Bibliographic Essay

NACA RECORDS

In 1972 and 1973 an attempt was made to bring all the records of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics under one roof. It failed. Some of the files were still actively in use by NASA to continue research begun by the NACA. Some had already been retired to federal archives and records centers around the country, inextricably mingled into NASA records with which they had become interfiled. Some remained at the former NACA laboratories, now NASA research centers, as part of the permanent station inventory.

The most complete guide to these scattered records is the 1973 "Special Study on the Records of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics," NN-572-13, prepared by William H. Cunliffe and Herman G. Goldbeck, then of the records appraisal staff at the National Archives. This 90-page typescript describes in considerable detail 3967 cubic feet of records at the Washington National Records Center in Suitland, Maryland. It also accounts, in much less detail, for another 1265 cubic feet of records either retained by former NACA research laboratories and stations or stored in their local federal archives and records centers. At the time the Special Study was prepared, it was expected that all these records would be permanently accessioned by the National Archives. To date, only the files at the Washington National Records Center and a portion of those at the San Francisco Federal Archives and Records Center have been. Except for a few classified files, these are now open to all researchers; permission from NASA is required to see the classified ones, or those at NASA centers.

All NACA records in the custody of the National Archives and Records Service, whether or not title to them has actually passed from NASA to NARS, are accessioned into Record Group 255, Records of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. When a group of records is retired, the archives and records center to which it goes assigns it an alphanumeric accession number. All accession numbers for NACA records are in the same form: i.e., 57 A 415, indicating the 415th group of records accessioned by that records center in fiscal year 1957.

Each accession has a "Transmittal of Government Records" form prepared by the NACA or NASA, identifying the office retiring the records and describing the contents of the one-cubic-foot records center boxes used to transfer and store the documents. The accuracy and completeness of these descriptions vary considerably from office to office, and within the same office over time. Too often they are brief, inaccurate, or unclear. Still, they are in many cases the only guide available.

Washington National Records Center

The seventy accessions at the Washington National Records Center constitute the largest and most important single collection of NACA records. Most of these originated at NACA headquarters. Some are from the Langley laboratory in Hampton, Virginia, and its former subsidiary Wallops Island Research Station (now part of Goddard Space Flight Center). Title to all of these records is now permanently vested in the National Archives.

The Cunliffe and Goldbeck special study of these records divides them into five categories: Correspondence Files, Publication Files, Reference Collection, Organizational Records, and Topical Files.

The 235 cubic feet of correspondence files are really the general files of the NACA headquarters. In addition to correspondence, they comprise subject files, biographies, clippings, budget material, research program information, and report files. All the material is filed according to one of three systems. Guides to these systems may be found in 63 A 29 (31), i.e., Record Group 255, accession 63 A 29, box 31.

The publications files contain 680 cubic feet of documentation on the NACA's publications (see appendix F). Besides copies of NACA reports, the files contain documents related to the distribution and editing of the reports, as well as Langley laboratory files of research authorizations under which the reports at the laboratory were prepared.

The reference collection is essentially the NACA headquarters library. In its 1426 cubic feet are reports, studies, papers, journal articles, and translations from military, academic, and industrial sources around the world. Some are classified according to an alphanumeric code; others have simply a sequential "N" number, indicating the order of their receipt by the NACA library. NASA's Langley Research Center has a complete shelf list and numeric index to this collection. The 180 drawers of 3x5 cards mentioned in the special study as being at NASA Headquarters have since been transferred to the NASA Scientific and Technical Information Facility in Linthicum Heights, Md.

The 160 cubic feet of organizational records contain material on the activities of various NACA committees and subcommittees, reports and memoranda from field laboratories and stations, biographies of key personnel, and lists of visitors to NACA headquarters and laboratories.

The topical files contain 169 cubic feet of information on patents and inventions, legal and fiscal matters, security, and Project Vanguard. Finally there are two boxes of photographs, three boxes of slides, and 23 cubic feet of miscellaneous records ranging from personnel policies through laboratory-site selection.

Using the special study and the Transmittal of Government Records forms as guides to these nearly 4000 cubic feet of records, I selected 718 boxes for examination. I looked for records that promised to tell most about how NACA operated as opposed to what it did: i.e., the procedure instead of the product. Especially did I choose boxes that seemed to have material on policy, organization, administration, research procedures, committee composition, personnel recruiting and management, and relations with other agencies and institutions. Of the 718 selected, I examined 480. After sampling some accessions, I found the materials were not what I had expected and warranted no further attention. In this way I was able to delete 178 boxes from my list. Also, 64 boxes were not available for research because they had been destroyed or were missing, either misplaced within the records center or charged out to NASA and not returned. All these now appear to be irrecoverable. In the course of my research I added to my list 4 boxes that had not appeared to be interesting on the inventories but which continued important sets of files found in other boxes.

