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

[User] There is no treatment. And unfortunately, even in the States it’s been really difficult to find a doctor. Mefloquine toxicity doesn't exist in the medical literature yet. If you talk to the VA, if you talk to former military doctors, I'm in touch with a former military physician and a former Army psychiatrist. And they're, you know, they're very well read on mefloquine toxicity. And they've done quite a few studies about it and have published literature on it. So they've been incredibly supportive. It's interesting, the military community is incredibly supportive of sick and injured volunteers because they really get it, you know, and it's just a little unfortunate that, you know, the Peace Corps, broader Peace Corps community should be a little bit more receptive to people who have been sick and injured and, you know, just want a safe space to talk about it.

[Assistant] I think it's just people are not aware of it.

[User] True. There is some of that. Absolutely. So, yeah. But yeah, we've been working with the National Peace Corps Association. I've had several meetings on the Hill. So we'll see slowly, slowly. Little by little was what they would say in Burkina.

[Assistant] But other than that, it was a good experience, it sounds like.

[User] Yeah. I mean it's interesting because especially with me being on the Hill, all of my talking points surround my health issues. So I feel like my memory of kind of the better parts of my service have really just been colored in a different light or have diminished somewhat. And yeah, it's interesting. I was looking at pictures the other day and it was good to see me happy in Burkina. And like I said, I do think that my Peace Corps medical officers did take care of me. I have heard from other volunteers where they haven't been as fortunate. So I do feel very lucky. But yeah, my service, it's very complicated.

[Assistant] So it's changed your life, but not for the better because now you have a chronic illness.


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

[User] True. There is some of that. Absolutely. So, yeah. But yeah, we've been working with the National Peace Corps Association. I've had several meetings on the Hill. So we'll see slowly, slowly. Little by little was what they would say in Burkina.

[Assistant] But other than that, it was a good experience, it sounds like.

[User] Yeah. I mean it's interesting because especially with me being on the Hill, all of my talking points surround my health issues. So I feel like my memory of kind of the better parts of my service have really just been colored in a different light or have diminished somewhat. And yeah, it's interesting. I was looking at pictures the other day and it was good to see me happy in Burkina. And like I said, I do think that my Peace Corps medical officers did take care of me. I have heard from other volunteers where they haven't been as fortunate. So I do feel very lucky. But yeah, my service, it's very complicated.

[Assistant] So it's changed your life, but not for the better because now you have a chronic illness.

[User] Yeah. I mean without the illnesses, you know, sure. Would I be living and working the life in D.C.? Sure. But to a certain extent, you know, there's such a community of those of us who have been sick and injured and we haven't really had a platform and we really haven't had advocacy. And so it's actually been, yeah, it's actually been pretty rewarding trying to affect that change that I think is needed. I mean, you know, there are so many discussions anymore about what's the direction of Peace Corps with technology and what about phones? And I think that we're in such a prime environment where we can really look at Peace Corps critically. I mean, and not to be critical in the sense of, oh, this is part of this, but critical in ways that matter, you know, and to make it run more efficient or have a greater impact.

[Assistant] Well, there are lessons that are learned in each period, right?


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

[User] Yeah. I mean without the illnesses, you know, sure. Would I be living and working the life in D.C.? Sure. But to a certain extent, you know, there's such a community of those of us who have been sick and injured and we haven't really had a platform and we really haven't had advocacy. And so it's actually been, yeah, it's actually been pretty rewarding trying to affect that change that I think is needed. I mean, you know, there are so many discussions anymore about what's the direction of Peace Corps with technology and what about phones? And I think that we're in such a prime environment where we can really look at Peace Corps critically. I mean, and not to be critical in the sense of, oh, this is part of this, but critical in ways that matter, you know, and to make it run more efficient or have a greater impact.

[Assistant] Well, there are lessons that are learned in each period, right?

