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IIRC they used to always style "NASA" as "N.A.S.A." even though the agency itself never uses periods and is of course always pronounced as a word rather than initials. (This particular example stuck in my mind just because I work there). Hopefully "ICE" and "REI" reflect a change in that style to omit periods when referring to organizations that omit the periods in their own style guides.


I don’t think this has been true for the vast majority of NASA’s existence. [This 1966 NYT article about Gemini](https://www.nytimes.com/1966/03/20/archives/gemini-8-mishap-...), [this 1986 article about Challenger](https://www.nytimes.com/1986/09/22/us/nasa-had-solution-to-k...), and [this 2010 article about Constellation](https://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/27/science/space/27nasa.html) all omit periods. Even if NYT did stylize it as “N.A.S.A.” in its earliest articles, this would not diverge from common agency practice early on. For instance, in [this official reel about the dedication of Marshall Space Flight Center](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4fasslw4MvE), it is pronounced spelled-out as four letters.




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