David Hoag

David Garratt Hoag (October 11, 1925 – January 19, 2015) was an American aeronautical engineer who was Director of the Apollo Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Instrumentation Laboratory, later renamed the Charles Stark Draper Laboratory. The Program was responsible for the Apollo Primary Guidance, Navigation, and Control Systems on the Apollo command module and the lunar landing spacecraft. The Guidance and Navigation system included an inertial measurement unit, optical alignment telescope and space sextant, and Apollo Guidance Computer, which was used during the Apollo missions.

Early life and education

Hoag was born in Boston, Massachusetts on October 11, 1925 to Helen Garratt and Alden Hoag. After graduating from the Chauncy Hall School in Boston, he joined the Navy. While in the military, he attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he received a bachelor's degree in electrical communications and later a masters in aeronautical engineering instrumentation. The laboratory was tasked to do the programming and test verification of both Command and Lunar Module Guidance, Navigation, and Control computer programs for all the Apollo missions. This comprised 12 missions, 6 being Moon landings. Software verification was aided by the development of both digital and hybrid simulators.

Later, when the MIT Instrumentation Laboratory became the Draper Laboratory, he became the Head of the Advanced Systems Department, where he led activities on precision pointing and tracking, as well as orbiting surveillance systems. With Draper He worked on both NASA and Army programs. He retired as Senior Technical Advisor in 1989 and remained as a consultant for the lab until 2005. Laser Pointing System---This invention relates to systems for aiming a beam of light from a moving vehicle, such as a space vehicle, in a desired direction which is specified by celestial or geographic coordinates

Awards

Hoag received the Col. Thomas L. Thurlow Award in 1969 from the Institute of Navigation, the NASA Public Service Award in 1969, the Navy Certificate of Merit in 1970, and the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautic's Louis W, Hill Space Transportation Award in 1972 along with Dick Battin.