Mercury Redstone and Apollo Little Joe II

From August 1963 to January 1966, a series of unmanned flight tests were conducted at the White Sands Missile Range to demonstrate the adequacy of the Apollo launch escape system and to verify the performance of the command module earth landing system. The launch vehicle used for five of these tests was the Little Joe II.

First launched in 1953, the American Redstone rocket was a direct descendant of the German V-2. It was used for the first live nuclear missile tests by the United States. It was also known as the Redstone MRBM (medium range ballistic missile). Redstone was also used in several suborbital launches in the United States Mercury program. [wikipedia]