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

[User] It's fast. And they drop syllables and they drop endings, and it was like, I don't know what they're saying, what's wrong with me?

[Assistant] And that's true in any costal.

[User] It is, it is. But I didn't know that. And I'd just think, what's wrong with me? Why can't I communicate better? And then after, like, maybe we'd been in country two or three months and we went up to visit friends in Quito or someplace, and it was like, oh my God, I can understand what these people are saying. You know, it was like, this is lovely.

[Assistant] Yes, something you learned.

[User] I realized that it wasn't just me, but it didn't. It still is frustrating, you know, to not have that sense of being understood. And I had said, in one of my reflections, my personal reflections, was I had like a third grade level of communicating in Spanish. So I had this college education, you know, but I couldn't communicate at a college level much of anything. You know, it was like a third grader's basic, basic, basic Spanish. And it was hard. It was humiliating. It was embarrassing. It was frustrating. It was, you know, all those things for quite a long time. And I think about six or seven months into it, I started to feel like pretty comfortable, like I can go here and get by, you know. I can ride this bus and get off the right place, you know, buy this at the market. Haggling at the market was a huge thing.

[Assistant] Yeah, yeah, bartering.


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

[User] It is, it is. But I didn't know that. And I'd just think, what's wrong with me? Why can't I communicate better? And then after, like, maybe we'd been in country two or three months and we went up to visit friends in Quito or someplace, and it was like, oh my God, I can understand what these people are saying. You know, it was like, this is lovely.

[Assistant] Yes, something you learned.

[User] I realized that it wasn't just me, but it didn't. It still is frustrating, you know, to not have that sense of being understood. And I had said, in one of my reflections, my personal reflections, was I had like a third grade level of communicating in Spanish. So I had this college education, you know, but I couldn't communicate at a college level much of anything. You know, it was like a third grader's basic, basic, basic Spanish. And it was hard. It was humiliating. It was embarrassing. It was frustrating. It was, you know, all those things for quite a long time. And I think about six or seven months into it, I started to feel like pretty comfortable, like I can go here and get by, you know. I can ride this bus and get off the right place, you know, buy this at the market. Haggling at the market was a huge thing.

[Assistant] Yeah, yeah, bartering.

[User] Yeah, it's like, so I'd ask how much it was and they'd tell me and it was like, OK, well, I don't want to pay that, but I don't know how to say, oh that's too much, you know?

[Assistant] Right, right, right.


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

[User] I realized that it wasn't just me, but it didn't. It still is frustrating, you know, to not have that sense of being understood. And I had said, in one of my reflections, my personal reflections, was I had like a third grade level of communicating in Spanish. So I had this college education, you know, but I couldn't communicate at a college level much of anything. You know, it was like a third grader's basic, basic, basic Spanish. And it was hard. It was humiliating. It was embarrassing. It was frustrating. It was, you know, all those things for quite a long time. And I think about six or seven months into it, I started to feel like pretty comfortable, like I can go here and get by, you know. I can ride this bus and get off the right place, you know, buy this at the market. Haggling at the market was a huge thing.

[Assistant] Yeah, yeah, bartering.

[User] Yeah, it's like, so I'd ask how much it was and they'd tell me and it was like, OK, well, I don't want to pay that, but I don't know how to say, oh that's too much, you know?

[Assistant] Right, right, right.

[User] I got very good at that by the time I came home and I wanted to talk to the merchants, no, that's way too much. And what are you really going to take for this, you know? So it's an unlearning of haggling. But yeah, that was a huge thing to learn. I don't know that they prepared us for that particular thing in training so that might have been helpful.

[Assistant] A simulated market.


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

[User] Yeah, it's like, so I'd ask how much it was and they'd tell me and it was like, OK, well, I don't want to pay that, but I don't know how to say, oh that's too much, you know?

[Assistant] Right, right, right.

[User] I got very good at that by the time I came home and I wanted to talk to the merchants, no, that's way too much. And what are you really going to take for this, you know? So it's an unlearning of haggling. But yeah, that was a huge thing to learn. I don't know that they prepared us for that particular thing in training so that might have been helpful.

[Assistant] A simulated market.

[User] Yes, yes. That might have been very helpful.

[Assistant] So you're back from your international travel down to Chile and back up, and you're back to Machala. How do things look different to you now in your second year? Do you have somewhat different roles?


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

[User] In some ways I'm more connected to the community.

[Assistant] More language.

[User] Yeah, more language skills, more able, knew more people, was able to do more comfortably than I had been able to do prior to that. But I also knew I was, like, headed home. You know, it's like, that things are. So, you know, is this project going to be two months or six months? You know, what am I investing here? So there was always that push pull of how much longer am I going to be here to support this? And what's really going to make a difference here kind of thing. So it was a little different time. And I got pregnant before I came home.

[Assistant] Oh, OK.

[User] So there was that element of, OK, I'm ready to go home now and start a family.

[Assistant] First trimester of pregnancy can be difficult.


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

[User] Yeah, more language skills, more able, knew more people, was able to do more comfortably than I had been able to do prior to that. But I also knew I was, like, headed home. You know, it's like, that things are. So, you know, is this project going to be two months or six months? You know, what am I investing here? So there was always that push pull of how much longer am I going to be here to support this? And what's really going to make a difference here kind of thing. So it was a little different time. And I got pregnant before I came home.

[Assistant] Oh, OK.

[User] So there was that element of, OK, I'm ready to go home now and start a family.

[Assistant] First trimester of pregnancy can be difficult.

[User] Yeah, although I wasn't particularly sick. And you know, it was just exciting to be. I was sort of started forward thinking, you know, instead of thinking about like, you know, what's going on here, what do I have to do? I was, you know, working on my job.

[Assistant] Building your nest.


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

[User] So there was that element of, OK, I'm ready to go home now and start a family.

[Assistant] First trimester of pregnancy can be difficult.

[User] Yeah, although I wasn't particularly sick. And you know, it was just exciting to be. I was sort of started forward thinking, you know, instead of thinking about like, you know, what's going on here, what do I have to do? I was, you know, working on my job.

[Assistant] Building your nest.

[User] Yeah, thinking about, OK, we're going to be home. What does that mean? That kind of thing. So it definitely was a shift.

[Assistant] And your health in other ways?


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

[User] Yeah, although I wasn't particularly sick. And you know, it was just exciting to be. I was sort of started forward thinking, you know, instead of thinking about like, you know, what's going on here, what do I have to do? I was, you know, working on my job.

[Assistant] Building your nest.

[User] Yeah, thinking about, OK, we're going to be home. What does that mean? That kind of thing. So it definitely was a shift.

[Assistant] And your health in other ways?

[User] Was good for the most part. I know I lost a lot of weight.

[Assistant] Ah you did.


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

[User] Yeah, thinking about, OK, we're going to be home. What does that mean? That kind of thing. So it definitely was a shift.

[Assistant] And your health in other ways?

[User] Was good for the most part. I know I lost a lot of weight.

[Assistant] Ah you did.

[User] But I don't remember being sick much. But I remember there being a time when we were, I think we were in Santa Elena and Gary was very, very sick for several weeks and lost a lot of weight and was running a fever. And it was kind of a scary time, and I don't remember how we resolved it, if we actually got him into Guayaquil to see the Peace Corps doctor because that's where the doctor was.

[Assistant] How would you communicate from either Santa Elena or Machala if you needed a Peace Corps doctor? Was there a phone? Was there a phone in the village?


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

[User] Was good for the most part. I know I lost a lot of weight.

[Assistant] Ah you did.

[User] But I don't remember being sick much. But I remember there being a time when we were, I think we were in Santa Elena and Gary was very, very sick for several weeks and lost a lot of weight and was running a fever. And it was kind of a scary time, and I don't remember how we resolved it, if we actually got him into Guayaquil to see the Peace Corps doctor because that's where the doctor was.

[Assistant] How would you communicate from either Santa Elena or Machala if you needed a Peace Corps doctor? Was there a phone? Was there a phone in the village?

[User] There must have been a phone in the village. I do not remember being able to call anyone, you know, that we sort of had to go. We had to get on a bus and go and be there.

[Assistant] Which is hard if you're a running a very high fever, to get on a bus.


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

[User] But I don't remember being sick much. But I remember there being a time when we were, I think we were in Santa Elena and Gary was very, very sick for several weeks and lost a lot of weight and was running a fever. And it was kind of a scary time, and I don't remember how we resolved it, if we actually got him into Guayaquil to see the Peace Corps doctor because that's where the doctor was.

[Assistant] How would you communicate from either Santa Elena or Machala if you needed a Peace Corps doctor? Was there a phone? Was there a phone in the village?

[User] There must have been a phone in the village. I do not remember being able to call anyone, you know, that we sort of had to go. We had to get on a bus and go and be there.

[Assistant] Which is hard if you're a running a very high fever, to get on a bus.

[User] Yeah, yeah.

[Assistant] What is it, three hours?


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

[User] There must have been a phone in the village. I do not remember being able to call anyone, you know, that we sort of had to go. We had to get on a bus and go and be there.

[Assistant] Which is hard if you're a running a very high fever, to get on a bus.

[User] Yeah, yeah.

[Assistant] What is it, three hours?

