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September 1, 1939

"expanding our living space in the east and making our food supply secure; to have sufficient food you must have sparsely settled areas."

The object of the war was to physically destroy the enemy.

https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/invasion-poland-september-1939

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From the beginning, this was to be a different kind of war—a war not only of conquest but also of annihilation.

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started on May 10, 1940

"France declared war on Germany in September 1939 in response to the invasion of Poland they placed great faith in the strength of the Maginot Line to defend the French border with Germany. "

"French troops rushing into Belgium to meet the German attack, German forces invaded France through the dense forests of the Ardennes"

https://www.iwm.org.uk/history/what-you-need-to-know-about-the-battle-of-france

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Britain and France declared war on Germany in September 1939 in response to the invasion of Poland. The period between September 1939 and April 1940 is often called the 'Phoney War' because, although war raged at sea, very little happened in Western Europe during this time.

This changed in April 1940 with British and German actions in Norway. The following month, Germany launched its offensive against the Low Countries and France. It took just six weeks for them to overwhelm the Allied defence.

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What You Need to Know About the Battle of France

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Britain and France declared war on Germany in September 1939 in response to the invasion of Poland. The period between September 1939 and April 1940 is often called the 'Phoney War' because, although war raged at sea, very little happened in Western Europe during this time.

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Aug. 26, 1914

"Germany declared war on France. To avoid the French fortifications along the French-German border, the troops had to cross Belgium and attack the French Army by the north"

"Belgians refused to let them through, so the Germans decided to enter by force and invaded Belgium. Despite their resistance and the British Army's help, the German troops soon invaded the country, which remained in their hands for four years"

https://www.army.mil/article/200760/belgium_u_s_involvement_in_world_war_i

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CHIÈVRES, Belgium -- This year marks the centennial of the end of World War I. On this anniversary, it is important to understand the involvement of Belgium in the Great War as well as the consequences that the conflict had on its population.

GERMAN OCCUPATION

Belgium had been a neutral country since the Treaty of London in 1839. So how did the country get involved in World War I? Well, the answer is simple: Germany's Schliefen Plan. Germany declared war on France. To avoid the French fortifications along the French-German border, the troops had to cross Belgium and attack the French Army by the north. Of course, Belgians refused to let them through, so the Germans decided to enter by force and invaded Belgium on Aug. 4, 1914. By doing so, they violated the Treaty of London, which is why Great Britain, that was bound to guard the neutrality of Belgium, entered the war. Belgium's small Army could not defeat the invaders, but they did manage to slow them down. Despite their resistance and the British Army's help, the German troops soon invaded the country, which remained in their hands for four years until the Armistice on Nov. 11, 1918.

THE BATTLE OF MONS

The fiercest battles took place in Flanders, but Wallonia also played a major role in the war and suffered tragic consequences. Mons, for example, was the scene of several major events during World War I. The Walloon city is often referred to as "The First and The Last," because the first and the last British Soldiers that died during the war were actually killed in Mons. It also staged both the first and the last Allied engagements of the war. Moreover, some of the most mysterious events of World War I happened during the Battle of Mons, such as the famous legend of "The Angels of Mons." On the night of Aug. 26, 1914, several British Soldiers claimed that angels carrying bows came down from the sky to help them at a crucial time and saved their lives. However, it seems that this was a fictional story by the Welsh writer Arthur Machen, who published it in the London newspaper Evening News.

The British Army fought brilliantly but was forced to withdraw during what was later known as "The Great Retreat." The Battle of Mons was considered a success by both the Germans and the British, because despite being outnumbered, the British troops managed to prevent the French Army from being outflanked. As for the German troops, they managed to gain a lot of ground to get closer to their final goal: Paris.

CIVILIAN LOSSES

The German mistreatment of Belgian civilians during the invasion was tragic. Civilians lived in a nightmare during the four years of occupation. The numbers speak for themselves: almost 9,000 civilians were deliberately killed by the Germans and 6,453 of them were killed during the first week of occupation. This impressive number mobilized the public opinion of the Allies. It became a major propaganda object.

THE FLANDERS FIELDS AND THE U.S. ARMY IN WWI

The Americans, who were really moved by what was going on in Belgium, entered the war in 1917. While most of the American Expeditionary Force was fighting in France, four Army divisions fought in Belgium alongside the British Army in the "Flanders Fields," the name given to the battlefield stretching from West Flanders to East Flanders and the Nord-Pas-de-Calais in the north of France. The Flanders Fields was the theater of some of the fiercest battles of World War I. Many Soldiers were injured and killed there, and several villages of the area were totally destroyed. The battlefield has now been converted into a memorial site with monuments, museums and cemeteries. Today, 368 American Soldiers who lost their lives to defend Belgium are resting in Flanders Field Cemetery in the town of Waregem. Their memory is honored each year on the Sunday before Memorial Day with a special ceremony at the cemetery. The name "Flanders Fields" comes from the poem "In Flanders Fields" written by the Canadian Lt. Col. John McCrae. "In Flanders Fields the poppies blow," said in the poem. Poppies have become the symbol of the great loss of the war, because they were flowering the battlefields, especially in the fields of Flanders.

MEMORIAL SITES

World War I left its mark on the country. Today, Belgium is home to hundreds of sites, cemeteries and monuments commemorating the battles fought in its lands and honoring the memory of those who died to defend the country. In the local area, people can learn war history first-hand by going on a battlefield tour of the Battle of Mons and visiting the Mons Memorial Museum. Almost half of the museum is dedicated to WWI. About two kilometers away from Mons is the St. Symphorien Military Cemetery, where lies the remains of British and German Soldiers killed mainly during the Battle of Mons.

Other famous sites in Belgium include the Fort de Loncin, which is about seven kilometers from the center of Liège. This is a worth-seeing vestige of the Battle of Liège as it is the site where the Belgian Army remained under siege for three days before being blasted out by the Germans. Another famous site is the Citadel of Dinant. The fortress offers magnificent views of the city and holds an amazing exhibition dedicated to the history and consequences of World War I on the city and its population. The "Ploegsteert Memorial to the Missing" and the "Ploegsteert 14-18 Experience," both located in Comines-Warmeton, are also worth a visit.

