Step aside Hugh Dryden, there’s a moon walker who wants to get by. After 37 years of having the Dryden name attached to the flight research center at Edwards Air Force Base, the U.S. Congress is close to renaming it after Apollo 11 astronaut Neil Armstrong. In February, the House voted 394-0 on a resolution sponsored by Rep. Kevin McCarthy, R-Bakersfield, to create the Neil A. Armstrong Flight Research Center. The matter is still pending before the Senate. But the Dryden name will not disappear from Edwards. The resolution calls for renaming the western aeronautical test range for Dryden, who served as deputy administrator of NASA at the time of his death in 1965. The flight research center tests aircraft, supports space exploration and the International Space Station, and served as the West Coast home for the space shuttle during its years of operation. Naming the center for the first man to step on the moon was started five years before Armstrong’s death last August at age 82. The Antelope Valley Board of Trade was among the early supporters of the name change and worked behind the scenes with lawmakers. “It seemed very fitting six years ago, while Neil Armstrong was still with us, to initiate the name change as a way of inspiring the next generation of flight test and space explorers,” said Cathy Hart, former board of trade executive director. In the years before joining the astronaut corps in 1962, Armstrong was a test pilot at what was then called the High-Speed Flight Station at Edwards. He logged more than 900 missions flying such aircraft as the X-15 and the Bell X-1B. – Mark R. Madler
Air Base Shoots For Moon
