Four city rocketeers baffled adults
By Joe Walsh
Class of 1962
Ed. Note: The West Haven High School Class of 1962 will have its 60th class reunion 5 p.m. on Friday, Sept. 23 at App’s Restaurant, 283 Capt. Thomas Blvd. Send $40 per ticket to Class of ‘62’, 34 Goodsell Point Road, Bradford 06405. Joe Walsh, who now resides in Washington State, had this remembrance – a story that rocked the Town of West Haven, and amazed adults for the ingenuity shown by local youth.
After the atomic bomb blasts of Hiroshima and Nagasaki (1945) Americans (even kindergarten kids) saw the post atomic bomb picture of a Japanese farmer, mule, and plow silhouetted in ashes on a brick wall. This single picture clearly showed the horrors of atomic weapons.
Americans that lived through World Wars felt safe, because the horrors of war were in always in faraway lands. This feeling of security disappeared when the Soviet Union launched the satellite Sputnik on Oct. 4, 1957. Sputnik proved Soviets missiles could vaporize anyone in America.
Teachers had no idea how to help school kids deal with the possibility of Soviet nuclear missile attacks. Teachers showed 7th grade schoolers Life and Look magazine graphic maps of the USA and Soviet Union with mushroom clouds representing the relative destruction, after a nuclear missile war between the USA and Soviet Union. The USA had fewer missiles but larger nuclear warheads; thus, the USA could turn twice as many people to ashes as the Soviets. As we futilely huddled under desks during nuclear war drills, I wondered, how knowing that there would be two piles of ashes in the Soviet Union to make up for my one pile of ashes (under my desk) was supposed to make me feel safe.
On Dec. 6, 1957, a Vanguard missile blew up, while attempting to launch first American’s satellite. This colossal public failure became the subject of every TV news show. Had America fallen far behind the USSR? Are we in imminent danger of nuclear attack?
Four Connecticut boys (not from WH) asked to launch a homemade rocket from one of the 12 Nike Missile Sites in Connecticut. This was deemed not a good idea (probably because some Nike missiles had nuclear warheads). However, an alternate site was arranged for a live TV rocket launch. It seemed a good way to bolster sagging morale of citizens. Again, the rocket blew-up on the launching pad, thus, further dashing our hopes for the future.
Four boys (WH Class ’62) Jimmy Ballard, Phil Vallie, Billy Rubenstein, and Joe Walsh built-and -launched rockets. While NACA’s (predecessor to NASA) rockets were blowing up, WH rockets soared out of sight from empty lots. Rocket terminology and successful rocket launches elevated the WH boys to rocket and NACA experts. Suddenly, everybody knew who we were. Teachers asked these teenage boys about rockets and NACA. Adults asked these boys about the “Space Race” and wanted to know when NACA would catch up to the Russians. Always the optimist, Jimmy was full of inspirational and very imaginative stories about NACA, which made adults feel much better. The gist of Jimmy’s imaginative NACA stories (better known as BS) was that we would all be safe soon. Apparently, in times of crisis, reality-and-truth often take second place to feel-good-stories, no matter how farfetched. It was also apparent: the key to becoming an expert about rockets or any other subject is to tell people exactly what they wanted to hear.
The West Haven Library contained the book “All About Rockets and Jets” and other books about chemistry and science. We read and reread these books to understand the science of rockets and rocket fuel. Teachers at Union Street grade school were very encouraging, but Union School had no math or science teachers to help us.
We timed the rockets from takeoff to landing. Using library book formulas, we were able to calculate the trajectory, height, and speed of the rockets. Our early rockets were about 1 ½-feet-long, reached speeds of about 110 mph and heights of about 400 feet.
Later, we pinched the center, of two-foot-long rockets, to form a second rocket engine. These improved rockets reached heights of a ¼ mile and speeds of over 400 mph.
Ballard decided to boost the power of our rocket fuel with a drop or two of nitroglycerin. Jimmy read articles (in Hot Rod Magazine) about hot rod drivers, who mixed nitroglycerin with gasoline to make their cars go faster. The articles failed to mention, the race-car-nitroglycerin is mixed with stabilizing chemicals (such as alcohol) to make it much safer to use.