[User] Yeah, it was about three hours. And you know, and we'd think, well, he's going to get better. But when he didn't get better and didn't get better, I think we probably took him in to see the doctor and got some antibiotics. And he had some kind of an intestinal infection, bounced back from it eventually and did fine the rest of his time there. But there was like day after day with him running this fever and laying in bed and scary and not knowing what's going to happen. Is he's going to die here, you know, are we ever going to leave here?

[Assistant] What are you supposed to do about this?


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

[User] Yeah, yeah.

[Assistant] What is it, three hours?

[User] Yeah, it was about three hours. And you know, and we'd think, well, he's going to get better. But when he didn't get better and didn't get better, I think we probably took him in to see the doctor and got some antibiotics. And he had some kind of an intestinal infection, bounced back from it eventually and did fine the rest of his time there. But there was like day after day with him running this fever and laying in bed and scary and not knowing what's going to happen. Is he's going to die here, you know, are we ever going to leave here?

[Assistant] What are you supposed to do about this?

[User] Right, right. We're going to get help. How do we manage this? Yeah.

[Assistant] Did Peace Corps doctors ever come out like every six months or something, just to check on you?


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

[User] Yeah, it was about three hours. And you know, and we'd think, well, he's going to get better. But when he didn't get better and didn't get better, I think we probably took him in to see the doctor and got some antibiotics. And he had some kind of an intestinal infection, bounced back from it eventually and did fine the rest of his time there. But there was like day after day with him running this fever and laying in bed and scary and not knowing what's going to happen. Is he's going to die here, you know, are we ever going to leave here?

[Assistant] What are you supposed to do about this?

[User] Right, right. We're going to get help. How do we manage this? Yeah.

[Assistant] Did Peace Corps doctors ever come out like every six months or something, just to check on you?

[User] No, we went in for six-month checkups. We did, and they didn't weight, measure, and yada yada, the whole thing. But they never came out to our site. So I think they were spread pretty thin. I mean, I don't know how many. Ecuador is a country that always had a lot of volunteers, and I think they stayed pretty much at central and people came to them.

[Assistant] Came in, yeah. So when you came to the end of your time, your thoughts are divided between kind of reflecting on what you've just done in the last two years and this very intense desire to look ahead and plan for the baby that's growing inside of you.


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

[User] Right, right. We're going to get help. How do we manage this? Yeah.

[Assistant] Did Peace Corps doctors ever come out like every six months or something, just to check on you?

[User] No, we went in for six-month checkups. We did, and they didn't weight, measure, and yada yada, the whole thing. But they never came out to our site. So I think they were spread pretty thin. I mean, I don't know how many. Ecuador is a country that always had a lot of volunteers, and I think they stayed pretty much at central and people came to them.

[Assistant] Came in, yeah. So when you came to the end of your time, your thoughts are divided between kind of reflecting on what you've just done in the last two years and this very intense desire to look ahead and plan for the baby that's growing inside of you.

[User] Yes. Yes.

[Assistant] Was there some kind of close of service conference?


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

[User] No, we went in for six-month checkups. We did, and they didn't weight, measure, and yada yada, the whole thing. But they never came out to our site. So I think they were spread pretty thin. I mean, I don't know how many. Ecuador is a country that always had a lot of volunteers, and I think they stayed pretty much at central and people came to them.

[Assistant] Came in, yeah. So when you came to the end of your time, your thoughts are divided between kind of reflecting on what you've just done in the last two years and this very intense desire to look ahead and plan for the baby that's growing inside of you.

[User] Yes. Yes.

[Assistant] Was there some kind of close of service conference?

[User] No, I don't think we had that. I do remember like taking a language test at the end, you know, having, so there must have been some kind of, wouldn't be an orientation, I don't know what you'd call it. There was. But I don't remember there being a big thing. I mean, there was in our village where people said goodbye, hosted parties and things like that. But I don't remember there being a big thing from Peace Corps other than just you have the doctor check you out, get your proficiency, your language proficiency thing. You know, they were just going through the bureaucratic steps of things before we took off.

[Assistant] Did you, were you given an opportunity to sit down and write your reflections about what you'd accomplished?


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

[User] Yes. Yes.

[Assistant] Was there some kind of close of service conference?

[User] No, I don't think we had that. I do remember like taking a language test at the end, you know, having, so there must have been some kind of, wouldn't be an orientation, I don't know what you'd call it. There was. But I don't remember there being a big thing. I mean, there was in our village where people said goodbye, hosted parties and things like that. But I don't remember there being a big thing from Peace Corps other than just you have the doctor check you out, get your proficiency, your language proficiency thing. You know, they were just going through the bureaucratic steps of things before we took off.

[Assistant] Did you, were you given an opportunity to sit down and write your reflections about what you'd accomplished?

[User] I don't remember doing that.

[Assistant] What were the good things?


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

[User] No, I don't think we had that. I do remember like taking a language test at the end, you know, having, so there must have been some kind of, wouldn't be an orientation, I don't know what you'd call it. There was. But I don't remember there being a big thing. I mean, there was in our village where people said goodbye, hosted parties and things like that. But I don't remember there being a big thing from Peace Corps other than just you have the doctor check you out, get your proficiency, your language proficiency thing. You know, they were just going through the bureaucratic steps of things before we took off.

[Assistant] Did you, were you given an opportunity to sit down and write your reflections about what you'd accomplished?

[User] I don't remember doing that.

[Assistant] What were the good things?

[User] Maybe I did, but I don't remember doing that. I remember reflecting on it a lot when I got home.

[Assistant] When you got home.


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

[User] I don't remember doing that.

[Assistant] What were the good things?

[User] Maybe I did, but I don't remember doing that. I remember reflecting on it a lot when I got home.

[Assistant] When you got home.

[User] And how simple my life had been there and how little I really needed to get by. And that sort of influenced my parenting and influenced my life after that in his ways. But yeah, yeah. Had a bit of contempt for my friends that had been buying cars and buying houses and things like that. It was like, really, really, you know?

[Assistant] Yes. So when you look back now at it.


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

[User] Maybe I did, but I don't remember doing that. I remember reflecting on it a lot when I got home.

[Assistant] When you got home.

[User] And how simple my life had been there and how little I really needed to get by. And that sort of influenced my parenting and influenced my life after that in his ways. But yeah, yeah. Had a bit of contempt for my friends that had been buying cars and buying houses and things like that. It was like, really, really, you know?

[Assistant] Yes. So when you look back now at it.

[User] Yeah, a long ways back.

[Assistant] Mm hmm. Was it a good thing?


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

[User] I think it was probably had more impact on me than it did on the Ecuadorians. I felt that right away, that this was more. And what I said when I came home was I wouldn't have missed it for the world and I wouldn't do it again if you paid me. I really felt that conflict of, wow, I learned so much about myself and about what the rest of the world is like.

[Assistant] Yes.

[User] In that two years. I couldn't have gotten it any other way from doing what I did.

[Assistant] That's right.

[User] And at that point, I was like, and there's no way I want to go back and do that again. It was so hard. It probably never would have been that hard again because I'd been through it once, you know. If I, whether it was the language I didn't speak or the standard of living or whatever. Gave me great compassion for people coming here, probably more than I ever had before I left, for people that immigrate here and struggle with the language and struggle with the culture and struggle with the value systems and things like that. So I learned a lot and had great respect for my Peace Corps experience. But it was hard. It was a hard time. So, yeah.

[Assistant] Is there anything else that you'd particularly like to say?


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

[User] And at that point, I was like, and there's no way I want to go back and do that again. It was so hard. It probably never would have been that hard again because I'd been through it once, you know. If I, whether it was the language I didn't speak or the standard of living or whatever. Gave me great compassion for people coming here, probably more than I ever had before I left, for people that immigrate here and struggle with the language and struggle with the culture and struggle with the value systems and things like that. So I learned a lot and had great respect for my Peace Corps experience. But it was hard. It was a hard time. So, yeah.

[Assistant] Is there anything else that you'd particularly like to say?

[User] Well, I definitely applaud the fact that Peace Corps is still there and they're still sending volunteers over. And when they come back, they seem to have some of the same stories that I had. For some people, at least, the experience is still pretty intact, even though I'm sure there's way more bureaucracy now than there was when I was there. I think there's still that transformative, oh my God, this is what the rest of the world is like?

[Assistant] Right.

[User] That you can't get looking at National Geographic or even the wonderful programs on PBS. I'm sorry, but you know, smelling it, feeling it, tasting it, the only way to do that is to be there.

[Assistant] That's right. And interacting.


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

[User] Well, I definitely applaud the fact that Peace Corps is still there and they're still sending volunteers over. And when they come back, they seem to have some of the same stories that I had. For some people, at least, the experience is still pretty intact, even though I'm sure there's way more bureaucracy now than there was when I was there. I think there's still that transformative, oh my God, this is what the rest of the world is like?

[Assistant] Right.

[User] That you can't get looking at National Geographic or even the wonderful programs on PBS. I'm sorry, but you know, smelling it, feeling it, tasting it, the only way to do that is to be there.

[Assistant] That's right. And interacting.

[User] And it just, it really changed things. I mean, I felt like if I could have water, running water to do dishes, I didn't need hot running water, I mean. And there was a lot of times when I didn't have it back home and I thought, I can do this. I know how to do this.

[Assistant] Done that before.


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

[User] That you can't get looking at National Geographic or even the wonderful programs on PBS. I'm sorry, but you know, smelling it, feeling it, tasting it, the only way to do that is to be there.

