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

[User] Yes, I am.

[Assistant] When we first got what were your impressions? When we first got to Bolivia, we started in La Paz, I guess.

[User] We started in La Paz and my impressions were, my gosh this place is high and desert looking at the airport. And I remember picking up a couple of suitcases and heading toward the terminal and just getting a pretty good pace didn’t make it, ended up with a bloody nose. I had a little altitude sickness the first 24 hours. I really remember being pretty bummed out, because I just didn't have the strength and energy until I got a little bit acclimatized. I started off too fast.

[Assistant] You ignored what they said about taking it slow?

[User] Yeah, well, I would get shifted into a higher gear, but once we were there, I enjoyed La Paz very much, so much of it is still somewhat of a blur, going to and sitting there. And I don't know, whoever it was and whoever the ambassador. Getting your picture taken. And I was just kind of glad to get out of La Paz to where we were going to live and work. And I was anxious to get to work. I wanted to.

[Assistant] Can you talk a little bit about what you were where you were eventually ended up and what you were doing?


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

[User] And he kept things going quite well until he retired. We had a welcoming hand if we went back to Tanzania.

[Assistant] Yeah, I guess so.

[User] And then after that, we came back to Idaho again and worked with the Cupi tribe for another two years and realized that, you know, they needed an economic base, there’s just no way they can continue to make house payments and raise families and buy gas and food and whatever. And so we were able to work with the guys in Agnone when we lived here earlier that owned some land along the Cupi river. And so the tribe was able to help get a grant to work with the Best Western motel management folks. And they got really excited to work with the tribe and set up a little corporation kind of thing and bought the land to build a motel restaurant. And it's the largest employer in the county right now. And the tribe is all driving new cars.

[Assistant] Does it have a casino too?

[User] Pardon?

[Assistant] Does it have a casino too?


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

[User] And then after that, we came back to Idaho again and worked with the Cupi tribe for another two years and realized that, you know, they needed an economic base, there’s just no way they can continue to make house payments and raise families and buy gas and food and whatever. And so we were able to work with the guys in Agnone when we lived here earlier that owned some land along the Cupi river. And so the tribe was able to help get a grant to work with the Best Western motel management folks. And they got really excited to work with the tribe and set up a little corporation kind of thing and bought the land to build a motel restaurant. And it's the largest employer in the county right now. And the tribe is all driving new cars.

[Assistant] Does it have a casino too?

[User] Pardon?

[Assistant] Does it have a casino too?

[User] They have a casino. And the population is now a hundred and sixty seven people.

[Assistant] Ok, now, so you're still, go on with your story, you've got the motel and the restaurant and casino.


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

[User] Pardon?

[Assistant] Does it have a casino too?

[User] They have a casino. And the population is now a hundred and sixty seven people.

[Assistant] Ok, now, so you're still, go on with your story, you've got the motel and the restaurant and casino.

[User] No, at that time it was not a casino, just the motel restaurant. And a few years later, when I went back to Peace Corps and was not working there, the person that replaced me in the tribe got together. And they then realized that there is money to be made in gambling. And we're so close to the Canadian border and they love to gamble, too. And so they built the casino. It started off small and now it's expanded and they're doing quite well. And education has become important to the tribal members, most of them now graduate from high school and a couple have gone on and gotten their doctorate or master’s. And so the big change is going on, but still a lot of work to be done. And now they have resources, but I'm not sure that they're the happiest people here. I'm sure you know where they are going and whether I have the energy to get more involved again.

[Assistant] Are you or did they make you an honorary member of the tribe?


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

[User] They have a casino. And the population is now a hundred and sixty seven people.

[Assistant] Ok, now, so you're still, go on with your story, you've got the motel and the restaurant and casino.

[User] No, at that time it was not a casino, just the motel restaurant. And a few years later, when I went back to Peace Corps and was not working there, the person that replaced me in the tribe got together. And they then realized that there is money to be made in gambling. And we're so close to the Canadian border and they love to gamble, too. And so they built the casino. It started off small and now it's expanded and they're doing quite well. And education has become important to the tribal members, most of them now graduate from high school and a couple have gone on and gotten their doctorate or master’s. And so the big change is going on, but still a lot of work to be done. And now they have resources, but I'm not sure that they're the happiest people here. I'm sure you know where they are going and whether I have the energy to get more involved again.

[Assistant] Are you or did they make you an honorary member of the tribe?

[User] I wouldn't call it an honorary. But I am invited to all of their Christmas dinners and Thanksgiving dinners. And whenever an old person dies, I'm one of the first ones they get a hold of to come to the wake and go to the wake processing of things out there. And I'm still very respected and so is Marj as a person in the tribal community.

[Assistant] So Wayne, would you say your Peace Corps service had an effect on what you chose to do the rest of your life for the rest of your life after you got out?


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

[User] I wouldn't call it an honorary. But I am invited to all of their Christmas dinners and Thanksgiving dinners. And whenever an old person dies, I'm one of the first ones they get a hold of to come to the wake and go to the wake processing of things out there. And I'm still very respected and so is Marj as a person in the tribal community.

[Assistant] So Wayne, would you say your Peace Corps service had an effect on what you chose to do the rest of your life for the rest of your life after you got out?

[User] Oh, I think it certainly has had a role and I ended up, you know, leaving here. And we went to joined the program in South Africa with the University of Arizona, where I worked four years setting up the Nac Engineering Department and the soon to and after spending four years there and Peace Corps was there. And I worked developing programs where volunteers can work with different villages, developing gravity flow irrigation systems and just enjoying, again, seeing Peace Corps and their energy and develop training programs. So their training was more relevant to what they were going to do in their villages and part of the training was making sure they had a coworker into training and worked with them for the last few weeks of training. They and their coworker would work together and put together a plan of work. So when he was finally sworn in, they knew what they were going to do together. It wasn’t like we didn't know every day, you know, trying to find a need and fill it.

[Assistant] Yeah, well.

[User] They knew what they were going to do.

[Assistant] It was pretty pretty. They didn't really know what they were doing when we were in.


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

[User] They knew what they were going to do.

[Assistant] It was pretty pretty. They didn't really know what they were doing when we were in.

[User] And so then I kind of became an opening in Peace Corps, a training director in Lesotho, and my contract had finished up with the University of Arizona. So I threw my hat in the ring and I became training director for three years in Lesotho and worked with helping new program get started in South Africa. And so we were there during apartheid and Mandela took over and de Klerk stepped out. So we had some very interesting times, stressful times. And so I really enjoyed that. And my three years were up there. I threw my hat in the ring for a country director position and West Africa, and I was chosen for the job.

[Assistant] In where?

[User] In West Africa, in The Gambia. So I became. Peace Corps had this rule at Kennedy and Shriver put up that you couldn't stay longer than five years in Peace Corps. And I've always agreed with that. But in my case, I ended up staying seven and a half years because while we were in the Gambia, there was an overthrow of the government and I was about ready to leave, but Peace Corps Washington realized that it was too risky to bring someone else in because I knew all these escape routes to the neighboring countries and had very good relations with all the ministries and they needed security for our volunteers. The military leaders that took over within 24 hours, came to the Peace Corps office and said, Wayne, I don't care if everybody else from the USA leaves, the NGOs, we want you and your volunteers to stay in. If anybody gets out of, you know, we'll straighten things out. And that got to Washington. And they say, well, will you stay another two and a half years until we find you a replacement and things settle down and so I did.

[Assistant] So was that the leader of the coup that came to you?


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

[User] And so then I kind of became an opening in Peace Corps, a training director in Lesotho, and my contract had finished up with the University of Arizona. So I threw my hat in the ring and I became training director for three years in Lesotho and worked with helping new program get started in South Africa. And so we were there during apartheid and Mandela took over and de Klerk stepped out. So we had some very interesting times, stressful times. And so I really enjoyed that. And my three years were up there. I threw my hat in the ring for a country director position and West Africa, and I was chosen for the job.

[Assistant] In where?

[User] In West Africa, in The Gambia. So I became. Peace Corps had this rule at Kennedy and Shriver put up that you couldn't stay longer than five years in Peace Corps. And I've always agreed with that. But in my case, I ended up staying seven and a half years because while we were in the Gambia, there was an overthrow of the government and I was about ready to leave, but Peace Corps Washington realized that it was too risky to bring someone else in because I knew all these escape routes to the neighboring countries and had very good relations with all the ministries and they needed security for our volunteers. The military leaders that took over within 24 hours, came to the Peace Corps office and said, Wayne, I don't care if everybody else from the USA leaves, the NGOs, we want you and your volunteers to stay in. If anybody gets out of, you know, we'll straighten things out. And that got to Washington. And they say, well, will you stay another two and a half years until we find you a replacement and things settle down and so I did.

[Assistant] So was that the leader of the coup that came to you?

[User] Pardon?

[Assistant] The leader of the coup d’etat came to you to say that?


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

[User] Pardon?

[Assistant] The leader of the coup d’etat came to you to say that?

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] Wow, wow.

[User] I knew him personally. And you let it be known that he wanted volunteers to stay and help rebuild his country.

[Assistant] That's great. That's great. Are you writing your own memoirs, Wayne?


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

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] Wow, wow.

[User] I knew him personally. And you let it be known that he wanted volunteers to stay and help rebuild his country.

[Assistant] That's great. That's great. Are you writing your own memoirs, Wayne?

[User] Pardon?

[Assistant] Are you writing your memoirs?


