Robert Hutchings Goddard was born in Worcester, Massachusetts, in 1882. The phyicist determinedly pursued his spaceflight obsession.
Image source: NASA, via National Air and Space Museum.

In 1911 on this date, Robert Goddard, the “Father of American Rocketry,” received his PhD from Clark University. After a one-year fellowship at Princeton, he returned to Clark to teach as an assistant professor of physics.