For more information on World War I sites in Wallonia, visit walloniabelgiumtourism.co.uk/en-gb/3/i-love/heritage-and-culture/wallonia-in-the-wars/14-18.

For more information on World War I sites in Flanders, visit www.visitflanders.com/en/themes/flanders_fields/.

REMEMBER WWI THROUGH MWR

Remember World War I is a two-year collaboration among various libraries whose purpose is to highlight and celebrate the centennial of the U.S. involvement in World War I. Books, videos and other materials are available at the Army Morale, Welfare and Recreation's libraries, the Donovan Research Library and the Marine Corps Community Services Libraries. In U.S. Army Garrison Benelux, people can visit libraries at Chièvres Air Base, SHAPE, Brussels and JFC Brunssum. For more information, visit www.benelux.armymwr.com. and www.rememberww1.com.

Related Links:
U.S. Army Europe U.S. Army Garrison Benelux U.S. Army Family and MWR: Benelux USAG Benelux Facebook U.S. Army Installation Management Command Remember WWI

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Belgium, U.S. involvement in World War I

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CHIÈVRES, Belgium -- This year marks the centennial of the end of World War I. On this anniversary, it is important to understand the involvement of Belgium in the Great War as well as the consequences that the conflict had on its population.

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Gerald Liebenau was born on November 30, 1925

"Gerald was born to a Jewish family in Berlin, Germany. His father worked in the textile business. Gerald was the eldest of two children; he had a younger sister only and attended public school until 1936."

"In December 1938, Gerald’s family moved to London, England Since then they emigrated to United States when Gerald continued his studies after after finishing high school he became a solider when he finished his service in the military.Gerald went back to school and in 1950 graduated from Yale University."

https://www.ushmm.org/remember/holocaust-survivors/volunteers/gerald-liebenau

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Gerald Liebenau - United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

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Gerald was born to a Jewish family in Berlin, Germany. His father worked in the textile business. Gerald was the eldest of two children; he had a younger sister. He attended public school until 1936, when he and other Jewish children were forced to leave public schools.

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Zhang Zoulin born in march 19, 1875

"Zhang Zuolin enlisted in the Chinese army and fought in the Sino-Japanese War of 1894–95. After the war he organized a self-defense militia in his native district."

"In 1920 Zhang began to try to expand his power southward into North China proper. By 1924 his position was strong enough for him to extend his control to Beijing, then the capital of the Chinese republic, where he established himself, assuming the powers of a military dictator."

"https://www.britannica.com/topic/warlord-Chinese-history"

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Keith Rodney was born in jun 15, 1892

Keith Park was the Commander in Chief of 11 Group, the most important Group in Fighter Command.

Keith Park organized the air protection, shuttling his fighters back and forth across the English Channel. He stayed at the war-commanding squadrons in Egypt in 1941, Malta in 1942 and in South East Asia in 1944-45. After the war.

https://www.sirkeithparkmemorial.org.nz/biography-of-sir-keith-park/

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BIOGRAPHY OF SIR KEITH PARK | Sir Keith Park Memorial Airfield Inc

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V-2 Missile was created on 1936 and used until 1942

World's First Long-Range Ballistic Missile.

U.S. and Soviet Union used captured V-2s to develop their own large rockets, the ancestors of today's launch vehicles.

https://airandspace.si.edu/collection-objects/missile-surface-surface-v-2-4/nasm_A19600342000

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The V-2 rocket, developed and used by the Germans during World War II, was the world's first large-scale liquid-propellant rocket vehicle, the first modern long-range ballistic missile, and the ancestor of today's large-scale liquid-fuel rockets and launch vehicles. Called the A-4 (Aggregat 4) by German Army Ordnance, the rocket was dubbed V-2, or Vergeltungswaffe Zwei ("Vengeance Weapon Two"), by Dr. Josef Goebbels' Propaganda Ministry when its existence was publicly announced in November 1944, two months after it was first deployed as a weapon. The Smithsonian Institution's V-2 was acquired in 1946 from the U.S. Army Air Forces, and was officially transferred on 1 May 1949 by what was now the U.S. Air Force. It was moved to the National Air Museum's storage facility in Suitland, Maryland in 1954, and was restored in 1975-76 for exhibition in the new National Air and Space Museum building.

Construction

The V-2 is cylindrical, tapering down towards the base, with four clipped rectangular fins, and tapering down toward the top with an ogival warhead ending in a sharp pointed nose. The design of the clipped fins was influenced by the need to ship a military missile through standard European rail tunnels. Overall, the rocket was shaped for supersonic flight, based on wind tunnel tests. The "dimpled" appearance of the rocket's skin, as is very evident in the Museum's specimen, is partly the result of spot welding, which, when cooled, especially around panels in place near ribs or stringers, contracted or shrunk unevenly, although the rocket's skin was also damaged by years of rough handling. The Museum's artifact has a combustion chamber, but lacks plumbing and many internal components such as the guidance and control systems. The tanks were removed to lessen the weight supported by the fins.

Liquid oxygen (lox) served as the oxidizer (the substance providing the oxygen for combustion) while an 75% alcohol/water mixture was the fuel (the substance to be burned). The water additive helped cool the motor, which developed maximum operating temperatures of about 4,900 F.

The rocket was mainly constructed of thin sheet steel, welded, riveted, and braced around a wooden framework in some sections. The nose cap was a fuse for detonating the explosive, 1,650 lbs of amatol, upon impact. Underneath the warhead was the instrument section, divided into four quadrants devoted to guidance and control, radio, and electrical systems. The center section of the rocket was two half shells containing the aluminum-magnesium alloy propellant tanks, the lox tank below and the larger fuel tank above. The lox tank was insulated with glass wool to keep the super-cold lox at its desired temperature and also to prevent overheating from leftover propellants. The tail section contained the motor and adjoining turbopump, steam-generator, and associated plumbing. The motor, comprising the combustion chamber and nozzle, was made of steel, while the pumps were of steel with aluminum-silicon alloy impellers and housings. The tanks for the hydrogen peroxide and potassium permanganate catalyst for driving the turbopumps were coated inside and out with an aluminum bronze alloy for corrosion protection.

