SMC Heritage Center

The third of April St. Peter and Paul Middle School stood below the Armillary Sphere in the Schriever Courtyard at the Space and Missile Systems Center (Home of Military Space!) at the beginning of their visit to the SMC Heritage Center and STEM Program. They had a choice of three monuments in the courtyard for their group photo. They chose well in deciding to have the photo taken in front of the Armillary. It is a monument that has often been used to represent SMC and now it is the emblem used by the SMC Heritage Foundation which supports the SMC Heritage Center. The Armillary was commissioned in 1978 by the Air Force Association’s Chapter 147 and created by artist Jack Brogan of San Pedro. The inner rings of the monument represent the Earth, while the outer rings represent the tracks of satellites developed by SMC orbiting around it. The sculpture was unveiled in 1979 by Gen Schriever (then retired), Secretary of the Air Force Hans Mark, and others. It was originally located in front of SMC’s old headquarters across the street from SMC, but it was moved to its current location in 2006. If you would like to bring your school group to visit, start by emailing your contact info and preferred dates for visiting to [email protected].

The SMC Heritage Center received a package this past week from one of the school groups, St. John Fisher School that visited Los Angeles Air Force Base on 14 March 2019. The students contemplated their visit, took the time to take stock and think about what made the largest impression on their visit to SMC to see the SMC Heritage Center and participate in STEM Activities. What resulted was a collection of cards carefully created by the students depicting images from their visit and words of thanks to the whole team for making the visit possible. If you’re curious what these cards look like, plan a visit to see the SMC Heritage Center and its associated Local Art Wall which features these cards. Email us at [email protected] to plan your visit!

The evening of 20th of March 2019, our SMC Heritage Center and SMC STEM Organization worked together again to support a local STEAM event at Montemalaga Science Night by teaching about the History of Military Space andoffering age specific STEM activities to entice youth into the sciences. Rolando Ventura, SMC Heritage Center Volunteer from Harris Corporation (pictured in the red jacket) and Lt Col Porter, Director of SMC's STEM Program and his team are seen in the following collage...as you can see...the younger we encourage our community youth to increase their understanding of how things work, the more excited they become to learn and delve into the world of science, technology, engineering, arts and math! Interested in bringing your gorup to the SMC Heritage Center and SMC STEM Organiztion at Los Angeles Air Force Base, send your contact information to [email protected].