[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Chris has a knack for that.

[Assistant] From there, you moved on and you were involved with the Shuttle Program as a whole, the space transportation program, and getting into manifests. You were Deputy Manager of the Operations program there for a while. Did that all kind of come logically from your involvement with the arm and then previously with the policies and such?

[User] I guess it was logical. It’s another one of those funny things. Glynn Lunney showed up in the office one day and said, "I’ve been offered a job in Headquarters as Deputy Assistant Administrator for Space Flight, and I’m really considering it. You spent a couple of years in Washington. Tell me about Headquarters and about living there. Where did you live?" and all of that. So we talked for probably a couple of hours about all of that. He said, “Well, I’m kind of inclined to take this job, and, oh, by the way, I’ve already talked to Chris, and if I take this, then you’re going to come up and take over my job while I’m gone.”\n\n I said, “Well, thanks for telling me that.” [Laughter]\n\n So he went to Washington, and while he was gone, I guess I was originally Acting Manager of SPIDO, Shuttle Payload Integration and Development Office. Then sometime, I think before Glynn came back, we changed the name to STS Operations, which was Space Transportation System Operations, which was probably more descriptive of what we were doing, because we were involved in things other than just the payload integration at that time—how do you actually operate the Shuttle. So, yes, that’s another one of those stories.

[Assistant] You always seem to be in the right place at the right time for these jobs.

[User] Or the wrong place.

[Assistant] You said you were more involved in operations as a whole, for the whole Shuttle then at that point. This was before the Shuttle actually began flying.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] It would be possible, but, yes, it would be very involved. That’s why, even until today, you really want to land at Kennedy, because that’s where you have to process it. We landed once at White Sands. Boy, what a mess. I think they’re probably still getting sand out of the vehicle. But, yes, it would be a real challenge to get it back home, but obviously possible or it wouldn’t be planned that way. The Shuttle carrier aircraft, in fact, at least once has flown to Europe. It went to the Paris Air Show one year. It’s possible, but it’s not something that you would really like to happen.

[Assistant] But certainly if it is an abort situation, you want to get them down.

[User] Oh yes. But the price you would have to pay to get it back is worth it if you save the vehicle and the crew. That’s something you have to plan for that you hope you never have to do.

[Assistant] Absolutely.

[User] But you plan for it.

[Assistant] As you were working through all of this and still being involved somewhat with what the Shuttle was going to be carrying, as well as the operations of it, and this was again so different from everything that had been done before, and you were [involved with] working with a lot of different agencies and so forth, did all of this come together without a lot of—obviously there was a lot of challenges and a lot of difficulties going into it and in even early testing on the Shuttle, but were there a lot of changes along the way, I guess, is what I’m asking, by the time that you came into it? Or were things pretty well settling down into the way—


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Oh, yes, as long as there’s any question about—there’s been a lot of discussion over the years about if we really are going to have a space transportation system [we'll] take it away from NASA and give it to the Transportation Department or somebody. Of course, it wouldn’t help the other agencies, like NOAA [National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration], for example. They wouldn’t like that any better than NASA probably. And even though there’s probably some good arguments that that would be a good thing to do, even people within NASA are reluctant to give it up. But if it’s just pure transportation, I guess I would have to agree that that’s not NASA’s business. Somebody else can operate the Shuttle just as well as we can. It kind of hurts to say that, but it’s true. NASA’s job should be exploration and research that leads to that. I’m afraid we’ve gotten kind of bogged down with boring holes in the sky with the Shuttle.

[Assistant] We have been doing that for quite a few years now. Maybe as Space Station begins to actually move along—

[User] Hopefully so.

[Assistant] —that’ll help spur things and continuing discoveries on flights like Mars and such things maybe.

[User] Certainly hope so.

[Assistant] You stayed involved with the Shuttle for quite a while and moved into a couple of different roles, eventually moving up to Deputy Manager of the Space Shuttle Program. Was this change in the name of—where you still involved in the same types of work?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Hopefully so.

[Assistant] —that’ll help spur things and continuing discoveries on flights like Mars and such things maybe.

[User] Certainly hope so.

[Assistant] You stayed involved with the Shuttle for quite a while and moved into a couple of different roles, eventually moving up to Deputy Manager of the Space Shuttle Program. Was this change in the name of—where you still involved in the same types of work?

[User] It was more or less the same thing. It came time after the development flights of the Shuttle that the Shuttle—see, we still had the Shuttle Program Office headed by Bob Thompson, and the Space Transportation System Operations Office headed by Glynn Lunney. But after the development flights of the Shuttle, the first four flights, it was time to consolidate all of that into one, because then it was the job of continuing some development on the Shuttle to build more and to make a few changes, but really to operate it. So it was not a big change at the time.\n\n I continued doing more or less what I’d been doing. The title changed. Deputy Manager for Operations, [Arnold D.] Arnie Aldrich, came over and was—I’ve forgotten exactly what his title was, but it was Deputy Manager, Technical. He was more concerned with hardware, the development of the Orbiter and external tanks and the SRBs, and all of the hardware. Glynn Lunney was the overall manager. As far as I was concerned, it was more or less a continuation of the same thing that we’d been doing for the last couple of years.

[Assistant] Did you have a chance during any of this time to go down and see any of the launches?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Certainly hope so.

[Assistant] You stayed involved with the Shuttle for quite a while and moved into a couple of different roles, eventually moving up to Deputy Manager of the Space Shuttle Program. Was this change in the name of—where you still involved in the same types of work?

[User] It was more or less the same thing. It came time after the development flights of the Shuttle that the Shuttle—see, we still had the Shuttle Program Office headed by Bob Thompson, and the Space Transportation System Operations Office headed by Glynn Lunney. But after the development flights of the Shuttle, the first four flights, it was time to consolidate all of that into one, because then it was the job of continuing some development on the Shuttle to build more and to make a few changes, but really to operate it. So it was not a big change at the time.\n\n I continued doing more or less what I’d been doing. The title changed. Deputy Manager for Operations, [Arnold D.] Arnie Aldrich, came over and was—I’ve forgotten exactly what his title was, but it was Deputy Manager, Technical. He was more concerned with hardware, the development of the Orbiter and external tanks and the SRBs, and all of the hardware. Glynn Lunney was the overall manager. As far as I was concerned, it was more or less a continuation of the same thing that we’d been doing for the last couple of years.

[Assistant] Did you have a chance during any of this time to go down and see any of the launches?

[User] Yes. Not a lot, but enough. I never saw a night launch, which I really would—I wish I had.

[Assistant] There’s still time.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yes. Not a lot, but enough. I never saw a night launch, which I really would—I wish I had.

[Assistant] There’s still time.

[User] Oh, yes. I have to do that. Yes, and it was kind of fun to go back. I didn’t witness any Apollo launches, because I was in the control center here, and I really missed being in the control center at the Cape when we first started out with Mercury, because you could hear it and you could feel it. The building even would shake. So I kind of missed that all during Apollo. I never, unfortunately, got to see an Apollo launch.\n\n I saw one Skylab launch. I went down with Dr. Fletcher when I was working with him. We rode the vehicle out from the vertical assembly building out to the pad. Well, actually we only went about half way because it…takes a long time, but that was interesting, and then we saw the launch.\n\n I saw a couple of early Shuttle launches. It was more reminiscent of the Gemini-Titan launches because of the solid rocket boosters. They make a very distinctive sound. It’s like the whole air is cracking. It’s a very sharp, distinctive cracking sound. That brought back a lot of memories.\n\n But Shuttle launches still, even today, I remember the STS-1…launch. I had worked in the trajectory world most of my life designing launch profiles, and I obviously had worked on the Shuttle and I knew exactly what was going to happen, but when it’s unsymmetrical, when it lifts off and this unsymmetrical thing starts rotating around, it still looks kind of strange to me. Still haven’t gotten over that.

[Assistant] That’s understandable, I think. Must have been rewarding to see it all come together.

[User] But I would like to go see a night launch. Have do that sometime, I guess.

[Assistant] I’m sure there are still a few contacts that you can make the arrangements.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Oh, yes. I have to do that. Yes, and it was kind of fun to go back. I didn’t witness any Apollo launches, because I was in the control center here, and I really missed being in the control center at the Cape when we first started out with Mercury, because you could hear it and you could feel it. The building even would shake. So I kind of missed that all during Apollo. I never, unfortunately, got to see an Apollo launch.\n\n I saw one Skylab launch. I went down with Dr. Fletcher when I was working with him. We rode the vehicle out from the vertical assembly building out to the pad. Well, actually we only went about half way because it…takes a long time, but that was interesting, and then we saw the launch.\n\n I saw a couple of early Shuttle launches. It was more reminiscent of the Gemini-Titan launches because of the solid rocket boosters. They make a very distinctive sound. It’s like the whole air is cracking. It’s a very sharp, distinctive cracking sound. That brought back a lot of memories.\n\n But Shuttle launches still, even today, I remember the STS-1…launch. I had worked in the trajectory world most of my life designing launch profiles, and I obviously had worked on the Shuttle and I knew exactly what was going to happen, but when it’s unsymmetrical, when it lifts off and this unsymmetrical thing starts rotating around, it still looks kind of strange to me. Still haven’t gotten over that.