All 480 boxes were examined in Stack 3 of the Washington National Records Center, where most of them were stored. This relieved the Center staff of the necessity of carting them to the research room. Some of the boxes required only a few moments' examination to show they had no material worth closer scrutiny. Most required much more time. The very best ones took two or more days to examine. Of those, I brought 11 back to my office on special loan from the National Archives to examine in detail and make extensive photostatic copies.

A few peculiarities of these files warrant mention. John Victory, whose personality infects them, was awed and inspired by the great men who served on the NACA. In filing documents, he often put into biography files materials that might better, or more

reasonably, have gone elsewhere. If an important man was author or addressee of or interested party to a document, his file would probably contain the document, mixed indiscriminately with letters of appointment, travel vouchers, and regrets that he could not attend this or that meeting.

Victory began a history of the NACA in the late 1940s. In the early 1950s he was assisted by Ruth Walrad, for a while the NACA historian. After that his daughter Betty helped him. Scattered throughout the files at WNRC are out-slips indicating that documents and even whole folders have been removed, most often by Betty Victory. I have not tracked down all these removals, but I believe that most of them ended in a collection of NACA headquarters papers separately donated to the National Archives and now retained by the Modern Military Branch in the Main Building in Washington, D.C. (See National Archives.)

Except for these removals by the Victorys, the files appear remarkably complete. They contain many copies of most documents, especially the important ones. Even before the modern riot of photocopying, Victory ensured that numerous carbons were made and that extra copies were always available, through retyping if necessary. Crossreferencing is common in the files. Often the face of a carbon copy will contain directions to the complete files on the subject. There are considerable marginalia and, in the later years, there are buck slips, though never as many as the historian would like.

Some items I expected to find either are missing from the files or escaped my attention or my sampling. Information on the NACA staff is especially hard to come by. The Committee was traditionally opposed to organization charts and, lacking these, it is difficult to recreate the hierarchy over the years. I found no telephone directories, and the biography files on the staff are scattered and irregular. Information on facilities at Langley laboratory is quite complete, much less so for the other laboratories and stations. Controversy within the organization was seldom committed to paper. There are clues that the NACA had its share, but it seems that such unpleasantness was resolved orally-behind closed committee doors, in the privacy of John Victory's office, or over drinks at the Cosmos Club. I have found only one instance in which an NACA committee submitted a minority report. On paper, at least, all else was harmony and unanimity.

Following is a summary of the most useful material found in these records. It is by no means a thorough survey of the collection, but rather a description of what was most helpful to me in preparing this study.

Probably the single most useful accession is 57 A 415. Its 80 cubic feet of generalcorrespondence files, covering the years 1915 to 1942, document virtually every facet of NACA activity before World War II. These files follow meticulously the alphanumeric "Index to Files of Correspondence Division," dated 26 September 1942. This makes them doubly useful, for judicious comparison of the index and the retirement inventory enables the searcher to go directly to the box and folder containing information on any subject in the index. These files, by no means a complete record, are by far the most comprehensive single accession. A sampling of the kind of information I extracted from this accession gives an idea of its usefulness.

Boxes 3 through 5 reveal how aeronautical problems were selected for research in the early years, and how research authorizations were originated, approved, and monitored. Box 13 has folders on "Commercial Testing, General, 1929-1940," through which it is possible to trace the evolution of NACA policy on testing and refining prototypes for the aircraft industry. Box 14 has candid and confidential information on the campaign by Frank Tichenor in the early 1930s to abolish the NACA. It also contains copies of trip reports by NACA staff members who had visited industry plants. Boxes 16 and 17 contain folders on "Estimates of Appropriations, 1927-1943," one of the most complex and elusive subjects in the NACA's administrative history. Box 22

has documentation through 1933 on "Policy and Procedures," revealing how George Lewis sought by personal involvement to control the Langley laboratory's research program. Boxes 64 and 65 contain unique material on the background of the Air Commerce Act of 1926, including the important roles played by John Victory and the NACA. Box 66 contains correspondence with John J. Ide, the Committee's European representative. The letters to Ide from Victory and Lewis are especially useful, for the latter two often tried to summarize for Ide what they considered the most important news in U.S. aviation and aeronautics. Boxes 75 and 76 contain copies of Victory's semiannual reports to the NACA; these are the most consistent and comprehensive periodic summaries of the Committee's administration and organization, better even than the NACA's annual reports to Congress.