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

[User] I knew him personally. And you let it be known that he wanted volunteers to stay and help rebuild his country.

[Assistant] That's great. That's great. Are you writing your own memoirs, Wayne?

[User] Pardon?

[Assistant] Are you writing your memoirs?

[User] I'm not writing anything. I don't even like checks anymore. I haven't written a check in seven years. Marj takes care of all financial things in our family and I have sore knees, getting on my knees once in a while begging to get a little cash. Well, but, you know, the Peace Corps, when we finished up in the country director and moved back here to Idaho, I put a lot of volunteer work with the Land O'Lakes Corporation in Minnesota and went to Nigeria twice to do training programs and repair and maintenance of irrigation pumps. And I went to the Philippines two different times and did training programs and gravity pull irrigation on the isolated little island of Palawan and sort of did a lot. Then started doing a lot of traveling then to Australia a couple of times, then Indonesia two years ago, and now I'm ready to go somewhere else again.

[Assistant] All right, that’s great. Do you have any last thoughts that you would like to write before I turn off this recording?


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

[User] Pardon?

[Assistant] Are you writing your memoirs?

[User] I'm not writing anything. I don't even like checks anymore. I haven't written a check in seven years. Marj takes care of all financial things in our family and I have sore knees, getting on my knees once in a while begging to get a little cash. Well, but, you know, the Peace Corps, when we finished up in the country director and moved back here to Idaho, I put a lot of volunteer work with the Land O'Lakes Corporation in Minnesota and went to Nigeria twice to do training programs and repair and maintenance of irrigation pumps. And I went to the Philippines two different times and did training programs and gravity pull irrigation on the isolated little island of Palawan and sort of did a lot. Then started doing a lot of traveling then to Australia a couple of times, then Indonesia two years ago, and now I'm ready to go somewhere else again.

[Assistant] All right, that’s great. Do you have any last thoughts that you would like to write before I turn off this recording?

[User] Well, I guess I'd really like to try to figure out what I'm going to do with this second half. I’m seventy now, half way to one hundred and forty. And just wondering, what am I doing for the next 70 years?

[Assistant] Well, that's always a challenge.


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

[User] No, there wasn’t

[Assistant] You weren’t immediately embraced I wouldn’t imagine?

[User] No, since I was not a test pilot, there were several of us who weren’t, we basically figured out real fast that we were at that bottom of the totem pole… Also [our] group was not immediately embraced because … the Time Life [magazine] contract was a bit of an issue. The first group were well into that, the second group had been brought along by the first group reluctantly and the last thing they wanted was to start dividing the pie even further… [T]hey really didn’t know what to do with [us]. So there were some tensions that I didn’t fully understand going on because of that. … [G]enerally we were accepted and the lines were accepted, but if you had gone to test pilot school, whether it be Air Force or Navy, you were more accepted than if you were an ‘egghead’, so to speak, like I and several others were [considered].

[Assistant] So what were those first few weeks like when you arrived?

[User] Just a lot of briefings and … a lot of logistics of trying to get our families located and that kind of thing. … [W]e were treated well [but] you definitely knew there was a totem pole, just like in any organization.

[Assistant] And you all were given other duties—


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

[User] No, since I was not a test pilot, there were several of us who weren’t, we basically figured out real fast that we were at that bottom of the totem pole… Also [our] group was not immediately embraced because … the Time Life [magazine] contract was a bit of an issue. The first group were well into that, the second group had been brought along by the first group reluctantly and the last thing they wanted was to start dividing the pie even further… [T]hey really didn’t know what to do with [us]. So there were some tensions that I didn’t fully understand going on because of that. … [G]enerally we were accepted and the lines were accepted, but if you had gone to test pilot school, whether it be Air Force or Navy, you were more accepted than if you were an ‘egghead’, so to speak, like I and several others were [considered].

[Assistant] So what were those first few weeks like when you arrived?

[User] Just a lot of briefings and … a lot of logistics of trying to get our families located and that kind of thing. … [W]e were treated well [but] you definitely knew there was a totem pole, just like in any organization.

[Assistant] And you all were given other duties—

[User] … [W]e were trained in [spacecraft systems,] rendezvous and in geology which I particularly liked. I volunteered to go on all the geology trips which probably didn’t go over too well because you weren’t supposed to be interested in that kind of stuff. Then eventually we were assigned various duties, somewhat related to our experience, mine mainly being in space radiation shielding … [and] I was assigned that [responsibility for] the environmental control system…

[Assistant] Well part of the research, they noticed that you’re experienced with that, radiation and the Van Allen belts, you were asked about that?


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

[User] Just a lot of briefings and … a lot of logistics of trying to get our families located and that kind of thing. … [W]e were treated well [but] you definitely knew there was a totem pole, just like in any organization.

[Assistant] And you all were given other duties—

[User] … [W]e were trained in [spacecraft systems,] rendezvous and in geology which I particularly liked. I volunteered to go on all the geology trips which probably didn’t go over too well because you weren’t supposed to be interested in that kind of stuff. Then eventually we were assigned various duties, somewhat related to our experience, mine mainly being in space radiation shielding … [and] I was assigned that [responsibility for] the environmental control system…

[Assistant] Well part of the research, they noticed that you’re experienced with that, radiation and the Van Allen belts, you were asked about that?

[User] In the interviews you mean, when?

[Assistant] Well, no. Before the Apollo mission for the Gemini missions. For instance for 9, they were wondering whether that was going to cause a problem.


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

[User] … [W]e were trained in [spacecraft systems,] rendezvous and in geology which I particularly liked. I volunteered to go on all the geology trips which probably didn’t go over too well because you weren’t supposed to be interested in that kind of stuff. Then eventually we were assigned various duties, somewhat related to our experience, mine mainly being in space radiation shielding … [and] I was assigned that [responsibility for] the environmental control system…

[Assistant] Well part of the research, they noticed that you’re experienced with that, radiation and the Van Allen belts, you were asked about that?

[User] In the interviews you mean, when?

[Assistant] Well, no. Before the Apollo mission for the Gemini missions. For instance for 9, they were wondering whether that was going to cause a problem.

[User] Well, and there were various experiments on board the spacecraft measuring radiation and I generally got involved in reviewing those. Pete Conrad [Charles C. Conrad, Jr.] and I particularly on Gemini 11, which was highly elliptical orbit up through the Van Allen belt, went up to the Naval Research Lab and we had a little, (still have) a … joke [why] we wanted him to look good but he didn’t know anything about the [radiation] and wasn’t going to learn anything about. [We had] signals where [one finger] meant “no” and [two fingers] meant “yes”. So when you interview Pete Conrad you can [ask], “Does that [one finger] means anything to you?” …

[Assistant] Well do you think when they were choosing the crews for the various missions, were the individuals personalities taken into account?


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

[User] I did, but I could see because I had been put on the Command Module track by default even though I trekked down the lunar training vehicle [track] and checked out in the Lunar Module… [NASA] took our Lunar Module away from us to go around the Moon real quick. All that made sense. So I feel extremely fortunate to have been able to participate on man’s first flight away from [our] own planet but I would have traded the last lunar landing for the first flight away from the planet…

[Assistant] Well were you surprised when they made the decision to send Apollo 8 to the Moon?

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] And what were your concerns?

[User] Well my concern was that I was losing my Lunar Module, because if you had your name on the side of the Lunar Module, so to speak, then that meant, unless you screwed up, that you were going to make a lunar landing. When that Lunar Module went away, I could really quickly see the domino effects.

[Assistant] You’d lost those responsibilities.


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

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] And what were your concerns?

[User] Well my concern was that I was losing my Lunar Module, because if you had your name on the side of the Lunar Module, so to speak, then that meant, unless you screwed up, that you were going to make a lunar landing. When that Lunar Module went away, I could really quickly see the domino effects.

[Assistant] You’d lost those responsibilities.

[User] Right and [then] I [became] a Command Module expert and the hook there was that the more expert I became in the Command Module, the more I became welded to the Command Module [and] Command Module guys … don’t land. And my position on the totem pole was such that it was going to have to be Apollo 16, 17, 18, or later when I’d be a commander. … Gene [Eugene A.] Cernan sweated it out, but Gene … also flew [in] Gemini so he had slightly greater number of brownie points. … [I]f I’d have waited [there might have been a chance to land on Apollo [19] or [20]… But … at the time, I didn’t expect [NASA] to go past Apollo 15, given the [public] unrest that was developing over the cost of the space program.

[Assistant] And you had a better feel for that because weren’t you then in Washington?


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

[User] Well my concern was that I was losing my Lunar Module, because if you had your name on the side of the Lunar Module, so to speak, then that meant, unless you screwed up, that you were going to make a lunar landing. When that Lunar Module went away, I could really quickly see the domino effects.

[Assistant] You’d lost those responsibilities.

[User] Right and [then] I [became] a Command Module expert and the hook there was that the more expert I became in the Command Module, the more I became welded to the Command Module [and] Command Module guys … don’t land. And my position on the totem pole was such that it was going to have to be Apollo 16, 17, 18, or later when I’d be a commander. … Gene [Eugene A.] Cernan sweated it out, but Gene … also flew [in] Gemini so he had slightly greater number of brownie points. … [I]f I’d have waited [there might have been a chance to land on Apollo [19] or [20]… But … at the time, I didn’t expect [NASA] to go past Apollo 15, given the [public] unrest that was developing over the cost of the space program.

[Assistant] And you had a better feel for that because weren’t you then in Washington?