[Assistant] That’s understandable, I think. Must have been rewarding to see it all come together.

[User] But I would like to go see a night launch. Have do that sometime, I guess.

[Assistant] I’m sure there are still a few contacts that you can make the arrangements.

[User] Hopefully so. Hopefully so.

[Assistant] Certainly an interesting sight to see. Then you moved in to be Director of Mission Support. Obviously this is for Shuttle missions, but what was that? What were your duties there?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] But I would like to go see a night launch. Have do that sometime, I guess.

[Assistant] I’m sure there are still a few contacts that you can make the arrangements.

[User] Hopefully so. Hopefully so.

[Assistant] Certainly an interesting sight to see. Then you moved in to be Director of Mission Support. Obviously this is for Shuttle missions, but what was that? What were your duties there?

[User] Gerry Griffin was the center director at that time, and he decided that it would be better if he didn’t have as many people reporting directly to him. So he kind of reorganized the center and grouped several directorates or divisions up together and formed this thing called mission support, that included five divisions: mission planning, flight simulation, flight software, flight support, which was the control center, and data systems, which had responsibility for operating all the computers around the center.\n\n But the job was to provide the facilities for both training and execution of the Shuttle flights. That was primarily the Shuttle mission simulator and the control center. But then, in addition, to do the flight software and the mission planning for the Shuttle flights. Probably one of the best jobs I ever had. I really enjoyed that job. That was good.

[Assistant] Certainly sounds like it would be interesting.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Hopefully so. Hopefully so.

[Assistant] Certainly an interesting sight to see. Then you moved in to be Director of Mission Support. Obviously this is for Shuttle missions, but what was that? What were your duties there?

[User] Gerry Griffin was the center director at that time, and he decided that it would be better if he didn’t have as many people reporting directly to him. So he kind of reorganized the center and grouped several directorates or divisions up together and formed this thing called mission support, that included five divisions: mission planning, flight simulation, flight software, flight support, which was the control center, and data systems, which had responsibility for operating all the computers around the center.\n\n But the job was to provide the facilities for both training and execution of the Shuttle flights. That was primarily the Shuttle mission simulator and the control center. But then, in addition, to do the flight software and the mission planning for the Shuttle flights. Probably one of the best jobs I ever had. I really enjoyed that job. That was good.

[Assistant] Certainly sounds like it would be interesting.

[User] It was.

[Assistant] Were there any particular incidents or challenges during that time that really stick out for you?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] It’s a little hard to fix a virus when you’re in the middle of a launch phase or something.

[Assistant] That would be very bad. It’ll be interesting to see how it continues to grow and change with the times. We’ll probably be using the Shuttle for a while yet.

[User] Yes, I expect that we are, and there are a lot of upgrades that really need to be done that I think would be cost-effective. But it’s hard to convince the Congress at this point that that much more money should be spent. So those poor guys over there now that are fighting the daily budget battles, it’s much worse than it was when I was there. I had to admit that. Maybe that’ll get better. I don’t know.

[Assistant] We can hope.

[User] We can hope.

[Assistant] Eventually even though this was one of the most fun jobs that you had had, you did decide to move on from NASA.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yes, I expect that we are, and there are a lot of upgrades that really need to be done that I think would be cost-effective. But it’s hard to convince the Congress at this point that that much more money should be spent. So those poor guys over there now that are fighting the daily budget battles, it’s much worse than it was when I was there. I had to admit that. Maybe that’ll get better. I don’t know.

[Assistant] We can hope.

[User] We can hope.

[Assistant] Eventually even though this was one of the most fun jobs that you had had, you did decide to move on from NASA.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] How did you come to that decision?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yes, but it’s a challenge, because their question is, "Why aren’t we doing that anymore?" And that’s hard to explain. I need help. Somebody needs to explain to me why we aren’t doing that. You know, there are a lot of good reasons, but you stand back from all of the reasons. You look back, and some of that really doesn’t hold water. The other answer is, I’m afraid that we just aren’t bold enough. We aren’t being as aggressive enough. No, it’s not an easy thing to do, and there’s a lot of competition to do other things on the Earth. But it’s never been easy to do hard things, and it won’t ever be. So you might as well bite the bullet and go do it.

[Assistant] Absolutely.

[User] Who knows what we’ll find on Mars? Maybe nothing. I don’t believe that. Just going to the Moon, we found out a lot about ourselves and how the Earth was formed, and are still learning, I guess, on that. One of these days this planet’s going to get full, and it would have been nice to have another place to go.

[Assistant] Absolutely, and there’s always more out there to learn about.

[User] It’s better than the alternative.

[Assistant] Absolutely. Even though ours is a history project, hopefully by doing this history, it does help to inspire those people that read about it and hear it in your words.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Who knows what we’ll find on Mars? Maybe nothing. I don’t believe that. Just going to the Moon, we found out a lot about ourselves and how the Earth was formed, and are still learning, I guess, on that. One of these days this planet’s going to get full, and it would have been nice to have another place to go.

[Assistant] Absolutely, and there’s always more out there to learn about.

[User] It’s better than the alternative.

[Assistant] Absolutely. Even though ours is a history project, hopefully by doing this history, it does help to inspire those people that read about it and hear it in your words.

[User] I think it’s good to record the history as it happened, and hopefully it’ll make people ask questions about, why aren’t we still doing that? Why did we stop? Why don’t we start again?

[Assistant] One of the ways people get inspired is through science fiction and movies and Hollywood in particular. I wanted to ask you about your involvement with Apollo 13.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] It’s better than the alternative.

[Assistant] Absolutely. Even though ours is a history project, hopefully by doing this history, it does help to inspire those people that read about it and hear it in your words.

[User] I think it’s good to record the history as it happened, and hopefully it’ll make people ask questions about, why aren’t we still doing that? Why did we stop? Why don’t we start again?

[Assistant] One of the ways people get inspired is through science fiction and movies and Hollywood in particular. I wanted to ask you about your involvement with Apollo 13.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] I know that your son was involved with Ron Howard. If you could tell us kind of how that came about and [some of] your experiences on it.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yes. And I didn’t realize, I guess, to the extent that Lovell and Haise had thought that the mission was really a failure. I guess they felt like they were treated that way by NASA. If you look at their mission objective, of course, they didn’t accomplish it. But they obviously felt a big letdown, but they both kind of felt like they had failed. Hopefully, the experience with Lovell of writing the book and then doing the movie and all, it’s more accurate, I think, that the original mission objectives were not met, but the mission was not a failure.\n\n Missions fail when they go wrong and you don’t know what happened and you lose the spacecraft or you lose the crew or whatever and you have no reason or no data to tell you why. It was a horrible thing and the mission objectives weren’t met, but I think it taught NASA a lot about a lot of things, how to prepare better for risk and then how to deal with risk. It was kind of an eye-opener that, hey, we shouldn’t get too complacent. I’m not saying that we were, but it was a reminder that, don’t. Things can still come up and bite you when you least expect them. So it was not a failure.

[Assistant] And it was even a success all these years later when it was able to help in the NASA budget process and get people interested in it again.

[User] Yes. And hopefully that makes Lovell and Haise feel better about it, anyway.

[Assistant] Hopefully so.

[User] I think it did. I’m sure it did.

[Assistant] You mentioned at the time you were involved in the movie, you were still at Grumman, and now you’ve retired.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yes. And hopefully that makes Lovell and Haise feel better about it, anyway.

[Assistant] Hopefully so.

[User] I think it did. I’m sure it did.

[Assistant] You mentioned at the time you were involved in the movie, you were still at Grumman, and now you’ve retired.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Did you go onto anything else after that?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] I think it did. I’m sure it did.

[Assistant] You mentioned at the time you were involved in the movie, you were still at Grumman, and now you’ve retired.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Did you go onto anything else after that?

[User] Well, I had some relatives and some friends who, unfortunately, passed away well before their time, and I vowed that, if possible, I was not going to allow that to happen, that hopefully I would get to a point where I could retire and enjoy life. So in ‘96, I guess it was, I decided to do that.\n\n Glynn Lunney, though, kind of spoiled that for a while. He was at the United Space Alliance at the time and he called me a number of times and said, "Why don’t you come over and help me out." I really had no desire to go back to work, but I did because of Glynn purely, because he’d been a lifelong friend. I’d worked with him. I’d been his deputy probably three or four times in my career. I thought, "If he wants me to come and help, I'll go and see what I [can] do." So I did that for about a year and a half at U.S.A., United Space Alliance.\n\n Then Glynn decided that he was going to finally retire. He told me that ahead of time. He said, "I’ve decided I’m going to hang it up." I said, "Okay, I’ll leave the same day you do, because you’re the only reason I’m here." So I did. I did that in ‘98. I’ve been totally retired for a couple of years, and I really enjoy it. Occasionally I get a call from somebody that says, "Would you be interested in consulting?" I say the only consulting I do is I wake up in the morning and I consult my wife on what I should do today. [Laughter]

[Assistant] That’s a good kind of consulting to do. Well, you certainly have been involved with a number of interesting things over your career. I think you’ve earned the chance to sit back and do whatever you want to do.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] That’s the good news, and there’s always bad news. It’s hard to say, well, then what after that? Because I think for a lot of us, after Apollo it was kind of a "Is that all there is?" [Laughter] It’s hard to follow something like that. I don’t recall ever having any conversations with anybody about that at the time, but over the years I’ve talked with a lot of the flight controllers that I worked with and a lot of the astronauts and, boy, they went through the same thing. You can imagine some of the astronauts, especially the guys that went to the Moon. You say, "Okay, now what do I do now? What else? What can top that?" I mean, I thought I was having a struggle, but nothing compared to those guys. That’s a tough act to follow.

