The Harley-Davidson is more than a two-wheeled miscreant-hauler; it's one of America's most important indigenous technologies. The 45-degree V-twin engine has remained remarkably unchanged since it was introduced in 1909. Now the Harley has its own museum, which opened on July 12 in Milwaukee, the bike's birthplace. Inside the steel-framed compound, you'll find plenty of antique bikes and memorabilia, including the original outlaw: Serial Number One. There's also a "family tree" that shows how engineers modernized the distinctive two-cylinder engine without sacrificing its signature raw rumble.

But confining all that heavy metal thunder indoors would be sacrilege. So Pentagram, the chief design firm on the project, turned 20 acres of industrial land into hog heaven: The three buildings containing galleries, archives, and the obligatory store are arranged around an intersection of 60-foot-wide roads — broad enough for four rows of parking and two traffic lanes, just like at Sturgis — creating an ever-changing exhibit of visitors' bikes. "It's important to have a real museum," Pentagram architect James Biber says, "but also to have a kind of museum on the street." There's car parking as well, but the lots are a bit of a hike from the entrance; this is one stretch of pavement where motorcycles always have the right of way.

1958: President Eisenhower signs the National Aeronautics and Space Act, creating the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The plot had thickened months before.

Beep … beep … beep …

They were steady, almost metronomic, signals coming from a tiny radio beacon orbiting the Earth every 96 minutes aboard an aluminum sphere measuring a mere 22-inches across. In an instant, everything changed.

It was Oct. 4, 1957, when the Soviet news agency Tass announced to a stunned world that the Soviet Union had successfully placed Elementary Satellite 1, known by its diminutive "Sputnik," into an elliptical orbit some 550 miles above a Cold War-wracked planet.

American scientists attending a reception at the Soviet embassy in Washington, D.C., that day knew their Russian colleagues were close. With luck, the thinking went, the USSR might launch a satellite sometime in 1958. But the Americans were close, too. Their Vanguard program, run by the Naval Research Laboratory, was beset by cost overruns and various delays, but they were confident that they would be first into space.

That illusion was completely shattered October 4, which is remembered as "Sputnik Night." While getting Sputnik into orbit didn't suddenly confer technological supremacy upon the Russians, it was nevertheless a remarkable achievement -- and an enormous propaganda coup. For the moment, at least, communism had trumped capitalism on a major front, and the conceit that America stood unequaled in the technological sphere was shaken.

When, less than a month later, the Russians put the larger and much-heavier Sputnik 2 into orbit, with the dog Laika aboard, genuine alarm set in. Now there was talk of a growing technology gap. There were also fears in U.S. military circles that these satellites might be capable of pinpointing targets for a Soviet nuclear-missile attack.

The Space Age was dawning badly for the United States.

The pressure for a U.S. riposte grew. It only intensified with a failed attempt to launch the Vanguard TV3 satellite in December 1957. It was the Army that finally got the United States off the schneid. Wernher von Braun, a key scientist in Nazi Germany's rocket program, was now working for the U.S. Army, along with a number of his former German colleagues brought to the United States as part of Operation Paperclip. They convinced the Pentagon to set Vanguard aside and bet the ranch on the Army's still-untested Project Explorer.

Explorer 1, launched atop a Juno 1 rocket January 31, 1958, was the first American satellite to achieve orbit. Although it was much smaller than Sputnik 2 and only a few pounds heavier than the original Sputnik, Explorer 1 was a badly needed success. It also marked the beginning of the space race in the national consciousness.

Explorer 1, and the subsequent launching of Vanguard 1, mitigated, but did not efface, the sting of Sputnik. And it did nothing to stave off a comprehensive reorganization of the U.S. space program. The Eisenhower administration, working with an often-fractious Congress, got nowhere, so Ike (in between tee times, his detractors would say) directed his science adviser, James Killian, to convene a committee and come up with a game plan.

The first step was to reinvigorate the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, or NACA, a rather geeky and elitist civilian panel that had been around since 1915, by handing it all nonmilitary responsibilities connected to space exploration. As NACA's charter grew, the decision was made to expand it into a full-fledged government agency taking direct responsibility for the nation's space program.

President Eisenhower signed the legislation creating NASA on July 29, and it officially became a functioning entity October 1, with T. Keith Glennan as its first administrator. There were 8,000 employees, inherited from NACA; three research laboratories -- Langley Aeronautical Laboratory, Ames Aeronautical Laboratory and Lewis Flight Propulsion Laboratory -- and an annual budget of $100 million. (That's about $750 million in today's money, compared to a 2008 budget of more than $17 billion.)

The agency's mission statement will have faint echoes for Star Trek fans: "To improve life here, to extend life there, to find life beyond."

To mark the 50th anniversary of NASA's birth, Wired.com has created a special package of features: NASA: 50 Years of Towering Achievement Gallery: NASA's Most Amazing Extraterrestrial Vehicles Gallery: The Space Suit Makes the NASA Astronaut Gallery: NASA's Most Embarrassing Goofs NASA's Best Photos: You Make the Call

Source: Various

MOJAVE, California -- After years of secretive construction, Scaled Composites and Virgin Galactic presented the first stage of its commercial launch platform, White Knight Two, today at the Mojave Air and Space Port.

After Scaled Composites put the rocket plane Space Ship One (SS1) into suborbital spaceflight twice in 2004, thus winning the Ansari X-Prize, Virgin Galactic placed an order for 12 similar spacecraft capable of carrying six passengers and two crew members into space. Before those ships can get into space, however, they will need a lift up -- which is what White Knight Two will provide.

White Knight Two is a dual-hull quad-engine aircraft roughly three times larger than the original White Knight. WK2 employs a different tail construction, using a cruciform instead of the WK's "T" style. The engines and cockpits are also located in different areas compared to the original White Knight.

Virgin America flew Wired.com out to the Mojave Air and Space Port in their new plane christened My Other Ride's a Spaceship. We grabbed these photos for your viewing enjoyment.

Left: Sir Richard Branson and Burt Rutan hang out of the cockpit windows of White Knight Two.

A proud Burt Rutan looks over the window of White Knight Two during its unveiling at the Mojave Air and Space Port on Monday morning.

Sir Richard Branson gives an ecstatic thumbs-up during White Knight Two's unveiling Monday.

Virgin Galactic's new suborbital launch platform sits ready on the tarmac at the Mojave Air and Space Port.

Buzz Aldrin and his wife, Lois, step onto the tarmac in front of Virgin America's new plane, named My Other Ride's a Spaceship.

Sir Richard Branson hops out of the cockpit door of White Knight Two. Being constructed entirely of carbon fiber and other composites, a typical door is not included.

Richard Branson and his mother, Eve, officially name the White Knight Two, which bears her name. No photographers were injured during the christening.

White Knight Two's nose art features a scantily clad buxom blonde whom Branson said was modeled after his mother when she was younger.

One of the few parts not constructed completely from carbon composite is this Pratt & Whitney PW300 engine.

Inside the wheel well. a hatch was left open providing a glimpse into the internal construction of White Knight Two.

The smooth lines of the wheel well show the lack of fasteners that differentiate composite construction from the standard aluminum fuselage most airplanes employ.

A portion of the carbon fiber composite that the plane is built out of can be seen clearly.

: Photo: Dave Bullock/Wired.com

The cruciform tail is one of the differences between White Knight Two and White Knight One, which had a T-shape tail.

Sir Richard Branson and Burt Rutan sit side by side during the unveiling of White Knight Two at the Mojave Air and Space Port.