Topics included on the front page of this newspaper include the Jupiter missile developed by the German Rocket Team and the announcement that it had circled the globe, and other various space topics.
On back: "Key associates of vonBraun.Dr., pose with Maj. General. Medaris, J.B., immediately prior to the latters retirement from the Army in the fall of 1959.
Robert K. Bell (left) was an attorney based in Huntsville, Alabama. He would form a part of Nickerson's (right) defense counsel in 1957 along with Ray H. Jenkins, Lt. Col. Charles Zimmer, and Lt. Lewis G. Cole.
Ray H. Jenkins (center) was a lawyer that, along with Robert K. Bell, Lt. Col. Charles Zimmer, and Lt. Lewis G. Cole, would make up Nickerson's defense counsel for his court martial trial. Jenkins was considered the best lawyer in East Tennessee and appeared on the cover of Time magazine on May 17, 1954 during the Army-McCarthy hearings.
Medaris assumed command of the Army Ballistic Missile Agency in 1955 under which Dr. Wernher von Braun and the German Rocket Team developed the Jupiter missile in 1958.
Colonel John C. Nickerson was accused of leaking classified information after expressing anger when the missile and rocket program was transferred from the Army to the Air Force. He was tried by court martial, fined $1,500, and exiled to Panama for two years. A few years later on March 1, 1964, Nickerson and his wife, Carol, died in a car accident in New Mexico.
These letters to David Bowman, reporter and editorial writer, all pertain to Bowman's story about Colonel John Nickerson. The first letter includes foot notes and states that he sent a copy of the story to a Washington Post writer. The second letter contains additional information relating to the missile program that may be helpful for the story and a diagram of the original prototype for the Explorer I earth satellite. This set of letters also includes the original letter from David Bowman to Brig. Gen. Harold W. Nelson in which Bowman states he finally photocopied the published transcripts of Colonel Nickerson's court martial. Nelson's reponse follows thanking Bowman for sending the series on Colonel Nickerson. The final letter from Colonel Thomas W. Sweeney includes a working bibliography on the Nickerson case and invites him to visit the Military History Institute.