[Assistant] Certainly a lot of people did go through tough times with that.

[User] But that has to be the high point. That’s the thing I want to tell my grandkids the most about, I guess.

[Assistant] Absolutely, and well you should want to. Hopefully they can share some of that through your oral history.

[User] I hope they’ll always be interested. The ones that are old enough now are. Space program and basketball. [Laughter]

[Assistant] Well, okay. Basketball involves some trajectory work.\n\n Looking back, you had mentioned, we talked about it in your first oral history, how you even got involved in the first place. You had already had a job lined up and weren’t going to be doing anything with the space program. They pulled you in to fill in for an interview. Would you ever have imagined—


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] I hope they’ll always be interested. The ones that are old enough now are. Space program and basketball. [Laughter]

[Assistant] Well, okay. Basketball involves some trajectory work.\n\n Looking back, you had mentioned, we talked about it in your first oral history, how you even got involved in the first place. You had already had a job lined up and weren’t going to be doing anything with the space program. They pulled you in to fill in for an interview. Would you ever have imagined—

[User] No. There’s no way I could have designed it any better. No, I never imagined. In fact, I was obviously excited about the manned space program when I was in college, but because I hadn’t chosen that as a career path, I never thought I would be a part of that. I was just excited about that it was going on and I was a U.S. citizen and the U.S. was involved, but I never thought I would be a part of that.\n\n It’s just a real uncanny chain of events, I guess, that I was lucky, happened to be in the right places at the right time. Couldn’t have designed it any better if I had tried, and I never did. That’s one reason probably that I lucked out. Because I was never one of those people who thought, "Well, here I am on my career ladder. What am I going to do next?" type of thing. I probably should have paid more attention to that, but I just tried to enjoy what I was doing at the time and doing it as well as I could. Yes, as you think back about how I ended up at NASA and then how I ended at JSC and how I ended up being associated with people like Kraft and Lunney, it’s a pure lucky chain of events. I have no complaints about it. I feel very fortunate.

[Assistant] We feel very fortunate you’ve shared so much of that history with us.

[User] Well, thanks for letting me bore you.

[Assistant] Not at all. It’s very interesting. Is there anything that you can think of that we have missed or haven’t touched on?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] No. There’s no way I could have designed it any better. No, I never imagined. In fact, I was obviously excited about the manned space program when I was in college, but because I hadn’t chosen that as a career path, I never thought I would be a part of that. I was just excited about that it was going on and I was a U.S. citizen and the U.S. was involved, but I never thought I would be a part of that.\n\n It’s just a real uncanny chain of events, I guess, that I was lucky, happened to be in the right places at the right time. Couldn’t have designed it any better if I had tried, and I never did. That’s one reason probably that I lucked out. Because I was never one of those people who thought, "Well, here I am on my career ladder. What am I going to do next?" type of thing. I probably should have paid more attention to that, but I just tried to enjoy what I was doing at the time and doing it as well as I could. Yes, as you think back about how I ended up at NASA and then how I ended at JSC and how I ended up being associated with people like Kraft and Lunney, it’s a pure lucky chain of events. I have no complaints about it. I feel very fortunate.

[Assistant] We feel very fortunate you’ve shared so much of that history with us.

[User] Well, thanks for letting me bore you.

[Assistant] Not at all. It’s very interesting. Is there anything that you can think of that we have missed or haven’t touched on?

[User] No, not really. I’m impressed with the research that you and your office have done just in coming up with the questions. You remembered some stuff that I had forgotten about, and I know that has to be a challenge. I admire you for doing what you’re doing and encourage you to keep doing it. Hopefully one of these days it’ll be something the historians can—a real resource that they can use.

[Assistant] We certainly hope so, and we try, as you said, to do the best we can and certainly enjoy our jobs.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Well, thanks for letting me bore you.

[Assistant] Not at all. It’s very interesting. Is there anything that you can think of that we have missed or haven’t touched on?

[User] No, not really. I’m impressed with the research that you and your office have done just in coming up with the questions. You remembered some stuff that I had forgotten about, and I know that has to be a challenge. I admire you for doing what you’re doing and encourage you to keep doing it. Hopefully one of these days it’ll be something the historians can—a real resource that they can use.

[Assistant] We certainly hope so, and we try, as you said, to do the best we can and certainly enjoy our jobs.

[User] Well, I think it shows.

[Assistant]
Thank you. I was going to ask Summer and Sandra real quick if they had any questions.

I have a couple. You talked about the RMS and all the resistance that you had. Was there some point at which you finally convinced all those who had opposed it, or did they have see it in action before they were convinced of its—?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] There probably were, but I don’t recall what they were. I always did the orbit shift. I didn’t do ascent or entry. I got to learn a lot about the science that was going on on some of the science flights or smaller payloads. I had to learn about that and interact with the people that were working in the payload world.\n\n Quite frankly, I don’t remember any things that happened, but I just remember that there were always things going on. It kept you busy. It kept your mind working. Pull out the engineering drawings, or who knows how this is all linked up that could have possibly caused the problem. There were just a lot of smart people figuring a lot of things. Someone would get the “aha” moment, “Oh, I know what this is. It’s not there. It’s back here.” It was just fun, just fun.

[Assistant] Yes, it sounds like a fun assignment. I did want to ask you, “Hoot” [Robert L. Gibson] was chief of the Astronaut Office for a while.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] In the nineties. I was curious, how do you think that impacted your career? Did you ever get any sort of kidding from people in the office that you were getting the good jobs because he was your husband?

[User] [Laughs] Well, you know, I couldn’t work for him. That was one of the things that, you know, “Oh, dear, Hoot’s now chief of the office and Rhea can’t work for him. What shall we do?” Well, no big deal. It was obviously an administrative problem, not a real problem. What I did was I worked for Dave [David C.] Leestma, who was then head of FCOD [Flight Crew Operations Directorate], I think. I just bumped up one, and so that’s how we solved that problem. It wasn’t any problem at all.\n\n I can’t remember whether Hoot assigned me formally to my third flight or not. Do you remember when he was chief of the office?

[Assistant] Yes. I have December of ’92 to September of ’94.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] In the nineties. I was curious, how do you think that impacted your career? Did you ever get any sort of kidding from people in the office that you were getting the good jobs because he was your husband?

[User] [Laughs] Well, you know, I couldn’t work for him. That was one of the things that, you know, “Oh, dear, Hoot’s now chief of the office and Rhea can’t work for him. What shall we do?” Well, no big deal. It was obviously an administrative problem, not a real problem. What I did was I worked for Dave [David C.] Leestma, who was then head of FCOD [Flight Crew Operations Directorate], I think. I just bumped up one, and so that’s how we solved that problem. It wasn’t any problem at all.\n\n I can’t remember whether Hoot assigned me formally to my third flight or not. Do you remember when he was chief of the office?

[Assistant] Yes. I have December of ’92 to September of ’94.

[User] He didn’t assign me to a flight, but there was always sort of this question about things. But I don’t think anybody thought—I mean, Hoot was so clear-cut about who was assigned to flights and why. You went in order. People that needed to be on flights, he put on those flights. He put a tremendous amount of thought into it, and I think everybody thought that he was real fair about it. So I think if he had put me on a flight, they would have said, “Oh, yes, well, that makes sense. It’s time, and she’s the right person,” and so on. So it really wasn’t a problem. We did get a lot of kidding about it, and he would kid me—he was the boss. I told him, “I don’t work for you.” So life went on as normal.

[Assistant] Let’s talk about that third flight. I found it interesting that this was a continuation flight.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] [Laughs] Well, you know, I couldn’t work for him. That was one of the things that, you know, “Oh, dear, Hoot’s now chief of the office and Rhea can’t work for him. What shall we do?” Well, no big deal. It was obviously an administrative problem, not a real problem. What I did was I worked for Dave [David C.] Leestma, who was then head of FCOD [Flight Crew Operations Directorate], I think. I just bumped up one, and so that’s how we solved that problem. It wasn’t any problem at all.\n\n I can’t remember whether Hoot assigned me formally to my third flight or not. Do you remember when he was chief of the office?

[Assistant] Yes. I have December of ’92 to September of ’94.

[User] He didn’t assign me to a flight, but there was always sort of this question about things. But I don’t think anybody thought—I mean, Hoot was so clear-cut about who was assigned to flights and why. You went in order. People that needed to be on flights, he put on those flights. He put a tremendous amount of thought into it, and I think everybody thought that he was real fair about it. So I think if he had put me on a flight, they would have said, “Oh, yes, well, that makes sense. It’s time, and she’s the right person,” and so on. So it really wasn’t a problem. We did get a lot of kidding about it, and he would kid me—he was the boss. I told him, “I don’t work for you.” So life went on as normal.