Jimmy found the formula and instructions of how to make nitroglycerin in a library book. Please note: The instructions did not contain one word of caution about making this extremely dangerous and very unstable explosive. It is scary to think, this same book was in each of the many public libraries Andrew Carnegie built across America.
Jimmy purchased (one at a time) the four chemicals needed to make nitroglycerin from Silver’s Drug Store on the corner of Main Street and Campbell Avenue. Jimmy made a very large test tube of nitroglycerin, and then hid it in the basement of his home of 23 Ward Place, WH (a three-story, three-family house). The nitroglycerin (equivalent of 3 to 5 sticks of dynamite) was enough to blow the house and everybody in it into tiny pieces.
Acting on a tip, Det. John Wolfe of WHPD foiled an attempt by Ray (Class ‘62) from lunching a rocket at a huge commercial oil depot, with hundreds of thousands of gallons of oil. The oil tanks were located on the east end of the, near Kimberly Avenue. This rocket launch could have started a huge oil fire that could have engulf half of West Haven.
Wolfe also confiscated a 5-foot-long rocket (see picture from New Haven Register) from my basement on 211 Center St., and a smaller rocket and a test tube (with an unknown substance) from Jimmy’s basement.
The next morning, Jimmy and I realized, the WHPD had unknowingly confiscated the hidden test tube of nitroglycerin. We walked with fearful trembling legs to the police station to tell the police, they were in mortal danger.
A WHPD technician, in a white lab coat and coke bottle glasses, twisted his pencil thin mustache, smiled and knowingly giggled at the absurdity of teenage boys making nitroglycerin. As expected, only the police officer with the test tube of nitroglycerin in his pants pocket took us seriously.
The technician followed protocols and put the test tube in a bucket full of ice water for transport to the testing lab in the basement.
The technician put a single drop of the “unknown substance” on a large steel vise in the police lab. He said, “If this was really nitroglycerin, when I hit this drop with this hammer, the head would be blown off and get stuck in the ceiling.” The technician again smiled and nodded at each police officer in the lab. They all looked at us and had a nice little laugh.
The hammer hit. Bang! Ears rang. The single drop passed the test for nitroglycerin. The hammerhead stuck in the ceiling.
The police officer, who drove for hours with nitroglycerin in his pocket, fainted out cold and hit the floor, without even trying to break his fall.
Wolfe offered not to prosecute, if we told him how we made nitroglycerin and where we got the chemicals. A library book? A drug store? The simplicity of it all shocked him.
The informative library book soon disappeared from the public library and probably from every other Andrew Carnegie library across the country. We promised to never make nitroglycerin again.
The New Haven Register ran a story “Homemade Rocket Confiscated in West Haven,” included a picture of Det. Wolfe holding a 5-foot rocket. He wisely decided not to alarm the good citizens of West Haven. There was no mention of a police car driving around town carrying a large test tube of nitroglycerin, nor the planned oil depot rocket launch was included in the story. Instead of nitroglycerin, Det. Wolfe described the confiscated explosives as “Large amount of gun powder … powerful enough to send somebody to the moon without a rocket … made from ingredients from a hardware store.” For years, the walls of the police station had a shiny brass plaque reprint of the Register news story, including a picture of Detective Wolfe holding the 5 foot rocket.
The next day in school, we were heroes or least the topic of conversation. The girls asked, “Was that really you guys in the newspaper?” All four of us said, “Yes, it was.”
Billy Rubinstein and I built one last big rocket. It was over an inch in diameter and over 3 feet long, made from a scrapped TV aluminum antenna mast. The fins were made from a Maxwell House Coffee can. The solid fuel was purchased from the Mohegan Grocery Store on Campbell Avenue. It had over 10 times as much fuel as our previous rockets. It took us several days to load and pack the rocket fuel. At last, our rocket was ready. It was a thing of beauty.