[User] I had to make that decision before I went to Washington. Once I went to Washington, … though, I made a deal with the administrator that I could come back [if I so chose I] even got to fly NASA airplanes for five year later, [but I had] pretty much cast my lot of not [landing on the Moon. It was a good call].

[Assistant] Well when I asked about concerns with Apollo 8, those were your personal concerns but did you have personal concerns about the equipment because it was the second time—


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

[User] …[T]hat one [view] is sunk in my head. Then there’s another one I like maybe [and this is] of the first full Earth picture which made it again look very colorful. … [T]o me the significance of this [is that the Moon is] about the size of your fist held at arm’s length … you can imagine … [that at a hundred arms’ lengths the Earth is] down to [the size of] a dust mode. [A]nd, a hundred lunar distances in space are really nothing. You haven’t gone anywhere not even to the next planet. So here was this orb looking like a Christmas tree ornament, very fragile, not [an infinite] expanse [of] granite … [and seemingly of] a physical insignificance and yet it was our home…

[Assistant] Well, was there anything on that flight that you wish could have been accomplished that you, maybe, ran out of time?

[User] In retrospect I wish I would have taken more pictures, but Frank was concerned about whether we were rested or not so he forced Lovell and I to go to sleep which probably made sense. One screw up I did was I used some film that had been designed as ASA 2000, very high speed film, to photograph the Earth’s side of the Moon which was in Earth shine on that flight. … I got them mixed up and … used the Earth shine film on the intense lunar back side and vice versa. But fortunately I confessed to Dick Underwood who was the [NASA photo] guru and they were able to change the chemistry of the development and at least salvage some of [the photos]. But no, we made it up and back and that was our job and so I don’t have any regrets other than what I’ve already articulated about not making a landing…

[Assistant] Mr. Collins was here, of course before, and he said that he felt that it was more significant that your mission had left the Earth than their mission where they had actually landed on another.

[User] I’ve heard that from him and others.

[Assistant] And so I’d like to hear your…


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

[User] In retrospect I wish I would have taken more pictures, but Frank was concerned about whether we were rested or not so he forced Lovell and I to go to sleep which probably made sense. One screw up I did was I used some film that had been designed as ASA 2000, very high speed film, to photograph the Earth’s side of the Moon which was in Earth shine on that flight. … I got them mixed up and … used the Earth shine film on the intense lunar back side and vice versa. But fortunately I confessed to Dick Underwood who was the [NASA photo] guru and they were able to change the chemistry of the development and at least salvage some of [the photos]. But no, we made it up and back and that was our job and so I don’t have any regrets other than what I’ve already articulated about not making a landing…

[Assistant] Mr. Collins was here, of course before, and he said that he felt that it was more significant that your mission had left the Earth than their mission where they had actually landed on another.

[User] I’ve heard that from him and others.

[Assistant] And so I’d like to hear your…

[User] Well I’ve thought about that and I try to be objective. I certainly think it was very significant. I think landing on the Moon was very significant… [W]e were the first to leave our home planet, they were the first to go to … another planet. So even though maybe the lunar landing which was the objective got a lot … more hoopla, I certainly would put them both on the same level. To say that Apollo 8 is more significant, I’m not ready to say that. They were both significant.

[Assistant] What do you feel is your most significant contribution to the space program?


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

[User] I’ve heard that from him and others.

[Assistant] And so I’d like to hear your…

[User] Well I’ve thought about that and I try to be objective. I certainly think it was very significant. I think landing on the Moon was very significant… [W]e were the first to leave our home planet, they were the first to go to … another planet. So even though maybe the lunar landing which was the objective got a lot … more hoopla, I certainly would put them both on the same level. To say that Apollo 8 is more significant, I’m not ready to say that. They were both significant.

[Assistant] What do you feel is your most significant contribution to the space program?

[User] … [W]ell that’s difficult because so many things we did were just a culmination of all the activity and the fact that we happened to be the ones who were there. Maybe taking that picture which had a lot of ecological and philosophical impact at the time. Probably just making sure that the Apollo 8 Command Module and service module worked, not only during the flight but was rung out thoroughly during the tests, which I really had dedicated a tremendous amount of energy to which probably just doing my part in one link in the chain of success of Apollo 8 [in particular and the Apollo program in general].

[Assistant] When you were doing that, you got to go to the factory a lot and talk to all the engineers.


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

[User] Well I’ve thought about that and I try to be objective. I certainly think it was very significant. I think landing on the Moon was very significant… [W]e were the first to leave our home planet, they were the first to go to … another planet. So even though maybe the lunar landing which was the objective got a lot … more hoopla, I certainly would put them both on the same level. To say that Apollo 8 is more significant, I’m not ready to say that. They were both significant.

[Assistant] What do you feel is your most significant contribution to the space program?

[User] … [W]ell that’s difficult because so many things we did were just a culmination of all the activity and the fact that we happened to be the ones who were there. Maybe taking that picture which had a lot of ecological and philosophical impact at the time. Probably just making sure that the Apollo 8 Command Module and service module worked, not only during the flight but was rung out thoroughly during the tests, which I really had dedicated a tremendous amount of energy to which probably just doing my part in one link in the chain of success of Apollo 8 [in particular and the Apollo program in general].

[Assistant] When you were doing that, you got to go to the factory a lot and talk to all the engineers.

[User] To inspect the tests. Yea.

[Assistant] Do you have any memories of that? Were there any particular things that you recommended or suggested that were put into place, did engineers redesign anything?


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

[User] To inspect the tests. Yea.

[Assistant] Do you have any memories of that? Were there any particular things that you recommended or suggested that were put into place, did engineers redesign anything?

[User] Well it was just a continuous dialogue back and forth between me personally or the astronauts as a group or non-astronauts. There was a very good working relationship. The contractor clearly was more interested in doing it right than making a lot of money, although I suppose they did all right. But I don’t remember any issues where things weren’t resolved to my satisfaction whether I thought about them initially or not, so it was a very good. And there wasn’t, particularly prior to the fire and even after the fire there wasn’t, the kind of who shot John aspect that you see in the Shuttle today or who forgot to pull the plug out of the Mir or whatever they did. People now seem to be, maybe it’s the age of the yuppie or something, looking for blame, who can be blamed for this or who can be blamed for that, as opposed to, “Oh, the Mir’s probably pretty good.” Certainly better than nothing. And yet the press focus is on what’s the leak of the day. And we put people in much greater risks, we the United States, down in Antarctica or in airplanes everyday than the astronauts are put at risk in Mir, in my view, and yet the press hasn’t jumped on that. Why did I tell you this, you didn’t ask me about Mir?

[Assistant] No, no, but that’s good, that’s a good point. Because that was going to be one of my later questions was, what do you think NASA’s future is and …

[User] Is that the question now or later?

[Assistant] Well we can do it now since you’re on the subject.


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

[User] What is that?

[Assistant] Well the United Space Alliance.

[User] I got so tired of NASA politics I retired to my island and I fly my P-51 and fish for salmon and I don’t pay much attention anymore.

[Assistant] There’s a new organization that’s been made up of consortium of aerospace companies as the United Space Alliance and they are responsible for the Shuttle. And I think the goal is to privatize the Shuttle. Do you think that’s a good idea or workable?

[User] It basically is a massively uneconomical venture. If you privatize it, it will have to be subsidized in some way. So I can’t imagine that it can be successful in the [truly] private [unclear]. [W]here [is] their money? … Are they willing to buy the thing? [If note, why should the taxpayer?]

[Assistant] Well, that’s the talk.


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

[User] I got so tired of NASA politics I retired to my island and I fly my P-51 and fish for salmon and I don’t pay much attention anymore.

[Assistant] There’s a new organization that’s been made up of consortium of aerospace companies as the United Space Alliance and they are responsible for the Shuttle. And I think the goal is to privatize the Shuttle. Do you think that’s a good idea or workable?

[User] It basically is a massively uneconomical venture. If you privatize it, it will have to be subsidized in some way. So I can’t imagine that it can be successful in the [truly] private [unclear]. [W]here [is] their money? … Are they willing to buy the thing? [If note, why should the taxpayer?]

[Assistant] Well, that’s the talk.

[User] Yeah, well, I mean, are they going to pay for the non-reoccurring costs? If you give me a Cadillac, I can probably afford the gas… So if this alliance is given a massively subsidized, by the taxpayers, capital situation for free, well maybe they can make a success out of it. But I wouldn’t call that a real private activity. If they want to take over the job of the civil servants, who, with all due respect, may be are not as easy to manage as people are in the private sector, … that’s just trading one, sort of, frozen-in bureaucracy versus a somewhat more flexible bureaucracy. Maybe that would work better but that doesn’t mean that it makes sense. I wouldn’t buy stock in it myself. I’ve been asked to be the administrator of NASA three times and I’ve turned it down because I figured they couldn’t stand hearing this so I’m telling you this, more or less, in private. Okay. But that’s what I’d be saying on the hill.

[Assistant] Well then why didn’t you take the job and go ahead.


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

[User] It basically is a massively uneconomical venture. If you privatize it, it will have to be subsidized in some way. So I can’t imagine that it can be successful in the [truly] private [unclear]. [W]here [is] their money? … Are they willing to buy the thing? [If note, why should the taxpayer?]

[Assistant] Well, that’s the talk.

