Space: A Novel

by James A. Michener

  Hans Unger, who had helped Kolff rebuild the Oldsmobile, was devising in his head a better guidance system for the rockets he was convinced the Americans must build. ‘If we don’t,’ he said, identifying himself with his new country, ‘we shall lose the race to the Russians.’

  ‘Is the race itself important?’ Mott had asked, and he remembered the colloquium that Unger had once convened in the barracks at El Paso: ‘Chentlemen, Professor Mott hass asked a most benetrating qvestion. Duss it matter the Roosians, they are aheat of uss?’

  Mott would never forget the intensity of the replies: Von Braun, Stuhlinger, Kolff, Unger hammered at him, driving home their conviction that within the next decades someone would command space, and the military advantage derived therefrom, and the ability to predict weather, and the possibility of stationing a device of some kind to throw back radio signals to any spot on Earth. ‘But the most significant return,’ Von Braun had insisted, ‘will be the encouragement of the spirit of exploration … in all fields … in all arenas.’

  Mott had asked point-blank, ‘Are you satisfied that with the rockets we could build now, we could get to outer space?’

  ‘Tomorrow,’ Von Braun snapped. ‘If we’re set free.’

  ‘And the Moon? And Mars?’

  ‘Give us six years. Professor Mott, we’re on the verge of tremendous accomplishments. But so are the Russians.’ Mott remembered with chilling effect what Von Braun had said next: ‘Your United States has about one hundred of us Peenemünde men. Russia must have captured four hundred. Do you think that by accident you got all the bright ones? Don’t you think Russia got some able ones, too?’

  ‘But did they get any geniuses?’ Mott asked.

  ‘In this business a genius is merely a good engineer. I’m a good engineer. So is Kolff over there. You set Kolff free, by this time next year he could have something orbiting in space.’

  It was almost as if this caravan of used automobiles were heading purposefully to some powerful destiny. The fate of a good deal of mankind rode with these wandering scholars; one young man in a rebuilt Pontiac dreamed of throwing out from a potential spacecraft an immense gossamer construction made of the most delicate filament, infinitely finer than a nylon fishing line. As he explained it to Mott: ‘In outer space, you understand, with no wind, no gravity, no disturbance of any kind, a piece of my filament would be just as rigid as a steel beam eight inches through.’

  ‘I can’t believe it, but what would be the purpose?’

  ‘Collect radiation from the sun and convert it to electricity. Perpetual motion available at last.’

  ‘Is that practical?’

  ‘Would I work on it, otherwise?’ Odderveiss, the young man said, returning to his sketches.

  The boldest idea rode with the driver of the 1938 Oldsmobile, for Dieter Kolff had never surrendered his vision of the A-10: the immense rocket, which should have come off the line in early 1945, with the ability to launch from Peenemünde and deliver Trialen bombs into the heart of New York or Washington. Now that he lived in those cities, figuratively, he had diverted his imaginary rockets to other targets: Moon and Mars and Jupiter.

  ‘It can be done,’ he insisted to anyone who would listen. ‘We can do it now, and we must.’ In German he had often discussed the step-by-step procedures with Mott, hoping that Mott would report his conviction to the military, but nothing had happened, and he was bringing to his new job in Alabama not the equipment necessary for such shots into space and not even the plans, but only the moral conviction that whichever nation first mastered space might well master the world.

  It would be said later in Huntsville: ‘Over a hundred German scientists arrived here at eleven o’clock on an April morning and by nightfall more than sixty had applied for cards at the free library.’

  They were housed temporarily at the former Redstone Arsenal, which had been a thriving installation during the war but which served no peacetime need, and the citizens of Huntsville, while vigorously opposed to accepting Nazi Germans, as they called the Peenemünde scientists, were nevertheless gratified that at least someone had moved in to keep Redstone active and inject money into the local economy. These conflicting reactions meant that the reception was uneven, social leaders of the old Confederate city standing aghast at the invasion; bankers and businessmen being rather glad to see it. Certainly, there were no untoward incidents. Magnus Kolff, like the other youths, was enrolled in the local kindergarten, and when he returned for lunch with the exciting news that band instruments could be borrowed without cost, his mother said, ‘Get a trumpet, this afternoon,’ and the early days at Huntsville were marked by loud and enthusiastic trumpet practice.

  Liesl Kolff spent three days converting her new barracks into decent living space and then was seen about the camp no more. She spent her time in town trudging from one address to another, looking for a proper home in which to house her family: ‘No more camps. No more tents. We’re human beings now.’

  Huntsville residents were considerate of her desires, and one family after another suggested houses that might be available, but some were not large enough and others were too expensive. At the end of two weeks Liesl had succeeded in helping six other German families to settle into their own rented homes, but the Kolffs were still in barracks.

  And then one day, as she looked toward the north, she saw the beautifully wooded hills of a high area called Monte Sano, ‘The Mountain of Health’ a local woman explained, and Liesl went there, climbing the narrow footpaths until she reached a splendid plateau from which she could see the city below and the military installations beyond. From that moment she knew what she and Dieter must do, and next day she asked her husband to cut her a heavy walking stick from a sapling, and using this to knock aside brush, she explored the entire plateau until she found an almost perfect spot: sloping land that could be converted into a German-type wooded area with pine-needle base, cliff to protect the area from below, broad vista to delight the eye, and most important, tall, stout trees to give shade.