[User] Exactly. So, I mean, hopefully, you know, well, I do think the environment is ripe for that. Now, whether or not anybody really grabs that torch and, you know, charges full steam ahead into that argument, I don't know. But I do think it's warranted. And I do hope that, you know, those of us who have been sick and injured are part of that conversation.

[Assistant] Good, so thank you for the interview.

[User] Yeah, thank you for having me.

[Assistant] Is there anything else you want to say?


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

[User] Exactly. So, I mean, hopefully, you know, well, I do think the environment is ripe for that. Now, whether or not anybody really grabs that torch and, you know, charges full steam ahead into that argument, I don't know. But I do think it's warranted. And I do hope that, you know, those of us who have been sick and injured are part of that conversation.

[Assistant] Good, so thank you for the interview.

[User] Yeah, thank you for having me.

[Assistant] Is there anything else you want to say?

[User] Um, yeah, I think there are so many, but it's all right, I think, uh, I think.

[Assistant] You made the point?


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

[User] Yes, sure, it was an old Army ordnance plant. They had all that. I don’t remember a hangar so much—maybe a little building where people kind of waved their flags to say, “Land.”

[Assistant] What an interesting time to fly.

[User] I won’t say it was the Wild West because it’s Ohio, but people just did what they had to do to get it done. They just didn’t have all the rules and regulations and stipulations that you must do this or that. If you knew Eb Gough, Eb just did whatever the heck he needed to do. Fred came along and he was a new engineer, and he was very kind and sweet. Of course, he may have a different idea of it, but I remember that because they were just very, very nice to me.\n\n You do a lot of things in life. You have different worlds that you live in, with your family, with your community, your volunteer work, your work, and I always felt, in this particular place, to be well respected and cared about. That was a nice thing. I was 22, 23, 24 years old by then, and what did I know? I hadn’t lived much of life yet, but a lot of them were much older and had been through it all. I felt it was a good opportunity. I don’t know that the treatment we had for mustard gas exposure or radiation was worth anything, but that’s what we had.

[Assistant] That’s all you knew, at that point.

[User] That’s all we had. Sometimes the nuclear regulatory people would come down and walk around. I was often in a Jeep, riding around, looking for stuff, seeing what guys were doing, making sure they weren’t creating issues. I felt like the public safety person, I guess. I don’t mean to overextend what I did.

[Assistant] No, but your role was varied. It wasn’t just in the clinic.


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

[User] I won’t say it was the Wild West because it’s Ohio, but people just did what they had to do to get it done. They just didn’t have all the rules and regulations and stipulations that you must do this or that. If you knew Eb Gough, Eb just did whatever the heck he needed to do. Fred came along and he was a new engineer, and he was very kind and sweet. Of course, he may have a different idea of it, but I remember that because they were just very, very nice to me.\n\n You do a lot of things in life. You have different worlds that you live in, with your family, with your community, your volunteer work, your work, and I always felt, in this particular place, to be well respected and cared about. That was a nice thing. I was 22, 23, 24 years old by then, and what did I know? I hadn’t lived much of life yet, but a lot of them were much older and had been through it all. I felt it was a good opportunity. I don’t know that the treatment we had for mustard gas exposure or radiation was worth anything, but that’s what we had.

[Assistant] That’s all you knew, at that point.

[User] That’s all we had. Sometimes the nuclear regulatory people would come down and walk around. I was often in a Jeep, riding around, looking for stuff, seeing what guys were doing, making sure they weren’t creating issues. I felt like the public safety person, I guess. I don’t mean to overextend what I did.

[Assistant] No, but your role was varied. It wasn’t just in the clinic.

[User] Right, I was there to provide health care, and if I could avoid a health issue, I was giving them better care than treating it, I felt like. Nobody ever told me not to. Nobody ever said, “You can’t do this or that.” That was pretty much my career, and then Glynn and I got married in April ’60, after a long sort of courtship.

[Assistant] How did you meet?


