Aviation History in March: March 16, 1926 - Robert Goddard launches first liquid propellant rocket
Robert H. Goddard constructed and launched the first liquid-propellant rocket to achieve flight. The rocket, launched on March 16, 1926, at Auburn, Massachusetts, was damaged upon impact. The flight reached an altitude of 12 meters (41 feet), lasted 2.5 seconds, and covered a horizontal distance of 56 meters (184 feet).
Goddard experimented with liquid-propellant rockets before anyone else, but details of his work were so poorly known that he had little direct influence on later technological developments. Goddard recognized that liquid propellants could provide more energy for propulsion than an equal weight of gunpowder or other available solid fuels. In his earliest rockets, he placed the engine at the top of the vehicle and the fuel tanks below. However, he soon found that this "nose drive" arrangement was too unstable, so he placed the motor at the bottom, as in all modern rockets. Almost all of Goddard's liquid-propellant rockets burned liquid oxygen and gasoline.