[Assistant] That's right. And interacting.

[User] And it just, it really changed things. I mean, I felt like if I could have water, running water to do dishes, I didn't need hot running water, I mean. And there was a lot of times when I didn't have it back home and I thought, I can do this. I know how to do this.

[Assistant] Done that before.

[User] Yeah, yeah. So um, and I think it was hard for my kids in some ways because I had this whole chutzpah of, well, we can do anything. You know, I've survived Peace Corps and I can do anything and took them, you know, to the edge a few times with adventures. Some of them were good, some of them probably not as good. But we survived it, all of us.

[Assistant] And so you went on to have not just one, but three children.


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

[User] And it just, it really changed things. I mean, I felt like if I could have water, running water to do dishes, I didn't need hot running water, I mean. And there was a lot of times when I didn't have it back home and I thought, I can do this. I know how to do this.

[Assistant] Done that before.

[User] Yeah, yeah. So um, and I think it was hard for my kids in some ways because I had this whole chutzpah of, well, we can do anything. You know, I've survived Peace Corps and I can do anything and took them, you know, to the edge a few times with adventures. Some of them were good, some of them probably not as good. But we survived it, all of us.

[Assistant] And so you went on to have not just one, but three children.

[User] Yes. Yes, we adopted our second child. And I had a daughter. None of them went in the Peace Corps. I was hoping I'd get second generation Peace Corps, you know, that some of my friends have, but no, none of them did that. I guess I wasn't that convincing about my time there.

[Assistant] And in your profession? I know your marriage eventually came to an end. But in your professional life, you went on to?


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

[User] Yeah, yeah. So um, and I think it was hard for my kids in some ways because I had this whole chutzpah of, well, we can do anything. You know, I've survived Peace Corps and I can do anything and took them, you know, to the edge a few times with adventures. Some of them were good, some of them probably not as good. But we survived it, all of us.

[Assistant] And so you went on to have not just one, but three children.

[User] Yes. Yes, we adopted our second child. And I had a daughter. None of them went in the Peace Corps. I was hoping I'd get second generation Peace Corps, you know, that some of my friends have, but no, none of them did that. I guess I wasn't that convincing about my time there.

[Assistant] And in your profession? I know your marriage eventually came to an end. But in your professional life, you went on to?

[User] Yeah, I came back and did a lot, did post-graduate work in early childhood, and then I got a master's degree in adult education and ended up working for the university and working with families who have kids with disabilities. And did that for the last 15 or 18 years, and there was lots of other social work kinds of positions. I worked in drug and alcohol counseling. I worked in reproductive rights things, worked for Planned Parenthood for a few years. So did all kinds of social work and kinds of things, always feeling like I still owed the world. You know, that I had been given whatever I had here, good health, good safe place to be, and that I had a responsibility to try and do things, you know, to do things that would make a difference for other people. Yeah, yeah.

[Assistant] Have you ever been back to Ecuador?


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

[User] Yeah, I came back and did a lot, did post-graduate work in early childhood, and then I got a master's degree in adult education and ended up working for the university and working with families who have kids with disabilities. And did that for the last 15 or 18 years, and there was lots of other social work kinds of positions. I worked in drug and alcohol counseling. I worked in reproductive rights things, worked for Planned Parenthood for a few years. So did all kinds of social work and kinds of things, always feeling like I still owed the world. You know, that I had been given whatever I had here, good health, good safe place to be, and that I had a responsibility to try and do things, you know, to do things that would make a difference for other people. Yeah, yeah.

[Assistant] Have you ever been back to Ecuador?

[User] I have not. You know, I thought I would go back. And, um, thought I would go back within, you know, 10 years. But then the three small children. It wasn't going to happen. And we didn't have much in the way of resources, you know, financially. So I haven't been back. But, you know, I've talked to people that have been there and connect with other Peace Corps volunteers. But no.

[Assistant] Not yet.

[User] No, not yet. Not yet. That's right. Isn't over yet.

[Assistant] Well, Meredith, this has been quite wonderful talking to you. I'm always afraid to turn off the tape recorder thinking that there might be something.


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

[User] I have not. You know, I thought I would go back. And, um, thought I would go back within, you know, 10 years. But then the three small children. It wasn't going to happen. And we didn't have much in the way of resources, you know, financially. So I haven't been back. But, you know, I've talked to people that have been there and connect with other Peace Corps volunteers. But no.

[Assistant] Not yet.

[User] No, not yet. Not yet. That's right. Isn't over yet.

[Assistant] Well, Meredith, this has been quite wonderful talking to you. I'm always afraid to turn off the tape recorder thinking that there might be something.

[User] Something profound is going to happen.

[Assistant] Yet one more.


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

[User] No, not yet. Not yet. That's right. Isn't over yet.

[Assistant] Well, Meredith, this has been quite wonderful talking to you. I'm always afraid to turn off the tape recorder thinking that there might be something.

[User] Something profound is going to happen.

[Assistant] Yet one more.

[User] Well, you know, there were lots of other little incidents and memories and things like that that don't, you know? I mean, we took the bus rides and we couldn't get on a bus, so we would ride on the top of a truck. I have pictures of us on top of the truck just riding up the mountains and the roads were narrow. And I remember Peace Corps saying always shake the bus driver's hand and smell his breath before you get on that bus. Like, what am I going to do if he smells like alcohol? I'm going to wait for the next bus, you know? Probably not. I'm probably still going to get on that bus. So there were, you know, there were definitely outstanding things that happened. And having other Peace Corps people in the communities did make a huge difference. When we were in Machala especially, there was a Peace Corps community and it was pretty wonderful. We didn't get together often, but it meant a lot to have allies, people who understood.

[Assistant] That's right. That's right. Helps your mental health.


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

[User] Something profound is going to happen.

[Assistant] Yet one more.

[User] Well, you know, there were lots of other little incidents and memories and things like that that don't, you know? I mean, we took the bus rides and we couldn't get on a bus, so we would ride on the top of a truck. I have pictures of us on top of the truck just riding up the mountains and the roads were narrow. And I remember Peace Corps saying always shake the bus driver's hand and smell his breath before you get on that bus. Like, what am I going to do if he smells like alcohol? I'm going to wait for the next bus, you know? Probably not. I'm probably still going to get on that bus. So there were, you know, there were definitely outstanding things that happened. And having other Peace Corps people in the communities did make a huge difference. When we were in Machala especially, there was a Peace Corps community and it was pretty wonderful. We didn't get together often, but it meant a lot to have allies, people who understood.

[Assistant] That's right. That's right. Helps your mental health.

[User] It did. It did. It made a big difference. Yeah. So thanks for letting me tell my story.

[Assistant] Thank you, Meredith.


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

[User] Well, you know, there were lots of other little incidents and memories and things like that that don't, you know? I mean, we took the bus rides and we couldn't get on a bus, so we would ride on the top of a truck. I have pictures of us on top of the truck just riding up the mountains and the roads were narrow. And I remember Peace Corps saying always shake the bus driver's hand and smell his breath before you get on that bus. Like, what am I going to do if he smells like alcohol? I'm going to wait for the next bus, you know? Probably not. I'm probably still going to get on that bus. So there were, you know, there were definitely outstanding things that happened. And having other Peace Corps people in the communities did make a huge difference. When we were in Machala especially, there was a Peace Corps community and it was pretty wonderful. We didn't get together often, but it meant a lot to have allies, people who understood.

[Assistant] That's right. That's right. Helps your mental health.

[User] It did. It did. It made a big difference. Yeah. So thanks for letting me tell my story.

[Assistant] Thank you, Meredith.

[User] This was a long time ago. You can turn it off.

[Assistant] As so often happens as we're chatting after ending this interview, there's some more that comes up. The book locker.


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

[User] It did. It did. It made a big difference. Yeah. So thanks for letting me tell my story.

[Assistant] Thank you, Meredith.

[User] This was a long time ago. You can turn it off.

[Assistant] As so often happens as we're chatting after ending this interview, there's some more that comes up. The book locker.

[User]
The wonderful book locker. When we were in Peace Corps, we got a book locker that probably had two hundred novels in it or books, and we could swap them with other Peace Corps volunteers. I read so much. We had no TV, no radio. It was our entertainment and I read Dostoyevsky there. I'm sure I never would have picked it up. You know, read Crime and Punishment, read all kinds of books and swapped books, and it was just a godsend. I was like, what are we going to do tonight? Well, which book should we read out of the book locker? You know, I think we read to each other, we read privately. But it was. And I understand they don't do that anymore. I guess they still have, we have all this access to electronic media now, so you don't need it. But it was wonderful.

And the second thing I remembered is when we had a lot of free time, even though, you know, I mean, because my time was pretty unstructured. But even Gary with his job had a lot of free time. And when we were in Santa Elena, even though we were about five miles from the ocean, he built a sailboat. Went to the local wood guy and got wood. And I remember hand sewing the sails for this sailboat.

[Assistant] Oh my goodness.


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

[User] Oh, gee. It's been a long time ago since I even thought about them. Billy Gants was the Chief in Propulsion Engineering. And if I am lucky and dig around in the attic, I might find some details on who some of the other people were, but if I start to name anybody, other than the chiefs, I'm going to miss some of the key people, so I'd rather reserve that and give it to you some other time.

[Assistant] While you were at White Sands, the\n\n Apollo 1\n\n fire occurred, correct?