[User] Yeah, well, I mean, are they going to pay for the non-reoccurring costs? If you give me a Cadillac, I can probably afford the gas… So if this alliance is given a massively subsidized, by the taxpayers, capital situation for free, well maybe they can make a success out of it. But I wouldn’t call that a real private activity. If they want to take over the job of the civil servants, who, with all due respect, may be are not as easy to manage as people are in the private sector, … that’s just trading one, sort of, frozen-in bureaucracy versus a somewhat more flexible bureaucracy. Maybe that would work better but that doesn’t mean that it makes sense. I wouldn’t buy stock in it myself. I’ve been asked to be the administrator of NASA three times and I’ve turned it down because I figured they couldn’t stand hearing this so I’m telling you this, more or less, in private. Okay. But that’s what I’d be saying on the hill.

[Assistant] Well then why didn’t you take the job and go ahead.

[User] Because in [Gerald R.] Ford’s day and in George Bush’s day it was clear that [NASA and some politicians] were still mesmerized by the big-deal… I [would have] had to get rid of a lot of people to have it make sense and that’s always a very painful exercise and … maybe I’m too lazy…

[Assistant] How did you end up in Washington state”?


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

[User] A little bit. Yeah.

[Assistant] It gets on your nerves after all these years.

[User] No, I’m particularly bothered when somebody gets an autograph and tries to sell it. I got a real hard nose policy because even one of our lunar landing colleagues sold some stuff that our crew gave him and that really burned me up. I tried to buy it back on the open market. It was a flag that had been to the Moon or around the Moon and autographed by the Apollo 8 crew. Next thing I know, it was for sale. And it even had, I won’t say the name, you might guess who it was, ‘To so and so, thanks for all your help, Frank, Jim and Bill.’ … [T]here’s amazing amount of autograph sellers out there, who use every excuse you can think of to get an autograph. Like, “I’m dying of Cerebral Palsy,” or “I’ve been hit by a train and my last wish is that you give me your [autograph].” My secretary used to keep a record of the addresses versus the stories and there [were] about 100 people who had applied ten times under ten difference aliases with ten different diseases or whatever to try to get the autograph.

[Assistant] We had heard that Ken Mattingly does that too. That he has some database that he checks against all these.

[User] Yeah. I quit doing that, I just quit signing them [at] all unless it’s somebody that I really know [and that it’s] for their own use. But it’s amazing how many of these, ‘Oh, I swear I’ll never sell it,’ type stories end up … in the autograph catalog… One of our colleagues said “Well, okay, if they want to buy them, I’ll sell them.” So he gives them all his canceled checks for fifty cents or something. That has more honor than the other as far as I’m concerned.

[Assistant] Speaking of geriatrics, John Glenn wants to have another mission. Do you think that’s a good idea? Do you?


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

[User] Tuesday through Friday. Friday afternoon [they returned to the base]. Tuesday night, Wednesday night, Thursday night, three nights, and they had a lot to do.

[Assistant] Did you have a debriefing?

[User] Oh, yes, afterwards. The critique afterwards is how we were able to improve the course. All the time. All the [people] that went through the courses are the ones that made it. After each group, from the first group on, at the critique, the debriefing.\n\n Would you like to have a story of one colonel? It’s not particularly germane, and it’s a little shady.

[Assistant] It’s your story.

[User] I had a colonel from the mission chief in Ecuador. His name was Morganti. And I assigned him as the commander of his group. He had, I think, thirty, thirty-three, thirty-five people in that class. We always gave a lecture to the regular classes. We gave it about prison camps or someplace where you’re on your own, and as it proved, that was true in [Vietnam] and places. And I said, “Sometimes the only water you’ll have is urine.” And I said, “If the people are healthy. What makes urine repulsive is its waste materials, and most of it is salt. It is not poisonous unless somebody has some disease.”\n\n Well, that’s rough for our society to take. But Colonel Morganti rose to the occasion at the critique afterwards. He said, “Mr. Smith.” He said, “I’m so glad that you made that lecture about first aid and about the use of water and source of water.” He says, “when you assigned me to organize this group, I had these sergeants doing this and that and the other thing.” And he said, “I overhead one sergeant say to the other, ‘Well, piss on the colonel,’ and I didn’t know he was looking out for my welfare.” [Laughter] That was a common thing to say about your commander.

[Assistant] I can imagine.


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

[User] I will have to give you an answer, the first time you use “I” instead of “we.” I prohibited anybody from even being in the parking lot. This is serious lifesaving training. It’s not a sideshow, and the Air Force general I worked for at the time believed in that, and he put a security policeman [on duty to keep the place secured]. “There will be nobody here except the people immediately involved in training.” He agreed with that, and that’s the way we did it.

[Assistant] Did you ever have any of the press corps volunteer to go through your survival training to understand it?

[User]
All of them did. And a year or so later, I think all of them did. We had the Washington press corps down there, and they all went out into the rainforest, and we put them in a dugout canoe. We almost drowned them in rough water crossing the lake [on the way out]. They went through reality, and the press clippings that I have in my mementoes attest to the fact that they thought they went through a rough time and they survived and they were so proud of themselves. [Yes], we had them, and they respected [all of the Panamanian survival instructors].\n\n I will say this, there was none of this business like the Princess Diana thing and so on, chasing. Oh, sure, they wanted to be there. But when I told them why not, we had no problem whatsoever.

What about other NASA officials or NASA medical people that somewhat traveled with the astronauts? Did you train them as well?

No.

[Assistant] They had to go wait someplace else?

[User] They could go twiddle their thumbs and sit in the Officers’ Club and drink coffee. The people who did come were very respectful, as were the press corps, [although they] were very interested. No, I was going to say we did have one or two people who went into the field but did not go through the training. They were nice people. I have no negatives at all.

[Assistant] How many sets of astronaut survival camps did you have?


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

[User]
All of them did. And a year or so later, I think all of them did. We had the Washington press corps down there, and they all went out into the rainforest, and we put them in a dugout canoe. We almost drowned them in rough water crossing the lake [on the way out]. They went through reality, and the press clippings that I have in my mementoes attest to the fact that they thought they went through a rough time and they survived and they were so proud of themselves. [Yes], we had them, and they respected [all of the Panamanian survival instructors].\n\n I will say this, there was none of this business like the Princess Diana thing and so on, chasing. Oh, sure, they wanted to be there. But when I told them why not, we had no problem whatsoever.

What about other NASA officials or NASA medical people that somewhat traveled with the astronauts? Did you train them as well?

No.

[Assistant] They had to go wait someplace else?

[User] They could go twiddle their thumbs and sit in the Officers’ Club and drink coffee. The people who did come were very respectful, as were the press corps, [although they] were very interested. No, I was going to say we did have one or two people who went into the field but did not go through the training. They were nice people. I have no negatives at all.

[Assistant] How many sets of astronaut survival camps did you have?

[User] Three. You mean how many times?

[Assistant] How many times did they—


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

[User] They could go twiddle their thumbs and sit in the Officers’ Club and drink coffee. The people who did come were very respectful, as were the press corps, [although they] were very interested. No, I was going to say we did have one or two people who went into the field but did not go through the training. They were nice people. I have no negatives at all.

[Assistant] How many sets of astronaut survival camps did you have?

[User] Three. You mean how many times?

[Assistant] How many times did they—

[User] Three different times. Mercury, Gemini, and then Apollo.

[Assistant] Did you find any differences or do anything different?


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

[User] Three. You mean how many times?

[Assistant] How many times did they—

[User] Three different times. Mercury, Gemini, and then Apollo.

[Assistant] Did you find any differences or do anything different?

[User] No. They all needed the same type of training. Mostly they needed to know that a tropical jungle or rainforest is a friendly place. If you treat it well, meet it as a neutral entity, you’re fine.

[Assistant] What were your observations on how well the astronauts worked together in that group? I know you said you split them up in pairs, but when they were all together, did you have any observations?


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

[User] Three different times. Mercury, Gemini, and then Apollo.

[Assistant] Did you find any differences or do anything different?

[User] No. They all needed the same type of training. Mostly they needed to know that a tropical jungle or rainforest is a friendly place. If you treat it well, meet it as a neutral entity, you’re fine.

[Assistant] What were your observations on how well the astronauts worked together in that group? I know you said you split them up in pairs, but when they were all together, did you have any observations?

[User] Yes, we had observations there. Sure, there’s competition, and it was all that we—and I say we because my instructors all reported to me about it. What we saw was cooperative competition. And I realize that there’s different opinions and different personalities. We saw that. But I think we [coined] a term: it’s cooperative competition.

[Assistant] Did the critiques differ between the groups? Different comments?


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

[User] No. They all needed the same type of training. Mostly they needed to know that a tropical jungle or rainforest is a friendly place. If you treat it well, meet it as a neutral entity, you’re fine.

[Assistant] What were your observations on how well the astronauts worked together in that group? I know you said you split them up in pairs, but when they were all together, did you have any observations?

[User] Yes, we had observations there. Sure, there’s competition, and it was all that we—and I say we because my instructors all reported to me about it. What we saw was cooperative competition. And I realize that there’s different opinions and different personalities. We saw that. But I think we [coined] a term: it’s cooperative competition.

[Assistant] Did the critiques differ between the groups? Different comments?

