Learning Center Our Enshrinees

Maxime “Max” Faget

• Served aboard submarines during WWII.
• Joined NACA at Langley Research Center in Virginia where he worked with Dr. Robert Gilruth on research for designing high-speed and high-altitude aircraft, concentrating on high-speed aerodynamic heating.
• Set unofficial speed and altitude records after designing a ramjet engine and also aided in the design of X-15 airplane, Scout and Little Joe research rockets, and the Polaris missile.
• Transferred to NASA to help manage Project Mercury. Dr. Faget’s spacecraft design was the only one that would be light enough to enter Earth’s orbit and later put the first American in space in 1961.
• Appointed the Director of Engineering and Development at the Manned Aircraft Center in Houston, Texas where he helped with the design of the space shuttle and organized a team to study the possibility of reusing spacecraft.
• Served as Director of Engineering until 1981, after the second shuttle flight.
• Founding member of the private space agency: Space Industries, Inc. and also served as an executive for Eagle Engineering Inc.