[Assistant] Let’s talk about that third flight. I found it interesting that this was a continuation flight.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] But yet you were the only member who continued to fly.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] There are more women in medical school classes than there are men. I don’t think they are as well represented in medical leadership. I guess people have always said, “Well, women don’t want to do that.” I don’t think that’s quite right. So I think it’s just taking some time for women to make inroads into leadership positions in healthcare.\n\n It’s always interesting to me to go now to many hospitals all over the country, some of them academic centers and some of them community hospitals, and to be surprised that there are many more women physicians as leaders. We invite the leaders in for a “boot camp” for two days, and we go in the room and there are more women there. It’s kind of like, “Neat. This is good.” They are department chairs or chief medical officers or the CEOs [Chief Executive Officers]. They’re women, and that’s neat. So the world is changing in healthcare too.

[Assistant]
I’m sure I could keep asking you questions. I’m going to ask Rebecca if she has any for you.

No.

[User] Anything written down?

[Assistant] No. I was just going through. It was very interesting.

[User] I feel like I’m prattling on and on.

[Assistant] No, no, no, that’s the whole idea. It’s not for us to talk.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Anything written down?

[Assistant] No. I was just going through. It was very interesting.

[User] I feel like I’m prattling on and on.

[Assistant] No, no, no, that’s the whole idea. It’s not for us to talk.

[User] You’re good listeners. You’re both very good listeners.

[Assistant] I had one more question, but I think you’ve really talked about it. You had talked in the first interview about how you were pulled aside during the interview with NASA. You were told that the newspaper would be interested in covering one of the women, because this was the first time we were having women. You mentioned the myth that women’s hormonal cycles make them much more emotional than men, and that you wanted to study in space, you know, would you be more emotional than men, would it be dangerous in space for women, and I thought maybe you’d want to address that. But I think you did a nice job here of exploring how things have changed.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Oh, yes. There were many different things.\n\n Power issues were the main concern, “What happens if we lose power?” Obviously, we had backup systems and generators and UPS’s [uninterruptible power supplies]. But [that] was our [main] concern, if we lost power. Water. We said, “Okay, let’s make sure that we protect just in the event of any kind of a water leak,” because we’d had them in the past.\n\n It was very minor. I don’t think there was much concern that we weren’t prepared for any kind of event. The only thing that I—I’m sure they had something in place, but earthquake was the one thing that I wasn’t concerned about. We knew hurricanes were a possibility.

[Assistant] Especially that time of year, for sure.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] You said things went well, there really weren’t any major challenges with your system.

[User] No, there were no major challenges. Obviously, the way telemetry would present itself might be a little bit different than what we had originally expected, but other than that—in fact that’s actually something that’s expected. So, there was nothing really truly unexpected, and it performed the way it was supposed to. It was a very satisfying feeling when we started getting images back and they looked correct. Everything looked great. I still have those images on my screen.

[Assistant] What are your memories of that last day of the test and rolling out OTIS? Were you there for those days?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] I’d have to say ASPA. ASPA would be my most significant contribution. It was something tangible. It was something that I built from the ground up, the software at least. It was a very solid piece of software. We had some issues, but I’m very proud of it. Yes, I’d have to say that the software that controlled ASPA was my most significant contribution to OTIS.\n\n Aside from, obviously, the time that I put in with all the people and building relationships and establishing that trust between everybody. Obviously, that’s a contribution. But as far as a tangible contribution, I’d have to say ASPA.

[Assistant] I know I sent you these questions earlier. I wanted to know is there anything else that you may have jotted down that you think we haven’t covered today that you wanted to talk about?

[User] No, I don’t think so. No, I think we’ve covered pretty much everything.\n\n It was one of the most iconic moments and programs I’ve worked on to date. Such a spectacular team, amazing piece of engineering hardware. To be part of that is a life experience. It’s one of the most amazing things that we’ve done in our generation. To be part of that, to think about what we’re really going to be using Webb for—looking for first light, working with people that are Nobel Prize winners. John [C.] Mather—oh my gosh, what an amazing guy. To have him know me on a first-name basis is an incredible feeling.

[Assistant] Yes, that’s cool.

[User] The friends that I’ve made. It’s a life experience, it’s one of the most amazing things I’ve done.

[Assistant] Yes, I have to say it was pretty cool seeing it when I had the opportunity to take my family to see it. Knowing where it was going and what it would be doing, yes, it’s very exciting. Kind of cool, you don’t see much hardware here.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] No, I don’t think so. No, I think we’ve covered pretty much everything.\n\n It was one of the most iconic moments and programs I’ve worked on to date. Such a spectacular team, amazing piece of engineering hardware. To be part of that is a life experience. It’s one of the most amazing things that we’ve done in our generation. To be part of that, to think about what we’re really going to be using Webb for—looking for first light, working with people that are Nobel Prize winners. John [C.] Mather—oh my gosh, what an amazing guy. To have him know me on a first-name basis is an incredible feeling.

[Assistant] Yes, that’s cool.

[User] The friends that I’ve made. It’s a life experience, it’s one of the most amazing things I’ve done.

[Assistant] Yes, I have to say it was pretty cool seeing it when I had the opportunity to take my family to see it. Knowing where it was going and what it would be doing, yes, it’s very exciting. Kind of cool, you don’t see much hardware here.

[User] Yes, yes. You had an opportunity to bring your kids through?

[Assistant] Yes, I think it took us about three hours. He’s five, so he was like, “Oh.” I’m like, “No, trust me. It’s going to be so cool, it’s going to be so cool, it’s going to be so worth it.” I think when he’s probably 10 or 11 he’ll get it. But as a five-year-old it was a challenge to keep him excited about what we were going to see.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yes, yes. You had an opportunity to bring your kids through?

[Assistant] Yes, I think it took us about three hours. He’s five, so he was like, “Oh.” I’m like, “No, trust me. It’s going to be so cool, it’s going to be so cool, it’s going to be so worth it.” I think when he’s probably 10 or 11 he’ll get it. But as a five-year-old it was a challenge to keep him excited about what we were going to see.

[User] That’s exactly right. “Oh look, shiny mirrors. Okay, what’s next?”

[Assistant] Exactly, yes.

[User] I think Space Center Houston is really good for the younger kids, to get them excited about it. Space camp, as they start getting towards the 10, 11, 12 years old. Get them into space camp, get them interested in it. It’s just such an opportunity for them. I get so excited about it, I’m very passionate about doing that.

[Assistant] Yes, it sounds like you are. You may decide to change your career and go into more of that field at some point.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] That’s exactly right. “Oh look, shiny mirrors. Okay, what’s next?”

[Assistant] Exactly, yes.

[User] I think Space Center Houston is really good for the younger kids, to get them excited about it. Space camp, as they start getting towards the 10, 11, 12 years old. Get them into space camp, get them interested in it. It’s just such an opportunity for them. I get so excited about it, I’m very passionate about doing that.

[Assistant] Yes, it sounds like you are. You may decide to change your career and go into more of that field at some point.

[User] Yes, I’ve got some big plans for Ball Aerospace moving forward. My next program is working on the next big telescope which is coming through, which is WFIRST (Wide Field Infrared [Survey] Telescope). That’s going to be at Goddard. Right now, I believe it’s up in Rochester, New York. I’m not sure when it’s going to be down at Goddard, believe it’s going to be sometime next year it’s going to get underway. That’s my next program.\n\n I’m going to be working software, but I’m also going to be working with the teams. I really enjoy working with people. I enjoy building teams. It’s going to be more tours. I really enjoy working at Goddard. I love being in the middle of things; I love the excitement. I work very well under pressure. It’s just exciting to me.

[Assistant] Thank you so much for your time today. I’m glad we were able to get some time to talk. Really appreciate it, especially since you’re here and there and everywhere else.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] I think Space Center Houston is really good for the younger kids, to get them excited about it. Space camp, as they start getting towards the 10, 11, 12 years old. Get them into space camp, get them interested in it. It’s just such an opportunity for them. I get so excited about it, I’m very passionate about doing that.

[Assistant] Yes, it sounds like you are. You may decide to change your career and go into more of that field at some point.

[User] Yes, I’ve got some big plans for Ball Aerospace moving forward. My next program is working on the next big telescope which is coming through, which is WFIRST (Wide Field Infrared [Survey] Telescope). That’s going to be at Goddard. Right now, I believe it’s up in Rochester, New York. I’m not sure when it’s going to be down at Goddard, believe it’s going to be sometime next year it’s going to get underway. That’s my next program.\n\n I’m going to be working software, but I’m also going to be working with the teams. I really enjoy working with people. I enjoy building teams. It’s going to be more tours. I really enjoy working at Goddard. I love being in the middle of things; I love the excitement. I work very well under pressure. It’s just exciting to me.

[Assistant] Thank you so much for your time today. I’m glad we were able to get some time to talk. Really appreciate it, especially since you’re here and there and everywhere else.

[User] You’re welcome.