History

The V-2 (A-4) evolved from secret experimental tests made between 1932 and 1934 by the German Army on smaller lox-alcohol liquid-fuel rockets, designated A-1 and A-2, of 300 kg (660 lbs.) thrust at the Army's Kummersdorf artillery range, south of Berlin. Two A-2s were successfully flown in December 1934, from Borkum Island in the North Sea. These were followed by the1,500 kg (3,300 lb.) thrust A-3, designed and built in 1935-1937, and the A-4 which was proposed in 1936 as a projected 25 metric-ton thrust (56,000 lb.) scale-up of the A-3. The A-4 was designed in detail in 1939-1941. The A-5, a redesign of the A-3 launched from 1938 to 1943, was also very important, as it was the test-bed for guidance systems after the failure of the four A-3 launches in 1937. It was. The moving spirits of the A-4's development were Dr. Wernher von Braun, Technical Director of the Peenemünde Army center from its inception until the end, and Captain (later Brigadier General) Walter R. Dornberger, who became involved in the Army's rocket development in 1931, and was the military head of the program from 1936 to 1943. During the last 18 months of the war he was responsible for training, supplying and servicing the operational V-2 rocket units.

In April, 1937, the rocket group of then about 90 men moved to a much larger, secret research facility built at the relatively remote site of Peenemünde on the island of Usedom, off the Baltic coast of Pomerania. Besides the A-4, other missiles, such as the Wasserfall, were developed here. A-4 development took place at Peenemünde-Ost (Peenemünde East). The Luftwaffe (Air Force) occupied Peenemünde West. The estimated cost of establishing Peenemünde-Ost was about RM 300 million (Reichmarks), or $70 million US (for 1990s dollars, multiply by about a factor of 10). By 1942, the personnel of Peenemünde-East had grown to a work force of about 5,000 which included engineers, technicians, scientists and all other personnel. In addition there were thousands of construction workers building the new A-4 Production Plant south of the test center; by 1943 this number included three thousand mostly East European forced laborers working construction. In addition, in the summer of 1943, 1300 SS concentration-camp workers who were to become the core of the production-line workforce were brought to Peenemünde and housed in the factory buildings. Gen. Dornberger and Arthur Rudolph, the chief engineer of the factory, were among those responsible for deciding to exploit concentration-camp labor in the rocket program; Wernher von Braun was aware of these decisions and found himself increasingly involved in the management of camp labor as time went on.

The first non-flight vehicles were finished and tested in 1940-41, and the first flight vehicles were completed in 1942. After two failed launches in June and August 1942, on 3 October 1942 Peenemünde launched its first successful A-4, the V4, or fourth test vehicle (the first was destroyed in a ground test before it was ever launched). This rocket attained an altitude of 60 miles and range of 125 miles in a 296 second flight, coming within 2.5 miles of its target and reaching a top speed of 3,300 mph. On 22 November 1942, Hitler ordered the mass production of the missile, and exactly one month later, Armaments Minister Speer founded the Special Committee A-4 to accelerate the process so that production might begin in summer 1943. Production required a large number of drawings to be prepared and special tools designed and built. Other A-4 factories were to be located at the Zeppelin Works in Friedrichshafen, and the Raxwerke near Wiener Neustadt, Austria.

After the damaging Royal Air Force bombing of the facility during the night of 17-18 August 1943, A-4 manufacturing was shifted to the underground plant of Mittelwerk at Nordhausen, in the Harz Mountains. Undoubtedly, the Museum's V-2 was also made there. After the RAF raid, smaller scale improvement developments were still carried out at Peenemünde. (Altogether, about 250 developmental V-4s were made at Peenemünde.)

The initial cost of producing an A-4 rocket was 100,000 Reichmarks (warhead and guidance equipment not included); the average cost was later reduced to 75,110 RM. At Peenemünde, each A-4 took from 10,000-20,000 man-hours to produce, while at Mittelwerk the figure dropped to approximately 7,500. The rockets were made at Mittelwerk by 2,000 civilian technicians and approximately 10,000 prisoner laborers who lived in nearby barracks camp known as Dora, which became the main camp of Konzentrationslager Mittelbau in October 1944. The Dora prisoners lived in terrible conditions, especially during the first few months when the barracks had not been built, and prisoners were forced to live underground, and in the last few months of the war, when the food supply worsened and many prisoners from Auschwitz and other eastern camps were dumped into Mittelbau-Dora. Of the approximately 20,000 deaths in Mittelbau-Dora, about half can be ascribed to the V-2 program.

The V-1, a competing development launched by the Luftwaffe, was an air-breathing pulsejet-powered missile which inflicted a considerable amount of physical and psychological damage on Britain, Belgium and France. The V-2 was to be an even more decisive terror weapon, but the rocket was neither accurate, reliable, nor cost effective. On 7 September 1944 the first two operational rockets were fired against Paris, but both failed due to premature cutoffs. The first successful launch was made at 8:30 a.m. on 8 September and struck close to the Porte d'Italie. At 6:43 p.m. the same day, the missile was deployed against England and hit Chiswick, a suburb about six miles west of central London. In both operations the rockets were launched from the Hague-Wassenaar area of occupied Holland. Upon its introduction into the war, the weapon now became known as the V-2. During February-March, 1945, the heaviest period of rocket bombardment, the weekly average fired against England amounted to 60.

Figures vary in different sources, but during the remainder of the war 3,200 to 3,600 were sent towards Allied targets. In the U.K. they were mostly directed toward London; secondary targets were Southampton and Bristol. Out of these numbers, by one estimate, 1,115 reached the United Kingdom while 1,775 hit Continental targets. Of the latter, most were fired against Belgium, 1,610 striking Antwerp; between 80-100 against Liège, and a number against Brussels. Nineteen rockets hit Paris during its few days of V-2 bombardment. About 25% of the total rockets launched against the U.K. and Continental targets failed due to air bursts. About 600 V-2's were launched for training and experimental purposes.

Figures also differ as to the number of casualties and amount of property damage caused by the V-2, but the total number killed is variously estimated at about 5,500 ,while the number of seriously wounded is given as 6,500. The total number of houses and other buildings destroyed by both the V-1 and V-2 weapons, including greater London, Antwerp, and Liège, amounted to about 33,700. The V-2 was designed for use against cities and the only known pin-point tactical application was when 11 were fired against the Ludendorf Bridge at Remagen, Germany, during March 1945 in a German attempt to prevent the Allies from continuing to use the bridge after it had been inadvertantly seized by American troops on 7 March. A couple of missiles came remarkably close but did not hit the bridge. The last V-2 fired in combat took place on 29 March 1945.