[User] Oh, yes, sometimes. Some of them, yes. And a lot of them based their critiques on their personal experiences, Hollywood movies, and you could read that into the critiques, sure. I don’t recall any negative critiques. There were different levels of positivity on the critiques.\n\n Take Ed [Edward H.] White [II], for example. He was an outdoorsman and worked in South Florida in the Everglades as a young fellow. Oh, man, he reveled in [jungle training]. He wanted my job. I did not want his. [Laughter] He was absolutely [great], so we communicated and stayed in touch and corresponded. So did Pete Conrad and I. Of course, Pete was a motorcycle rider, and I had been, too. But there was a lot of sameness in a lot of those guys and a lot of what I did as an individual, my personal life. But their competition, for the most part that I saw, was healthy, in my opinion.

[Assistant] What did they say to you that they found the most challenging part of being out there for that week?


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

[User] Yes, we had observations there. Sure, there’s competition, and it was all that we—and I say we because my instructors all reported to me about it. What we saw was cooperative competition. And I realize that there’s different opinions and different personalities. We saw that. But I think we [coined] a term: it’s cooperative competition.

[Assistant] Did the critiques differ between the groups? Different comments?

[User] Oh, yes, sometimes. Some of them, yes. And a lot of them based their critiques on their personal experiences, Hollywood movies, and you could read that into the critiques, sure. I don’t recall any negative critiques. There were different levels of positivity on the critiques.\n\n Take Ed [Edward H.] White [II], for example. He was an outdoorsman and worked in South Florida in the Everglades as a young fellow. Oh, man, he reveled in [jungle training]. He wanted my job. I did not want his. [Laughter] He was absolutely [great], so we communicated and stayed in touch and corresponded. So did Pete Conrad and I. Of course, Pete was a motorcycle rider, and I had been, too. But there was a lot of sameness in a lot of those guys and a lot of what I did as an individual, my personal life. But their competition, for the most part that I saw, was healthy, in my opinion.

[Assistant] What did they say to you that they found the most challenging part of being out there for that week?

[User] Their previous “expert” knowledge of a tropical jungle. “Smith’s right. This is a park. Let’s have a picnic in the park.” See, Pete Conrad went twice. He came with the first group, and he came also as the escort for the Gemini people, of which he was one, too. He went through it twice because he requested it. I thought that was a great feather in our cap.

[Assistant] Did they have any suggestions for you on how you could improve or enhance your training, or did they all feel pretty well trained when they walked out of here?


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

[User] Their previous “expert” knowledge of a tropical jungle. “Smith’s right. This is a park. Let’s have a picnic in the park.” See, Pete Conrad went twice. He came with the first group, and he came also as the escort for the Gemini people, of which he was one, too. He went through it twice because he requested it. I thought that was a great feather in our cap.

[Assistant] Did they have any suggestions for you on how you could improve or enhance your training, or did they all feel pretty well trained when they walked out of here?

[User] They thought it was applied very well toward what they understood their mission would be and should there be an abort or something over some of the areas of the tropical rainforest or tropical ocean, because you couldn’t train in our training area without getting a lot of water training, besides what they had at the Air Force water survival school down in Florida. They recognized what their duties were and that this was just something to give them more confidence. They didn’t have to worry about it anymore. We got that from their critiques. After they go through the training, they didn’t worry about that. “Let’s get on with what our profession is,” modular work and so on.

[Assistant] Did the first group go back and tell stories to the second and third groups?

[User] Apparently so, because we were zeroed in on that. The first thing I remember the second group was, of course, Pete was with them, “When are we going to do Panama City?”\n\n “Guys, keep quiet. We can’t talk about that. You’ll have the State Department down my neck. The ambassador’s over there watching.” Yes, I remember very distinctly. [Laughs]

[Assistant] Well, the first group had no idea what they’d be going through. I was just wondering if that—


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

[User] They thought it was applied very well toward what they understood their mission would be and should there be an abort or something over some of the areas of the tropical rainforest or tropical ocean, because you couldn’t train in our training area without getting a lot of water training, besides what they had at the Air Force water survival school down in Florida. They recognized what their duties were and that this was just something to give them more confidence. They didn’t have to worry about it anymore. We got that from their critiques. After they go through the training, they didn’t worry about that. “Let’s get on with what our profession is,” modular work and so on.

[Assistant] Did the first group go back and tell stories to the second and third groups?

[User] Apparently so, because we were zeroed in on that. The first thing I remember the second group was, of course, Pete was with them, “When are we going to do Panama City?”\n\n “Guys, keep quiet. We can’t talk about that. You’ll have the State Department down my neck. The ambassador’s over there watching.” Yes, I remember very distinctly. [Laughs]

[Assistant] Well, the first group had no idea what they’d be going through. I was just wondering if that—

[User] Oh, yes, there was that back-channel intel [intelligence] type of things. What we did was change the exact spot. I’d say, “Oh, you guys, you’re in for a real treat. You’re going to virgin territory, virgin rainforest.” And then they’d make some caustic jokes about that….

[Assistant] Did the first group know that the Indians were observing them? Did you ever tell them that even at the end of the training?


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

[User] Apparently so, because we were zeroed in on that. The first thing I remember the second group was, of course, Pete was with them, “When are we going to do Panama City?”\n\n “Guys, keep quiet. We can’t talk about that. You’ll have the State Department down my neck. The ambassador’s over there watching.” Yes, I remember very distinctly. [Laughs]

[Assistant] Well, the first group had no idea what they’d be going through. I was just wondering if that—

[User] Oh, yes, there was that back-channel intel [intelligence] type of things. What we did was change the exact spot. I’d say, “Oh, you guys, you’re in for a real treat. You’re going to virgin territory, virgin rainforest.” And then they’d make some caustic jokes about that….

[Assistant] Did the first group know that the Indians were observing them? Did you ever tell them that even at the end of the training?

[User] Yes, at the end of the training. And during the training, the cross-cultural communication thing was an essential part of the training, was they had to know that people of a remote rainforest area, depending on how you met them, it would be friendly. Because their questions were, “Well, what about the headhunters? What about the cannibals?” And we got those questions and were able to, I think, satisfactorily resolve those questions.

[Assistant] Let me take you to Houston. You said you helped prepare a kit, a survival kit, for the capsule.


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

[User] Oh, yes, there was that back-channel intel [intelligence] type of things. What we did was change the exact spot. I’d say, “Oh, you guys, you’re in for a real treat. You’re going to virgin territory, virgin rainforest.” And then they’d make some caustic jokes about that….

[Assistant] Did the first group know that the Indians were observing them? Did you ever tell them that even at the end of the training?

[User] Yes, at the end of the training. And during the training, the cross-cultural communication thing was an essential part of the training, was they had to know that people of a remote rainforest area, depending on how you met them, it would be friendly. Because their questions were, “Well, what about the headhunters? What about the cannibals?” And we got those questions and were able to, I think, satisfactorily resolve those questions.

[Assistant] Let me take you to Houston. You said you helped prepare a kit, a survival kit, for the capsule.

[User] Well, survival equipment.

[Assistant] Could you share with us what some of those items were and why you felt they were essential?


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

[User] Yes, at the end of the training. And during the training, the cross-cultural communication thing was an essential part of the training, was they had to know that people of a remote rainforest area, depending on how you met them, it would be friendly. Because their questions were, “Well, what about the headhunters? What about the cannibals?” And we got those questions and were able to, I think, satisfactorily resolve those questions.

[Assistant] Let me take you to Houston. You said you helped prepare a kit, a survival kit, for the capsule.

[User] Well, survival equipment.

[Assistant] Could you share with us what some of those items were and why you felt they were essential?

[User] Well, the main thing was the little machete with a twelve-inch blade, and it had saw teeth on the back of it for cutting through a lot of cables and fabrics and plastics that were in the capsules.\n\n Excuse me, could you give me [a moment].

[Assistant] Sure, that’s fine.\n\n [Tape interruption]


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

[User] Well, survival equipment.

[Assistant] Could you share with us what some of those items were and why you felt they were essential?

[User] Well, the main thing was the little machete with a twelve-inch blade, and it had saw teeth on the back of it for cutting through a lot of cables and fabrics and plastics that were in the capsules.\n\n Excuse me, could you give me [a moment].

[Assistant] Sure, that’s fine.\n\n [Tape interruption]

[User] Okay.

[Assistant] We’re talking about the kit that you helped put together.


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

[User] In the astronaut portion of the training, I can’t recall any. If you consider John Glenn dropping off in the mud, and he made that humorous. No, I don’t recall. We had a few thorns. People got something in their finger or in their hand. But they were highly motivated and well behaved, and when you have motivation like they had, and intellect, they came there with some of the Hollywood ideas about a jungle, this tropical rainforest, but also there were some topnotch scholars.

[Assistant] Several years later you heard what they were doing, because they were moving along in the space program and traveling to space and to the Moon. What were your thoughts of where they were then compared to where they were with you just a few years before?

[User] I was sitting in a mobile home of a friend in Alabama, watching the TV when Neil did his thing. Pride. “We did it.” [Smith cries.]

[Assistant] It was a different type of terrain than one you had helped him walk through, wasn’t it?

[User] Yes. But they had worked in Bolivia in the Atacama in our territory, which I had made that recommendation that NASA try that, and they did.

[Assistant] And what a great bond between the Indians, with their spirits going to the Moon and knowing that your training connected that.


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

[User] I was sitting in a mobile home of a friend in Alabama, watching the TV when Neil did his thing. Pride. “We did it.” [Smith cries.]

[Assistant] It was a different type of terrain than one you had helped him walk through, wasn’t it?

[User] Yes. But they had worked in Bolivia in the Atacama in our territory, which I had made that recommendation that NASA try that, and they did.

[Assistant] And what a great bond between the Indians, with their spirits going to the Moon and knowing that your training connected that.

