Roll playing Space Age Adventures on earth based simulators lined up like "Launch Pad Row" at Cape Canaveral was the kid swings positioned as rocket launchers for us boomers to sub-orbit into the far reaches of outer space via the Prospect Park playground in Brooklyn.

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Next to Disneyland or the Coney Island Amusement Park a few miles away from where I lived, the only other place for any Space Age Boomer Astronaut in Training to experience the excitement the legendary CBS reporter Walter Cronkite felt every time he watched a real live launch of a rocket with an Astronaut riding on top was Cape Canaveral.

 

Cape Canaveral had been used by the United States government to test missiles since 1949, when President Harry S. Truman established the Joint Long Range Proving Ground at Cape Canaveral.  The location was among the best in the continental United States for this purpose, as it allowed for launches out over the Atlantic Ocean, and is closer to the equator than most other parts of the United States, allowing rockets to get a boost from the Earth's rotation.