Kennedy Space Center, on the east coast of Florida, is the launch facility for all United States space missions that carry crews. Several spacecraft that carry cargo are also launched from the center. Its full name is the John F. Kennedy Space Center of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). The center is on Merritt Island, across from a point of land called Cape Canaveral. People often call the center Cape Canaveral because it was formerly on the cape. 
NASA tested, repaired, and launched space shuttles at Kennedy Space Center. Prior to the shuttle launches, the Apollo missions to the moon, the Gemini two-person missions, and the first United States crewed missions into Earth orbit, named Mercury, were all launched from the site. Since 1958, various satellites and probes with an array of missions have also launched from the space center.
Kennedy Space Center evolved from NASA’s Launch Operations Directorate on Cape Canaveral. NASA leased facilities from the United States Air Force. The directorate was a part of the George C. Marshall Space Flight Center, with headquarters in Huntsville, Alabama. In 1962, NASA made the directorate an independent unit and renamed it the Launch Operations Center. The center received its present name in December 1963, the month after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. In 1964, NASA moved the center to Merritt Island because the Cape Canaveral facilities were not large enough to handle the assembly, service, and launching of huge rockets that were to carry astronauts to the moon.
NASA continues to assemble and test satellites and space probes on Cape Canaveral. In the 2010’s, the center also began hosting a number of private aerospace companies.
