Edward Stone

From 1991 to 2001, Edward C. Stone, Jr. was Director of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). Born in rural Iowa, he was inspired by the launch of Sputnik to pursue experiments in space. He joined the faculty of the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) in Pasadena, California shortly after earning his Ph.D. in Physics at the University of Chicago. In 1972, he became the chief scientist for Project Voyager, an unmanned mission to explore the distant shores of our solar system. The twin Voyager vehicles made their way from Jupiter ,to Saturn, to Uranus and Neptune, beaming back breathtaking images and extending our line of sight into the Milky Way. In his press briefings and television appearances, Edward Stone emerged as a leader of the American science community and a persuasive spokesman for space exploration. In 1991, he received the National Medal of Science, his country's highest honor in the sciences, and was appointed to head the Pasadena-based JPL, the world's leading center for planetary exploration. As head of JPL, he oversaw the Mars Pathfinder mission, and its Sojourner rover, whose automated excursion on the surface of Mars broadcast moving images to millions of fascinated television viewers back on planet Earth. Since stepping down as JPL Director, Dr. Stone has served as Vice President of Caltech, where he is also Morrisroe Professor of Physics. In this podcast, recorded at the Academy of Achievement's 1992 Summit in Las Vegas, he discussed the Voyager Project, sharing the excitement of interplanetary exploration with the Academy's student delegates.