Significant Contributions Service Award

From 1982 to 1990, Launius held several positions as a civilian historian with the United States Air Force. Between 1990 and 2002, he was the chief historian for NASA. In 2001, he held the Charles A. Lindbergh Chair in Aerospace History at the Smithsonian. From 2002-2006 he was Chair of the Division of Space History at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum. From 2006-2013 he was Senior Curator, and from 2013-2016 Launius was Associate Director for Collections and Curatorial Affairs at the same institution.

Publications

Launius has written more than twenty books and 100 articles on the history of aerospace. Some titles include Historical analogs for the stimulation of space commerce (2014), Space shuttle legacy: how we did it and what we learned (2013), and Exploring the Solar System: The History and Science of Planetary Probes (2012). He has twice won the AIAA History Manuscript Award, for Coming Home: Reentry and Recovery from Space in 2011, and for Space Stations: Base Camps to the Stars in 2003.

Roger D. Launius is former chief historian of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and most recently Associate Director for Collections and Curatorial Affairs at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Air and Space Museum. He is the author, most recently, of NACA to NASA to Now: The Frontiers of Air and Space in the American Century (NASA SP-2022-4419, 2023); Apollo’s Legacy: The Space Race in Perspective (Smithsonian Books, 2019); Reaching for the Moon: A Short History of Space Race (Yale University Press, 2019); and The Smithsonian History of Space Exploration: From the Ancient World to the Extraterrestrial Future (Smithsonian Books, 2018). He is also a recipient of the NASA Exceptional Service Medal and the Exceptional Achievement Medal. He has been a guest commentator on space history for all the major television and news radio networks.