[User] That's the 201 fire down at the Cape.

[Assistant] Right.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] What kind of an impact did that have on people at White Sands?


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

[User] No, because safety, reliability, and quality assurance starts at the cradle and ends at the grave. During the design phase, we look very carefully at the design for reliability, for safety considerations, analysis of that. As far as quality assurance, are there techniques, better techniques for fabrication? Where are the inspection points? Where are the best places to look for problems? It's essentially the same thing. You have to start with the design, actually with the design requirements. We were a party to all the design requirements all the way through. So we were busy, right up to here and beyond.

[Assistant] I wonder if you could explain the Space Shuttle Reliability Engineering Policy to me and your role in its development.

[User]
Policy. Reliability is a number of things, and mainly what we did was make sure that items were built in accordance with specification, that the specifications were correct, that they met the test requirements, and basically that when you turned the switch on to do something, that it happened.\n\n The policy, I guess you would have to say, is to make the most reliable item absolutely possible. Sometimes this is not the cheapest way. There is one other thing, and it's a matter of redundancy, which is, the policy was being at least fail-safe, which means that one failure will not cause a catastrophic event, that you have to have another way of doing the same thing, either the same part or another path, numerous secondary paths, so that there's not one wiring bus, there's a number of components to do the same thing.

So we looked to make sure that everything is at least fail-safe, and in some components, the requirement is to be fail-operational fail-safe, so you have to have a double redundancy.

[Assistant] I guess that now brings us to the\n\n Challenger\n\n accident, which safety reliability/quality assurance people don't like to use the term "accidents," do they? From my experience, people don't like that word.

[User] What word do they use?

[Assistant] I'm not sure.


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

[User]
Policy. Reliability is a number of things, and mainly what we did was make sure that items were built in accordance with specification, that the specifications were correct, that they met the test requirements, and basically that when you turned the switch on to do something, that it happened.\n\n The policy, I guess you would have to say, is to make the most reliable item absolutely possible. Sometimes this is not the cheapest way. There is one other thing, and it's a matter of redundancy, which is, the policy was being at least fail-safe, which means that one failure will not cause a catastrophic event, that you have to have another way of doing the same thing, either the same part or another path, numerous secondary paths, so that there's not one wiring bus, there's a number of components to do the same thing.

So we looked to make sure that everything is at least fail-safe, and in some components, the requirement is to be fail-operational fail-safe, so you have to have a double redundancy.

[Assistant] I guess that now brings us to the\n\n Challenger\n\n accident, which safety reliability/quality assurance people don't like to use the term "accidents," do they? From my experience, people don't like that word.

[User] What word do they use?

[Assistant] I'm not sure.

[User] It's generally referred to in the press and elsewhere as the\n\n Challenger\n\n accident, and that doesn't give me any problem.

[Assistant] What was the impact of that on you and your division?


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

[User] He just told me about what they were doing as far as setting up [the] type of shop he was going to build.\n\n Maybe I should back up a little bit. I’d had experience, in the short time that I worked for NASA, with the rockets and what have you, because that’s what I was in. I was in the test lab there at Redstone. That was doing work on the test stands where [they] static fired the missiles, at Redstone. So I’d had experience in that, and that was similar to what they were going to set up here when they came to Houston. So he just told me that he felt like at that time they could hire me, and I bugged the heck out of them for the longest until I finally got a call. It was taking [so] long till I thought I wasn’t going to get hired. But then, like I said, in November of ’62, we came out, and that’s what more or less started my career as far as being with JSC.

[Assistant] When you two came to Houston, you said you went directly to the Manned Spacecraft Center site itself, or did you work out in those scattered buildings in Houston?

[User] The first building where we had our shop was at the old Canada Dry Building on the Gulf Freeway. We had our shop there. Then as soon as Building 10 was open, we moved into Building 10.

[Assistant] While you moved into this area, can you tell us what your first thoughts were about moving to Houston?

[User] I knew the area because I had a sister and a brother both that had lived in Galveston [Texas] for years. Both my sister’s husband and my brother were merchant seamen and they had been there for many years. My sister was still living there at the time we moved. My brother had already left; he was, I think, living around New Orleans [Louisiana] or on the East Coast somewhere at that time. But my brother-in-law and sister were still living in the La Marque [Texas] area, Galveston.

[Assistant] That would be nice to know that you were moving toward family.


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

[User] The first building where we had our shop was at the old Canada Dry Building on the Gulf Freeway. We had our shop there. Then as soon as Building 10 was open, we moved into Building 10.

[Assistant] While you moved into this area, can you tell us what your first thoughts were about moving to Houston?

[User] I knew the area because I had a sister and a brother both that had lived in Galveston [Texas] for years. Both my sister’s husband and my brother were merchant seamen and they had been there for many years. My sister was still living there at the time we moved. My brother had already left; he was, I think, living around New Orleans [Louisiana] or on the East Coast somewhere at that time. But my brother-in-law and sister were still living in the La Marque [Texas] area, Galveston.

[Assistant] That would be nice to know that you were moving toward family.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Tell us about Building 10 and what you found when you moved there.


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

[User] Yes. We went to, what, Apollo—next to the last one, or the last one.

[Assistant] It was seventeen.

[User] Seventeen? No, was it seventeen? Or sixteen.

[Assistant] It gave you an opportunity to see some of your work in action, I guess.

[User] But I never got to see the Shuttle launch yet, I’m going to one of these days, if I live long enough.

[Assistant] Hopefully that will be a time that will come soon, and safe.


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

[User] Seventeen? No, was it seventeen? Or sixteen.

[Assistant] It gave you an opportunity to see some of your work in action, I guess.

[User] But I never got to see the Shuttle launch yet, I’m going to one of these days, if I live long enough.

[Assistant] Hopefully that will be a time that will come soon, and safe.

[User] Some of them say, though, that watching the Shuttle, after seeing the Apollo, it’s kind of disappointing, because the Shuttle just goes “shhhttt” and it’s gone. Where the old “um-um-um–um-um-um,” it was so much slower. I don’t know, but I’d still like to see one of them go up.

[Assistant] It was interesting as you were describing your work with your tools. Could you share with us how your tools might have changed over the years that you were there, or did they?


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

[User] Oh yes. There’s always, in anything that we did, almost, because not only did they have to satisfy what the item was supposed to do, but they also had to satisfy the astronauts. They had lots of good input and they had lots of stuff that sometimes it wasn’t so good and it would be hard to try to get [done].

[Assistant] Do you have an example of that that you can share?

[User] Not right off the top of my head.

[Assistant] We talked about how some tools changed. Can you talk to us about the materials and how they changed from when you were at Redstone until the time that you got ready to retire? Were there a lot of different types of materials that you used that were new?

[User] Not a whole lot. There was a few things. Like in the electron-beam welding, there’s some metals that could not be beam welded because they wouldn’t flow together; they wouldn’t fuse together. Plus, they would outgas in the vacuum chamber. See, that was done in a vacuum chamber, something I don’t think I said a while ago, but it was done in a small vacuum chamber, and I was limited as to the size of the items that I could weld on account of the chamber, size of the chamber. Like zinc, for instance, zinc you can’t weld; brass you can’t weld like that, not electron-beam weld. You can silver solder it and that sort of thing. And copper was very, very hard to weld because it had so much impurities and outgassed a lot [so] it was very hard to weld. I did do some copper. The good metals was the stainless and the monel. Certain types of aluminum you cannot weld. In fact, it’s not feasible to weld certain types of aluminum in any shape, form, or fashion. There are different alloys and, of course, you have to know which alloys is weldable and which is not.

[Assistant] Did you have a variety of materials that you had to use all the time, or were you specifically mastered one more than the other?


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

[User] It was a hectic time, that’s for sure.

[Assistant] Speaking of Skylab, once the Apollo efforts were closed down or starting to close down, and the Space Center was starting to move into Skylab, how did your shop adjust to that? Were you given new projects to do that were going to be for the Skylab?

[User] Yes. They just moved right in to that. The engineers would come over with jobs that they wanted to get on Skylab, and we had several things that we had built that went into Skylab. Like I said, our work was items that someone wanted to do, some experiments or whatever, in addition to everything else that was on there. They’d come up with an area that they could do something or whatever, and they had that old Skylab there, before they moved it to the Space Center [Houston, Houston, Texas], had it set up. Then, of course, we’d build things, and they’d go over and check it out over there and fit it into it or whatever, until they were satisfied with the job.

[Assistant] In 1975, ASTP [Apollo-Soyuz Test Project] flew, and then the space agency was looking forward to Shuttle. That didn’t launch till ’81. What all was your shop doing during that time period, and how were you involved in how the new era began at NASA?

[User] ASTP, what was that?

[Assistant] The Apollo-Soyuz. That was the last of the missions.


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

[User] Yes. They just moved right in to that. The engineers would come over with jobs that they wanted to get on Skylab, and we had several things that we had built that went into Skylab. Like I said, our work was items that someone wanted to do, some experiments or whatever, in addition to everything else that was on there. They’d come up with an area that they could do something or whatever, and they had that old Skylab there, before they moved it to the Space Center [Houston, Houston, Texas], had it set up. Then, of course, we’d build things, and they’d go over and check it out over there and fit it into it or whatever, until they were satisfied with the job.

