true space history

Hi there,

I thought this was supposed to be a group about space history. There
doesn't seem to be much here so I'll add a little and maybe someone
else will have a story to ad from the "good old days"

1958
We had just moved to Florida from upstate New York. My dad was fresh
out of college with a degree in phyisics a pocket protector and a
slide rule. He had obtained a job as an engineer at "The Cape". I was
all of 9 years old and the ocean fascinated me. My brother and I were
some of the first surfers along the Florida east coast.
Anyway, we lived in a brand new subdisvison. It seemed that most of
the dads that lived in the subdivision also worked at "The Cape" and
everyone that lived there was from someplace else. We quickly made
new friends and other than the mosquitoes, really enjoyed living in
the area. As a 9 year old I never really knew what dad did at "The
Cape" other than it had something to do with missles. Everything was
pretty secretive abnd he never talked about his work.
One evening he took the family down to the Indian River. It was just
after dark. Dad told us to look over towards some searchlights in the
distance and we saw our first missle launch. Dad told us later that it
was a Vanguard. It went up what, in the distance seemed to be all of
a few inches but was, in reality, probably a few hundred feet...and
came right back down and exploded..welcome to space flight.
11 years later, I stood at the same spot and watched the Saturn blast
off for the moon. A few months later I was in Vietnam. Now we are
involved in another stupid war and people are talking about going back
to the moon again....go figure! Back in 1969 I thought we would be at
Mars or beyond by now.
Just a little history. Anyone else?