Space Command leader meets space pioneer legend

Gen. John Hyten, commander, Air Force Space Command, Peterson Air Force Base, Colo. talks with 94-year-old retired Col. Thomas Haig, one of six early Air Force and civilian space pioneers whose newly inscribed names were unveiled at the General Bernard A. Schriever Memorial located on the grounds of the Space and Missile Systems Center at Los Angeles Air Force Base in El Segundo, Calif. Col. Haig managed requirements for satellite ground support at the Air Force Ballistic Missile Division until 1961, developing tracking and control stations for early surveillance programs. When the National Reconnaissance Office established a meteorological satellite program to provide information on cloud cover over the Soviet Union for its Corona photographic reconnaissance satellites, Haig created and managed the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program for the NRO. (U.S. Air Force photo/James Spellman, Jr.)