[Assistant] Like I said, I’ll send you a copy of the transcript once it’s ready, probably take about eight weeks. But if we’re running later I’ll let you know.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yes, I’ve got some big plans for Ball Aerospace moving forward. My next program is working on the next big telescope which is coming through, which is WFIRST (Wide Field Infrared [Survey] Telescope). That’s going to be at Goddard. Right now, I believe it’s up in Rochester, New York. I’m not sure when it’s going to be down at Goddard, believe it’s going to be sometime next year it’s going to get underway. That’s my next program.\n\n I’m going to be working software, but I’m also going to be working with the teams. I really enjoy working with people. I enjoy building teams. It’s going to be more tours. I really enjoy working at Goddard. I love being in the middle of things; I love the excitement. I work very well under pressure. It’s just exciting to me.

[Assistant] Thank you so much for your time today. I’m glad we were able to get some time to talk. Really appreciate it, especially since you’re here and there and everywhere else.

[User] You’re welcome.

[Assistant] Like I said, I’ll send you a copy of the transcript once it’s ready, probably take about eight weeks. But if we’re running later I’ll let you know.

[User] Okay, that sounds great.

[Assistant] All right. Good luck with it.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] You’re welcome.

[Assistant] Like I said, I’ll send you a copy of the transcript once it’s ready, probably take about eight weeks. But if we’re running later I’ll let you know.

[User] Okay, that sounds great.

[Assistant] All right. Good luck with it.

[User] All right, Jen. Thank you, it was very nice talking with you.

[Assistant] Yes, absolutely. Have a good day, and I’ll be in touch soon.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Okay, that sounds great.

[Assistant] All right. Good luck with it.

[User] All right, Jen. Thank you, it was very nice talking with you.

[Assistant] Yes, absolutely. Have a good day, and I’ll be in touch soon.

[User] All right, sounds good, Jen. You take care.

[Assistant] All right, you too. Thank you, bye-bye.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] It’s much lower than in a traditional program. In a traditional program, you would have hundreds of civil servants supporting the program. You would have more of a support contractor staff, and you would have dedicated engineering staff providing support to the program. The COTS program chose to only buy engineering support as needed, and they were able to get part-time of maybe 100 to 150 people, maybe an hour here and there, maybe a week when we had a major review, if we needed it. Engineering support from that perspective was much lower than traditional. And we were there to help the partners, not tell them how to do it.

[Assistant] To clarify, was that engineering support the COTS Advisory Team?

[User] Yes, that’s the COTS Advisory Team.

[Assistant] You said that by the time you became involved in the COTS program, they had already selected the first two commercial partners. Did you have any role in the termination of RpK, when their Space Act Agreement was terminated [in October 2007]?

[User] I was in the program office at the time that RpK was terminated, and I was on the Source Evaluation Board [Participant Evaluation Panel] for the new partner.

[Assistant] Can you talk about your experience? As much as you can share, because we understand that a lot is proprietary.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yes, that’s the COTS Advisory Team.

[Assistant] You said that by the time you became involved in the COTS program, they had already selected the first two commercial partners. Did you have any role in the termination of RpK, when their Space Act Agreement was terminated [in October 2007]?

[User] I was in the program office at the time that RpK was terminated, and I was on the Source Evaluation Board [Participant Evaluation Panel] for the new partner.

[Assistant] Can you talk about your experience? As much as you can share, because we understand that a lot is proprietary.

[User] RpK had difficulty raising money in the private sector, and had essentially stopped work. The program had a tough decision to make, as to whether or not to continue to partner with them and decided that it was not in the best interest of the government to continue that partnership.

[Assistant] Did you have any input in those discussions?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] I was in the program office at the time that RpK was terminated, and I was on the Source Evaluation Board [Participant Evaluation Panel] for the new partner.

[Assistant] Can you talk about your experience? As much as you can share, because we understand that a lot is proprietary.

[User] RpK had difficulty raising money in the private sector, and had essentially stopped work. The program had a tough decision to make, as to whether or not to continue to partner with them and decided that it was not in the best interest of the government to continue that partnership.

[Assistant] Did you have any input in those discussions?

[User] Only from a budget perspective, as far as what we had spent to date, and the remaining milestones. Then in the recompetition, I was on the evaluation board for the selection of the new partner.

[Assistant] What kind of lessons learned from RpK’s termination did you apply to your role in the selection of the next partner?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] RpK had difficulty raising money in the private sector, and had essentially stopped work. The program had a tough decision to make, as to whether or not to continue to partner with them and decided that it was not in the best interest of the government to continue that partnership.

[Assistant] Did you have any input in those discussions?

[User] Only from a budget perspective, as far as what we had spent to date, and the remaining milestones. Then in the recompetition, I was on the evaluation board for the selection of the new partner.

[Assistant] What kind of lessons learned from RpK’s termination did you apply to your role in the selection of the next partner?

[User] I think it’s really important that these agreements had financial milestones as well as technical milestones. I think the board as a whole, and the business team on the selection panel, looked very closely at the business model of the potential partners and made sure that business model made sense. We also had an outside consultant who looked at those as well [Alan Marty], and the person who led the business team was Dennis [A.] Stone. Dennis had been through the first partnership selection and was part of the program from the beginning. He had a good handle on what the business model should look like, and whether or not they would be able to close the business model.

[Assistant] As the [Resource] Analyst, did you also play a part in how some of the milestones were negotiated in the new Space Act Agreement?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Only from a budget perspective, as far as what we had spent to date, and the remaining milestones. Then in the recompetition, I was on the evaluation board for the selection of the new partner.

[Assistant] What kind of lessons learned from RpK’s termination did you apply to your role in the selection of the next partner?

[User] I think it’s really important that these agreements had financial milestones as well as technical milestones. I think the board as a whole, and the business team on the selection panel, looked very closely at the business model of the potential partners and made sure that business model made sense. We also had an outside consultant who looked at those as well [Alan Marty], and the person who led the business team was Dennis [A.] Stone. Dennis had been through the first partnership selection and was part of the program from the beginning. He had a good handle on what the business model should look like, and whether or not they would be able to close the business model.

[Assistant] As the [Resource] Analyst, did you also play a part in how some of the milestones were negotiated in the new Space Act Agreement?

[User] No, I did not. At one point in time, Congress gave us additional funding. I was involved in the augmentation discussions, regarding the augmentation milestones. Not in the negotiations between the partner and the program office.

[Assistant] Can you share a little bit more about the augmentation and the negotiation of those milestones?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] I think it’s really important that these agreements had financial milestones as well as technical milestones. I think the board as a whole, and the business team on the selection panel, looked very closely at the business model of the potential partners and made sure that business model made sense. We also had an outside consultant who looked at those as well [Alan Marty], and the person who led the business team was Dennis [A.] Stone. Dennis had been through the first partnership selection and was part of the program from the beginning. He had a good handle on what the business model should look like, and whether or not they would be able to close the business model.

[Assistant] As the [Resource] Analyst, did you also play a part in how some of the milestones were negotiated in the new Space Act Agreement?

[User] No, I did not. At one point in time, Congress gave us additional funding. I was involved in the augmentation discussions, regarding the augmentation milestones. Not in the negotiations between the partner and the program office.

[Assistant] Can you share a little bit more about the augmentation and the negotiation of those milestones?

[User] The partners proposed augmentation milestones that would reduce risk to the program and to their performance in their achievement of their vehicle demo [demonstration]. There was a lot of back and forth between the partners and the project managers within the program office, about what those milestones should be and what the closure criteria for success should be. They should be milestones that reduce risk, which incorporated additional tests.\n\n In the case of Orbital, it incorporated an additional test flight. With regards to SpaceX, there was additional testing. They were further along because they had been operating for a year or more longer than Orbital, but there were still some additional test activities that mitigated potential risk.

[Assistant] How has your work in procurement evolved as a result of your work with the COTS program, and that different way of doing business between private and public enterprise?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] No, I did not. At one point in time, Congress gave us additional funding. I was involved in the augmentation discussions, regarding the augmentation milestones. Not in the negotiations between the partner and the program office.

[Assistant] Can you share a little bit more about the augmentation and the negotiation of those milestones?

[User] The partners proposed augmentation milestones that would reduce risk to the program and to their performance in their achievement of their vehicle demo [demonstration]. There was a lot of back and forth between the partners and the project managers within the program office, about what those milestones should be and what the closure criteria for success should be. They should be milestones that reduce risk, which incorporated additional tests.\n\n In the case of Orbital, it incorporated an additional test flight. With regards to SpaceX, there was additional testing. They were further along because they had been operating for a year or more longer than Orbital, but there were still some additional test activities that mitigated potential risk.

[Assistant] How has your work in procurement evolved as a result of your work with the COTS program, and that different way of doing business between private and public enterprise?

[User] I’m on the budget side, not the procurement side.

[Assistant] I’m sorry, excuse me.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] The partners proposed augmentation milestones that would reduce risk to the program and to their performance in their achievement of their vehicle demo [demonstration]. There was a lot of back and forth between the partners and the project managers within the program office, about what those milestones should be and what the closure criteria for success should be. They should be milestones that reduce risk, which incorporated additional tests.\n\n In the case of Orbital, it incorporated an additional test flight. With regards to SpaceX, there was additional testing. They were further along because they had been operating for a year or more longer than Orbital, but there were still some additional test activities that mitigated potential risk.