[Assistant] In 1975, ASTP [Apollo-Soyuz Test Project] flew, and then the space agency was looking forward to Shuttle. That didn’t launch till ’81. What all was your shop doing during that time period, and how were you involved in how the new era began at NASA?

[User] ASTP, what was that?

[Assistant] The Apollo-Soyuz. That was the last of the missions.

[User] We worked on that, too. We had some areas. I don’t remember exactly now a lot about that, but most of that, we supported work that the machinists would do, but a good portion of the items, if I recall right, that TSD [Technical Services Division] did for the AST[P], was for machine work, because that was more of the docking and the locking. That was heavier stuff and had to be machined parts and that sort of thing, and most of that was machine work, if I remember right. But we would be responsible for helping out with the welding and that sort of thing, though, when they’d need welding.

[Assistant] It must have been an interesting subject for all of you who started during that first days of space race, and here it ends with the United States working so closely with Russia to have a joint mission.


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

[User] ASTP, what was that?

[Assistant] The Apollo-Soyuz. That was the last of the missions.

[User] We worked on that, too. We had some areas. I don’t remember exactly now a lot about that, but most of that, we supported work that the machinists would do, but a good portion of the items, if I recall right, that TSD [Technical Services Division] did for the AST[P], was for machine work, because that was more of the docking and the locking. That was heavier stuff and had to be machined parts and that sort of thing, and most of that was machine work, if I remember right. But we would be responsible for helping out with the welding and that sort of thing, though, when they’d need welding.

[Assistant] It must have been an interesting subject for all of you who started during that first days of space race, and here it ends with the United States working so closely with Russia to have a joint mission.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] How did the shop move toward working for the Shuttle, and how did things change for your task?


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

[User] It seems to me that we didn’t have a lot of items. We did have a lot of stuff supporting experiments and that sort of thing that would be sent up on the Shuttle and all, but as far as anything to do with the Shuttle itself, I don’t recall doing any work much for that.\n\n The only item I can remember, I had to make a little shroud or a strut cover for when they first brought the Shuttle from California, that was the one that never flew, actually, I think was what it was used on, but later, they built more of these things. But anyway, the strut that held the nose part of the Shuttle on top of the—

[Assistant] The Guppy.

[User] No, it wasn’t on the Guppy. What was the big plane?

[Assistant] The 747?

[User] The 747. They came one afternoon, and I’ll never forget. It was one afternoon and another one of the rush job things. They needed this thing because they had experienced turbulence before when they had flown it just short periods of time, somehow or another on the nose of that Shuttle, riding on the 747, and they wanted a cover to cover that strut that mounted the nose of the Shuttle to the 747. So they wanted someone to stay over on a Friday afternoon and work, and I had to work Friday, Saturday, and Sunday on that thing, form something up, just metal, that would cover that strut and then mount down to the—and had no real good drawings or anything. We had some sketches and rough dimensions and what have you, but we wound up getting it fixed. Then the only time that I actually was up close and saw a Shuttle then was out at Ellington [Field, Houston, Texas] there, when it came through going to the Cape and I saw my part was on there, on that deal. But they said it worked, so that was all that mattered.

[Assistant] What type of work did you do for the experiments? You mentioned that a couple of times, in Skylab and in Shuttle.


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

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Could you share with us why you wanted to do that leadership position, and what kind of responsibilities were involved with that?

[User] For one reason, it was kind of a self-preservation-type thing, I guess, because at that time a lot of the working people, they [weren’t] getting what they should have in wages and what have you. Out here—let’s see. How to put that? We were on Wage Board scale, to begin with, and they did not like to go out on what they call a Wage Board Survey. And when they did, they only went to like production-type shops, where one man would be doing one little item. He didn’t take a complete job and build it all the way through, which was nowhere near in comparison to our type of work, the type of work that we did. Because we would take a job, we’d get the engineering drawings and everything on it and we would build it, see it from start to finish, all the way through. So we felt that we [weren’t] getting a comparison.\n\n This started, though, way back at Redstone Arsenal. We were both involved in the union, and it was the same way back there. We had to fight for everything that we were getting. I had established a good rapport with the personnel director at Redstone. He was at Redstone, then he wound up being out here; Stu [Stuart H.] Clarke. So once we came out here, then we just continued on and we started the union out here.

[Assistant] It was Jack [R.] Lister.

[User] It was Stu Clarke first and then Jack. In fact, from Stu Clarke was where I first heard of the SMA files. He told me, sitting right there in his office, he said, “You can better believe I got my SMA file.”

[Assistant] Do you want to tell us what that is on the record, so we’ll know?


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

[User] It was Stu Clarke first and then Jack. In fact, from Stu Clarke was where I first heard of the SMA files. He told me, sitting right there in his office, he said, “You can better believe I got my SMA file.”

[Assistant] Do you want to tell us what that is on the record, so we’ll know?

[User] Save My Ass file. But, like I say, we wound up going that route. After we got the union going and all, then I went out on the Wage Board Survey with the man from Personnel, one of the Personnel reps [representative], and I’d go out on the Wage Board Survey.\n\n Every Monday morning, the first thing, I’d be in Stu Clarke’s office, and I’d sit down with him; any complaints and questions and stuff that had come up from any of the areas, I would take and present to him. Then I’d have our union meeting then after that and would tell them whatever I had come up with from Personnel.\n\n Stu was not anti-union or anything like that; he was good. Same way with Jack Lister after he became Personnel Director. I’d also known Jack Lister at Redstone. In fact, he taught me. I don’t know what grade and all that he was back there, but he was a teacher that I had in the apprentice program in one of the math classes—I think it was math—that had to take. I had known him from Redstone, too.

[Assistant] How long did you serve as president?

[User] Oh, gosh, I don’t really know. Not that long. I don’t know whether it was two years or four years. Something like that, maybe.

[Assistant] After you left NASA in ’87, I believe you mentioned earlier you went to work for Johnson Engineering.


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

[User] Save My Ass file. But, like I say, we wound up going that route. After we got the union going and all, then I went out on the Wage Board Survey with the man from Personnel, one of the Personnel reps [representative], and I’d go out on the Wage Board Survey.\n\n Every Monday morning, the first thing, I’d be in Stu Clarke’s office, and I’d sit down with him; any complaints and questions and stuff that had come up from any of the areas, I would take and present to him. Then I’d have our union meeting then after that and would tell them whatever I had come up with from Personnel.\n\n Stu was not anti-union or anything like that; he was good. Same way with Jack Lister after he became Personnel Director. I’d also known Jack Lister at Redstone. In fact, he taught me. I don’t know what grade and all that he was back there, but he was a teacher that I had in the apprentice program in one of the math classes—I think it was math—that had to take. I had known him from Redstone, too.

[Assistant] How long did you serve as president?

[User] Oh, gosh, I don’t really know. Not that long. I don’t know whether it was two years or four years. Something like that, maybe.

[Assistant] After you left NASA in ’87, I believe you mentioned earlier you went to work for Johnson Engineering.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Could you tell us what you were doing there? Were you still working on things for the space agency?


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

[User] Oh, gosh, I don’t really know. Not that long. I don’t know whether it was two years or four years. Something like that, maybe.

[Assistant] After you left NASA in ’87, I believe you mentioned earlier you went to work for Johnson Engineering.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Could you tell us what you were doing there? Were you still working on things for the space agency?

[User] Yes, doing the very same type of work. I got out of any of the—I thought I was getting out completely, out of any of the management or supervision and all, and I did for a while. They were doing a lot of the mock-up stuff for the Space Station mock-ups. At that time, they were just getting started good into making all the big Space Station mock-ups. So that’s what I was doing there.

[Assistant] How long did you work with them?


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

[User] Yes, doing the very same type of work. I got out of any of the—I thought I was getting out completely, out of any of the management or supervision and all, and I did for a while. They were doing a lot of the mock-up stuff for the Space Station mock-ups. At that time, they were just getting started good into making all the big Space Station mock-ups. So that’s what I was doing there.

[Assistant] How long did you work with them?

[User] I worked till ’97 I guess it was. Ten years.

[Assistant] Goodness.

[User] I wound up being supervisor for them before I left there.

[Assistant] During all that time that you worked, when you look back, what do you consider to be the most challenging aspect or the most challenging project that you had to deal with?


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

[User] I worked till ’97 I guess it was. Ten years.

[Assistant] Goodness.

[User] I wound up being supervisor for them before I left there.

[Assistant] During all that time that you worked, when you look back, what do you consider to be the most challenging aspect or the most challenging project that you had to deal with?

[User] I guess maybe it was during Skylab, or the Apollo fire and Skylab. Both of them were very trying times, and didn’t have a whole lot of time to get something done, and people breathing down your neck the whole time. But I suppose that would be about the most trying.

[Assistant] So much of what you did is little by little in so many of the missions and so much of the successes of the agency. Is there one or two of those projects that you feel you’d like to think about as your greatest contributions?


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

[User] There again, some of the engineers would; some wouldn’t. The best engineers that I found throughout the time at the Space Center that I’ve worked with [are] the ones that had some shop training behind them or they had gone to school on the co-op program, where we ran the engineers, the students and all, as they were going to school, ran them through the shop area. They worked right with us or whatever. They saw everything as we saw it, or chased it through the whole system. They’d work a week in our shop, work a week in the machine shop, in the electronics a week, metal finishing for a week. They saw everything through. Then, of course, some of the older ones that we had that were good ones; they were good from the very beginning.\n\n But the better ones, I would say, were the young guys that had gone through that co-op program. That was one of the best programs, as far as I’m concerned, for developing engineers that you could have.