In 1942 the filing system used in accession 57 A 415 was replaced by a far more elaborate Dewey decimal system that attempted to code all the information with which the NACA dealt. It had eight classes, of which three (000, 100, 300) were “abstract"; four (400, 500, 600, 700) were "concrete"; and one (200) was mixed, dealing mostly with personnel. Each of the classes would include hyphenated abstractions. Thus, category 600 was "Flight"; 662 was "Flight Instruments" (still concrete); but "Flight Characteristics" (an abstract) was -532. Category 300 was "Administration"; "Coordination with Universities" was 370.112; but "Classification of Firms by Commodities" was -073. The system was so complex it was unworkable. Repeated attempts to modify it failed. In February 1952 it was scrapped altogether.

Records filed under this system are in the following accessions:

Taken together, these accessions continue the general files of the NACA begun with 57 A 415. Several guides to the filing system exist, none entirely dependable. The 1 May 1944 "NACA Filing System: Index to 'Concrete' and 'Abstract' Subjects," running to 110 pages, may be found in 63 A 29 (31). Perhaps more helpful is the 10-page "Index to the Old Files: 1943 Filing System, revised 26 Oct. 1945" to be found in National Archives, Record Group 255, Entry 11, Box 1.

Compared with the Dewey decimal filing system used by the NACA between 1942 and 1952, the alphanumeric system of the Committee's final six years is a model of clarity and simplicity. A guide to it appears in an untitled 6-page typescript dated 11 March 1952. Copies may be found in 63 A 29 (31) and as an appendix to the Cunliffe and Goldbeck special study. The system had three lettered categories. The “A” category contained the Committee's operating files: i.e., documentation on conferences, committees, visits, comments on reports, security, films, etc. The "B" category covered concrete and tangible subjects like complete aircraft, airframe components, propulsion systems, fuels, materials, equipment, and instruments. The "C" category covered abstract or intangible subjects like fluid mechanics, aerodynamic characteristics, stability and control, heat transfer, aircraft loads, structural properties and stresses, and operating problems. These files are contained in the following accessions:

Other accessions, though less comprehensive, were almost equally informative. Accession 62 A 35, filed mostly in a Dewey decimal system, continues 57 A 415 through 1952. Box 40 has excellent material on Committee reorganizations and on the NACA's role in the creation of the National Science Foundation. Box 41 contains useful material on the important Unitary Wind Tunnel Plan and on the post-World War II Mead committee hearings, for which the NACA gathered and tabulated much formerly scattered information about its organization and activities. Boxes 44 through 49 contain material on the short-lived but important Research and Development Board of the Department of Defense. Boxes 54 through 56 contain reports by NACA staff members after they attended professional conferences, a mine of information on the aircraft industry and the scientific and engineering professions that serve it. Box 77 lists all research authorizations at the three major NACA laboratories.

Accessions 57 A 807 (1-64) and 61 A 195 (20-64) hold complete files on research authorizations. The first is a Langley laboratory accession, the second is from headquarters. Some RAs require a single folder; others fill more than one box. Through them the whole NACA research process can be followed from idea through final published report. A note of caution: the Special File folders are not the treasure troves described in the special study; rather, they are gathering places for miscellaneous correspondence regarding the authorizations.

Accession 54 A 581 records, with photographs, the construction at Langley laboratory between 1929 and 1951. It offers a unique perspective on what complex and magnificent machines the wind tunnels were, and how easily the NACA engineers could have become enamored of them. Accession 55 A 344 (R25-R32, R34, R38, R40R47) shows how reports were circulated within the NACA, commented upon, published, and distributed. Accession 56 A 635 (1-4) has more of the same.

Boxes 10 through 39 of accession 59 A 2112 are the files on the technical committees. Generally these are arranged in separate folders on Organization, Minutes, Notices [of meetings], Reports, and General. The Organization folders are the most revealing. Interspersed in these records are some characteristically rich biography files of prominent committee members. Boxes 5 through 13 of accession 55 A 312 contain biography files on members of the NACA technical committees. These show clearly that aircraft-manufacturing firms were actively seeking NACA membership for their employees.

Among the best fiscal records are those in accession 64 A 125 (17-40). Box 17 is especially useful for its summary of construction at Langley laboratory. In box 23 are copies of all Treasury Department warrants, the only sure and complete source of information on moneys received by the NACA from Congress or other branches of the federal government. Box 35 contains excellent summaries of NACA finances year by year, many first collected for presentation to the Mead committee in 1946. Accession 64 A 518 (8-13) also has useful budget information.