[Assistant] How has your work in procurement evolved as a result of your work with the COTS program, and that different way of doing business between private and public enterprise?

[User] I’m on the budget side, not the procurement side.

[Assistant] I’m sorry, excuse me.

[User] That’s okay. I do occasionally get involved with procurement activities.\n\n I think it’s helped me to see that there are other approaches that can be very successful, and I am a big advocate for the COTS program and the COTS model. I think that Alan [J.] Lindenmoyer [Commercial Crew and Cargo Program Manager] has been extremely successful in helping the partners to accomplish the goals that they set. Coming to the Space Station Program, it’s nice to the see the fruition of that work, and to see SpaceX delivering cargo.\n\n It is a very different model. It’s a very different mindset as to how we accomplish things. Typically on a contract, we [NASA] are writing the requirements and telling the contractor how to do what we want them to do. In the COTS program, its model is to tell them what we need, and let them go figure out how to deliver it. From a financial perspective, it has been much cheaper to partner with SpaceX and Orbital to deliver cargo than it would have been under a traditional NASA program.

[Assistant] You talked about the lean staff in the COTS office. What are some of the other areas where you saw major savings in the budget?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] We had a legal representative and a procurement representative who were integral to the program. There was a dedicated person or persons who were involved. We were all involved in the weekly staff meetings with Alan. It was a very lean team, and everybody was at the table in the weekly meetings with the program manager. You can do that when you have a small team. You can’t do that when you have a team of 300, 400, or more.\n\n Everybody was knowledgeable about what was important to the program, what things were going on in the program, what issues we might be dealing with. I think that’s really important, to have that very flat hierarchical structure, or lack of hierarchy within a program office that size, if you’re going to do something different.

[Assistant]
I think I’d like to ask Rebecca Wright if she has any questions she’d like to follow up on.

I have a question about the augmentation. You said Congress gave that money. It’s very rare that you hear of programs getting more money. Can you share the background of how that money actually made it into the program office here?

[User] I’m not sure what the driver was behind the Congressional appropriation, whether there was lobbying on behalf of the partners. It was not something that the program originally asked for, but when we were offered it, we felt like the best use of those funds was to reduce the risk. There was actually language written into the appropriation bill specifically directing that additional funding to the partners. I think it has proven to be very successful.

[Assistant] It must have been a surprise as a budget person to get more money to deal with. Usually people are ready to take it away.

[User] It was quite a surprise to have more funding offered to you, without having to go and fight for it and defend it. That’s not something that happens frequently.

[Assistant] You made a comment about the payments for the milestones, getting the money to them so quickly. That the process changed from JSC to the NSSC, is that right?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] All. Certain subsystems might have taken a half a page, but other subsystems probably took 200 pages. I presented the overview, but we had our subsystem managers go into the details of the significant changes. Myself and my counterpart from USA and NASA worked as a project team, and we went through this orbiter presentation and managed it from that way. We had picked certain areas where we would overview these sections of the presentation and then introduce our subsystem experts and go over the details with the program office. It was a long meeting, it was three days. Those days weren’t eight-hour days either. They were twelve, thirteen hours.

[Assistant] Were there any changes that you had to go back and make?

[User] Yes. We had certain actions coming out of that that we had to readdress. We readdressed them at the flight readiness review and closed those actions, but they weren’t constraints to moving forward for the flight readiness review.

[Assistant] Were you at the Cape [Canaveral, Florida] for the launch?

[User] I was there. I’ve been at probably 30 or 40 launches.

[Assistant] Were you on console or you were just there to witness the launch?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yes. We had certain actions coming out of that that we had to readdress. We readdressed them at the flight readiness review and closed those actions, but they weren’t constraints to moving forward for the flight readiness review.

[Assistant] Were you at the Cape [Canaveral, Florida] for the launch?

[User] I was there. I’ve been at probably 30 or 40 launches.

[Assistant] Were you on console or you were just there to witness the launch?

[User] No, no, I was just there.

[Assistant] Did you go to the Mission Evaluation Room for the mission?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] I was there. I’ve been at probably 30 or 40 launches.

[Assistant] Were you on console or you were just there to witness the launch?

[User] No, no, I was just there.

[Assistant] Did you go to the Mission Evaluation Room for the mission?

[User] No, I came back since I wasn’t vehicle manager. I’ve done my time in that MER.

[Assistant] You mentioned that you started working on transition and retirement. When did transition officially begin?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Right.

[Assistant] Of all the responsibilities that you had during the Gemini time period, did you find that one task was more difficult to accomplish than the other?

[User] I think as far as tasks are concerned, my greatest concern and challenge was each liftoff, is how much damage you're going to have and how soon can we get that turned around where we can get the next vehicle along. As I said, no two vehicles react the same; the damage pattern is different each time. So my biggest challenge was every vehicle as far as blast damage was concerned.

[Assistant] As Gemini progressed, and of course, most people knew, or everybody knew, that we would be moving toward the Apollo era and moving toward going to the Moon to fulfill John Kennedy's challenge. So you knew that your job would be changing. Did you know during Gemini where you would be going after the program had stopped?

[User] No. At that time, I was getting ready to retire and I kind of thought to myself, well, it's time that I relax and spent more time with [my family]—as I said, I had several offers to go with different contractors, people that I knew, developed a friendship with. So I was just going to retire and go play golf, and it didn't work out that way.

[Assistant] What did you do?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Well, yes, I really didn't—Freeport. Because of my experience with government, they sent me to Rocky Flats, Colorado, because Dow had the big contract up there on cleaning up after the big fire they had. Since I had worked around the government and was familiar with the government regulations and contracting, I went up there.

[Assistant] Quite a difference in location from Florida to Colorado.

[User] Tell me. Working out there when it was zero temperature, you know. But I guess you get used to those things.

[Assistant] I'm sure it was quite a change, too, from the family that you had been so closely involved with—

[User] Oh, yes.

[Assistant] —in Gemini days, to move to these other types of work.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Tell me. Working out there when it was zero temperature, you know. But I guess you get used to those things.

[Assistant] I'm sure it was quite a change, too, from the family that you had been so closely involved with—

[User] Oh, yes.

[Assistant] —in Gemini days, to move to these other types of work.

[User] Yes, I found in Dow a similarity, but not like we had on the Gemini. Dow Chemical was a close-knitted company and it's an old family company, and the Dow family believed in the philosophy of everybody being close together, working together as a team. When I went to Dow, they had just changed from that philosophy. The Dow family decided that they needed to change their philosophy, the family could no longer control Dow and grow Dow Chemical, because every cousin, aunt, and uncle wanted their share of the stock and dividends. Mr. Dow decided it was time to break away from the family, and they did so.\n\n Dow began to really grow and became, as you well know, it's the second—I guess it's still second in chemical processing and manufacturing. So I think they had they stayed the way they were, they would have probably withered up and disappeared.\n\n He brought a young man in from Allied Chemical, Ben Branch, who was a fair-haired boy with Allied Chemical, and, of course, they were number one. Mr. Branch brought the team together where they really grew.

[Assistant] Well, as families do, families gather. And you recently returned from a reunion of the Gemini family.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Oh, yes.

[Assistant] —in Gemini days, to move to these other types of work.

[User] Yes, I found in Dow a similarity, but not like we had on the Gemini. Dow Chemical was a close-knitted company and it's an old family company, and the Dow family believed in the philosophy of everybody being close together, working together as a team. When I went to Dow, they had just changed from that philosophy. The Dow family decided that they needed to change their philosophy, the family could no longer control Dow and grow Dow Chemical, because every cousin, aunt, and uncle wanted their share of the stock and dividends. Mr. Dow decided it was time to break away from the family, and they did so.\n\n Dow began to really grow and became, as you well know, it's the second—I guess it's still second in chemical processing and manufacturing. So I think they had they stayed the way they were, they would have probably withered up and disappeared.\n\n He brought a young man in from Allied Chemical, Ben Branch, who was a fair-haired boy with Allied Chemical, and, of course, they were number one. Mr. Branch brought the team together where they really grew.

[Assistant] Well, as families do, families gather. And you recently returned from a reunion of the Gemini family.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Would you share with us what all that entailed and so maybe some of the people that you got a chance to visit with while you were there?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] No, I tried not let it get boring.

[Assistant] Where do you call home? Where are you from originally?

[User] I was born in Ohio, but I would never go back to Ohio, because it's cold and I don't like cold weather. So I came to Texas in [1940], and I liked it. This is home. I don't like cold weather, and, of course, the service, they sent you where you didn't like—if you didn't like cold weather, you got to go to cold weather.

[Assistant] Did you do your training in Texas, your Army Air Corps training?

[User] No, my training was rather unique the way I was—yes, the basic training I was sent to Chanute Field, Illinois, and I went to what they called the aircraft and engine training school there. I had twenty-six weeks.\n\n After that I was sent to Seattle, [Washington] and went through an engineering course on B-17s. Then from there I went to Nevada and through what they call a gunnery course, and came back out of that, and then I was sent to Geiger [phonetic] Field, Washington, and was assigned a combat crew, it was for combat training. I stayed in that, was placed in a training command for training crews. I volunteered for overseas several times, but they wouldn't let us go because supposedly we were supposed to be essentials to training crews.\n\n Then I went to the Pacific, and right after the war served five years in occupation duty in Japan with the Air Force. Then I came back in '50, and a year later I was back in Japan because of the Korean War.

