The fact we finally overcame the Soviets had nothing to do with mobilizing educational resources, however, and everything to do with infusions of money and existing private sector intellectual capital. We were on the moon before any "sputnik inspired" engineers finished school.
-——We were on the moon before any “sputnik inspired” engineers finished school.-——
Wrong........ I finished engineering school in 1964, five years before the moon landing. My high school class graduated a very large number of new engineering school students.
I did not become a bone fide rocket scientist however....... until the seventies when I received all the rocket design manuals from Estes and could design and build real rockets to my heart’s content