I took a page out of Lewis Bush‘s book (almost literally) and visited the old “Opel Rennbahn“ (Opel Racetrack) where Max Valier - founding member of the “Verein für Raumsschifffahrt“ (Association for Space Travel) - tested the Opel RAK 1, the first rocket-propelled automobile. 1/ - ThreadSky

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jenstemmen.bsky.social • 2 days ago

I took a page out of Lewis Bush‘s book (almost literally) and visited the old “Opel Rennbahn“ (Opel Racetrack) where Max Valier - founding member of the “Verein für Raumsschifffahrt“ (Association for Space Travel) - tested the Opel RAK 1, the first rocket-propelled automobile.
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jenstemmen.bsky.social•2 days ago

The construction of the RAK 1 was financed by Valier‘s patron Fritz von Opel, who had also commissioned the construction of the race track a decade earlier in proximity to the headquarters of the family business in Rüsselsheim.
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jenstemmen.bsky.social•2 days ago

The test runs were somewhat successful and are considered an important stepping-stone towards full-fledged rocket technology. The same year that RAK 1 sped around in circles in Rüsselsheim, Wernher von Braun (WvB) became a member of the Verein für Raumschifffahrt.
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jenstemmen.bsky.social•2 days ago

The racetrack itself and the test runs seem surrounded by an air of nostalgia for what is framed as the - sometimes reckless, but always passionate - pioneering spirit of progress that the motley crew of the Verein for Raumschifffahrt embody for some.
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jenstemmen.bsky.social•2 days ago

Confronted with the horrors of the labor camps where the V2 rockets were constructed for the Nazis under his supervision, von Braun returned to this romanticized image of early rocketry - the image of a hopeless romantic who made a Faustian bargain to achieve his vision for space exploration.
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jenstemmen.bsky.social•2 days ago

For more on von Braun, the beginnings of modern rocketry and its continuities into modern space exploration, visit the exhibition “An Infinitely Dark Legacy: The Fascist Roots of Modern Space Exploration“ at the Haus der Universität Düsseldorf, opening April 25:

https://www.hdu.hhu.de/programm/einzeltermin/vernissage-ein-unendlich-dunkles-erbe-die-faschistischen-wurzeln-der-modernen-weltraumforschung

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