Following the war, in an effort to acquire the know how of this clearly revolutionary new technology, the U.S. and other Allies scrambled to capture as much V-2 hardware, documents, and V-2 technicians as they could. This included the British, French and Soviets. The British, under Operation Backfire, succeeded in examining and experimentally test launching, with the assistance of German technicians, three V-2 rockets. The Backfire launches took place in the British zone of occupation, at a former Krupp armament proving ground at Altenwalde, near Cuxhaven, Germany, on the North Sea coast. The launches were made on 2, 3, and 15 October 1945. The last launch was known as Operation Clitterhouse and included foreign (U.S., French, and Soviet) observers. The data acquired from all the launches and contained in five illustrated manuals was shared with the U.S. The French obtained the services of Wolfgang Pilz and other V-2 researchers who helped them build their first liquid-fuel missiles. The French Veronique sounding rocket, which outwardly resembled the V-2, also resulted from these efforts.

On 5 May 1945, the Soviets captured Peenemünde, though it was largely destroyed or stripped of useful material by the evacuating Germans. The Soviets did, however, seize invaluable material from Nordhausen, which they occupied on 5 July, and set up rocket institutes in the region and reconstructed a number of V-2s in the repair facility of the Mittelwerk at Kleinbodungen. The top ranking man recruited by the Soviets was Helmut Gröttrup, an expert from Peenemünde in guidance and control. In October 1946, thousands of German engineers, scientists, technicians, and their families were forcibly deported to the USSR, among them several hundred members and their families from the East German rocket institutes. The Soviets already had considerable experience since the 1930s in the design and construction of liquid-fuel rockets, but like the Americans and others, they lacked experience in handling liquid-fuel rockets of the size of the V-2. The Russians launched their first reconstructed V-2 on 30 October 1947 at Kapustin Yar, 75 miles east of Stalingrad (now Volgograd).

They sought to greatly improve upon basic V-2 technology and from the later 1940's to early 1950's constructed several V-2 derivative engines. They also created about ten or more derivative V-2 rockets which included the R-1 (also designated 1R), V-1A (1VA), V-1C, V-1B (1VB), V-1E (1VE), V-1D (1VD), R-2 (2R), V-2A (2VA), and V-2B/C. The majority of the vehicles appear to have been essentially re-built V-2s using similar or much modified engines powered by the same lox-alcohol propellant, though they had successively elongated propellant tanks for "stretched" bodies and larger nose cones. The first successful R-1 launch took place on 17 September 1948, called by the Russians their first "national rocket," although still looking identical to the V-2 with a Meilerwagen as part of the handling equipment. In addition to affording design and handling experience, these rockets were used for upper atmospheric research and were thus called "geophysical rockets." The Soviets also launched numerous animals including rabbits and dogs for biological studies, with eventual space flight in mind. By the mid-1950s, the Soviets graduated to an entirely different generation of rockets but had clearly learned a great deal from their V-2 experience. It is relevant to note that the first two rockets given to their allies at the time, the Chinese, in 1956, were R-1s followed in 1958 by R-2s, both models obsolete V-2 derivative vehicles known in the West as the SS-1 (Scunner) and SS-2 (Sibling). The Chinese first launched their R-2, using a different fuel, on 5 November 1960 and called it the Dong Feng 1 (East Wind 1). The launch site was at Jiuquan, in the Gobi desert, in Gansu province, 1,000 miles west of Beijing. This was the beginning of the Chinese long-range missile and space launch vehicle development.

The Americans similarly planned to acquire V-2 technology almost as soon as it appeared. On 15 November 1944, a little more than two months after the first V-2s were fired against Paris and London, the U.S. Army Ordnance Corps awarded the General Electric Company a contract to prepare captured V-2's for flight tests and to develop missiles based upon German designs, with the overall name of Project Hermes. Upon the brief occupation of Mittelwerk by the U.S. Army in May1945, before the Soviet Army moved in, parts for about 100 V-2s were shipped to the U.S., including presumably the two that were eventually turned over to the Smithsonian.

During that period, the Americans were also fortunate in the surrender of Wernher von Braun and his key team members. Under Operation Paperclip (originally Operation Overcast), a total of 118 of these men were eventually sent to the U.S. where they were to greatly contribute to the development of ballistic missiles and later space program launch vehicles. Under Hermes, the U.S. used them to gain knowledge and experience in handling large-scale liquid-fuel rockets as well as conduct upper-atmospheric research experiments. To coordinate the experiments, a V-2 Upper Atmosphere Research Panel was established on 16 January 1947.

On 15 March 1946 the static firing of a V-2 took place at the White Sands Proving Grounds, New Mexico, followed on 16 April with the first captured V-2 launch. The first successful land recovery of a V-2 nosecone by parachute was accomplished in February 1947. Altogether, there were 67 flights of V-2's at White Sands as well as at the Long Range Proving Ground, Cape Canaveral, Florida (later, U.S. Air Force Eastern Test Range and Kennedy Space Center). On 17 December 1946, a single stage V-2 reached a record altitude of 116 miles, the highest ever reached alone by this vehicle. The last captured V-2 flight was made at White Sands on 28 June 1951.

In Project Bumper, which comprised eight rounds, the V-2 also served to test the feasibility of a two-stage liquid-fuel rocket. The second stage was the smaller, American-made WAC-Corporal. On 24 February 1949, a V-2/WAC-Corporal rocket reached an altitude of 244 miles and speed of 5,150 miles per hour. The altitude record stood for many years and was perhaps first broken on 20 September 1956 when the first the U.S. Army's three-stage Jupiter-C test missile attained an altitude of 680 miles. On 24 July 1950 Bumper No. 8 was the first rocket successfully launched from Cape Canaveral. In this case the two-stage rocket was fired for velocity in a hypersonic aerodynamics test.