[Assistant] Makes sense.

[User] Yes, because they see it from our standpoint of view and we’re the ones that would wind up having to do the finished product. And why not? If I can make your job be a little bit better, why not accept it, you know? But you had people, some of the hardheaded ones would not. But not this guy. That’s Bill Creasy right there [points]. You can’t see much of him. I just now realized who he was.

[Assistant]
I was going to ask Jennifer if she had some questions to ask you as well.

I had a couple of questions. You mentioned you started out as an apprentice, and I’m curious, did JSC also have an apprentice program?

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Could you tell us a little bit about that?


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

[User] I don’t really recall, but at one time we had as many as three, I can remember, at one time, just in our shop. See, there’d be different ones. There’d be machinists, electronics, sheet metal. Welding was separate. We had a separate apprentice in welding and model and plastics. I guess that was all of it.

[Assistant] Before we started the tape, Billie had mentioned that Apollo-1 [fire] and the loss of a number of astronauts, before the fire, really impacted the NASA community. Can you give us a sense of how the NASA community dealt with theses losses and how it pulled together?

[User] Well, I don’t know. I don’t know if I could answer that. I don’t know how I would answer that.

[Assistant] There must not have been very much time to mourn, because you had so much work to do.

[User] There really wasn’t. I was just going to say, you just come back into work the next day and everything would be rush still going on, just like when we lost the Shuttle that time, the first time. It had kind of gotten routine to see the launch. And that particular day, of all times—I guess I’d seen about all of the launches before—we had a TV that we could go across the street and watch. Normally, I’d go over there and watch liftoff, you know, then we’d come back to work. Well, I was working on something that day or something, and I remember walking down through the shop. I was heading to the machine shop for something, and somebody [came] by and they said the Shuttle blew up. That was hard to even think about. I just, you know—then I went over to see it. But I didn’t see it initially. But after that, I think I saw most of them after that.

[Assistant] It must have been a rewarding time to know that they have returned to flight, even though it did take eighteen months [after the fire].


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

[User] Well, I don’t know. I don’t know if I could answer that. I don’t know how I would answer that.

[Assistant] There must not have been very much time to mourn, because you had so much work to do.

[User] There really wasn’t. I was just going to say, you just come back into work the next day and everything would be rush still going on, just like when we lost the Shuttle that time, the first time. It had kind of gotten routine to see the launch. And that particular day, of all times—I guess I’d seen about all of the launches before—we had a TV that we could go across the street and watch. Normally, I’d go over there and watch liftoff, you know, then we’d come back to work. Well, I was working on something that day or something, and I remember walking down through the shop. I was heading to the machine shop for something, and somebody [came] by and they said the Shuttle blew up. That was hard to even think about. I just, you know—then I went over to see it. But I didn’t see it initially. But after that, I think I saw most of them after that.

[Assistant] It must have been a rewarding time to know that they have returned to flight, even though it did take eighteen months [after the fire].

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] I guess it must have been a joyous time to watch Apollo 7 [after the Apollo 1 fire], to know that we were moving on.\n\n We’ve tried to cover as many areas that we knew about. Are there some other areas or thoughts that you would like to share with us before we close?


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

[User] There really wasn’t. I was just going to say, you just come back into work the next day and everything would be rush still going on, just like when we lost the Shuttle that time, the first time. It had kind of gotten routine to see the launch. And that particular day, of all times—I guess I’d seen about all of the launches before—we had a TV that we could go across the street and watch. Normally, I’d go over there and watch liftoff, you know, then we’d come back to work. Well, I was working on something that day or something, and I remember walking down through the shop. I was heading to the machine shop for something, and somebody [came] by and they said the Shuttle blew up. That was hard to even think about. I just, you know—then I went over to see it. But I didn’t see it initially. But after that, I think I saw most of them after that.

[Assistant] It must have been a rewarding time to know that they have returned to flight, even though it did take eighteen months [after the fire].

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] I guess it must have been a joyous time to watch Apollo 7 [after the Apollo 1 fire], to know that we were moving on.\n\n We’ve tried to cover as many areas that we knew about. Are there some other areas or thoughts that you would like to share with us before we close?

[User] No, I don’t think so. I think we’ve pretty well covered what you had listed down here, too.

[Assistant] I guess on a fun note, I was going to ask you all [about] the splashdown parties and the after-success events, did you and your team members go?


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

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] I guess it must have been a joyous time to watch Apollo 7 [after the Apollo 1 fire], to know that we were moving on.\n\n We’ve tried to cover as many areas that we knew about. Are there some other areas or thoughts that you would like to share with us before we close?

[User] No, I don’t think so. I think we’ve pretty well covered what you had listed down here, too.

[Assistant] I guess on a fun note, I was going to ask you all [about] the splashdown parties and the after-success events, did you and your team members go?

[User] No. She was in on more of those. By that time, she was in PAO [Public Affairs Office] more than the history part of it. She attended many of the splashdown parties. I only got in on one or two of them. We didn’t get in on that. We were peons.

[Assistant] The working folks.\n\n Billie, we were asking Fred if there were any other areas that he could think of that we haven’t covered, and didn’t know if you had any other thoughts.


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

[User] Before I came here? I didn’t care. It didn’t bother me a bit—I wasn’t going to stay here very long. Besides, I was an Air Force guy, anyhow, so what’s the difference? The Air Force would be moving me anyway.

[Assistant] They were going to move you, huh?

[User] Yes, the Air Force was going to move me, anyhow. I found out that the NACA had a philosophy of teaching you: “We want you to know how this works. We want you to know this.” NACA would take time to do that and that was valuable to me. NACA and even early NASA had courses we went through to learn how to work instruments, learn how a boundary layer works, and so forth. We had to learn all kinds of things. The guys that were doing the work were the guys that were teaching us what they wanted us to know so we could help them and do their work. It’s not the case anymore—they don’t do that now. We had “organizational meetings;” granted, they were in the evening, and the whole lab was invited. Everybody from the lab went—not everybody, but there would be several hundred people who would gather in the Administration Building auditorium. There, you discussed things. Those things that didn’t work, you wanted to know why they didn’t work—maybe we can help you out. We don’t do that anymore.

[Assistant] Like an open forum, whatever was in your area?

[User] Like an open forum, yes. You learned a lot from those people. Those people had all the experiences, and it was a big, huge learning curve. I couldn’t have gotten that kind of education anywhere; no place in the world—no university—had that kind of expertise. Talk to Simon Ostrach, he’ll tell you: we had the greatest things since sliced bread, but those outside NACA/NASA had nothing like that. Ostrach was here, part of that teaching group, and we had some of the finest people in the world here.

[Assistant] They must have believed in sharing knowledge if they were such great teachers.


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

[User] Like an open forum, yes. You learned a lot from those people. Those people had all the experiences, and it was a big, huge learning curve. I couldn’t have gotten that kind of education anywhere; no place in the world—no university—had that kind of expertise. Talk to Simon Ostrach, he’ll tell you: we had the greatest things since sliced bread, but those outside NACA/NASA had nothing like that. Ostrach was here, part of that teaching group, and we had some of the finest people in the world here.

[Assistant] They must have believed in sharing knowledge if they were such great teachers.

[User] They didn’t have any qualms about that. They’d work right along with you. I worked with the people in the instrumentation group, and we had technicians who were top notch, absolutely top notch. You’d give them a sketch of what you thought you wanted to do, and a couple of days later, they’d call you and say, “Here, is this what you want?” “Wow, yes, that’ll work.” We had machine shops here, we had people who had fabrication machine shops, which were like the same thing they had at Rocketdyne. People built things and actually made them work. We had metallurgy shops, we had everything here—all gone now.

[Assistant] Were you able to work side-by-side by these technicians, if you needed to, to have something changed?

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Was it kind of a partnership?


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

[User] They didn’t have any qualms about that. They’d work right along with you. I worked with the people in the instrumentation group, and we had technicians who were top notch, absolutely top notch. You’d give them a sketch of what you thought you wanted to do, and a couple of days later, they’d call you and say, “Here, is this what you want?” “Wow, yes, that’ll work.” We had machine shops here, we had people who had fabrication machine shops, which were like the same thing they had at Rocketdyne. People built things and actually made them work. We had metallurgy shops, we had everything here—all gone now.

[Assistant] Were you able to work side-by-side by these technicians, if you needed to, to have something changed?

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Was it kind of a partnership?

[User] Yes, and the same way with the guys in the machine shop. All the people worked as sort of an integral unit. At that time, we didn’t have this business of “what’s your WBS [Work Breakdown Structure] number,” and “I’m not going to work on this because you don’t have a WBS,” or anything like that. They were always interested in what you were doing and why, you talked to them about it, and they didn’t just make what you wanted, they made it better. When you did your experiments, they wanted to know what you did and how it worked and all that type of thing—how can we make it better for you? Always, it was always the same way. It’s all gone.

[Assistant] You stated about writing a report, in 1957, of the work that you did on the X-15. Talk to us about how important those reports were, and what all it took to put those reports together that were passed on and passed through to other people.


