Jesco von Puttkamer

Jesco Hans Heinrich Max Freiherr von Puttkamer (22 September 1933 – 27 December 2012) was a German-American aerospace engineer, senior manager at NASA, and a pulp science fiction writer.

He was an advocate of human space exploration, and the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI). While at NASA, he served as the program manager in charge of long-range planning of deep space crewed activities (flights beyond Earth orbit). He was regarded as an expert on the Russian space program.Puttkamer assisted with daily on-orbit operations at NASA from 2009 until 2012.

He was given the nickname Jessie by DeForest Kelley, whom Puttkammer called Dee.: xxiv He died of a sudden flu-like illness on 27 December 2012.