Voting Station

Arthur Rudolph

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Scientist

The Resume

    (November 9, 1906-January 1, 1996)
    Born in Stepfershausen, Germany
    Rocket scientist
    Helped develop the German V-2 rocket
    Brought to the US under 'Project Paperclip'
    Became a US citizen (1954)
    Helped develop the Pershing missile for the US Army and the Saturn V rocket for NASA
    Agreed to renounce his US citizenship and be deported to West Germany to avoid a war crimes trial (1984)

Why he might be annoying:

    He joined not just the Nazi Party but also the SA 'Brownshirt' paramilitary wing.
    He said, 'Hitler's first six years until the war started were really marvelous. Everybody was happy.'
    After touring an arms factory that used concentration camp inmates for labor, he asked for inmates to work at the V-2 production plant.
    Conditions at the V-2 plant were so appalling that 20,000 workers died from exhaustion, starvation and disease.
    In order to bring him to the US, the Army cleaned up his files, changing their original assessment '100% Nazi, dangerous type, security threat' to 'nothing in his records indicate that he is a war criminal, an ardent Nazi, or otherwise objectionable.'
    He tried to regain his US citizenship, with his main supporters being politcal flakes Lyndon LaRouche and James Traficant.

Why he might not be annoying:

    He was married to Martha Kohls for 60 years until his death.
    For his work on rocketry, he received the highest civilian awards from both the Army and NASA.
    The Justice Department had possessed information about his wartime activities since the 1940s, but did not bother to prosecute him until after the Space Race was safely won.
    He said about the US government, 'They only wanted me for what I could do, and when it was finished, they did not care what happened to me.'

Credit: C. Fishel


Featured in the following Annoying Collections:

Year In Review:

    In 2023, Out of 1 Votes: 0% Annoying
    In 2022, Out of 5 Votes: 60.0% Annoying
    In 2021, Out of 9 Votes: 66.67% Annoying
    In 2020, Out of 8 Votes: 75.00% Annoying
    In 2019, Out of 26 Votes: 50.0% Annoying
    In 2018, Out of 25 Votes: 48.00% Annoying
    In 2017, Out of 18 Votes: 50.0% Annoying
    In 2016, Out of 10 Votes: 50.0% Annoying
    In 2015, Out of 8 Votes: 50.0% Annoying
    In 2014, Out of 23 Votes: 47.83% Annoying
    In 2013, Out of 22 Votes: 50.0% Annoying