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- The Orlando Sentinel, Florida, Friday, September 24, 1999
William Palmer Bass, 86, Was ?Rensissance Man?
MELBOURNE - William Palmer Bass watched the early glamour days of America's space program unfold from a unique vantage point.
Bass was the highest-ranking civilian manager at the Air Force Eastern Test Range headquartered at Cape Canaveral.
The Melbourne resident, who was responsible for negotiating agreements between the test range and
NASA's missile program in the late 1960s and early 70s, died Tuesday of heart failure. He was 86.
He presided over the Gemini and Apollo manned space missions, and the Polaris, Redstone and Minuteman missile launches.
During Bass' watch, 26,000 people worked at the test range, and the space program launched 200 missiles a year, compared with fewer than 10 launches a year today, said his daughter Apple Bass of Tampa.
''My father left the Air Force after World War II and went to work for the Air Force as a civilian,'' she said. He came to Florida from Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio in 1950 to help formulate the Eastern Test Range.
Bass, who wanted to build ships as a young man, retired in 1974 and launched his second ''career'' - researching the architecture of the USS Constitution, the world's oldest commissioned ship.
His work produced a model of the famous ship and a book, USS Constitution, Super Frigate of Many Faces, 1802-07.
Launched in 1797 and known as Old Ironsides for its copper hull, the wooden ship outran and outfought British frigates in the War of 1812.
Apple Bass said her father uncovered many facts about the ship's design during his research in the National Archives and various museums.
''He truly was a Renaissance man,'' she said. ''He painted, he wrote he was incredible.''
She said it took her father two years to finish the model of Old Ironsides because he made every piece himself. He also made most of the family's furniture, including ''every bed I ever slept in,'' his daughter said.
Bass is also survived by his wife, Ethel, of Melbourne; a stepson, Thomas Prophet, of Haverhill, Mass.; and a sister, Martha Brandenburgh, of Lexington, Ky.
Maxwell Funeral Home in Melbourne is handling arrangements.
The Tampa Tribune, Florida, Saturday, 25 September 1999
William Palmer Bass
WILLIAM PALMER BASS, 86, of Melbourne died Tuesday at University Community Hospital. A native of Ironton, Ohio, he moved to the area from Yellow Springs, Ohio, in 1950. He was a retired management assistant at the Eastern Test Range, was instrumental in the formation of Kennedy Space Center, held a variety of positions at Patrick Air Force Base and was an Army Air Forces veteran of World War II. He is survived by his wife, Ethel; a daughter, Apple of Tampa; a stepson, Thomas Prophet of Haverhill, Mass.; and a sister, Martha Brandenburgh of Lexington, Ky. Brownlie-Maxwell Funeral Home, Melbourne.
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Bassett Family Association Database
1913 - 1999 (86 years)