work unrestrained for a number of years. In January 1977, then very ill, he resigned from Fairchild Industries. Later in 1977, President Gerald R. Ford awarded him the country's highest science honor, the National Medal of Science in Engineering. He was, however, too ill to attend the White House ceremony. Von Braun died on 16 June 1977 of pancreatic cancer in Alexandria, Virginia, at age 65. He is buried on Valley Road at the Ivy Hill Cemetery in Alexandria. His gravestone cites Psalm 19:1: "The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork" (KJV). Recognition and critique Apollo program director Sam Phillips was quoted as saying that he did not think that the United States would have reached the Moon as quickly as it did without von Braun's help. Later, after discussing it with colleagues, he amended this to say that he did not believe the United States would have reached the Moon at all. In a TV interview on the occasion of the US Moon landing in July 1969, Helmut Gröttrup, staff member in Peenemünde and later head of the German collective in the Soviet rocketry program, set up the thesis that automatic space probes can get the same amount of scientific data with an effort of only 10 or 20 percent of the costs, and that the money should be better spent on other purposes. Von Braun justified the expenses for manned operations with the following argument: "I think somehow space flights for the first time give mankind a chance to become immortal. Once this earth will no longer be able to support life we can emigrate to other places which are better suited for our life." Scrutiny of von Braun's use of forced labor at Mittelwerk intensified again in 1984 when Arthur Rudolph, one of his top affiliates from the A-4/V2 through the Apollo projects, left the United States and was forced to renounce his citizenship in place of the alternative of being tried for war crimes. A science- and engineering-oriented Gymnasium in Friedberg, Bavaria, was named after von Braun in 1979. In response to rising criticism, a school committee decided in 1995, after lengthy deliberations, to keep the name but "to address von Braun's ambiguity in the advanced history classes". In 2012, Nazi concentration camp survivor David Salz gave a speech in Friedberg, calling out to the public to "Do everything to