We launched the rocket from far away Painter Park (190 Kelsey Avenue). It seemed the ideal place for our last big grand finale rocket launch. There were no people or buildings nearby and it had a dirt pit that would protect us, during the launch. Even safety skeptic Phil was willing to join us for this one last grand launch.
We lit the fuse and ran to a dirt pit for shelter. Heads down, we waited for what seemed like forever. Experience and Phil told us not to peek our heads up. At last, the rocket engine roared and then a big bang.
The blast from the rocket bent-and-twisted the launching ramp, sending the rocket far off-course. The smoke trail headed toward highly populated downtown. The loud bang was from the rocket exceeding the sound barrier (770 mph) and making a sonic boom. The rocket was nowhere in sight. We split up to look for the rocket. Billy and Phil walked toward Phil’s home on Campbell Avenue. Jimmy and I walked toward his home on Ward Place.
A crowd had gathered near Jimmy’s home. We asked, “What happened?” Answer: “Someone tried to kill the police chief. A man fired a homemade bazooka from across the street. The bazooka went through the police chief’s picture window and just missed him sitting on his band new couch.”
The police talked to an “eyewitness” and took notes. The eyewitness pointed across the street to a group of trees, where “the bazooka was fired from”.
Jimmy said it was a police detective’s house, not the police chief’s house. This was still the most exciting thing to happen in sleepy West Haven.
Det. Wolfe (then running for mayor) gave a very inspiring speech on how he was going to “protect the good people of the town from the criminal element of West Haven.” I felt safer already.
The couch had a small hole in the front and a very large hole in the back, where the fabric was ripped out. It was very impressive.
Two lab technicians (in white coats) carried a wood 2 X 4 on their shoulders. Hanging from the 2 X 4 (on wires) was our rocket. Our rocket flew about a mile and a half, then ricocheted off a tree, and went through the window of the police detective’s house, without injuring anyone. What are the odds?
Jimmy and I looked at each other and said, “Just walk away slowly.” Which, we did, for about 10 steps and then we ran as fast as we could. Fortunately, no one noticed two teenage boys running. Jimmy and I decided not to tell anyone (not even Phil and Billy) about the near miss.
After waiting for weeks for the police to take me away, I wondered why Wolfe did not solve the case. “Keeping the good citizens safe from the criminal element in West Haven” became the theme in his bid for mayor. Which sounds a lot better than keeping the good citizens safe from clueless teenage amateur rocket builders. Perhaps mayor candidate Wolfe did not want to solve the case. To be honest, the eyewitness’s bazooka account and the near miss of the PD detective probably misled detective Wolfe. Happily, we were not arrested.
On Feb. 1, 1958, America launched its first successful satellite (Explorer 1) into space orbit. To avoid the weaponization of space, President Dwight Eisenhower, on Oct. 1, 1958, moved the space program from the NACA (military) and into the newly created NASA (civilian) and gave NASA the largest budget of any agency in US History. Sept. 12, 1962, President Kennedy gave his famous “We Choose to Go to the Moon” speech.
National Defense Education Act of 1958 boosted higher education. It provided federal funding for higher education and low-cost student loans, thus, boosting public and private colleges and universities all across America.
Satellite communication, Smart phones, semi-conductors, computers, the internet, fuel efficient and more reliable automobiles, solar panels and many more technologies, came from NASA. These (Sputnik inspired) NASA technologies boosted American economy and gave us unprecedented prosperity for over 60 years.
Jimmy loved all of his classmates and was always the first person to sign up for a reunion.
To those attending the Class of ’62 reunion, please raise a glass to Jimmy and toast “Jimmy, may you forever drive your robin’s egg blue 1954 Chevy convertible in the sky. Jimmy, you will be missed.”
Jimmy Ballard served in the Air Force, then followed his father’s trade and became a typesetter for New Haven Registrar, later Jimmy became a welder at Sikorsky Helicopter. Jimmy helped raise a family and retired from Sikorsky Helicopter. He passed away, Oct. 12, 2021.