Badge, Vandenberg A.F.B.

This identification badge, for use by employees of Lockheed Space Operations Company at Vandenberg Air Force Base, was worn during work around the Space Shuttle orbiter. It belonged to Dennis Jenkins, a consulting aerospace engineer for the Space Shuttle Program, and author of Space Shuttle: The History of the National Space Transportation System, a definitive book detailing the development, and first 100 flights of the space shuttles.Although not as large as the Kennedy Space Center, the Vandenberg Launch Site at the Vandenberg Air Force base offered an alternative launch location for the space shuttle orbiter. Identification badges delineated those employees of the Lockheed Space Operations Company involved in constructing the necessary features to launch a space shuttle from the Vandenberg Launch Site.Designed as a reusable spacecraft capable of flights to low Earth orbit, space shuttle orbiters carried astronauts to conduct scientific experiments, launch and repair satellites, and construct the International Space Station.This identification badge was donated to the National Air and Space Museum by Dennis Jenkins in September 2011.