Almost immediately after the Soviet Union launched its satellite, Sputnik I, President Dwight D. Eisenhower called a meeting with key officials from the defense and scientific communities to discuss its ramifications. The concern Eisenhower and the officials at the meeting experienced did not stem from a great scientific advance on the part of the Soviet Union. Rather, the concerns at the meeting were the result of the increasing competition in high technology with the Soviet Union. As a result, Congress passed the National Aeronautics and Space Act and the National Defense Education Act the following year.
Text adapted from “October 1957 Memorandum Related to Sputnik” in the October 2007 National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS) publication Social Education.
