Virginia also witnessed American efforts in the Space Race. When the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics was transformed into the National Aeronautics and Space Administration in 1958, the resulting Space Task Group headquartered at the laboratories of Langley Research Center. From there, it would initiate Project Mercury, and would remain the headquarters of the U.S. manned spaceflight program until its transfer to Houston in 1962. On the Eastern Shore, near Chincoteague, Wallops Flight Facility served as a rocket launch site, including the launch of Little Joe 2 on December 4, 1959, which sent a rhesus monkey, Sam, into suborbital spaceflight. Langley later oversaw the Viking program to Mars.