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

[User] When the name changed to NASA from NACA, it was just a name-change; it meant no difference to their work. Maybe there was something I wasn’t aware of because it didn’t affect anything I did.\n\n One day we were NASA, and one day we were at NACA, so I really don’t know that it mattered that much. The thing that probably bothered most of us was when they changed from the Lewis Research Center and called it John Glenn Center.

[Assistant] I wanted to ask you, did you have to wear a nurse’s uniform?

[User] Yes. White stockings, shoes, cap, uniform, all of that. Carried my hemostats and scissors in my pocket, and everything you would need to tie off a bleeder or something. It’s just the way it was.

[Assistant] Yes, in the Jeep and in the plane, right?

[User] That was our role, and I never felt—I don’t know what the word is—I won’t say I was that self-assured, but I’ve never felt threatened, or maybe because Ruth was a good steady, influence on me. There was another lady would fill in when Ruth would go on vacation, so then I’d essentially be in charge. She took over when I got to Plum Brook, for that day. There were always two nurses there because one would have to sometimes go out on the site, which I usually did, and somebody would always be in the office in case somebody was brought in or came in, there. We had a lot of heart attacks, we had strokes, we had anything that can happen to the human population, and they happened in earlier days than they do now. You had 40-and-50-year-olds having coronaries, strokes, and a lot of lung disease. Some of the Korean veterans had a lot of lung disease. I can’t remember anything specific, but smoking was very much the thing to do, and drinking. It was Humphrey Bogart era—they all did it.

[Assistant] There were a lot of social activities during those time periods, too, wasn’t there?


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

[User] Yes. White stockings, shoes, cap, uniform, all of that. Carried my hemostats and scissors in my pocket, and everything you would need to tie off a bleeder or something. It’s just the way it was.

[Assistant] Yes, in the Jeep and in the plane, right?

[User] That was our role, and I never felt—I don’t know what the word is—I won’t say I was that self-assured, but I’ve never felt threatened, or maybe because Ruth was a good steady, influence on me. There was another lady would fill in when Ruth would go on vacation, so then I’d essentially be in charge. She took over when I got to Plum Brook, for that day. There were always two nurses there because one would have to sometimes go out on the site, which I usually did, and somebody would always be in the office in case somebody was brought in or came in, there. We had a lot of heart attacks, we had strokes, we had anything that can happen to the human population, and they happened in earlier days than they do now. You had 40-and-50-year-olds having coronaries, strokes, and a lot of lung disease. Some of the Korean veterans had a lot of lung disease. I can’t remember anything specific, but smoking was very much the thing to do, and drinking. It was Humphrey Bogart era—they all did it.

[Assistant] There were a lot of social activities during those time periods, too, wasn’t there?

[User] There was always some event—picnics, and the family picnics, and all kinds of things. My sister and brother-in-law would go, and my parents, we’d bring them along, with the picnics. Two or three nights a week, we’d be doing something with the folks. Our job was regular 8:00 to 5:00 there; I didn’t have to work shifts or anything, so whatever it was, 8:00 to 5:00, I think it was. It was just easy.

[Assistant] Did you stay living with your parents until you and Glynn married?


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

[User] Right, and there’s materials that get outlawed. They did have to make some substitutes due to, I forget what laws, but some of the materials you just can’t use anymore in the industry.

[Assistant] Do you guys keep track of how many tests you guys have done over the years at the Arc Jet facility?

[User] Yes. We probably ought to take the time one day to go count them. We test about 200-300 a year, has been our clip recently. I think one year we did 400-and-something.

[Assistant] How many people work at the facility?

[User] Now, there’s zero.

[Assistant] How many people worked at the facility?


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

[User] Yes. We probably ought to take the time one day to go count them. We test about 200-300 a year, has been our clip recently. I think one year we did 400-and-something.

[Assistant] How many people work at the facility?

[User] Now, there’s zero.

[Assistant] How many people worked at the facility?

