Although he studied for a career in medicine, Oberth never could shake
his obsession with spaceflight and finally switched his emphasis to
physics. He wrote a dissertation on the problem of rocket-powered
flight but his work was rejected by the University of Heidelberg in
1922 for being too speculative. This dissertation, however, became the
basis for his classic 1923 book, Die Rakete zu den Planetenräumen (By
Rocket to Space). The book explained the mathematical theory of
rocketry, applied it to possible designs for practical rockets, and
considered the potential of space stations and human travel to other
planets.
The
success of the 1923 book prompted Oberth to consider writing a more
popular, and less technical, treatise on the possibilities of
spaceflight, but because of his teaching load in a secondary school,
German spaceflight enthusiast Max Valier condensed and published one
for him. This book inspired a number of new rocket clubs to spring up
all over Germany as hardcore rocket enthusiasts tried to translate
Oberth's theories into practical space vehicles. The most important of
these clubs was the Verein fur Raumschiffarht (Rocket Society) or the
VfR. Oberth became something of a godfather for the VfR during the
1920s, encouraging the efforts of Valier, Willy Ley, and the young
Wernher von Braun.
In
1929 Oberth published another major work, Wege Zur Raumschiffahrt (The
Road to Space Travel), in which he envisioned the development of ion
propulsion and electric rockets. This book won an award established by
the French rocket pioneer, Robert Esnault-Pelterie, and Oberth used
the prize money to buy rocket motors for the VfR.
One
man who foresaw a vision with the space program was the silent
moviemaker Fritz Lang. After reading Oberth's book, he decided to film
an adventure story about space travel. The result was the 1929
feature, Die Frau Im Mond (The Woman in the Moon). Lang wanted his
movie set to be technically correct so he called upon Herman Oberth to
be his main technical advisor. Oberth and Willy Ley helped Lang with
his sets and built a spacecraft that looked very realistic. Ever the
dramatist, Lang even invented the countdown to increase the tension
for the audience and to add drama to the rocket flight.
As a
publicity stunt for Lang's film, Oberth also agreed to build an actual
rocket that would be launched at the premier of Die Frau Im Mond. Two
days before the premier, however, Oberth discovered that he would not
have the rocket completed in time. At that point, he went to Romania
to soothe his nerves. After 1938, Oberth was involved in a series of
research projects concerning rockets for Germany. In 1941, he became a
naturalized German citizen, and during World War II he worked for
Wernher von Braun in the V-2 development program but never held an
important position in the project. At the end of the war, Oberth was
interrogated by American captors and then released. He settled in
Feucht, West Germany, near Nuremberg.
In
1955 Wernher von Braun, by this time the head of a U.S. army ballistic
missile effort at Huntsville, Alabama, invited Oberth to work for him
on his program. Oberth worked for a short time on these efforts, but
in 1959 he retired and returned to Feucht, where he lived the rest of
his life. Because of his significance as the “godfather” of early
German rocketry, Oberth returned to the United States in July 1969 to
witness the launch of the Saturn V rocket that carried the Apollo 11
crew on the first lunar landing mission. He then returned to Germany
where he died on December 29, 1989, having helped to create and
sustain spaceflight and witness many of the major events of space
exploration in the latter half of the 20th century.
home
