X-Ray Astronomy Discovery Experiments*

A Lockheed proposal to ``scan along the galactic equator in the direction of the galactic center {\ldots}'' $^{1}$ was made to NASA in late 1960, over a year before Giacconi's discovery of Sco X-1, in 1962.$^{2 }$ The nature of the Lockheed survey and first results were announced in 1964. Data in several publications verified the 1960 postulate that the brightest sources would lie within the galaxy and at low galactic latitude. A fourth publication summarized results.$^{3 }$ A recent listing $^{4}$ confirmed the discovery nature of the nearly fifty-year-old Lockheed proposal, and the effort's success. Data from the two concurrent experiments will be presented, and several published or just copyrighted appraisals of the two efforts will be described. \newline \newline *Work supported by NASA contracts NAS5-1174 and NASw-909, the Lockheed Independent Research Program, and several successive forms of Ruffner Associates. \newline $^{1}$P. C. Fisher, Lockheed Missiles and Space Division Document LMSD 702172, Palo Alto, (1960) \newline $^{2}$R. Giacconi \textit{et al}., Phys. Rev. Lett. \textbf{9} (1962) 439 \newline $^{3}$P. C. Fisher \textit{et al}., Astrophys. J., \textbf{151} (1968) 1. \newline $^{4}$P. C. Fisher, \textit{Who'sWho in the World}, Marquis Who's Who LLC, New Providence, NJ, 22$^{nd}$ Edition, (2005) 667-668.