b'T he Guggenheim Family had an immense impact on the development of aeronautics and space travel as the primary sponsor of two of the greatest figures in these fields: the legendary aviator Charles A. Lindbergh and the father of modern rocketry dr. Robert H. Goddard, whose ingenuity propelled the American space program for decades to come. Thedaniel guggenheim fund for the Promotion of Aeronauticswas established bydaniel Guggenheimand his son,Harry F. Guggenheim,in June 1926; in the following four years, the Fund provided $3 million in grants to establish schools and research centers atnew york University,Stanford University, Massachusetts institute of technology, Georgia institute of technology,Harvard University, andCalifornia institute of technology, among many others.From July to october, 1927, the Fund also sponsored a 22,350-mile flying tour of the United States byCharles Lindbergh,on his plane, TheSpirit of St. Louis,after his solo non-stop flight from new york to Paris in May 1927. the Guggenheim tour included visits to 82 cities in all 48 states, where Lindbergh gave 147 speeches promoting aviation.With Lindbergh as his advocate, Goddard secured financing from the Fund as well as the daniel and Florence Guggenheim Foundation for his groundbreaking rocketry research. Following daniels death in 1930, his widow, Florence, and Harry continued to support Goddards experiments in Roswell, new Mexico and at Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts, where Goddard taught and conducted research. the Guggenheims were Goddards primary funder throughout his rocketry career, at a grand total of $183,500. ironically, daniel, Florence, and Harry did not see a single Goddard rocket take flight.in1948,thedanielandFlorenceGuggenheimFoundationestablishedcentersfor research in jet propulsion at Princeton and Cal tech with two endowed Robert Goddard professorships. Created to encourage the development of rocket engines, the center at Cal tech became the nASA-affiliated Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which pioneered American space exploration from the 1970s on.The Guggenheim grants were extraordinarily generous.They showed vision, courage, and amazing confidencein Goddard as an individual. Charles lindbergh'