  Next day she took Magnus to the hill with her, and while he practiced trumpet calls off-key, she piled stones at what she deemed would be the corners of a satisfactory lot. On the weekend she led Dieter and Magnus up the hill to see what she already called ‘our house,’ and when Dieter saw what she had uncovered he was satisfied that they must build here: ‘After nearly five years of test shots in New Mexico, I’m hungry for trees.’

  But how to get the money to buy the land, if it was for sale, and build an American house, which must be very costly? Dieter went to his counselor, Professor Mott, who was himself living in a rented home. ‘How can we Germans get enough money to buy our homes? Or build ones?’

  Mott explained that in America one went to a bank and pleaded with the banker for a mortgage, but that none would be available unless the applicant already had a nest egg of several thousand dollars. ‘Could we see the banker, just in case?’ Dieter asked, and an appointment was made with a Mr. Erskine, descendant of a well-regarded Confederate family, who listened attentively to Dieter’s plea, then said with some warmth, ‘Mr. Kolff, the city of Huntsville is truly delighted to have you Germans as our guests. You could be the salvation of this city, and we intend to offer you every consideration. But we cannot issue mortgages unless you have some down payment to protect us.’

  That was final, and Kolff understood, but Mott asked if he could speak with Erskine alone. ‘I assure you I’ve not said a word about this to Kolff, but would you drive out to the camp to see what kind of people they are?’

  ‘I surely would. Let me assure you, Mott, I’m sick about refusing so many of your Germans, men and women of good character apparently …’

  ‘Come see.’

  So with Dieter sitting in the back seat, the banker and Mott drove out to the barracks, and there Erskine saw the cleanliness of the Kolff home, the trumpet on the sideboard and the extreme neatness of the place, but what impressed him most was the 1938 Oldsmobile standing beside th
e barracks. It was impeccable, well-washed and polished, with shiny black tires. Any family that would rebuild an antique like that and care for it with such obvious affection would repay a mortgage.

  ‘What we can do,’ Erskine said, back in his office, ‘is grant you a mortgage—that is, all the German families— on the lowest down payments we’ve ever accepted. How much money would you need, Mr. Kolff, land and house?’

  ‘If we can get the land …’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘I’d rather not say till we get the money.’

  ‘That’s prudent. But how much?’

  ‘Land, maybe fifteen hundred. House, maybe five thousand.’

  ‘Six thousand, five hundred—and no security? That’s rather much, Professor.’ He broke off the conversation to ask, ‘Are you buying, Mott?’

  ‘My future’s very uncertain. I’m not military, you know. I’m renting.’

  The banker asked Kolff if he would wait outside, and when he was gone, Erskine said, ‘These are the kind of people we want in this community. Will they be here long?’

  ‘I believe this is a long-term commitment. The government doesn’t know it yet, but the whole push of experiment …’

  ‘Does the Army agree?’

  ‘The Army is fumbling, sir. But it knows it can’t turn back.’

  ‘I can only repeat what I said to Kolff—and you can tell all your Germans this. I can give them mortgages at the lowest possible rate, the lowest possible down payment. If your man Kolff can come up with … well, let’s say two thousand dollars …’

  ‘He can’t. There’s no way he can.’

  ‘He drives an automobile.’

  ‘He bought it for forty dollars. What you see is what he did.’

  Erskine leaned back and drummed his fingers. ‘We forget down here in Alabama that immigrants still come to our shores. With nothing. Wife, two children and nothing. It’s amazing, really. Why don’t you assemble all your Germans who want to buy homes, see how much money they can come up with, and come back and see me. We might be able to work something out en masse.’ But when the Peenemünde men were assembled, they had almost no savings and their salaries were already allocated to furniture and food.

  The solution came from a remarkable source. General Funkhauser, fifty-four years old and handsome, with graying hair and a gray worsted suit, flew in to check with the Army concerning rocket contracts obtained by Allied Aviation, and when he heard of the plight of the German scientists he said on the spot, ‘I’ll lend you fifteen thousand dollars, and Allied will guarantee another fifteen thousand against your salaries on our projects.’

  When Mott heard this he insisted that Funkhauser leave his meeting at Redstone and drive immediately to the bank to assure Mr. Erskine that the funds would be available, and the general so charmed the banker, a trait Funkhauser had perfected in California, that a deal was arranged whereby the thirty thousand, some in hand, some guaranteed, could be used as a revolving fund which the Germans could then use as collateral to enable them to buy their own homes.

  The first loan was made to Dieter Kolff, and ten minutes after it was assured, Liesl had a real estate man tramping over the plateau of Monte Sano, noting the rock-pile corners of her proposed lot. At the end of two weeks several German families had bought adjoining lots, and one of the most congenial settlements in northern Alabama was under way, a place of solidly built homes, wooded gardens and lanes marked with flowering shrubs.

