Earlier in the school year, our history teacher assigned a research paper as a “mini NHD.” For the paper, Noah wrote about the Space Race. After the assignment, we both realized that we were interested in delving more into the subject, as it was an obvious conflict. We also found it intriguing that the United States would compromise their “Americanism” by bringing 1,600 German scientists, many of whom were ardent Nazis, to America under a secret government program called Operation Paperclip to win the Space Race during the Cold War.
We first found basic websites relating to Operation Paperclip, the Space Race, and the Cold War to learn the historical context. As we read through these websites, we learned that Wernher von Braun, one of the most integral scientists brought to America under Operation Paperclip, was responsible for the successful launch of Apollo 11, as well as the creation of the V-2 bombs made with concentration camp slave labor that devastated much of England. We went to the NASA’s Ames Research Center, where we were able to listen to actual NASA scientists and learn more about its missions firsthand, while taking pictures to include in our website. We also visited the library. We found one book in particular from a National Public Radio (NPR) podcast we heard on Operation Paperclip by Annie Jacobsen. This led us to an online book tour speech she gave, a part of which we included in our website. The video of Annie Jacobsen was our favorite source. She knew so much about the program and the premises of what made it a compromise. United State’s conundrum: “hang them or hire them.” Hearing her speak with such passion and knowledge made the history truly come alive.
We chose the website category because we wanted to show the powerful and controversial pictures, while also expressing our topic in words. Because we were very new to making websites, we thought this would be the project category that would challenge us the most, but not overwhelm us. We decided to work together as a team because we are siblings both fascinated by the topic and we worked well together for last year’s NHD project.
Operation Paperclip was a secret government program under which 1,600 German scientists were brought to the U.S. after World War II because of their military and scientific intelligence. World War II was the original conflict, but the U.S. government foresaw that the Communist Soviet Union would soon be a threat in the next conflict, the Cold War. Military officials believed that the German scientists’ knowledge was more important than their Nazi pasts and even went so far as to whitewash their records. The Americans celebrated these German scientists by putting them in charge of the Space Race program and compromising their American ideals, and even possibly their humanity, in order to put the first man on the moon.
We first found basic websites relating to Operation Paperclip, the Space Race, and the Cold War to learn the historical context. As we read through these websites, we learned that Wernher von Braun, one of the most integral scientists brought to America under Operation Paperclip, was responsible for the successful launch of Apollo 11, as well as the creation of the V-2 bombs made with concentration camp slave labor that devastated much of England. We went to the NASA’s Ames Research Center, where we were able to listen to actual NASA scientists and learn more about its missions firsthand, while taking pictures to include in our website. We also visited the library. We found one book in particular from a National Public Radio (NPR) podcast we heard on Operation Paperclip by Annie Jacobsen. This led us to an online book tour speech she gave, a part of which we included in our website. The video of Annie Jacobsen was our favorite source. She knew so much about the program and the premises of what made it a compromise. United State’s conundrum: “hang them or hire them.” Hearing her speak with such passion and knowledge made the history truly come alive.
We chose the website category because we wanted to show the powerful and controversial pictures, while also expressing our topic in words. Because we were very new to making websites, we thought this would be the project category that would challenge us the most, but not overwhelm us. We decided to work together as a team because we are siblings both fascinated by the topic and we worked well together for last year’s NHD project.
Operation Paperclip was a secret government program under which 1,600 German scientists were brought to the U.S. after World War II because of their military and scientific intelligence. World War II was the original conflict, but the U.S. government foresaw that the Communist Soviet Union would soon be a threat in the next conflict, the Cold War. Military officials believed that the German scientists’ knowledge was more important than their Nazi pasts and even went so far as to whitewash their records. The Americans celebrated these German scientists by putting them in charge of the Space Race program and compromising their American ideals, and even possibly their humanity, in order to put the first man on the moon.