Heinz Gartmann
From The Space Library
 Heinz Gartmann (ca. 1954) | |
| Birth Name | Heinz Gartmann |
|---|---|
| Birth Date | Dec 12 1917 |
| Birth Place | Dessau Germany |
| Date of Death | Aug 18 1960 |
| Place of Death | Stockholm |
| Occupation | Engineer, Author |
| Nationality | Germany |
| Notable Works | The Men Behind The Space Rockets |
Heinz Gartmann was a German engineer who worked on early rocket development at BMW during World War II. His father was an engineer at the Junkers works where he worked on rocket fasteners. On April 18 1931 he witnessed one of the rocket launches of pioneer Johannes Winkler. He graduated from the Carolinum -Gymnasium in Bernburg, and studied from 1937 to 1941 at the TH Berlin-Charlottenburg, in the field of aircraft engine construction. He became a member of the Lilienthal Society and then worked at BMW on rocket development at Zühlsdorf during the war.
After the war he worked during 1946 and 1947 he was at Air Materiel Command at Wright Field in Ohio as a research assistant working on fluid mechanics.
His refusal to work on rocket weapons led to him returning to Germany where he co-founded the GfW with H.H. Koelle and became publisher of the society journal Weltraumfahrt. He was a member of the British Interplanetary Society, the Detroit Rocket Society, and the Pacific Rocket Society.
He was instrumental in the creation of the International Astronautical Federation. Along with Heinz Hermann Koelle Gartmann arranged the first International Astronautical Congress at the Sorbonne in Paris France in 1950. Gartmann was unable to attend as he was denied an entry visa by the French authorities. In 1949 he contributed an article to Koelle's magazine Weltluftfahrt Air World in which he outlined a design for an Aussenstation or a space station, which used a rotating arm to provide artificial gravity for the crew.
In 1956 his book The Men Behind The Space Rockets was published in English by the David McKay Company of New York. The book related biographical information on Konstantin Tsiolkovski, Robert H. Goddard, Hermann Oberth, Max Valier, Eugen Sanger, Wernher von Braun, Hermann Ganswindt and Gartmann's mentor at BMW, Helmut Philip von Zborowski.