[User] It’s not super clean, but on order of 20. For a while, we were running two shifts during Return to Flight. Before Columbia, we’re down to bare bones, and then we had to build back up. That process wasn’t immediate—it was a good three, four years before we really felt a lot of confidence, and we’re blowing and going and had some good inertia and some continuity. For our first few years, we just clunked along; things would break. Our PM [Project Management] plan wasn’t very good, and we’re just basically inefficient. It took a long time to get into a mode where we’re really humming along nicely. Probably two years ago, we’re doing great. Just real good reliability, we’d be turning that Arc on any time we wanted, and morale was really high. Guys were doing real good. The shut-down process killed that. That was another thing that was disappointing. It’s like, “Man, we got this place running how we always wanted, it’s really doing the best it’s ever done, and here we are, shutting it down.” That was tough to take.

[Assistant] I can imagine. What are your memories of that last test? Were you there?


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

[User] No, I missed the very last test. I was with my father, he’s been sick, so I missed the last one. Matt and some of the long-time customers came and thanked the team for their dedication. I had written a little note that I had Ron read for me, but I wasn’t able to be there. Then, that afternoon, they tested a test for the Safety Office, testing a system that if you do have a breach in your heat shield and you’re able to turn on some sort of fluid or compressed gas to pressurize the compartment between the pressure vessel and the heat shield—there’s two different pieces of structure, usually, in the capsule like that. There’s a pressure vessel where the crew is, and then outside that is a heat shield. If you’re able to pressurize that, you can actually make air—let’s just say it’s nitrogen—if the pressure’s great enough, it would actually flow out of the breach, so you have cold gas flowing out rather than hot gas coming in to your spacecraft. You wouldn’t need to repair it—you’ve just got this air flowing out. No hot air is coming in, and it’s entirely feasible because, like I said, the heating usually is at a high altitude and the pressure’s pretty low. You really don’t need that much mass flow or pressure to get the flow to go out. They built a little rig to test the system like that, and that was the last test we did. It worked out great, evidently.

[Assistant] A bittersweet moment.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Would you talk a little bit about the camaraderie out there at the facility?

[User] Yes, I always liked going out there because my seat wasn’t there. Just a real good atmosphere, everybody’s super friendly and always willing to do whatever it took to get things to happen. They share food all the time and they have a Christmas dinner every year, so it’s a really good group.

[Assistant] I saw you guys have a logo or a patch, when we were out there, doing some of the taping.


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

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Would you talk a little bit about the camaraderie out there at the facility?

[User] Yes, I always liked going out there because my seat wasn’t there. Just a real good atmosphere, everybody’s super friendly and always willing to do whatever it took to get things to happen. They share food all the time and they have a Christmas dinner every year, so it’s a really good group.

[Assistant] I saw you guys have a logo or a patch, when we were out there, doing some of the taping.

[User] When I became deputy branch chief, that was one of my assignments, to be lab manager. I got—it was Lockheed, at the time—a Lockheed guy to design us a patch, so we made a little patch and went out and bought some shirts. It ended up being a pretty cool patch.

[Assistant] Would you tell us about the patch?


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

[User] Yes, I always liked going out there because my seat wasn’t there. Just a real good atmosphere, everybody’s super friendly and always willing to do whatever it took to get things to happen. They share food all the time and they have a Christmas dinner every year, so it’s a really good group.

[Assistant] I saw you guys have a logo or a patch, when we were out there, doing some of the taping.

[User] When I became deputy branch chief, that was one of my assignments, to be lab manager. I got—it was Lockheed, at the time—a Lockheed guy to design us a patch, so we made a little patch and went out and bought some shirts. It ended up being a pretty cool patch.

[Assistant] Would you tell us about the patch?

[User] It had the name on the outside, like a mission patch, a little icon for a shockwave, and a little lightning bolt arc heating it up. It said, “JSC Arc Jet” on it.

[Assistant] Earlier, you had mentioned one of the tests you did was for Boeing. Was that for their commercial space venture?


