The MIT Computation Center was organized in 1956 as a 10-year joint venture between the

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the ...

and IBM to provide computing resources for New England universities. As part of the venture, IBM installed an IBM 704, which remained at MIT until 1960.

Operation Moonwatch

After the successful launch of Sputnik on October 4, 1957, the race was on to calculate and predict where the first man-made satellites would appear in the sky.

Fred Lawrence Whipple Fred Lawrence Whipple (November 5, 1906 – August 30, 2004) was an American astronomer, who worked at the Harvard College Observatory for more than 70 years. Amongst his achievements were asteroid and comet discoveries, the " dirty snowball" h ...

, then director of the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO) in Cambridge Massachusetts, had gathered

amateur astronomers Amateur astronomy is a hobby where participants enjoy observing or imaging celestial objects in the sky using the unaided eye, binoculars, or telescopes. Even though scientific research may not be their primary goal, some amateur astronomer ...

to track artificial satellites in an organization called Operation Moonwatch. The aim was to get the position of the

satellite A satellite or artificial satellite is an object intentionally placed into orbit in outer space. Except for passive satellites, most satellites have an electricity generation system for equipment on board, such as solar panels or radioi ...

in order to obtain its orbital elements. The first "satisfactory orbit" calculated by the IBM 704 as official tracker for the SAO occurred at 7AM on October 11, 1957.

References

* Christian Science Monitor, "Soviet Space-Satellite Rocket Sighted By Observation Teams in Cambridge", Oct 11, 1957, page 1 * Tech Talk (MIT Newsletter), October 22, 1957 "A Lucky Seven" * Tech Engineering News, "moon track", March 1958, Vol XXXIX No. 6, p68 * Beyer, Jean-David and Sidney Shinedling, "The i.b.m 704 computer at m.i.t" tech engineering news, May 1958, Vol XXXIX No. 8, p26 * NASA Article Citation "Technical aspects of satellite tracking on IBM computers at Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory in Cambridge, Massachusetts" Feb 26, 1960

External links

Archive.org: selected articles and references on Sputnik
{{authority control Computation Center Computer science institutes in the United States Research institutes in Massachusetts 1956 in computing Research institutes established in 1956 Scientific organizations established in 1956 1956 establishments in Massachusetts