  A significant characteristic of Monte Sano was the amount of music that could be heard as the German children brought home their free instruments, and after a while the Huntsville band, accustomed to playing John Philip Sousa and American Legion marches, was offering Mozart and Beethoven.

  At the arsenal things were not going so smoothly for the German scientists; they were now prisoners of the Army and were restricted in their work to those rockets which the Army alone was developing for potential military use-Corporal, Sergeant, Redstone—and were not free to participate in the exciting and competing work being done by the Navy, with their more scientific Viking research rockets, or by the newly fledged Air Force, which was developing missiles like the Bomarc and Matador to its own specifications. It seemed to Dieter that America was prodigal in its waste of talent, headstrong in allowing conflict among agencies, and lagging in its pursuit of the Russians.

  ‘I don’t see how this country ever gets anything done,’ he told his wife as they worked together to make their home on Monte Sano always a little neater and better. ‘You put Von Braun in charge of everything, he’d have rockets in six months.’

  ‘America won the war, didn’t she?’ Liesl asked.

  ‘That’s a mystery also,’ Dieter said, but at the same time he was continuously grateful for the asylum America had provided and, unlike certain of the Peenemünde men, never considered returning to Germany. He was especially gratified with the easy manner in which Magnus was fitting in to American patterns and was proud of the boy’s fine marks at school. Once when Wernher von Braun came to Monte Sano for supper, the great scientist took Magnus on his knee and interrogated him about mathematics and geography, and the Kolffs were proud of how their son acquitted himself.

  When the boy was in bed, Von Braun confided his fears, his large, usually placid face betraying real doubts about the Army program in which he was inextricably enmeshed. ‘American generals are like German generals. If our team does a single thing that might be useful only to science, they scream and inspect us for loyalty.’ He laughed. ‘Remember how General Funkhauser was going to have us shot because we were thinking about space? They don’t shoot you in Huntsville. They do worse. They cut off your funds.’

  On the other hand, if the Germans applied themselves to military projects, they enjoyed remarkable freedom and constant encouragement. This was partly because the generals realized that in going before Congress in search of funds, they were restricted in what they could divulge; to the appropriation committees, they appeared as merely one more group of American military men, singing the same tired songs; but if they could throw the burden of testimony on Von Braun and General Funkhauser and specific experts like Dieter Kolff, all speaking in heavily accented phrases which carried an extra freight of scientific substance, they were apt to gain attention and grants.

  Von Braun seemed to be away from Huntsville most of the time: in Washington to testify before Congress, in Chicago to speak before large assemblies of scientists, or in the smallest Tennessee town to explain to local businessmen the significance of the new science. He was a genius in meeting American voters where they were and leading them gently, amusingly, to where he wanted them to be. He was especially adept at using his German accent effectively, and Dieter once heard him say to a group of representatives from a House committee, ‘When I left Alabama this morning to fly here to testify before you, my wife asked, “Wernher, do you have your speech prepared?” and I told her, “I know it backwards,” and that’s how I’m giving it, I’m afraid.’

  Von Braun, from his painful experience with Hitler and the Wehrmacht generals, knew how effective models and displays could be when talking to non-scientists, and it was for this reason that he often took Kolff along with him when he wished to make an especially powerful presentation before President Eisenhower or Senator Glancey’s committee: ‘I have my prized assistant, Dieter Kolff, to demonstrate the four parts which will fit together to make a Saturn rocket.’ And Kolff would take the carefully machined mock-up and break it apart, allowing watchers to handle the segments; then he would skillfully put them together again, as if he were a child playing with toys. Von Braun did not invite him to speak about the parts, for Dieter’s English could not be relied upon; Von Braun did the talking, and it was largely due to him that Huntsville continued to receive the funds necessary for basic research.

  But he and Kolff could never understand the peculiar workings of the American system, in which the Army remained suspicious of the Navy and the Air Force combated both, on the
grounds that space should belong to those who flew it. ‘They could see, if they studied what happened to Germany’s war effort,’ Von Braun said one night at his home when Kolff and Stuhlinger and the visiting Funkhauser were discussing next steps, ‘what happens when you allow generals to fight among themselves and make scientific decisions based on their own narrow interests.’ He was recalling the devastating debates that had occurred at Peenemünde, where the German air force had used the north end of the island to build an unmanned airplane, which proved extremely effective in bombing large areas, while Von Braun’s group filled the rest of the island with their competing rocketry.

  ‘I defend the American system,’ Funkhauser said. ‘Everyone competing with everyone else.’

  ‘It’s so wasteful,’ Von Braun complained.

  ‘More so than even you imagine,’ Funkhauser conceded. ‘Because in my opinion, some of the very best work is being done by private industry. I sometimes think that Allied Aviation is ahead of all the services.’

  The experts discussed this for some time, in German, and when Funkhauser told them what he had seen in the California and Texas aviation shops, they were astonished. ‘What will happen, I think,’ Funkhauser predicted, ‘is that we will all drift along, going our own ways, until something big happens. Bang! Then we’ll have to pay attention. In six weeks, Army … Navy … Air Force … private industry—we’ll coalesce into one very effective instrument.’