[User] Oh, let me tell you, the pride I have and the emotion, every one of those instructors has the same thing. Yeah, they’re great, and they all feel, as I know, that we all had a part of it. And it wasn’t such a small part, because NASA wanted to know, “Is there anybody that you’ve observed that we shouldn’t have in the program?” Because they were in real danger.\n\n And I tell you who lived up to that, is Apollo 13. They weren’t in a jungle, but they were surviving. The phone call I got after that was, “We didn’t worry about it,” because in the survival training you not only emphasize tropical rainforest that they were going to have an experience in, but also the general term in itself—self-confidence. “We can handle it.” Most important in that was that they would be able to handle anything that hit them. I remember telling my wife and the other people around me, on Apollo 13’s little adventure, “Don’t sweat it. They will improvise.” And they did.

[Assistant]
Jennifer, do you have any questions you’d like to ask?

I have a couple of questions. I’m wondering if you can tell us exactly where the tropical survival school was, because you had mentioned that you weren’t allowed to go into Panama, but much of the training was in Panama and they worked with the different native American groups. Was it on the Air Force base? Or did it change?


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

[User] No.

[Assistant] Okay.

[User] That’s new on me.

[Assistant] All right.

[User] The stew they made, that’s not quite the word they used. Gun was not. [Laughter]

[Assistant] Maybe that’s why you don’t remember.


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

[User] That’s new on me.

[Assistant] All right.

[User] The stew they made, that’s not quite the word they used. Gun was not. [Laughter]

[Assistant] Maybe that’s why you don’t remember.

[User] That’s why, I’m sure, I don’t remember it. [Laughter]

[Assistant] That was the polite term for it?


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

[User] The stew they made, that’s not quite the word they used. Gun was not. [Laughter]

[Assistant] Maybe that’s why you don’t remember.

[User] That’s why, I’m sure, I don’t remember it. [Laughter]

[Assistant] That was the polite term for it?

[User] Yeah. They would drop an old snake in the stew or something. It wasn’t gun. But anyhow, I think that’s probably what you’re talking about.

[Assistant] Well, thank you very much.


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

[User] That’s why, I’m sure, I don’t remember it. [Laughter]

[Assistant] That was the polite term for it?

[User] Yeah. They would drop an old snake in the stew or something. It wasn’t gun. But anyhow, I think that’s probably what you’re talking about.

[Assistant] Well, thank you very much.

[User] Well, thank you very much for coming.

[Assistant] Before we close, I wanted to ask you, when you were working with this program or providing this program for the astronauts and for NASA, what do you consider to be the most challenging part of this program and its success for you?


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

[User] Well, thank you very much for coming.

[Assistant] Before we close, I wanted to ask you, when you were working with this program or providing this program for the astronauts and for NASA, what do you consider to be the most challenging part of this program and its success for you?

[User] For us at the school?

[Assistant] Yes.

[User] The most challenging part was administrative, getting the Air Force hierarchy to leave us alone. We knew our business. We weren’t going to endanger those people, but they were not going to get any special treatment. And do you know what? I told those guys that. [They (astronauts) wanted no special treatment.]\n\n [Tape recorder turned off.]

[Assistant] So if you’ll just walk us through a typical one and what you put them through.


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

[User] For us at the school?

[Assistant] Yes.

[User] The most challenging part was administrative, getting the Air Force hierarchy to leave us alone. We knew our business. We weren’t going to endanger those people, but they were not going to get any special treatment. And do you know what? I told those guys that. [They (astronauts) wanted no special treatment.]\n\n [Tape recorder turned off.]

[Assistant] So if you’ll just walk us through a typical one and what you put them through.

[User] A day in the training.

[Assistant] A day in the training and what type of equipment they had and the types of things that they had to go through during those few days out in the tropical rainforest.


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

[User] Happy to. [I know you are looking for anecdotes and stories from our NASA experience, and that you will lead or elicit these with questions. If it’s okay with you, I will feel free to digress into stories as they occur along with answering your questions.]

[Assistant] [Sure.] I’d like to begin by asking you what your interest was in aviation and engineering as a child.

[User] As a child, engineering was just something I always tended to gravitate to. It’s where my interest lied. I remember repairing bicycles, repairing toys and trinkets, taking things apart and putting them back together again. I ended up growing up on a farm in Rhode Island and that type of a talent was needed. There was always a use for somebody to go fix things, and I enjoy[ed] doing that.\n\n I went to West Point [the United States Military Academy, New York], where the engineering definitely got reinforced. [I] got into aviation on my second tour in Vietnam, and that’s when I decided that aviation is where I wanted to be, and to maximize that, I applied for the Navy Test Pilot School. It’s one of the Army programs. Got accepted to that, and then it was pretty much of a natural step to apply to the astronaut program.

[Assistant] When did you find out that they were actually going to be selecting astronauts for the 1980 class?

[User] [I got the word while stationed in Korea about January 1980.] I [had been] a test pilot at Edwards [Air Force Base, California] when the ’78 class was picked. Bob [Robert L.] Stewart, one of my good friends that preceded me in the ’78 class, got picked up in that group, and I kept pretty good contact with Bob to see how things went and what the process was. I was in Korea getting what we called regreened [when the class of 1980 selection began]. … So I applied while I was in Korea, and then I got invited to come back and do the interview, from Korea, which was quite a thrill.

[Assistant] Can you tell us about the interview process itself?


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

[User] I don’t remember exactly what I said, but the theme was that I think the challenge of mankind, going into space, is such a wonderful opportunity that I am so privileged to be alive during this period of history when we’re doing that, and that it would be such a privilege to be allowed to be part of something so big, so wonderful, so grand. I don’t know if that’s what got me in there or helped a little bit or not. I think you can blow it one of those, but not make it just on that. … But I believe[d it then], and I still feel I was very, very privileged to have been part of [the nation’s space program].

[Assistant] And where were you when George Abbey called you?

[User] I was in Tucson, Arizona. I had just come back from Korea and I was en route to my next [Army] assignment, Fort Monmouth, New Jersey. And George called and said, “Well, we wondered if you’re still interested in the job.”\n\n “Wow! Yes, of course I am.” So I diverted from Fort Monmouth, New Jersey, to Houston, Texas, and got all my household goods changed in [to] final destination, and that was it.

[Assistant] What did your family think when you told them you were going to be an astronaut?

[User] Oh, they were excited for me. I was away from my mom and dad and brothers and sisters, but my wife was there and she was certainly excited. It had been something that they knew was a goal or a dream; they were delighted for me.

[Assistant] Why don’t you tell me a little bit about astronaut training and the first few months of being in the Astronaut Office. What are you memories?


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

[User] That sounds right. You probably know more than I do right now [about which missions I worked when].

[Assistant] Do you have any memories of any of those missions or any of your time at the Cape?

[User] Oh, a lot of memories. The one thing about the NASA family was that everybody—I think everybody—shares the dream about space. For some people it’s a job, but it’s also a job that leads to a pretty cool mission. Working with the technicians, just being able to go into the high bay or into the Orbiter processing facility and see this [big beautiful] spaceship there [was a thrill]. This is really a spaceship. You know, that’s magic. To me, it’s magic.\n\n [There are lots of impressions and memories. On a foggy day at KSC], Vance [D.] Brand took [a] picture of the Shuttle rolling out on the launch platform, and it’s just all foggy. I remember being in the vertical assembly building when we opened the doors for [the stack] to go out. [These doors are one hundred plus feet tall] and just fog just rolled in like it was a movie set. Everything is so [much] bigger than life, almost surrealistic, and [the fog] just made it twice as much so. I just remember [thinking], “Oh, wow.” It is just so cool being around these big monster vehicles that are going to go to space. It really is bigger than life. … Every American ought to see a launch, by the way [an experience what goes on at NASA].

[Assistant] I would love to.

[User] You should.

[Assistant] It’s one of the things on my list.


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

[User] Oh, a lot of memories. The one thing about the NASA family was that everybody—I think everybody—shares the dream about space. For some people it’s a job, but it’s also a job that leads to a pretty cool mission. Working with the technicians, just being able to go into the high bay or into the Orbiter processing facility and see this [big beautiful] spaceship there [was a thrill]. This is really a spaceship. You know, that’s magic. To me, it’s magic.\n\n [There are lots of impressions and memories. On a foggy day at KSC], Vance [D.] Brand took [a] picture of the Shuttle rolling out on the launch platform, and it’s just all foggy. I remember being in the vertical assembly building when we opened the doors for [the stack] to go out. [These doors are one hundred plus feet tall] and just fog just rolled in like it was a movie set. Everything is so [much] bigger than life, almost surrealistic, and [the fog] just made it twice as much so. I just remember [thinking], “Oh, wow.” It is just so cool being around these big monster vehicles that are going to go to space. It really is bigger than life. … Every American ought to see a launch, by the way [an experience what goes on at NASA].

[Assistant] I would love to.

[User] You should.

[Assistant] It’s one of the things on my list.

[User] Yes. Well, hopefully, we’ll get started again and you’ll be able to.

[Assistant] Let me ask you about your class. Your classmates called themselves the “Needless Nineteen.” Can you tell me who coined that phrase?


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

[User] You should.

[Assistant] It’s one of the things on my list.

[User] Yes. Well, hopefully, we’ll get started again and you’ll be able to.

[Assistant] Let me ask you about your class. Your classmates called themselves the “Needless Nineteen.” Can you tell me who coined that phrase?

