The University of Texas at Austin
College of Engineering

Timeline: 1950s

Timeline


1950: The Experimental Aerodynamics Laboratory was founded by Milton J. Thompson in the Defense Research Laboratory to perform research on supersonic boundary layers at speeds five times faster than sound.
1951: The Department of Engineering Mechanics granted its first doctoral degree to Robert Felgar.
  William H. Shutts joined the department faculty.
1952: Dr. Eugene Ripperger joined the department faculty.
1953: Sigma Gamma Tau, the honor society for aerospace engineering students, started a chapter at the University of Texas at Austin.
  The Container Research Laboratory (later the Structural Mechanics Research Laboratory) was established under the leadership of J. Neils Thompson.
  Joseph Dalley and Raymond Staley joined the department faculty.
1955: NASA astronaut Alan Bean graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Aeronautical Engineering. He later became the fourth man to walk on the moon as lunar module pilot on Apollo 12, man’s second lunar landing.
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  Joseph Dalley, Raymond Staley, and Dr. Vance Moyer joined the department faculty.
1958:





1959:

The Engineering Laboratories Building (later the W.R. Woolrich Laboratories) was constructed.



The Department of Aeronautical Engineering was renamed the Department of Aerospace Engineering.

WRW photo
Center for American History, UT-Austin
Construction of Engineering Building
UT College of Engineering Records
  Kenneth Rathbun and Drs. Phil Ferguson, Byron Short, and Shao Yuan joined the department faculty.