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Commercialization

Jim Rose

By Keith Cowing
NASA Watch
May 30, 2015
Filed under
Jim Rose

James Turner Rose
“James Turner Rose, 1935-2015, known throughout the space community to have been an early pioneer of space as a place for commercial pursuits, Jim Rose was among the first to develop a business proposition that involved capturing the advantages of microgravity. He created Electrophoresis Operations In Space (EOS), the first joint endeavor agreement between industry and NASA to bring space commercialization into reality.”

NASA Watch founder, Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA, Away Teams, Journalist, Space & Astrobiology, Lapsed climber.

4 responses to “Jim Rose”

  1. Courtney Stadd says:
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    I attended a commercial space panel discussion in Washington, DC, recently. The moderator described one of the new space entrepreneurs on the panel as “deserving a place on Mount Rushmore.” What struck me was that the panelist rather immodestly took the praise in stride without acknowledging the many early pathfinders who fought for the opportunities being pursued by today’s space ventures.

    The news of Jim Rose’s passing should remind us all of those early pathfinders who bravely fought to foster an environment that facilitated the emergence of today’s Nanoracks, SpaceX and other
    commercial space ventures. In my various government positions, I had the honor of working closely with Jim (especially when he was NASA’s Assistant Administrator for Commercial Programs) and watched
    him battle the bureaucracy numerous times as he fought for his vision of forging partnerships with the emerging commercial space sector.

    Today’s space entrepreneurs owe Jim much for his passion, tenacity and dedication to forging policies and programs to support US leadership in commercial space activities. He will be missed but he leaves a proud legacy. Godspeed, Jim!

    • jamesmuncy says:
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      Yes! Let’s hear it for the Tom Rogers Club… all of us whose entire bodies, or at least missing pieces, cover the barbs on the wire fencing allowing today’s generation to climb safely.

  2. Neal Aldin says:
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    I agree with Courtney. There was a lot of activity that led to the present-day commercial cargo and crew which a lot of the present day NASA and contractors give no credit to. Not only the Joint Endeavor Agreements with 3M, McDAC which resulted in CFES, and had it not been for Challenger, a large payload bay electrophoresis processor, but also Spacehab’s commercial middeck module contract, which went along with the oversight of the Code C Centers for Commercial Development and the development of many ‘commercial’ payloads, some of which still fly today such as PCG and CGBA.

    Some of the present day NASA managers, like Gerst, discount Spacehab, Inc, because he did not like Spacehab. Inc suing NASA for the loss of the SH modules on Columbia. Ater all, NASA would say, NASA did their best to protect the Columbia Shuttle, the Crew and the SH Module (in a pig’s eye) and they never promised to do any more than their best. He could not have afforded to fly the Columbia mission, or the Mir missions or the ISS Spacehab missions if he’d had to fly something like a Spacelab with its government overhead. I think Spacelab cost was once estimated at $1.5 billion per flight while Spacehab was charging $15 million for essentially the same capability.

    NASA recently published a book “Commercial Orbital Transportation Services” and amazingly absolutely no credit was given to these earlier programs.

    Now I would suggest that since NASA seems to pay zero attention to past programs and processes, the current management is frequently caught reinventing the wheel and they may actually think they are doing something for the first time. It says something about the lack of continuity of personnel in functions for which they actually have experience, which perhaps explains the ridiculously high government costs.

    However today’s commercial progress is owed in large measure to Courtney, Jim Rose, Bob Citron, Chet Lee, Dan Bland and several others.

  3. John C Mankins says:
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    Jim Rose was a true pioneer at NASA; it took great courage in those days to advocate for something so different from mainstream NASA goals as Commercial Space. His accomplishments and setbacks serve as a reminder that for many decades using the word “commercial” was a very, very fragile and sometimes risky proposition at the Agency.