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

[User] When I became deputy branch chief, that was one of my assignments, to be lab manager. I got—it was Lockheed, at the time—a Lockheed guy to design us a patch, so we made a little patch and went out and bought some shirts. It ended up being a pretty cool patch.

[Assistant] Would you tell us about the patch?

[User] It had the name on the outside, like a mission patch, a little icon for a shockwave, and a little lightning bolt arc heating it up. It said, “JSC Arc Jet” on it.

[Assistant] Earlier, you had mentioned one of the tests you did was for Boeing. Was that for their commercial space venture?

[User] Right.

[Assistant] Can you talk about that?


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

[User] It had the name on the outside, like a mission patch, a little icon for a shockwave, and a little lightning bolt arc heating it up. It said, “JSC Arc Jet” on it.

[Assistant] Earlier, you had mentioned one of the tests you did was for Boeing. Was that for their commercial space venture?

[User] Right.

[Assistant] Can you talk about that?

[User] This country’s developing four re-entry spacecraft right now. We have MCPV, and then Boeing, Sierra Nevada, and SpaceX, vying to be the next Low-Earth Orbit guys. Right now, there’s four, and those guys need to test. That’s one thing I’ve been trying to point out. Boeing approached us to do testing for their vehicle. They’re going through different materials in their selection, and they have an in-house material they’re trying to see if they are confident enough in. They approached us to do some testing, and we signed the Space Act. We have a similar one with Sierra Nevada to do radiant testing. Boeing was real anxious to get in. In fact, we delayed, if you will, our closing so that we can meet that commitment because we had already signed the Space Act. It was basically the last set of tests we did before that one for the Safety Office.

[Assistant] Did you do any testing for SpaceX?


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

[User] Right.

[Assistant] Can you talk about that?

[User] This country’s developing four re-entry spacecraft right now. We have MCPV, and then Boeing, Sierra Nevada, and SpaceX, vying to be the next Low-Earth Orbit guys. Right now, there’s four, and those guys need to test. That’s one thing I’ve been trying to point out. Boeing approached us to do testing for their vehicle. They’re going through different materials in their selection, and they have an in-house material they’re trying to see if they are confident enough in. They approached us to do some testing, and we signed the Space Act. We have a similar one with Sierra Nevada to do radiant testing. Boeing was real anxious to get in. In fact, we delayed, if you will, our closing so that we can meet that commitment because we had already signed the Space Act. It was basically the last set of tests we did before that one for the Safety Office.

[Assistant] Did you do any testing for SpaceX?

[User] No, did not. They’ve tested a little bit at Ames, but we’ve never tested for SpaceX. Their heat shields are doing good, so you got to hand it to them.

[Assistant] Have you done any work for any universities, perhaps, or other Centers out at the Arc Jet?


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

[User] This country’s developing four re-entry spacecraft right now. We have MCPV, and then Boeing, Sierra Nevada, and SpaceX, vying to be the next Low-Earth Orbit guys. Right now, there’s four, and those guys need to test. That’s one thing I’ve been trying to point out. Boeing approached us to do testing for their vehicle. They’re going through different materials in their selection, and they have an in-house material they’re trying to see if they are confident enough in. They approached us to do some testing, and we signed the Space Act. We have a similar one with Sierra Nevada to do radiant testing. Boeing was real anxious to get in. In fact, we delayed, if you will, our closing so that we can meet that commitment because we had already signed the Space Act. It was basically the last set of tests we did before that one for the Safety Office.

[Assistant] Did you do any testing for SpaceX?

[User] No, did not. They’ve tested a little bit at Ames, but we’ve never tested for SpaceX. Their heat shields are doing good, so you got to hand it to them.

[Assistant] Have you done any work for any universities, perhaps, or other Centers out at the Arc Jet?

