As Patrick Air Force Base celebrates 70th anniversary, it was almost not chosen to launch rockets

It seems hard to imagine a more iconic place than the Kennedy Space Center, where rockets have sent humans and spacecraft to the outer reaches of Earth's atmosphere and out to explore the cosmos.

Sure, there's the Russian Space Agency's Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, but from an American perspective, the premier gateway to space is here on the swampy lands of the Cape Canaveral area. 

Yet when deciding where to base U.S. space efforts nearly 70 years ago, the Cape was the third choice for the U.S. Air Force. 

Other places like southern California or Washington state were in contention for that first pick.

"But they eventually picked Cape Canaveral," said Roger McCormick, Cape Canaveral Air Force Space & Missile Museum Volunteer Historian during a Friday media teleconference. "One of the things that Cape Canaveral had going for it was one, being on the East Coast of Florida, you could launch rockets out over the ocean so you're not launching over populated areas." 

"We had all these islands downrange on which you could put tracking stations so you can track the missile in flight and make sure everything was going well," McCormick continued. "Also, we're kind of close to the Earth's equator so we're taking advantage of the Earth's easterly rotation. Launching from Cape Canaveral is a bit more efficient as far as your rocket, how large it needs to be, how much fuel you need to have." 

Aside from the Cape having favorable conditions to launch rockets, there was already a military base set up here nearly 10 years before the Air Force selected this area.

Known as Naval Air Station Banana River before being renamed Patrick Air Force Base in 1950, the Navy decided to set up a military base in 1940 to complement facilities in Jacksonville and Fort Lauderdale. 

"They needed somewhere a little bit further down the coast, kind of in-between Jacksonville and the southern part of Florida, like the Fort Lauderdale area, and the whole region of Cape Canaveral was pretty much centrally located so the Navy figured that was a good place to establish a facility," McCormick said.

But after only seven years in use, the Navy decided Naval Air Station Banana River was no longer needed after the end of World War II and in swooped the Air Force.

Despite no longer being known as the Naval Air Station Banana River, this October will mark the 80th anniversary since the Navy created a base here and in August, it will be the 70th anniversary since Patrick Air Force Base originated. 

Contact Jaramillo at 321-242-3668 or antoniaj@floridatoday.com. Follow her on Twitter at @AntoniaJ_11.

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