen," said J.R. Thompson, a longtime NASA official.]

References