Among other notable V-2 flights were: a launch on 24 October 1946 in which motion picture cameras took films of Earth from a 65 mile altitude and covered 40,000 square miles; a series of flights, starting on 20 February 1947, known as Project Blossom, in which containers with fruit flies and various types of seeds were carried to test the effects of cosmic rays, the canisters with these life forms recovered by parachute; a U.S. Navy-sponsored flight up to 100 miles on 7 March 1947 in which the first photographs of Earth were taken at this height; a shipboard launch (under the name of Operation Sandy) from the U.S. aircraft carrier Midway, in the Atlantic, on 6 September 1947; and attempts to the carry live Air Force Aero Medical Laboratory monkeys, Albert I and II, on 18 June 1948 and 14 June 1949, to test the effects of acceleration and weightlessness. (Albert I who was anesthetized in preparation for the flight unfortunately died before the liftoff due to breathing problems. Albert II survived the flight to 83 miles and withstood peak forces of 5.5 g during acceleration as well as the brief period zero-gravity, but the parachute on the return capsule was defective and the high-speed descent of the capsule was fatal. Two other monkeys met the same fate.)

Acquisition

The Museum's specimen and another V-2 (now in La Coupole, in Wizernes, France) were part of the almost 1,400 enemy and Allied war time artifacts that were especially collected for the then National Air Museum under the direction of General of the Army Henry H. Arnold, Commanding General of the Army Air Forces, as "outstanding examples of aircraft and components" from World War II. The Air Force made the official transfer on 1 May 1949. In the meantime, the V-2s and the other artifacts were stored in a former plant of the Douglas Aircraft Company at Park Ridge, Illinois, at the present site of O'Hare International Airport, northwest of Chicago.

The actual history of the Army Air Forces' acquisition of both V-2s may never be known due to the loss of relevant documents. From an available photo of this specimen at Park Ridge, ca. 1948, showing the rocket in its combat camouflage colors, the vehicle was clearly an operational round, although as a result of the restoration of 1975-76, it now carries the black-and-white test-flight scheme similar to the one used on the rocket's first successful flight of 3 October 1942. The alternate black and white patterns of the fins aided tracking and determining the rocket's attitude during test launches. The "Woman in the Moon" logo of the original A-4/V4 was not painted on the NASM artifact, however.

Because of the enormous logistical problems and limited manpower available to handle all the Park Ridge material, not until late November 1954 did the V-2s travel by train from Chicago to Washington, D.C. They were then trucked to the Museum's storage facility at Suitland, Maryland, by February 1955. It was not until 1975 that the better of the two rockets underwent restoration, entailing 2,000 man-hours of work in preparation for the new National Air and Space Museum, which opened for the Bicentennial celebration on 1 July 1976. However, the display rocket lacked key parts. The thrust ring, graphite exhaust vanes, servo motors, potentiometers, chain and sprocket drive for the movements of the air rudders, and other tail section components, were provided by the Royal Air Force Museum at Hendon, England, while the launch stand (A19761038000) came from NASA Marshall Space Flight Center at Huntsville, Alabama. A section of one of the fins of the Museum's V-2 is purposely removed to permit viewing of the chain and sprocket drive.

The V-2 was normally carried into combat on a rocket trailer and hauled and erected into its upright vertical firing position by a Meilerwagen. There was also an array of related ground support vehicles which included a heavily armored fire control vehicle that ran on tank tracks, a tractor-pulled liquid oxygen transporter, and alcohol tankers. The Museum does not possess a Meilerwagen nor other V-2 support equipment in its collections.

The V-2 on display at the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum represents one of about twenty-one known examples of this rocket worldwide. Other extant V-2 rockets are at the following locations:

Australian Army Headquarters, Holsworthy, New South Wales

Australian War Memorial, Canberra

Point Cook Royal Australian Air Force Base, near Melbourne, Australia

La Coupole, Wizernes, France.

Deutsches Museum, Munich, Germany

Luftwaffenmuseum, Berlin, Germany

Wehrtechnische Studiensammlung, Koblenz, Germany

Legermuseum, Delft, The Netherlands

The Aerospace Museum, Cosford, U.K.

The Defence Explosive Ordnance Explosive Disposal School, Chattendon, U.K.

The Imperial War Museum, London, U.K.

Ministry of Technology Rocket Propulsion Establishment, Westcott, U.K.

The RAF Museum, Hendon (London), U.K.

The Science Museum, London, U.K.

Fort Bliss, El Paso, Texas

Kansas Cosmosphere and Space Center, Hutchinson, Kansas

U.S. Air Force Museum, Wright-Paterson Air Force Base, Ohio

U.S. Air Force Space and Missile Museum, Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida

U.S. Space and Rocket Center, Huntsville, Alabama

White Sands Missile Range, near Alamogordo, New Mexico

Bibliography

Becklake, John, "Conservation of the German WW II Rocket Collection at the Aerospace Museum, Cosford, England," paper presented at the 49th International Astronautical Congress, 28 Sept. 2-Oct. 1998, Melbourne, Australia.

Béon, Yves. Planet Dora. Edited with an Introduction by Michael J. Neufeld (Boulder, CO, 1997).

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Engle, Eloise and Arnold Lott, Man in Flight - Biomedical Achievements in Aerospace (1979), pp. 91, 93-94.

Garlinski, Josef, Hitler's Last Weapons (New York, 1978).

Harvey, Brian, The Chinese Space Programme (Chichester, 1998), pp. 5-6, 11-12.

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Huzel, Dieter, Peenemünde to Canaveral (Englewood Cliffs, NJ,1962).

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Originally written by Frank H. Winter; revised by Michael J. Neufeld, Aug. 3, 2000.

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The German V-2 rocket was the world's first large-scale liquid-propellant rocket vehicle, the first long-range ballistic missile, and the ancestor of today's large rockets and launch vehicles.

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The Jeep was the result of a request by the Army  in 1940.

Jeep symbolized American ingenuity, military prowess, and the possibility of victory.

the roles of the jeep were ranging from being the mount for cavalry units conducting combat reconnaissance missions, the vehicle from which commanders led their units.

https://studebakermuseum.org/the-jeep-in-world-war-ii/#:~:text=The%20Jeep%20was%20the%20result,producing%20over%20360%2C000%20of%20them.

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The Jeep in World War II - The Studebaker National Museum

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The Jeep was the result of a request by the Army in 1940 for a general purpose vehicle that was small, lightweight, had four-wheel drive for cross-country travel, and capable […]

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Penicillin, the first antibiotic, was accidentally discovered in 1928 by Scottish biologist Alexander Fleming.

the first person to receive penicillin was a policeman who was exhibiting a serious infection with abscesses throughout his body.

