Robert H. Goddard Alumni Award for Outstanding Professional Achievement
Named in honor of Robert Hutchings Goddard, Class of 1908, pioneer in the field of modern rocketry. Recipients will have demonstrated exceptional professional achievement in his or her chosen field. Qualifications include, but are not limited to, outstanding leadership skills, business acumen, innovative approaches to technical challenges, pre-eminence in teaching or research, and/or entrepreneurship.
In 1926, Dr. Goddard's first liquid fuel rocket was launched in Auburn, Mass. Larger scale experiments and a skeptical local government made it necessary for Dr. Goddard, who was to become recognized as the father of the United States space program, to move to New Mexico in 1930. There, he carried on a major series of tests until 1942 at which time he was called to Washington as Chief of Navy Research on jet-propelled planes.