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

[User] No, we had purged stacks, and we purged it with gaseous nitrogen, and it went out pretty quickly, so we didn’t have any problem with it. That series of HLJ-tests became the baseline report for two-phase flows and somewhat for designs towards rocket engines in the low-pressure region for liquid hydrogen. Doc Graham [Chief] was the supervisor for that. Bob Ehlers and I worked the X-15 LOX -Ammonia project and then we started with Bob Friedman with the liquid hydrogen Dewars. I would guess we gathered and published the data, which surprised me, to find out that all our NACA/NASA reports, which were pretty closely held, weren’t secret, but most of the community didn’t know about NASA reports. When I became Vice President of the International Institute of Refrigeration in 1975, I chaired a session at the international cryogenics meeting in Moscow, Russia. Afterward, one of the Russians came up to me and said, “We know all about your work.”\n\n I said, “How did you find out?”\n\n He said, “We’ve read all your reports.” The Russians not only acquired those reports, but they knew all about what we were doing. It was an eye-opening experience.

[Assistant] Very surprising. How long were you part of the Air Force?

[User] About two years—about a year-and-a-half or two years, something like that. Then I was part of the Reserves for a long time after that.

[Assistant] You were somewhat still affiliated with the military when you went to Russia?

[User] When I first started, yes. When I first started, as I said, Colonel Pattillo was still here at NACA and he got me assigned here as NACA personnel, and then they transferred me over to NASA.

[Assistant] Were you still part of the Reserves when you went to Russia for that meeting in 1975? That’d have been 20 years.


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

[User] About two years—about a year-and-a-half or two years, something like that. Then I was part of the Reserves for a long time after that.

[Assistant] You were somewhat still affiliated with the military when you went to Russia?

[User] When I first started, yes. When I first started, as I said, Colonel Pattillo was still here at NACA and he got me assigned here as NACA personnel, and then they transferred me over to NASA.

[Assistant] Were you still part of the Reserves when you went to Russia for that meeting in 1975? That’d have been 20 years.

[User] No, I don’t believe so. I think I’d signed off, and got an honorable discharge. They said, “Well, you’re not keeping up with your active duty, so we’ll give you a discharge if you want one.”\n\n I said, “Good. ” So they did.

[Assistant] Talk to us a little bit more about that. From what I understand from what I read, the work that you were doing certainly played an important part in the Space Shuttle Main Engine [SSME].


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

[User] Sure. We worked with Rocketdyne and we worked with Pratt & Whitney, Aerojet and, mostly with Rocketdyne. Not only because of my own experience with those people, but Aerojet and Rocketdyne were competitors. They would swap people back and forth to acquire secrets, and that’s how they got information transferred. A few took advantage and would hire in at a significantly raised salary, and he’d transfer over there, and that type of thing. Rocketdyne had, I would say, a cadre of just absolutely excellent designers, fabrication techniques, and test facilities. They built the big engines, and they built the J-2 engines for the liquid hydrogen engines. The RL-10s were built by Pratt & Whitney, and that was liquid hydrogen. The big, key issue is that they built a lot of these things and they worked, but they didn’t know why they worked. The things that we added were not only the smarts to understand why they worked, but also the handling characteristics and all the heat transfer information designed into them. Unfortunately [or fortunately], it became designed into the Russian vehicles as well.

[Assistant] How did you share this information with them, or did they come to you?

[User] Who?

[Assistant] With Rocketdyne and Aerojet?

[User] They would come here. That’s the time that contractors came here. We had some contractors that worked with us and some contractors that worked for the Air Force or someplace else, and they all came here. They built their engines and we told them all; everybody that came here basically got the same type of information. There wasn’t a barrier between this contractor and that contractor like you have today. It just didn’t exist. If it did, I didn’t know about it.

[Assistant] Your information that you gathered here was shared to those who were using it.


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

[User] Who?

[Assistant] With Rocketdyne and Aerojet?

[User] They would come here. That’s the time that contractors came here. We had some contractors that worked with us and some contractors that worked for the Air Force or someplace else, and they all came here. They built their engines and we told them all; everybody that came here basically got the same type of information. There wasn’t a barrier between this contractor and that contractor like you have today. It just didn’t exist. If it did, I didn’t know about it.

[Assistant] Your information that you gathered here was shared to those who were using it.

[User] Yes, it was widely shared.

[Assistant] Looking back on the years that you spent working with that, what did you find to be the most challenging time of working with that whole project, and all those elements? Other than the time when everybody was standing outside. What was the most challenging part of working with that?


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

[User] I just told him I’d do it.

[Assistant] You continued doing everything else you were doing as well? Or was this something that got put at the top of the list because of its nature?

[User] It became a priority item because—let me back up—Abe felt that we had run as much hydrogen as we probably could or should. I ran also liquid methane, and things like that, in that tank. He probably felt that we had enough data to do the rocket engine designs, so he was looking to try to wind down the thing anyhow, and that probably precipitated the changeover. I told Otto, “This is something that’s very important and I can do this.”\n\n He said, “Do it,” and so we did it.

[Assistant] Do you remember what timeframe that was?

[User] I don’t know. It was early in the Shuttle development, where NASA was very early in the Shuttle engine developments, where they were having all kinds of trouble. The NASA Marshall-Rocketdyne test crews blew them up, one after the other, on the test stand. They just couldn’t keep the pumps together.

[Assistant] What other type of work did you do with that program, the Shuttle Program? You mentioned this one—is there other aspects that you were able to lend your skills and talents to, as well?


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

[User] It became a priority item because—let me back up—Abe felt that we had run as much hydrogen as we probably could or should. I ran also liquid methane, and things like that, in that tank. He probably felt that we had enough data to do the rocket engine designs, so he was looking to try to wind down the thing anyhow, and that probably precipitated the changeover. I told Otto, “This is something that’s very important and I can do this.”\n\n He said, “Do it,” and so we did it.

[Assistant] Do you remember what timeframe that was?

[User] I don’t know. It was early in the Shuttle development, where NASA was very early in the Shuttle engine developments, where they were having all kinds of trouble. The NASA Marshall-Rocketdyne test crews blew them up, one after the other, on the test stand. They just couldn’t keep the pumps together.

[Assistant] What other type of work did you do with that program, the Shuttle Program? You mentioned this one—is there other aspects that you were able to lend your skills and talents to, as well?

[User] This is getting way far into NASA.

[Assistant] It is, but we’re here.


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

[User] I don’t know. It was early in the Shuttle development, where NASA was very early in the Shuttle engine developments, where they were having all kinds of trouble. The NASA Marshall-Rocketdyne test crews blew them up, one after the other, on the test stand. They just couldn’t keep the pumps together.

[Assistant] What other type of work did you do with that program, the Shuttle Program? You mentioned this one—is there other aspects that you were able to lend your skills and talents to, as well?

[User] This is getting way far into NASA.

[Assistant] It is, but we’re here.

[User] Once we got, in my opinion, the Shuttle stuff straightened out—because there was a long effort in that we’d had several meetings with people from all over the free world who were looking at instabilities. The French were heavily involved in finding out what we knew, and eventually they built their own engine, as you probably know. Also, they built their own launch vehicles from that type of stuff. They piggybacked off an awful lot of our data in order to build their systems, so that they now have a competitive launch system. I was really surprised at the Russians because you couldn’t get any information in or out of that place. I worked with the détente committees [President Richard M. Nixon Détente Agreements with USSR].

[Assistant] I was going to ask you that—I saw that on the list. Share with us how you got that opportunity to do that, about the détente committees, how did you get involved with that?


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

[User] Détente was quite an experience, and we learned a lot. As for those people who went there with the CIA [Central Intelligence Agency], the CIA wanted to know everything you did when you came back. The CIA wanted you to act as one of their agents. I said “no.” I said, “I’m not going to do that.” Those people who did got in a lot of trouble. They didn’t get any information from the Russians. We did, we had no problems. They knew who we were, we knew who they were, they wanted to know more about our life, we wanted to know more about their life. We formed a bridge. I hope it eventually led to the bridge that I still hope exists.

[Assistant] It did. Do you feel like you were able to apply any of the knowledge you brought back?

[User] Yes, because we learned a lot about the problems with superconducting transmission power transmission lines. The biggest problem is that they carry a lot of energy. If they go normal [what we call normal; namely, they become like an ordinary conductor], what do you do with all that power? Where does it go? It’s just going to blow things up. You have to be very careful about how you put things together, where they are placed, how they operate, and things like that. There are some superconducting lines now, and the temperature has been able to come up, but not like what was promised. It was always promised, “We’ll run these cables and you won’t have any power transmission line problems.” We learned a lot.

[Assistant] Your short-term assignment, or your short-term position that you took when you came here, lasted a number of years. You’ve been here 50?

[User] Yes, 55 years I guess, since 1957, yes.

[Assistant] Are you still working on new and exciting projects?


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

[User] Yes, because we learned a lot about the problems with superconducting transmission power transmission lines. The biggest problem is that they carry a lot of energy. If they go normal [what we call normal; namely, they become like an ordinary conductor], what do you do with all that power? Where does it go? It’s just going to blow things up. You have to be very careful about how you put things together, where they are placed, how they operate, and things like that. There are some superconducting lines now, and the temperature has been able to come up, but not like what was promised. It was always promised, “We’ll run these cables and you won’t have any power transmission line problems.” We learned a lot.

[Assistant] Your short-term assignment, or your short-term position that you took when you came here, lasted a number of years. You’ve been here 50?