[Assistant] It was nice that you were able to move toward seeing aircraft become an achievement, as such, as going to the Moon and not just used for war purposes. I'm sure you enjoyed the transition from that.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] I read a lot of history about history and that's why I think history—there's a lot in literature and in books about Germany, about their development of missiles and that. I was always interested in that, and everything I could find to read I would read about it. Goddard always interested me, Dr. [Robert H.] Goddard. I've read probably most of his books on rocketry. It's always amazing, here was a man that had certain personals and philosophies and then he decided he would prove these things. As you all know, history is that he went out to New Mexico, he and Dr. [Daniel] Guggenheim, and that's where they first started firing rockets. I was always interested in that to see how that this was done. I ended up being in the big business with them.

[Assistant] Of course, even though you worked with the Atlas so closely yourself, Saturn launch, as well.

[User] Right.

[Assistant] Such a tremendous rocket to go, as well.

[User] Yes, I saw that. In the Atlas Program, there were three or four of us that would always get together and we'd talk. Since I'd worked around some solids, why, I often wonder why we can't strap a solid on the side of a vehicle and give it an additional boost. We were always worrying about the necessary thrust, first stage and to get through the initial thrust of the outer space. I often wondered why we couldn't strap something on it and here later on the thing is developed. As you well know, the Delta. I often wondered, why couldn't we take the Minuteman and put that on the side of the vehicle. Of course, that's about what you've got today with your vehicles. The capability of those two is about equal to a Minuteman. So I visioned these things and now they're there.

[Assistant] Knowing that they would come true. It's quite remarkable what they're able to do with the technology, how it goes through its evolution.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Right.

[Assistant] Such a tremendous rocket to go, as well.

[User] Yes, I saw that. In the Atlas Program, there were three or four of us that would always get together and we'd talk. Since I'd worked around some solids, why, I often wonder why we can't strap a solid on the side of a vehicle and give it an additional boost. We were always worrying about the necessary thrust, first stage and to get through the initial thrust of the outer space. I often wondered why we couldn't strap something on it and here later on the thing is developed. As you well know, the Delta. I often wondered, why couldn't we take the Minuteman and put that on the side of the vehicle. Of course, that's about what you've got today with your vehicles. The capability of those two is about equal to a Minuteman. So I visioned these things and now they're there.

[Assistant] Knowing that they would come true. It's quite remarkable what they're able to do with the technology, how it goes through its evolution.

[User] Yes. It's just like you're thinking about using the thrust vehicle, using fuel, who would have thought you could take liquid oxygen, or take oxygen and liquify it, and use it as a fuel to thrust something into space and then come along and use nothing but kerosene as another fuel and mix the two and develop an engine that would put you into space? Years ago nobody would have thought of that. Years ago nobody thought about liquid nitrogen or liquid hydrogen or liquid oxygen, you see.\n\n But even in the early days that I started in the weapons systems, there was a lot of fuels, I mean, that's been developed since that, because we didn't have the technology basically. I mean, people wrote certain theories about it and then we could do it. But to develop it and to make it work and harness it was a real, real challenge to us, and the American people rose up and challenged that, taken that challenge, and succeeded.

[Assistant] I'll bet you saw quite sights at Wallops Island when you were originally there, all the trial and errors that happened.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Oh, yes. But somebody, I guess, had to do it. I mean, the Army, of course, we used the Nike and Honest John [rockets], and, of course the Army, they had all kinds of safety devices. Here you are out there on a strip of land and you don't have all these buildings to go to, you see.

[Assistant] Mr. Barton, if it's okay, I'm going to ask Sandra if she's got any questions to ask.

[User] Fine. Either one of you have questions—

[Assistant] I actually have several that I want to go back and ask you about. I wondered if whenever you were talking about the Atlas, you had mentioned the challenges that the Atlas posed for you. What would you consider the greatest challenges were during the testing of the Atlas Program?

[User] I think our greatest challenge was to make sure that we were doing it right, so that when we finished with the development of it we had a successful ICBM. Because what we were doing depended upon the success of that ICBM, and that ICBM, remember, was our first front-line defense for deterrent of any ally or foreign nation trying to penetrate us.

[Assistant] A couple of other things I was wondering about. You said you were the Air Force rep in the beginning for the Gemini Program. Were you actually stationed at McDonnell…, or were you actually a contractor or were the Air Force rep at the Cape?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Fine. Either one of you have questions—

[Assistant] I actually have several that I want to go back and ask you about. I wondered if whenever you were talking about the Atlas, you had mentioned the challenges that the Atlas posed for you. What would you consider the greatest challenges were during the testing of the Atlas Program?

[User] I think our greatest challenge was to make sure that we were doing it right, so that when we finished with the development of it we had a successful ICBM. Because what we were doing depended upon the success of that ICBM, and that ICBM, remember, was our first front-line defense for deterrent of any ally or foreign nation trying to penetrate us.

[Assistant] A couple of other things I was wondering about. You said you were the Air Force rep in the beginning for the Gemini Program. Were you actually stationed at McDonnell…, or were you actually a contractor or were the Air Force rep at the Cape?

[User] I was the Air Force rep at the Cape. See, what generally the Air Force always—when it had a project like that, it would assign somebody to represent the Air Force to see that the contractor complying with the contract and that all your equipment is going to be all according to the drawings and that. So that was my job basically. I worked night shift, second shift, and most of the work went on at night, because during the daytime they were working schedules and plans and that, and then at night they would do the work.

[Assistant] Was this part of your being part of the Blue Suit Team? You mentioned that very briefly at the beginning of our conversation.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Good morning.

[Assistant] You've had quite a career with NASA, and most recent years have been spent with the Shuttle-Mir. I know that you were the first American woman to train in Star City, as well as you were part of the first crew to dock with the Mir. I would like for you to start out by telling us now what are you doing? Because those years have quickly gone by and I know that you're busy every day. So if you could just start with telling us what your current roles are.

[User] Well, I just came off of the eighth docking flight to Mir in January of this year [1998], and after a couple of months of post flight debriefing and report-writing and so forth, I've been assigned to a temporary job. Right now I'm filling the shoes of Steve Hawley for about six months as Deputy Director of Flight Crew Operations while he trains for a flight later this year.

[Assistant] Are all of the past experiences benefiting you in this new job?

[User] Oh, yes. Well, I've rotated through a lot of different technical jobs in my 20-year career here, and this sort of pulls them all together. My primary job is supporting the Director, Dave Leestma, who was a classmate of mine in 1980, as well as filling all of the other roles that our directorate has within the rest of the [Johnson Space] Center.

[Assistant] I know that you've worked with so many people for so long, and you work with them now day to day. But you spent many months in Russia training in Star City. Would you tell us some of those experiences? And first of all, tell us how you were selected to do that.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Strictly the language. I told somebody, we went to do winter survival out in the woods there by Star City, and they said, "Is this hard? How was it?" I said, "This is the most comfortable thing I've done," because I grew up in the Northwest. My dad was a World War II Marine, and he used to teach us survival. You know, the snow's on the ground, you're out with your horse. You're checking the fence and it gets foggy and you lose your way. How do you survive? I learned survival from the time I was a kid. So being out there in the woods in the snow and taking care of the fire actually was kind of fun.

[Assistant] You were home. [Laughter]

[User] Yes. We used to do that for fun. On the weekends we'd pack the horses up and go into the Cascade Mountains and we'd call that fun. [Laughter]

[Assistant] Wow. You were in pre-training. [Laughter]

[User] So I actually enjoyed winter survival.

[Assistant] That sounds great. You had a chance to be on the first group and, of course, you got to fly with your crew. So tell us how exciting that was for you to be able to be there at the Mir.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yes. We used to do that for fun. On the weekends we'd pack the horses up and go into the Cascade Mountains and we'd call that fun. [Laughter]

[Assistant] Wow. You were in pre-training. [Laughter]

[User] So I actually enjoyed winter survival.

[Assistant] That sounds great. You had a chance to be on the first group and, of course, you got to fly with your crew. So tell us how exciting that was for you to be able to be there at the Mir.

[User] Well, it was very exciting to be part of that first flight. As you probably know, Anatoly Solovyev and Nikolai Budarin also went up on the Shuttle, so they were my crew. And sat on the mid-deck. I sat with them on ascent. I also acted as an interpreter, too, because they were only with us for about three months in training. We transferred them after docking. It was very exciting to see the Mir, to actually get on there. Although there was a lot of extra hardware there, it was still somewhat familiar. I recognized all the panels and so forth.\n\n The hardest part was leaving them and not staying with them, and I realized how tightly we had started to bond as a crew when we got ready to close that hatch and I was going to be on one side and they were going to be on the other. That was probably the hardest time.

[Assistant] I can imagine. And then as you slowly leave and see them in the rear-view mirror, I'm sure that part of you wanted to be there, and I'm sure part of you was.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] So I actually enjoyed winter survival.

[Assistant] That sounds great. You had a chance to be on the first group and, of course, you got to fly with your crew. So tell us how exciting that was for you to be able to be there at the Mir.

