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George Shuster
 U.S. Air Force Reserve Lt. Col. George Shuster (’55 Applied Sciences) helped develop Sac State’s original master plan, but
it’s his space shuttle and Hubble Space Telescope experience that gets him noticed at dinner parties.
Shuster, whose military and civilian
computer-engineering career catapulted him into the fields of space exploration and military surveillance, helped manufacture the first space shuttle’s tiles and designed computer systems used on the Hubble. But before engaging in the high-tech, Shuster worked on Sac State’s master plan, designing its landscaping. At the time, just nine campus buildings rested on a sand esplanade. “When a nearby air conditioner kicked in – we sure had one big sandstorm,” Shuster says. For 36 years Shuster worked at some of the West Coast’s premiere advanced technology centers, including Lockheed Missiles Space Systems, The Aerospace Corporation and Air Force Systems. His work on defense systems ranged from helping develop classified missile technology and space technology to gathering and compressing computer data. Projects included the reentry of satellites, ground-to-ground missile targeting and satellite surveillance.
“We were in the front row of all of this new technology,” he says.
Shuster earned his multi-engine aircraft pilot’s license from Enid Air Force Base in 1949. He later flew special missions from Germany over Africa, Asia, Europe, Saudi Arabia and Turkey.
In 1958 he joined Lockheed and worked on the Discover and Athena satellite programs— NASA and military airborne recovery projects. Later at the Aerospace Corporation he helped develop a computer system used by space scientists.
After returning to Lockheed he supervised the Space Shuttle Enterprise’s tile manufacturing team, which cut materials imported from South Africa into geometric shapes requested by NASA engineers. “The tiles give the shuttle its aerodynamic shape,” he says. “Without them, it would be like a giant banana without its peel.”
In addition to the Space Shuttle team, Shuster supervised the numerical engineers who fabricated more than 1,000 structural parts used on the Hubble Telescope— of which only four needed to be reconstructed.
Shuster retired from the Air Force in 1977, and in 1991 from Lockheed. Between those years, he also worked for Saudi Arabia’s royal War and Aviation department from 1980–81.
He and his wife Patty live in Magalia. They raised six children, and have 14 grandchildren and five great-grandchildren.
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