Eilene Galloway, Dies at 102; Space Policy Expert Helped in Creation of NASA

Eilene M. Galloway, a retired Library of Congress expert on space law and policy who helped shape legislation creating the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, died May 2 of cancer at her home in the District. She was two days short of her 103rd birthday.

Her involvement with space issues began Oct. 4, 1957, the day the Soviet Union launched Sputnik I, the first artificial satellite to orbit the Earth. The scientific coup ignited Cold War fears that a space-based nuclear war was a real possibility. Lyndon B. Johnson, then a Democratic senator from Texas and chairman of the Preparedness Subcommittee of the Senate Armed Services Committee, asked Mrs. Galloway to serve as staff consultant for hearings on space technology and its military implications.

At the time, Mrs. Galloway worked at a desk in a small study room of the Library of Congress Annex. She spent her days, as The Washington Post noted in 1958, "sifting the signals of what she calls 'creative brains reacting to the issues of the day.' "

The Post, with a bit of '50s-era chauvinism showing, described her as "a blue-eyed, frosty-haired little lady with only the merest of library manners." She defined her work this way: "I translate the world of scholarly research" into a form in which "it can be understood in the world of practical politics."

She advised House Majority Leader John W. McCormack (D-Mass.) to establish a space committee. He became chairman of the Select Committee on Astronautics and Space Exploration, which recommended creating a national space agency. Mrs. Galloway suggested that the proposed agency be an administration, thereby giving NASA the ability to plan and coordinate across federal agencies.

Eilene Marie Slack was born May 4, 1906, in Kansas City, Mo. As a youngster, she was part of a group of girls who performed a patriotic song and dance for Theodore Roosevelt at Kansas City's Muehlebach Hotel during his 1912 presidential campaign.

She was a 1928 political science graduate of Swarthmore College and found a series of government jobs after moving to the District in 1931 with her husband and two sons.

In 1941, she joined the Legislative Reference Service (which became the Congressional Research Service) as editor of postwar abstracts on international relations and national security. She later was named a national defense analyst.

When the United States dropped the atomic bomb in 1945, Mrs. Galloway began researching the science of atomic energy and wrote a public affairs bulletin called "Atomic Energy: Issues Before Congress" (1946). She also wrote a report called "Guided Missiles in Foreign Countries" that came out just before the Soviet Union launched Sputnik. Named a senior specialist in 1966, she retired in 1975 but continued as a Library of Congress consultant until 2006.

A founding member of the International Institute of Space Law, she strongly opposed weaponizing space. She argued that the 1967 Outer Space Treaty enables the world community to maintain peace in space and should be preserved and upheld. She often quoted what she considered a core principle of the treaty: "Celestial bodies are not subject to national appropriations by claims of sovereignty, by means of use or occupation, or by any other means."

She received numerous honors for her work, including the National Aeronautic Association's 2003 Katherine Wright Memorial Award. The award is named for the sister of Wilbur and Orville Wright and honors women who have made behind-the-scenes contributions to the advancement of aviation and space flight.

Mrs. Galloway's husband, George Barnes Galloway, died in 1967. A son, David Barnes Galloway, died in 1993.

Survivors include a son, Jonathan Fuller Galloway of Burlington, Vt.; six grandchildren; and five great-grandchildren.