[User] I don’t recall that. No, I [really] don’t recall that. I mean, there was the TFNG, which Thirty-Five New Guys, which was in ’78. … [We knew we were the new guys, the last on the list. There were about fifty people ahead of us in line for a flight.] If you recall, the Shuttle hadn’t even flown yet, and [NASA] brought in thirty-five folks for the class of ’78. There was already a herd of probably forty or fifty folks already sitting in the Astronaut Office, waiting for their turn, and then they piled on, really, twenty-one, nineteen U.S. and two of the foreign folks in our class, to just jump into the waiting line. [We found a way to help.]\n\n I remember a couple folks saying that, “I’m not sure what we’re going to do with you all.” But there were more than enough jobs to put us all to useful work pretty quickly. Some of our guys turned out to be real workhorses to keep the [NASA or the Astronaut Office] going, like Jerry [L.] Ross.

[Assistant] I’ve also heard that you were the Astronaut Office expert on EVA [Extravehicular Activity]. Can you talk to us about that?


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

[User] Oh, she was happy for me. She was just happy for me. I guess she had some concerns, but [I] pretty well overrode those. I mean, that’s what we were there for. In the early days, NASA chose a fairly high percentage of test pilots, folks who kind of enjoyed being on the edge just a little bit, [and who] understood the risks and wanted them. That was just part of the thrill of it, really.\n\n Anyway, we got constituted as a crew and Brewster brought us together [as a team]. Of that crew, really, all but Mary Cleave were experimental test pilots or experimental-trained. Jerry Ross was not a pilot, but he still went through the Air Force Test Pilot School [as a flight test engineer]. So we made Mary the flight engineer. Have you already interviewed Mary?

[Assistant] Yes, we have.

[User] Yes, so she would have told you that, too. [Making her the flight engineer] got the maximum strength out of the entire crew. We backed Mary up at first, when she was learning systems, because if you’re not an aviator, some of the aviation things are not instinctive for you. But by the time we were ready fly—actually quite a while before we ready to fly—Mary was a tiger and had it all down pat, and then Jerry and I got to learn other disciplines [like satellite launch and EVA]. It was really a good combination.

[Assistant] Now, your flight actually changed a couple of times. You were originally assigned to 51-D.

[User] Oh, yes.

[Assistant] Then to 51-L and then finally 61-B. How did all these changes and payload changes affect your training?


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

[User] Oh, yeah. I can't imagine that. But that was the solution, for us to fly more than the prescribed number of days we had originally planned. There was a literal problem.\n\n The thing that had to be managed then were the storage lockers in the Apollo command module, where you had stuff tied down and packaged and so forth. There was a lady that worked for Crew Systems Division, and I don't remember her name, but she was, I believe, a clinical nutritionist. She may have been an M.D., but I think she was a nutritionist. I remember in the review meeting we had where she produced one of these—I call them breakfast bars. [Laughter] It was like, oh, my God, these guys are going to eat these things for 100 days, three meals a day? I think they had other food interspersed, but I think that was the bulk of their diet.

[Assistant] Wow.

[User] Oh, that was incredible.

[Assistant] Some dedication there.

[User] Yes. You had to really want to fly in space to do that. [Laughter]\n\n That and changing the duration of the mission. We were pretty well along the way at that one question by Chris Kraft saying, "Why the hell are we flying another fifty-six-day mission after the second mission?" That and the conflict with prime television time were a couple of our real challenges. [Laughter]

[Assistant] Quite interesting challenges, at least.


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

[User] Oh, that was incredible.

[Assistant] Some dedication there.

[User] Yes. You had to really want to fly in space to do that. [Laughter]\n\n That and changing the duration of the mission. We were pretty well along the way at that one question by Chris Kraft saying, "Why the hell are we flying another fifty-six-day mission after the second mission?" That and the conflict with prime television time were a couple of our real challenges. [Laughter]

[Assistant] Quite interesting challenges, at least.

[User] [You think] mission planning has to do with trajectories and astrophysics and everything? No, it was other considerations.

[Assistant] TV and candy bars.


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

[User] Yes. You had to really want to fly in space to do that. [Laughter]\n\n That and changing the duration of the mission. We were pretty well along the way at that one question by Chris Kraft saying, "Why the hell are we flying another fifty-six-day mission after the second mission?" That and the conflict with prime television time were a couple of our real challenges. [Laughter]

[Assistant] Quite interesting challenges, at least.

[User] [You think] mission planning has to do with trajectories and astrophysics and everything? No, it was other considerations.

[Assistant] TV and candy bars.

[User] TV and candy bars. Right.

[Assistant] Looking at Skylab and the missions as they flew, and even the planning and building up to the missions, what lessons can be learned from Skylab that either were or should be applied to future programs?


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

[User] I can go another half an hour longer.

[Assistant] Would that work?

[User] Yes. How about you?

[Assistant] That's fine with me. We could tie off a little bit about the Shuttle at that point, if that works.

[User] Sure.

[Assistant] As Skylab—you mentioned some of the aspects of Skylab that could apply to Shuttle, and Skylab had its three successful missions. Apollo-Soyuz came along, but Shuttle was in development throughout this whole time frame. How did you first become involved in the Shuttle Program?


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

[User] Yes. I think the buildings are going once again back to the county or to the school district or something. I don't know. I think those are government-owned buildings and facilities. A lot of plants that go back to World War II, where the federal government went in and built factories, the government owns the land and the buildings. In fact, where the Shuttle external tanks are built in Michoud [Assembly Facility, New Orleans, Louisiana], that goes back to World War II as a large tank production facility, and after the war they had this big, big building under one roof, and they ended up making the tanks there.

[Assistant] That's an interesting bit of history, too.

[User] Well armed for Trivia Pursuit. [Laughter]

[Assistant] That's right.

[User] If you still play that.

[Assistant] Absolutely. During mission control and the Mercury and the Gemini and Apollo and Skylab, you were involved in all this. You talked some about how with Skylab you vamped up the computers in the Control Center. For Shuttle and for the computers on board Shuttle, and even in the Mission Control, it was so different than what happened on the earlier programs. What were some of the differences there, and were you involved in any of that?


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

[User] I think because in 2006 Constellation [Program] was so big here at the Johnson Space Center, I couldn’t keep that out of my mind. All I kept thinking is, “We need something either to test a vehicle or to test a planetary hab [habitation] module.” Those were on our mind.\n\n Interestingly enough, because the system is so robust and capable, we used all that to test James Webb. Especially on some of the pathfinder testing, which I know you had a question about testing things like that. If they had done those tests at Goddard, they probably would have been like 200-day tests to be able to achieve the temperatures and perform anything. We did them in 30 days, because we have the ability to take on a higher heat load and have a better thermal, stable environment.\n\n People were going, “We could actually create a Martian atmosphere and test things at really cold.”\n\n I’m like, “We absolutely can.” This chamber is not limited to creating a 20 K deep-space environment for James Webb. If we wanted to do polar simulation of Mars or one of its moons, we could create that in that chamber.\n\n So that was on our mind, to get back to your original question. Yes, I always want to make sure we’re doing things that are flexible and looking to the future. I really thought at the time Orion and Constellation would be doing some type of testing in the facilities post-James Webb, but unfortunately they’re not.

[Assistant] We’ll see what happens, we’ve still got Orion and some other programs going.

[User] Yes. They’re actually getting ready to test in another facility.

[Assistant] Oh, that’s too bad.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] I wanted to just clarify. You mentioned Jacobs was doing this. They were in charge of actually building most of what you put in there?


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

[User] Yes. They’re actually getting ready to test in another facility.

[Assistant] Oh, that’s too bad.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] I wanted to just clarify. You mentioned Jacobs was doing this. They were in charge of actually building most of what you put in there?

[User] We used the engineering contract here at Johnson and Jacobs to really provide the ability to get the contracts let and do the implementation and integration project management for the chamber modification. It was a huge thing for them. For a lot of the systems, myself, and people from the Department of Energy were writing all the requirements for them or reviewing and essentially worked hand-in-hand trying to maintain.\n\n I had a certain amount of budget with some stuff that of course the Jacobs people didn’t see. You’re trying to see their budget and how they’re managing it, and hopefully you’re not using your reserve for their problems just yet. But they did the heavy lifting, I would always say. At times we had 200 people working modifying the chamber. The chamber is filled with scaffolding; the building is filled. We had built a tent behind us, and we put air-conditioning in because we had so many people. We needed a place for people to eat lunch and take breaks, because we had welders and machinists and pipe fabricators.\n\n There were, at times, I would say five or six different contractors working. Cryogenic piping companies that were out of Minnesota, two or three local pipe fitters that were from the Houston area. We had the shroud companies that were from the Boston area that were all working and had very specialized fields, companies from Ohio that really dealt with our vacuum systems and pumps. We had to coordinate that and make sure people weren’t working on top of each other.\n\n We helped with that, but really I think Jacobs was the one who let the contracts out for all the subcontracts. But even I would review the proposals and verify that it met the requirements that I had placed down and out.

[Assistant] Was there anything made in-house that you used?


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

[User] No, not really.

[Assistant] Okay.

[User] It’s the same everyday stuff that you have in any job.

[Assistant] How about turning points in your NARA career? Any significant turning points—maybe you found yourself in a different place than you thought you’d be when you first came to NARA.

