Today, 48 years ago, on June 16, 1977 (Lunar Calendar, April 30, 1977), the rocket expert von Braun died. On June 16, 1977, the German-born rocket expert and American space engineering technology leader von Braun died of cancer in Alexandria, Virginia, aged 65. Von Braun was born in East Prussia, and he was passionate about spaceflight in his early years. His early experiments made him a senior civilian rocket expert in the German Army at the age of 20. He continued to study the experiments in the Nazi forces, and established a secret base in Penindade, in the Baltic Sea. He together with other members manufactured a V.2 rocket and bombed London at the end of the war. After landing in the United States, von Braun and his team turned to the U.S. Working Forces later. He turned to civ