[User] Yes, 55 years I guess, since 1957, yes.

[Assistant] Are you still working on new and exciting projects?

[User] Yes, I can’t tell you what I’m working on right now.

[Assistant] That’s great to know you’re working on new stuff.


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

[User] Yes, 55 years I guess, since 1957, yes.

[Assistant] Are you still working on new and exciting projects?

[User] Yes, I can’t tell you what I’m working on right now.

[Assistant] That’s great to know you’re working on new stuff.

[User] It’s related to energy, as you might expect.

[Assistant]
I was going to ask Sandra if she had a couple of questions for you.

As you mentioned, you’re working on things you can’t tell us about, and the stuff with the Russians. At the very beginning, with the X-15, and those other things you said that had been worked on that were somewhat secret, did you have to have any special clearances? Or because you were in the Air Force, did you already have those clearances?


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

[User] Yes, I can’t tell you what I’m working on right now.

[Assistant] That’s great to know you’re working on new stuff.

[User] It’s related to energy, as you might expect.

[Assistant]
I was going to ask Sandra if she had a couple of questions for you.

As you mentioned, you’re working on things you can’t tell us about, and the stuff with the Russians. At the very beginning, with the X-15, and those other things you said that had been worked on that were somewhat secret, did you have to have any special clearances? Or because you were in the Air Force, did you already have those clearances?

[User] I did, but strange enough, when I came here to NACA, they did the clearance again. We were pretty particular in the early days, anyhow, about your clearances. I found out a lot later in life, that it wasn’t just my grandfather that they interviewed. It was the neighbors. They interviewed all the neighbors near the farm, around the farms, around the neighborhood down there in Worthington, Ohio. They told me about it later, but I didn’t know about it then. I didn’t even learn about a lot of this stuff until after most of them passed away. At funerals and things like that, people said, “Do you know that so-and-so—?” I didn’t know that.

[Assistant] Do you think that was a common experience for most people that were working at that time on all projects?


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

[User] It’s related to energy, as you might expect.

[Assistant]
I was going to ask Sandra if she had a couple of questions for you.

As you mentioned, you’re working on things you can’t tell us about, and the stuff with the Russians. At the very beginning, with the X-15, and those other things you said that had been worked on that were somewhat secret, did you have to have any special clearances? Or because you were in the Air Force, did you already have those clearances?

[User] I did, but strange enough, when I came here to NACA, they did the clearance again. We were pretty particular in the early days, anyhow, about your clearances. I found out a lot later in life, that it wasn’t just my grandfather that they interviewed. It was the neighbors. They interviewed all the neighbors near the farm, around the farms, around the neighborhood down there in Worthington, Ohio. They told me about it later, but I didn’t know about it then. I didn’t even learn about a lot of this stuff until after most of them passed away. At funerals and things like that, people said, “Do you know that so-and-so—?” I didn’t know that.

[Assistant] Do you think that was a common experience for most people that were working at that time on all projects?

[User] I don’t know that. I don’t know, but I was surprised that not only they interviewed my family and associates and people that I was familiar with, and references that you put down, but they went into the history, family history, and where you’re from and what you were doing and how you worked or didn’t work, and what kind of person were you, and could you be trusted. All that type of thing.

[Assistant] That’s very interesting.


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

[User] I did, but strange enough, when I came here to NACA, they did the clearance again. We were pretty particular in the early days, anyhow, about your clearances. I found out a lot later in life, that it wasn’t just my grandfather that they interviewed. It was the neighbors. They interviewed all the neighbors near the farm, around the farms, around the neighborhood down there in Worthington, Ohio. They told me about it later, but I didn’t know about it then. I didn’t even learn about a lot of this stuff until after most of them passed away. At funerals and things like that, people said, “Do you know that so-and-so—?” I didn’t know that.

[Assistant] Do you think that was a common experience for most people that were working at that time on all projects?

[User] I don’t know that. I don’t know, but I was surprised that not only they interviewed my family and associates and people that I was familiar with, and references that you put down, but they went into the history, family history, and where you’re from and what you were doing and how you worked or didn’t work, and what kind of person were you, and could you be trusted. All that type of thing.

[Assistant] That’s very interesting.

[User] I had secret clearance—I still have it—but I didn’t want top secret. After I found out what was in secret and why it was secret, I didn’t want to know any more about it. There’s a lot of stuff you don’t want to know. You don’t want to know. I’ll just say that.

[Assistant] I believe you. There’s a lot I don’t want to know.


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

[User] I don’t know that. I don’t know, but I was surprised that not only they interviewed my family and associates and people that I was familiar with, and references that you put down, but they went into the history, family history, and where you’re from and what you were doing and how you worked or didn’t work, and what kind of person were you, and could you be trusted. All that type of thing.

[Assistant] That’s very interesting.

[User] I had secret clearance—I still have it—but I didn’t want top secret. After I found out what was in secret and why it was secret, I didn’t want to know any more about it. There’s a lot of stuff you don’t want to know. You don’t want to know. I’ll just say that.

[Assistant] I believe you. There’s a lot I don’t want to know.

[User] I thank the Good Lord that we still have a country where we’re able to worship God and some people don’t. There are a lot of people that don’t. I still have a clearance, but I don’t use it much anymore. I shy away from classified projects as much as I can.

[Assistant]
Thank you for answering that, I appreciate it.

I was reading some information that was out on the site, one of the comments that was made in this article was that you have been quoted as saying that you’re “driven by the applications of my research.” Could you explain that to us?


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

[User] No, no, no. A hug from a Marine, God forbid! And it's still with me, and when that part opens up, it's frightening.\n\n So I'm not sure what the lesson learned about that is. I guess it's a vulnerability, because it could have gone very badly. Through my own discipline and the excellent support of the support system we built in Moscow, and it wasn't always this good. If this had happened to me four years ago, it probably would have been a couple days.\n\n Now, I've heard this has happened at other times. In fact, one of the people coming in on our trip didn't have a visa at all. Now, I would have never gotten on the airplane if I didn't have a visa, because I have a sense of what the system is about. Again, you don't want to mess with an essentially hostile system. There's no benefit there.

[Assistant] Yes, that's very good. It underscores just another endorsement of the power of positive thinking.

[User] Oh, yes.

[Assistant] I bet you there's one more lesson learned here. Make sure before you leave, administratively, that you've got a multi-entry visa.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Okay. That's a fascinating discussion. Is there anything you want to close up with in final thoughts?


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

[User] Well, 2440 is the number I always use, then when I saw this thing, it says 2,000. Then I got a pay increase—it didn’t include the overtime—then I got a pay increase to 2430. [Laughs]

[Assistant] Sure doesn’t sound like much nowadays, does it?

[User] No, it doesn’t. It didn’t matter. I was just getting started.

[Assistant] Yes, there are these somewhat apocryphal stories about how people wouldn’t cash their paychecks. They’d just leave them sitting in their desk drawers for weeks at a time, whatever.

[User] I’ve heard that, yes, I’ve heard that. But as I indicated to you, with that I still had to go borrow from my boss a deposit on a car, which, fortunately, I didn’t lose.

[Assistant] Yes, fortunately.\n\n The point you were making before we went off on this tangent, got at the heart of my next question, which was how was the technical side of things divided up between the AEC and NASA and all the contractors?


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

[User] It did a little bit. Yes, I didn’t know it was going to happen, but, to me, it was always inevitable that if we were going to have any deep-space science or human missions, we would have to go nuclear. Pluto proved that to a large extent. So there was never any question in my mind if NASA was going to have a major science exploration program, you’d have to go that route.\n\n So, from that point of view, it didn’t surprise me. It surprised me, if anything, that it happened that quickly and visibly. It wasn’t snuck in somewhere; it was a visible point that was made. And Sean O’Keefe keeps emphasizing the need for technology development on power and propulsion so we have a capability to do missions we may want to do.\n\n My sense of inadequacy in that is, I haven’t yet seen the real definition of “So what, in fact, are the missions you’re aiming at?” So you can development the technology, a technology base, but not one that’s necessarily directly applicable in all those cases. And you may have to make some adjustment. That might take time. But at least let’s get the technology rolling and maintain a strong technology [development] effort, but let’s get to defining some of the missions more rigorously and fund them appropriately.

[Assistant] How different is the technology now than the last time there was a serious effort?

[User] Oh, I don’t think it’s different.

[Assistant] Really?

[User] I really don’t think it’s much different. I think much of the technology is going to be an extension of what was there and get back to it. I really believe that.

[Assistant] So in forty years there’s—in terms of that field—


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

[User] Well, I sat in on all those meetings. There’s no question about it. I can’t say that it changed things. It was just a major problem that we faced, and the Administrator was on top of it all the way, as were others. Bob [Robert C.] Seamans was heavily involved, people down at Langley were involved, a committee was set up to examine, and so on. But I can’t say that it really affected how I worked. I was involved in it. I sat in on those groups, but I can’t say I was a decision maker in that process. I haven’t thought about it. I really haven’t.

[Assistant] I just didn’t know if that incident had brought to light any of these organizational concerns that were addressed by the creation of your office.

[User] I don’t think so, really. Well, maybe it had some role, but I don’t know. I really don’t know. I never had that feeling that it was that that stimulated stuff.

[Assistant] You ended up staying in this position as AA for a couple of years.

[User] That’s right.

[Assistant] Why did you decide to leave that post?