[User] Well when I first came to NARA I didn’t expect to be the renovation project manager. I expected to be in charge of Facilities and working with that but I fully thought other people would be involved with that. On completion of the renovation I moved to—a short time as Director of Space and Security and then finally to Adrienne Thomas’ Deputy position. They were all great positions. One of the continuities that we have is the fact that throughout the entire time I’ve been at NARA Adrienne Thomas either was the Deputy Assistant Archivist or the Assistant Archivist [for Administration]. And it was just a great pleasure working for her and how she set an agenda and allowed me to work within that agenda to achieve whatever I have achieved.

[Assistant] Pat, you have a deep career background from the Navy, through Proctor and Gamble, et cetera. You’ve been exposed to different management philosophies or styles. Is there anything that NARA can learn that it isn’t doing at current from those exposures that you’ve had.


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

[User] Well, I don't know. I guess. It’s a lot of luck. I just have lucked out and been in some fascinating things. I guess anything is what you make it.

[Assistant] Did you ever make it down for a launch?

[User] Not in Apollo, no. I never saw a Saturn; I was always here during launch. I was with NASA for 34 years, and in my 34 years I saw one launch and it was Shuttle launch. Since I've been with USA now, I have a console in the firing room and I go down for every launch. I've even lost count of how many I've seen now. But yes, I would have loved to have seen a Saturn launch, but never got to.

[Assistant] You mentioned about so many of the flights having so many similarities. But were there a lot of differences from one mission to another in the LM?

[User] Yes, there were some changes over time. We changed the LM to what they call the Extended LM, where they increased the hover time and increased the stay time, and we added an extra battery to the vehicle so we could stay on the Moon longer. We modified the systems and added that capability to it. Then later, we added the [Lunar] Rover, the little car that we’d take up there, and we had to put that on the vehicle and figure out a way to deploy it. And the science experiments that we carried, every time were always different. Of course, the crews were always different. That was the biggest thing that was different was getting to deal with the different personalities, and that was fun, a great bunch of people.

[Assistant] Any stories come to mind that you can share?


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

[User] No. We had about six or eight pilots that were checked out in the airplane, and so you’d draw a different pilot. There was no telling who you’d be with that day. There were five of us that flew the backseat, that shared the duties. You’d stay at altitude about five to five and a half hours. There was a rule that we inherited from the military that if you fly over five and a half hours in the pressure suits, you can’t fly again for thirty hours. It’s a physiological thing. Whenever we’d go on deployments, we’d take two crews and we’d alternate flying days. If you flew one day, you couldn’t fly the next day. You’d have to stay down. We found out you couldn’t even do that for very many cycles. You could fly about three cycles in a row, where you’d fly every other day for three times, then you were just shot. You’d have to stand down. Never did really know why.

[Assistant] Did you fly often during that time period that you were working there?

[User] Yes, we flew a lot. I was in the program from ’73 to ’79, and I flew over 1,200 hours in the airplane. So you got a lot of good flying in.

[Assistant] Is there a mission or two that’s more memorable than the others?

[User] Well, later in the program there were seven or eight federal agencies in Alaska that pooled their budgets, and they were trying to photo-document the state of Alaska before it started getting all messed up with civilization. They wanted a baseline of what was there, and so we would go up there six weeks every summer and stage out of Elmendorf. We had the NASA U-2 staging out of Fairbanks and we were staging out of Elmendorf in Anchorage, and we were photo mapping the entire state of Alaska. We’d fly wherever the weather would let us fly. We did that every summer. That was fun.

[Assistant] Did you find a lot of changes every time you went back, or was it a lot the same?


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

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Talk about your thoughts. We understand that this was a very almost simplistic proposal. How were you able to move your ideas and thoughts and your expectations into something that was acceptable to NASA, so that you were chosen in that first round [of the COTS competition].

[User] Certainly that was our concern, that we were a very small team, and we were still trying to prove ourselves on the Falcon 1. So we didn’t really have what you’d call “street cred” [credibility] quite yet. I mean, that does help. We had enough to put into a proposal that could show technically that we thought we knew the right direction for a next-generation rocket and a next-generation spacecraft. But we didn’t have the staff and the time yet, frankly, to develop a proposal that was stacks of volumes. It really ended up being, like you said, a very condensed version of what some might think that original proposal may have looked like.\n\n I think if you go back and review it, you’ll find that it has all the technical merit that is needed to see that this company could actually do it. Really that’s what I think got us through that proposal and award selection, is that it had some really good technical content. It was missing some of the things that you might see in the proposals of other companies that had been around doing federal contracts and things like that. It was missing a lot of what you might have seen in other large government contracts, but maybe in one sense that was a good thing, because it cut to the chase on what did we actually propose to do, and a very technical discussion. That was pretty exciting.

[Assistant] Were you involved in answering questions from the evaluation process and the due diligence process?

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Can you share with some of the questions that you received, that they were looking for?


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

[User] Certainly that was our concern, that we were a very small team, and we were still trying to prove ourselves on the Falcon 1. So we didn’t really have what you’d call “street cred” [credibility] quite yet. I mean, that does help. We had enough to put into a proposal that could show technically that we thought we knew the right direction for a next-generation rocket and a next-generation spacecraft. But we didn’t have the staff and the time yet, frankly, to develop a proposal that was stacks of volumes. It really ended up being, like you said, a very condensed version of what some might think that original proposal may have looked like.\n\n I think if you go back and review it, you’ll find that it has all the technical merit that is needed to see that this company could actually do it. Really that’s what I think got us through that proposal and award selection, is that it had some really good technical content. It was missing some of the things that you might see in the proposals of other companies that had been around doing federal contracts and things like that. It was missing a lot of what you might have seen in other large government contracts, but maybe in one sense that was a good thing, because it cut to the chase on what did we actually propose to do, and a very technical discussion. That was pretty exciting.

[Assistant] Were you involved in answering questions from the evaluation process and the due diligence process?

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Can you share with some of the questions that you received, that they were looking for?

[User] I’m not sure I can actually remember specifically. Unfortunately, this was back in 2006.

[Assistant] I know it’s been a few launches ago.


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

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Can you share with some of the questions that you received, that they were looking for?

[User] I’m not sure I can actually remember specifically. Unfortunately, this was back in 2006.

[Assistant] I know it’s been a few launches ago.

[User] I don’t actually remember a specific question, but what I can tell you is people that were reviewing it came from an extensive, very experienced background in launch sites, launch infrastructure, boosters, rockets, and spacecraft. We were certainly faced with a tough challenge to try to answer all of the questions that came to us. I mean, it wasn’t like we had already developed this technology and proven it. We were proposing to finish developing it, and that it would work. There were a lot of very difficult questions, and we did our best to answer them all. Looking back, I think we answered them all through the program, but we probably could not have answered them in the proposal phase to everyone’s satisfaction. Fortunately, we still won the contract.

[Assistant] The [Space Act] Agreement was set up to give you flexibility.


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

[User] I’m not sure I can actually remember specifically. Unfortunately, this was back in 2006.

[Assistant] I know it’s been a few launches ago.

[User] I don’t actually remember a specific question, but what I can tell you is people that were reviewing it came from an extensive, very experienced background in launch sites, launch infrastructure, boosters, rockets, and spacecraft. We were certainly faced with a tough challenge to try to answer all of the questions that came to us. I mean, it wasn’t like we had already developed this technology and proven it. We were proposing to finish developing it, and that it would work. There were a lot of very difficult questions, and we did our best to answer them all. Looking back, I think we answered them all through the program, but we probably could not have answered them in the proposal phase to everyone’s satisfaction. Fortunately, we still won the contract.

[Assistant] The [Space Act] Agreement was set up to give you flexibility.

[User] Absolutely.

[Assistant] There was a Project Exec [Executive] that was assigned to SpaceX from NASA [Michael J. “Mike” Horkachuck] that would help when you needed help, or answer questions. Talk to us about that relationship and how that worked. What were the benefits, but maybe also the restrictions of working in that type of environment?


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

[User] Crashed into Canada, yes.

[Assistant] Crashed into Canada with radioactive debris. People were a little concerned about Skylab since the orbital path crossed 90 percent of inhabitable areas in the world. You were relatively young at that time, and I know sometimes when we’ve talked to people in mission control during Apollo, they were so focused on what they were doing, they didn’t even know what was going on in the rest of the world. Was it like that for you, too? Were you aware?

[User] I would say we were aware. Because you could see the press articles, and you’d see people running around with funny crash helmets. But we knew the capability of the spacecraft, and we knew that the ability to really influence was pretty small. Having done the studies of the teleoperator retrieval system earlier, from my recollection we had picked orbits to actually do a controlled reentry. Skylab picked one of those orbits to come in on. The orbit that at the endgame she was aimed for was pretty much straight down the center of the Atlantic Ocean. There were uncertainty bounds on that, on the “if she comes in early” kind of bounds; it was still over the continental U.S. and Canada. Tumbling the spacecraft was meant to shift the midpoint a little bit into the South Atlantic so that you didn’t have the inhabited northeast United States and Canada under the track.\n\n But the orbit, as it became clear a few days out, it would have been hard to really pick a better orbit that covered that much ocean and that little inhabited ground. As it turned out, the best I can recall from those days is that the spacecraft actually held together longer than the engineering projections. That’s why some of the components did land in Australia, out in the relative Outback.

[Assistant] It was expected by the time it got over eastern U.S. to start coming apart, and it didn’t.

[User] Yes, it was expected to come apart and it hung together a little bit longer than the engineering analyses said.

[Assistant] Was there a little breath holding?