[User] Well, it was very exciting to be part of that first flight. As you probably know, Anatoly Solovyev and Nikolai Budarin also went up on the Shuttle, so they were my crew. And sat on the mid-deck. I sat with them on ascent. I also acted as an interpreter, too, because they were only with us for about three months in training. We transferred them after docking. It was very exciting to see the Mir, to actually get on there. Although there was a lot of extra hardware there, it was still somewhat familiar. I recognized all the panels and so forth.\n\n The hardest part was leaving them and not staying with them, and I realized how tightly we had started to bond as a crew when we got ready to close that hatch and I was going to be on one side and they were going to be on the other. That was probably the hardest time.

[Assistant] I can imagine. And then as you slowly leave and see them in the rear-view mirror, I'm sure that part of you wanted to be there, and I'm sure part of you was.

[User] Well, it's like any job. I had that sense, as we were closing the hatch. Then immediately my brain's back in the time line, so then I think about it after the flight. But there was just that period there. I think even Hoot [Gibson] noticed it. I mean, Hoot was feeling it. It's just kind of, "Well, it would have been nice to stay."

[Assistant] Would you tell us some of the things that you were doing during that time that you were all together? Did you help them transition or were you just part of the whole crew doing an assortment of duties?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Well, it was very exciting to be part of that first flight. As you probably know, Anatoly Solovyev and Nikolai Budarin also went up on the Shuttle, so they were my crew. And sat on the mid-deck. I sat with them on ascent. I also acted as an interpreter, too, because they were only with us for about three months in training. We transferred them after docking. It was very exciting to see the Mir, to actually get on there. Although there was a lot of extra hardware there, it was still somewhat familiar. I recognized all the panels and so forth.\n\n The hardest part was leaving them and not staying with them, and I realized how tightly we had started to bond as a crew when we got ready to close that hatch and I was going to be on one side and they were going to be on the other. That was probably the hardest time.

[Assistant] I can imagine. And then as you slowly leave and see them in the rear-view mirror, I'm sure that part of you wanted to be there, and I'm sure part of you was.

[User] Well, it's like any job. I had that sense, as we were closing the hatch. Then immediately my brain's back in the time line, so then I think about it after the flight. But there was just that period there. I think even Hoot [Gibson] noticed it. I mean, Hoot was feeling it. It's just kind of, "Well, it would have been nice to stay."

[Assistant] Would you tell us some of the things that you were doing during that time that you were all together? Did you help them transition or were you just part of the whole crew doing an assortment of duties?

[User] You mean on--

[Assistant] During the docking.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Well, it's like any job. I had that sense, as we were closing the hatch. Then immediately my brain's back in the time line, so then I think about it after the flight. But there was just that period there. I think even Hoot [Gibson] noticed it. I mean, Hoot was feeling it. It's just kind of, "Well, it would have been nice to stay."

[Assistant] Would you tell us some of the things that you were doing during that time that you were all together? Did you help them transition or were you just part of the whole crew doing an assortment of duties?

[User] You mean on--

[Assistant] During the docking.

[User] During the docking flight, all the duties are very well laid out. As soon as we took over Norm's seat, his so-called Lojement seat, and put it in to the Soyuz, he and Anatoly and Nick became the Mir crew. So that happened not long after docking. We picked up Norm. We brought Norm back. We brought Norm, Vladimir, and Gennady [Strekalov] back. They became part of our crew. Then Anatoly and Nick became the Mir crew. I didn't see much of them except for pre-planned events after that, because their job was then to receive control of the Mir and to work with their Mission Control Center, the TsUP.\n\n Our job in the Space Lab, for Ellen Baker and I, was to start the medical analysis on Norm and Vladimir and Gennady, and that's what we did. We had a whole suite of experiments, everything from blood work to cardiopulmonary work, to lower-body negative-pressure work, cardiovascular type of work. We had to do that on orbit to get the Zero-G data. That took much of our time for the dock time.

[Assistant] How were your experiences different this last time when you were up visiting [STS-89] and your duties that were there on this last flight?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Well, the thing is that Anatoly was there again. [Laughter] When we opened the hatch, it was Anatoly and Pavel Vinogradov. It was really fun to see Anatoly. So one of the things we did before we closed the hatch and left is, I went in on the other side of the hatch and they took a picture of Anatoly and I inside the Mir before I came back over, and when Mission Control in Moscow called us after undocking, they asked me what side of the hatch I was on. [Laughter] I told them, unfortunately, I was on the Shuttle side.

[Assistant] [Laughter] That had to be fun. You all had a good visit?

[User] Yes, we had a good visit. He had been working very hard on this particular increment. I think history shows the systems were starting to degrade, a lot of maintenance required. He told me he had been working very hard and hadn't had much sleep.

[Assistant] Had you visited with him through other communication means up in the Mir, or was this the first time you had seen--

[User] I talked to him once on the ham radio when I had called up to talk to Andy. So we had talked once on the ham radio.

[Assistant] He'll be home soon and maybe you'll get a chance to visit with him.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yes, we had a good visit. He had been working very hard on this particular increment. I think history shows the systems were starting to degrade, a lot of maintenance required. He told me he had been working very hard and hadn't had much sleep.

[Assistant] Had you visited with him through other communication means up in the Mir, or was this the first time you had seen--

[User] I talked to him once on the ham radio when I had called up to talk to Andy. So we had talked once on the ham radio.

[Assistant] He'll be home soon and maybe you'll get a chance to visit with him.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Tell us about some of the equipments that you have helped put together, if you have some specific ones that you have helped design or that you feel are very important, that have gone through with the Shuttle-Mir Project.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] My parents homesteaded in 1948, and my mother lived in a tent partly while she was pregnant with me. My first house after I was born was two “sheep herder” cookhouses moved together. We had no indoor plumbing. They hauled water. We had a small oil stove until I was about three or four and an outhouse beyond that. Nothing around us. At night, no lights to the north, absolutely no lights to the north, and at night the Milky Way was a big white band across the sky. That's how I saw Sputnik. That was my first introduction to real space flight, was watching it go over.

[Assistant] It must have been thrilling for you to get to see the stars from the other side.

[User] Well, they don't twinkle out there. [Laughter] No, it is, there are a lot more. What is it Carl Sagan said--billions and billions. It's a much different picture, no less spectacular than what we used to see.

[Assistant] And Earth, when you're looking down on it.

[User] Earth. We have no sensors that really do justice to what you see from space, no artificial sensors, except the human eye--the depth, the colors, the motion. We see still pictures, but in space you're moving 17,500 miles per hour, once every ninety minutes, orbits slightly precessing, so you're covering a different part of the planet. I'd always wanted at least one orbit at the window, ninety minutes. I never got it. There's just never enough time to really do that. But I've seen some pretty spectacular things that will stay with me my entire life.

[Assistant] And I'm sure it's never the same.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Well, they don't twinkle out there. [Laughter] No, it is, there are a lot more. What is it Carl Sagan said--billions and billions. It's a much different picture, no less spectacular than what we used to see.

[Assistant] And Earth, when you're looking down on it.

[User] Earth. We have no sensors that really do justice to what you see from space, no artificial sensors, except the human eye--the depth, the colors, the motion. We see still pictures, but in space you're moving 17,500 miles per hour, once every ninety minutes, orbits slightly precessing, so you're covering a different part of the planet. I'd always wanted at least one orbit at the window, ninety minutes. I never got it. There's just never enough time to really do that. But I've seen some pretty spectacular things that will stay with me my entire life.

[Assistant] And I'm sure it's never the same.

[User] It's never the same. The Earth is a dynamic planet; it's always changing.

[Assistant] The successes of Shuttle-Mir, of Phase One.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Earth. We have no sensors that really do justice to what you see from space, no artificial sensors, except the human eye--the depth, the colors, the motion. We see still pictures, but in space you're moving 17,500 miles per hour, once every ninety minutes, orbits slightly precessing, so you're covering a different part of the planet. I'd always wanted at least one orbit at the window, ninety minutes. I never got it. There's just never enough time to really do that. But I've seen some pretty spectacular things that will stay with me my entire life.

[Assistant] And I'm sure it's never the same.

[User] It's never the same. The Earth is a dynamic planet; it's always changing.

[Assistant] The successes of Shuttle-Mir, of Phase One.

[User] The successes of Phase One. Number one, we elevated our interactions as a people. I think it's been said many times before, we've spent many years and billions of dollars as adversaries. In the course of this interaction, we have forced many diverse groups to work together, not just the flight crews. I think flight crews are probably the easiest to integrate across the board—because they share a common goal. They're like pilots. This is your work and you enjoy it. But we integrated researchers, we integrated flight controllers, we integrated managers, and it was a necessary thing to do before we actually started the International Space Station.\n\n The International Space Station is probably the most challenging civil engineering project ever undertaken. If we had to compound that with all of the other language and cultural and technical issues that we've learned about in Phase One, I think we would have put it at risk, higher risk. It's already challenging enough. Now we can go into this assembly not having solved every problem, but solving a large number of them.

[Assistant] Looking back over the few years, is there a high point that's in your mind that you see as maybe the greatest contribution that's been made either from you or from the program as a whole?