Space History Photo: Dr. Wernher von Braun and Astronaut Cooper

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A scene from the blockhouse during the Freedom 7 recovery operation. (Image credit: NASA.)

In this historical photo from the U.S. space agency, Dr. Wernher von Braun and Astronaut L. Gordon Cooper are in the blockhouse during the recovery operation of MR-3 (Freedom 7) mission on May 5, 1961. The MR-3 mission, a 15-1/2 minutes sub-orbital test flight, put the first American, Astronaut Alan Shepard, in space.

Each weekday, SPACE.com looks back at the history of spaceflight through photos (archive).

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The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is the U.S. government agency in charge of the civilian space program as well as aeronautics and aerospace research. Founded in 1958, NASA is a civilian space agency aimed at exploring the universe with space telescopes,  satellites, robotic spacecraft, astronauts and more. The space agency has 10 major centers based across the U.S. and launches robotic and crewed missions from the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral Florida. It's astronaut corps is based at the Johnson Space Center in Houston. To follow NASA's latest mission, follow the space agency on Twitter or any other social channel, of visit: nasa.gov.