After 75 years of penicillin’s clinical use, the world can see that its impact was immediate and profound.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5403050/#:~:text=The%20success%20of%20sulfa%20drugs,treated%20mice%20were%20still%20alive.

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Abstract

After just over 75 years of penicillin's clinical use, the world can see that its impact was immediate and profound. In 1928, a chance event in Alexander Fleming's London laboratory changed the course of medicine. However, the purification and first clinical use of penicillin would take more than a decade. Unprecedented United States/Great Britain cooperation to produce penicillin was incredibly successful by 1943. This success overshadowed efforts to produce penicillin during World War II in Europe, particularly in the Netherlands. Information about these efforts, available only in the last 10-15 years, provides new insights into the story of the first antibiotic. Researchers in the Netherlands produced penicillin using their own production methods and marketed it in 1946, which eventually increased the penicillin supply and decreased the price. The unusual serendipity involved in the discovery of penicillin demonstrates the difficulties in finding new antibiotics and should remind health professionals to expertly manage these extraordinary medicines.

Keywords: penicillin, discovery, antimicrobial drugs, antibiotics, history of medicine

According to British hematologist and biographer Gwyn Macfarlane, the discovery of penicillin was "a series of chance events of almost unbelievable improbability" (1). After just over 75 years of clinical use, it is clear that penicillin's initial impact was immediate and profound. Its detection completely changed the process of drug discovery, its large-scale production transformed the pharmaceutical industry, and its clinical use changed forever the therapy for infectious diseases. The success of penicillin production in Great Britain and the United States overshadowed the serendipity of its production and the efforts of other nations to produce it. Information on penicillin production in Europe during World War II, available only in the last 10-15 years, provides new insights into penicillin's story.

Dawn of Chemotherapy and the "Magic Bullet"

At the beginning of the 20th century, Paul Ehrlich pioneered the search for a chemical that would kill a microorganism and leave the host unaltered-the "magic bullet." Ehrlich also coined the term chemotherapy: "There must be planned chemical synthesis: proceeding from a chemical substance with recognizable activity, making derivatives from it, and then trying each to discover the degree of its activity and effectiveness. This we call chemotherapy" (2). After extensive testing, he found a drug with activity against the bacterium Treponema pallidum, which causes syphilis. The introduction of this drug, arsphenamine (Salvarsan), and its chemical derivative neoarsphenamine (Neosalvarsan) in 1910 ushered in a complete transformation of syphilis therapy and the concept of chemotherapy. Unfortunately, despite exhaustive searches, the promise of more magic bullets for microbial therapy remained elusive. For 20 years, Salvarsan and Neosalvarsan were the only chemotherapy for bacterial infections.

Alexander Fleming's Discovery

A chance event in a London laboratory in 1928 changed the course of medicine. Alexander Fleming, a bacteriologist at St. Mary's Hospital, had returned from a vacation when, while talking to a colleague, he noticed a zone around an invading fungus on an agar plate in which the bacteria did not grow. After isolating the mold and identifying it as belonging to the Penicillium genus, Fleming obtained an extract from the mold, naming its active agent penicillin. He determined that penicillin had an antibacterial effect on staphylococci and other gram-positive pathogens.

Fleming published his findings in 1929 (3). However, his efforts to purify the unstable compound from the extract proved beyond his capabilities. For a decade, no progress was made in isolating penicillin as a therapeutic compound. During that time, Fleming sent his Penicillium mold to anyone who requested it in hopes that they might isolate penicillin for clinical use. But by the early 1930s, interest had waned in bringing to life Paul Ehrlich's vision of finding the magic bullet.

Discovery of Prontosil and Sulfa Drugs

This dismal outlook on chemotherapy began to change when Gerhard Domagk, a German pathologist and bacteriologist, found bacteriologic activity in a chemical derivative from oil dyes called sulfamidochrysoïdine (also known as Prontosil). This compound had bacteriologic activity in animals, but strangely, none in vitro. Prontosil had limited but definite success when used to treat patients with bacterial infections, including Domagk's own child. A German company patented the drug, and ultimately, Domagk won a Nobel Prize in 1939. The paradox of Prontosil's in vivo success but lack of success in vitro was explained in 1935, when French scientists determined that only part of Prontosil was active: sulfanilamide. In animals, Prontosil was metabolized into sulfanilamide. Within 2 years, sulfanilamide and several derivative sulfa drugs were on the market. The success of sulfanilamide changed the cynicism about chemotherapy of bacteria (1).

Isolation of Penicillin at Oxford University

The success of sulfa drugs sparked interest in finding other agents. At Oxford University, Ernst Chain found Fleming's 1929 article on penicillin and proposed to his supervisor, Howard Florey, that he try to isolate the compound. Florey's predecessor, George Dreyer, had written Fleming earlier in the 1930s for a sample of his strain of Penicillium to test it for bacteriophages as a possible reason for antibacterial activity (it had none). However, the strain had been saved at Oxford. In 1939, Howard Florey assembled a team, including a fungal expert, Norman Heatley, who worked on growing Penicillium spp. in large amounts, and Chain, who successfully purified penicillin from an extract from the mold. Florey oversaw the animal experiments. On May 25, 1939, the group injected 8 mice with a virulent strain of Streptococcus and then injected 4 of them with penicillin; the other 4 mice were kept as untreated controls. Early the next morning, all control mice were dead; all treated mice were still alive. Chain called the results "a miracle." The researchers published their findings in The Lancet in August 1940, describing the production, purification, and experimental use of penicillin that had sufficient potency to protect animals infected with Streptococcus pyogenes, Staphylococcus aureus, and Clostridium septique (4).

After the Oxford team had purified enough penicillin, they began to test its clinical effectiveness. In February 1941, the first person to receive penicillin was an Oxford policeman who was exhibiting a serious infection with abscesses throughout his body. The administration of penicillin resulted in a startling improvement in his condition after 24 hours. The meager supply ran out before the policeman could be fully treated, however, and he died a few weeks later. Other patients received the drug with great success. The Oxford team then published their clinical findings (5). At the time, however, pharmaceutical companies in Great Britain were unable to mass produce penicillin because of World War II commitments. Florey then turned to the United States for assistance.

