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On this day in space! June 14, 1914: Robert Goddard snags patent for liquid-fueled rocket

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On June 14, 1914, the first patent for a liquid-fueled rocket design was granted to Dr. Robert Goddard, an American scientist and rocket pioneer.

a black and white schematic of a rocket and its engine
Illustrations from Robert Goddard's 1914 patent for the first liquid-fueled rocket design. (Image credit: U.S. Patent Office)

On June 14, 1914, the first patent for a liquid-fueled rocket design was granted to Dr. Robert Goddard, an American scientist and rocket pioneer.

In the patent, Goddard described a rocket fueled with liquid propellants (liquid nitrous oxide and gasoline) or with a solid fuel (explosive material).

In this same year, he was also granted a patent for a multi-stage rocket fueled with solid "explosive material." He would go on to launch the world's first liquid-fueled rocket in 1926.

Goddard's work in the field was revolutionary and his achievements helped make spaceflight possible. He has even been called the "Usherer of the Space Age." NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, is named in his honor.

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Hanneke Weitering
Hanneke Weitering
Contributing expert

Hanneke Weitering is a multimedia journalist in the Pacific Northwest reporting on the future of aviation at FutureFlight.aero and Aviation International News and was previously the Editor for Spaceflight and Astronomy news here at Space.com. As an editor with over 10 years of experience in science journalism she has previously written for Scholastic Classroom Magazines, MedPage Today and The Joint Institute for Computational Sciences at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. After studying physics at the University of Tennessee in her hometown of Knoxville, she earned her graduate degree in Science, Health and Environmental Reporting (SHERP) from New York University. Hanneke joined the Space.com team in 2016 as a staff writer and producer, covering topics including spaceflight and astronomy. She currently lives in Seattle, home of the Space Needle, with her cat and two snakes. In her spare time, Hanneke enjoys exploring the Rocky Mountains, basking in nature and looking for dark skies to gaze at the cosmos. 

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