A Sperry Gyroscope executive (1936–41) and Marine Corps major, he served as US president Harry Truman's budget director (1946–9), balancing the budget before joining the state department (1949–52). As NASA director from 1961, he oversaw the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo programmes that put US astronauts ahead of the Russians. Webb left NASA in 1968 to head a science foundation. See James Webb Space Telescope