Penicillin and US Involvement

In June 1941, Florey and Heatley traveled to the United States. Concerned about the security of taking a culture of the precious Penicillium mold in a vial that could be stolen, Heatley suggested that they smear their coats with the Penicillium strain for safety on their journey. They eventually arrived in Peoria, Illinois, to meet with Charles Thom, the principal mycologist of the US Department of Agriculture, and Andrew Jackson Moyer, director of the department's Northern Research Laboratory. Thom corrected the identification of Fleming's mold to P. notatum; it was initially identified as P. rubrum (1).

Thom also recognized the rarity of this P. notatum strain because only 1 other strain in his collection of 1,000 Penicillium strains produced penicillin. The strain that was eventually used in mass production was a third strain, P. chrysogenum, found in a moldy cantaloupe in a market, which produced 6 times more penicillin than Fleming's strain. When a component of the media that Heatley used to grow the mold in England was unavailable, A.J. Moyer suggested using corn steep liquor, a waste product from the manufacture of cornstarch that was available in large quantities in the midwestern United States. With corn steep liquor, the investigators produced exponentially greater amounts of penicillin in the filtrate of the mold than the Oxford team had ever produced. Heatley remained in Peoria for 6 months to work on methods of growing Penicillium strains in large quantities. Florey headed east to interest the US government and multiple drug companies in penicillin production. The US government took over all penicillin production when the United States entered World War II. Researchers at drug companies developed a new technique for producing enormous quantities of penicillin-producing Penicillium spp.: deep-tank fermentation. This process adapted a fermentation process performed in swallow dishes to deep tanks by bubbling air through the tank while agitating it with an electric stirrer to aerate and stimulate the growth of tremendous quantities of the mold. Unprecedented United States/Great Britain cooperation for penicillin production was incredibly successful. In 1941 the United States did not have sufficient stock of penicillin to treat a single patient. At the end of 1942, enough penicillin was available to treat fewer than 100 patients. By September 1943, however, the stock was sufficient to satisfy the demands of the Allied Armed Forces (6).

Public Awareness: The Fleming Myth

Early in 1942, Florey and Heatley went back to England. Because of the shortage of penicillin supplies coming from the United States, the Oxford group still had to produce most of the penicillin they tested and used. In August 1942, Fleming obtained some of the Oxford group's supply and successfully treated a patient who was dying of streptococcal meningitis. When the patient recovered, the cure was the subject of a major article in The Times newspaper in Great Britain, which named Oxford as the source of the penicillin. However, neither Florey nor Fleming was acknowledged in the article, an oversight quickly corrected by Fleming's boss, Sir Almroth Wright. He wrote a letter to The Times expounding on Fleming's work and suggested that Fleming deserved a "laurel wreath." Fleming happily talked to the press. Florey not only did not speak with the press but prohibited any member of the Oxford team from giving interviews, leading many to erroneously believe that Fleming alone was responsible for penicillin.

Secrecy in Wartime England

The British government went to great lengths to prevent the means for producing penicillin from falling into enemy hands. However, news about penicillin leaked out. A Swiss company (CIBA, Basal, Switzerland) wrote to Florey requesting P. notatum. Concerned about responding, Florey contacted the British government. Agents attempted to track down where Fleming's Penicillium cultures had been distributed. Fleming wrote, "During the past 10 years I have sent out a very large number of cultures of Penicillium to all sorts of places, but as far as I can remember NONE have gone to Germany" (7). Florey believed that, without the mold, no one in Germany could produce penicillin even though his publication had provided a "blueprint" for its small scale manufacture. Florey was wrong, and so was Fleming.

Fleming had sent a culture of Penicillium strains to "Dr. H. Schmidt" in Germany in the 1930s. Schmidt was unable to get strain to grow, but even though the Germans did not have a viable strain, other Europeans did.

Production during World War II

France

Someone at Institut Pasteur in France, had Fleming's strain. In 1942, efforts began at Institut Pasteur and Rhone-Poulenc to produce penicillin. Eventually, German officials found out and, in early 1944, the Germans asked the French for their P. notatum. They were given a false strain that did not produce penicillin. With limited supplies, the French produced only enough penicillin to treat ≈30 patients before the war's end.

The Netherlands

The situation in the Netherlands was different. The Centraalbureau voor Schimmelcultures (CBS) near Utrecht had the largest fungal collection in the world. A published list of their strains in 1937 included P. notatum. A letter found at CBS shows that in February 1942 the Nazis asked CBS to send their strain of P. notatum to Dr. Schmidt in Germany, mentioning penicillin in the letter. CBS told the Germans they did not have Fleming's strain of P. notatum. In fact, they did. In the 1930s, Fleming had sent his strain to Johanna Westerdijk, the CBS director. Westerdijk could not refuse the German request for their strain of P. notatum but sent them the one that did not produce penicillin.

Efforts to produce penicillin in the Netherlands went underground at a company in Delft, the Nederladsche Gist-en Spiritusfabriek (the Netherlands Yeast and Spirit Factory, NG&SF). After the German occupation in 1940, NG&SF was still allowed to function. Because Delft was not bombed in the war, NG&SF's efforts were unaffected. In early 1943, NG&SF's executive officer, F.G. Waller, secretly wrote to Westerdijk at CBS, asking for any Penicillium strains that produced penicillin. In January 1944, Westerdijk sent all of CBS' Penicillium strains to NG&SF.

Four reports in NG&SF records detailed their efforts (8). In the first report, NG&SF scientists tested 18 Penicillium strains from CBS; they found 1 strain with the greatest antibacterial activity, which was coded P-6 and was identified as P. baculatum. The second report discussed how NG&SF scientists then isolated an extract from P-6. They gave the substance in the extract the code name Bacinol after the species from which it was derived and to keep the Germans unaware of what they were doing ( Figure). As Waller wrote, "When we first started looking, in 1943, only one publication was available, that of Fleming in 1929. It was on that basis we started our research" (6). NG&SF researchers then had help from an unanticipated source. In 1939, Andries Querido was employed by NG&SF as a part-time advisor. By January 1943, however, his Jewish background limited his visits. On his last visit in the summer of 1944, Querido met someone in Amsterdam's Central Train Station who gave him a copy of the latest Schweizerische Medizinische Wochenschrift (Swiss Medical Journal), which he passed on to the NG&SF scientists. The June 1944 issue contained an article entirely devoted to penicillin, showing the results that the Allies had achieved, including details of penicillin growth in corn steep extract, the scaling up of penicillin production, the measurement of strength by the Oxford unit, results of animal and human studies, and identification of the bacteria known to be susceptible to penicillin. The third report described how NG&SF scientists isolated Bacinol from the extract using the information supplied secretly by Querido.

