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For thousands of years of human history, man has gazed upwards at the stars and dreamed of going there. It took until the middle of the 20th century for that dream to come true.
In the 1950s, at the height of the Cold War arms race, the Soviet Union launched the first orbiting satellite on an intercontinental missile, and America responded by creating NASA, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
That happened 50 years ago this month. From the beginning, NASA's mission has been to advance the exploration of space for peaceful purposes. President John Kennedy, in his famous speech at Rice University in 1962, said men had to go into space because "space is there...and the moon and the planets are there, and new hopes for knowledge and peace are there."
To commemorate this anniversary, Houston Public Radio has produced a six-part series that traces NASA's story from its beginnings through today, and its uncertain future
