SPACE FUNDS

Press, Volume C, Issue 29508, 9 May 1961, Page 20

SPACE FUNDS

Kennedy Seeks More WASHINGTON. May 6 President Kennedy at his press conference yesterday hailed the United States first manned shot into space and pledged "a substantially larger effort” in that field. The President said the effort would include a request to Congress for more than the 1 230,000.000 dollars he already had requested for the space programme. In spite of the successful sub-orbital flight of Commander Alan Shepard, “We have a long „way to go in the field of space—we are

behind.” the President said. “But we are working hard. We are going to increase our effort.”

The President also offered to make available to scientists of other nations the data obtained from Alan Shepard's flight. He said it always had been the United States custom—and would continue to be—to give the information to "people who share the view that space probes should be peaceful enterprises for the common good.” The former Vice-President. Mr Richard Nixon, hailed the successful flight as proof that the United States was on its way to catching and passing the Soviet Union in the race for space. But he said Shepard's ride Into space was "an American achievement" rather than a victory for either the Democratic Administration or the Eisenhower-Nixon Administration which first laid plans for the Mercury shot