Figure.

Bacinol 2, building named in honor of the site of efforts in the Netherlands to produce penicillin during World War II and the drug produced by the Netherlands Yeast and Spirit Factory in Delft. Bacinol was a code name for penicillin. Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Delft_-_Gevel_Bacinol_2.jpg

Large-scale production would be difficult to do and to keep secret from the Germans, especially with a German guard on site. However, NG&SF scientists used an obvious ploy to keep the German guard, who knew nothing about microbiology, at bay: they kept him drunk. "We did have a German guard whose job it was to keep us under surveillance, but he liked gin, so we made sure he got a lot. He slept most afternoons" (6). NG&SF scientists used milk bottles for growing large quantities of Penicillium mold. From July 1944 until March 1945, production of Bacinol continued, as detailed in the fourth report. At the end of the war, the NG&SF team still did not know if Bacinol was actually penicillin until they tested it against some penicillin from England, proving it to be the same compound. NG&SF began marketing the penicillin they produced in January 1946. Although the original building where Bacinol was produced was demolished, NG&SF named a new building in honor of their WWII efforts ( Figure).

The Nazis eventually succeeded in making penicillin by October 1944. However, Allied air raids crippled mass production of the drug (9).

Patents

The issue of a patent for penicillin was a controversial problem from the beginning. Chain believed that obtaining a patent was essential. Florey and others viewed patents as unethical for such a life-saving drug. Indeed, penicillin challenged the basic notion of a patent, considering it was a natural product produced by another living microorganism. The prevailing view Great Britain at the time was that a process could be patented, but the chemical could not. Merck (New York, NY, USA) and Andrew Jackson Moyer each filed patents on the process of penicillin production with no opposition. Eventually, at war's end, British scientists were faced with paying royalties for a discovery made in England. The penicillin production at NG&SF turned out to be more than of historical interest. Because NG&SF had researched and developed their own penicillin using their own mold culture, P. baculatum, and used their own production methods, they were not embroiled in any patent clash; the marketing of their penicillin eventually increased penicillin supply and decreased prices.

Nobel Prize in 1945

Penicillin's colossal effects led to the awarding of the Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology in 1945 to Fleming, Chain, and Florey. Penicillin was isolated from other microorganisms, which led to a new term, antibiotics. Using similar discovery and production techniques, researchers discovered many other antibiotics in the 1940s and 1950s: streptomycin, chloramphenicol, erythromycin, vancomycin, and others.

Conclusions

Lessons can be learned from the circumstances surrounding the discovery of penicillin. The US government's successful takeover of penicillin's production and the unprecedented cooperation among drug companies (and nations) should strongly encourage public/private partnerships as we search for additional effective antimicrobial drugs. In addition, despite their essential value in modern medicine, antibiotics are also the only class of drugs that lose their efficacy with large-scale use as bacteria develop antibiotic resistance. We now are struggling with resistant bacteria that cause infections that are virtually untreatable. Infections such as those occurring after transplantation and surgical procedures, caused by these highly antibiotic-resistant pathogens, are threatening all progress in medicine. Yet, drug companies, some of the same companies that helped develop penicillin, have nearly abandoned efforts to discover new antibiotics, finding them no longer economically worthwhile. The dry pipeline for new antibiotics has led the Infectious Diseases Society of America and others to call for a global commitment to the development of new agents (10). We also must expertly manage the drugs that are currently available. The noteworthy serendipity involved in the discovery of penicillin should remind us that new antibiotics are difficult to find and, more important, should make us mindful when using these limited medical treasures.

Acknowledgment

The author thanks Monica Farley for her helpful review of the manuscript.

Biography

Dr. Gaynes is professor of medicine/infectious diseases at Emory University School of Medicine and the Rollins School of Public Health. He worked for >20 years at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and is an award-winning author of Germ Theory: Medical Pioneers in Infectious Diseases.

Footnotes

Suggested citation for this article: Gaynes R. The discovery of penicillin-new insights after more than 75 years of clinical use. Emerg Infect Dis. 2017 May [ date cited]. http://dx.doi.org/10.3201/eid2305.161556

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Articles from Emerging Infectious Diseases are provided here courtesy of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
The Discovery of Penicillin-New Insights After More Than 75 Years of Clinical Use

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After just over 75 years of penicillin's clinical use, the world can see that its impact was immediate and profound. In 1928, a chance event in Alexander Fleming's London laboratory changed the course of medicine. However, the purification and first ...

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it stared Feb 19, 1945 until march 26, 1945

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Written by Seth Paltzer Throughout history, dogs have accompanied man at work and play. Even in the midst of men’s wars, dogs have been found serving in functions ranging from […]

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The Battle of Stalingrad and Allied Invasions Shaped the End of WWII.

Germany found itself squeezed on both sides as Soviet troops advanced into Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Romania while the Western Allies continued to push eastward After the firebombing of Dresden and other German cities that killed tens of thousands of civilians, the Western Allies crossed the Rhine River and moved eastward toward Berlin. As they closed in on the capital, Allied troops discovered the horror of the Holocaust as they liberated concentration camps such as Bergen-Belsen and Dachau.

Franklin D. Roosevelt, authorized the atomic bomb against Japan in the hopes of bringing a swift end to the war. Having an effect on Japan’s Emperor Hirohito broke the tie and decided that his country must surrender. At noon on August 15 (Japanese time), the emperor announced Japan’s surrender in his first-ever radio broadcast. On September 2, World War II ended when U.S. General Douglas MacArthur accepted Japan’s formal surrender aboard the U.S. battleship Missouri, anchored in Tokyo Bay along with a flotilla of more than 250 Allied warships.

https://www.history.com/articles/world-war-ii-end-events