[User] Yes, we’ve done work for other Centers. We did a little bit of things for the Air Force, Air Force Research Lab. I’m trying to think. I can’t recall too much else. Our bread and butter has been the big programs: Apollo, Shuttle, X-38, MPCV. The other interesting thing is, Shuttle—we were testing up until two weeks before the last mission. Arc Jet testing isn’t just for developing the material. We found that we tested every year for the Shuttle in its existence, through development, through qualification, certification, first flight, last flight. Through the whole life of the program, the Shuttle, at least, required Arc Jet testing. It’s a very big player, the whole time.

[Assistant] You’ve talked several times about the CO2 landing for Mars. Why’d did you come up with that concept? What drove you to come up with the idea?


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

[User] No, did not. They’ve tested a little bit at Ames, but we’ve never tested for SpaceX. Their heat shields are doing good, so you got to hand it to them.

[Assistant] Have you done any work for any universities, perhaps, or other Centers out at the Arc Jet?

[User] Yes, we’ve done work for other Centers. We did a little bit of things for the Air Force, Air Force Research Lab. I’m trying to think. I can’t recall too much else. Our bread and butter has been the big programs: Apollo, Shuttle, X-38, MPCV. The other interesting thing is, Shuttle—we were testing up until two weeks before the last mission. Arc Jet testing isn’t just for developing the material. We found that we tested every year for the Shuttle in its existence, through development, through qualification, certification, first flight, last flight. Through the whole life of the program, the Shuttle, at least, required Arc Jet testing. It’s a very big player, the whole time.

[Assistant] You’ve talked several times about the CO2 landing for Mars. Why’d did you come up with that concept? What drove you to come up with the idea?

[User] We just thought, “We can do it,” and the guys did it in their spare time, on the side. Manned mission to Mars and big missions to Mars has been talked back and forth forever. Sometimes, our Agency says, “Hey, don’t worry about it; don’t talk about it,” the other time it says, “Hey, that’s what you should be thinking.” We just felt if we attained the capability, we would probably have a customer some day to use it.

[Assistant] You’ve shared that with Ames, since they’ll be the only Arc Jet Facility?


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

[User] Yes, we’ve done work for other Centers. We did a little bit of things for the Air Force, Air Force Research Lab. I’m trying to think. I can’t recall too much else. Our bread and butter has been the big programs: Apollo, Shuttle, X-38, MPCV. The other interesting thing is, Shuttle—we were testing up until two weeks before the last mission. Arc Jet testing isn’t just for developing the material. We found that we tested every year for the Shuttle in its existence, through development, through qualification, certification, first flight, last flight. Through the whole life of the program, the Shuttle, at least, required Arc Jet testing. It’s a very big player, the whole time.

[Assistant] You’ve talked several times about the CO2 landing for Mars. Why’d did you come up with that concept? What drove you to come up with the idea?

[User] We just thought, “We can do it,” and the guys did it in their spare time, on the side. Manned mission to Mars and big missions to Mars has been talked back and forth forever. Sometimes, our Agency says, “Hey, don’t worry about it; don’t talk about it,” the other time it says, “Hey, that’s what you should be thinking.” We just felt if we attained the capability, we would probably have a customer some day to use it.

[Assistant] You’ve shared that with Ames, since they’ll be the only Arc Jet Facility?

[User] They haven’t developed it yet, but they intend to, by the end of the fiscal year, develop that capability.

[Assistant] Tell me a little bit about the deactivation process that the Arc Jet Facility has undergone since the decision was made to close the facility.


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

[User] The process has been long, long in terms of actually closing. There’s basically an order given, “You need to shut down,” and our Center Director at the time, [Michael L.] Coats, wrote back a letter, said, “Okay, we’re going to shut down, but we’ve got to do these things first. Ames needs to develop the capabilities that we have that they don’t have, so the Agency doesn’t lose those capabilities.” We had a list of tests we needed to do, and Ames had to develop these capabilities. At first, each of them were projected to be six months away, and then we both kept marching in time. They really marched together, coincidentally. So it wasn’t until probably a year after that, [that] we originally intended to close, before we finally finished up what we needed to finish up. Ames has come real close to finishing their capabilities, so we did our last test. That shutdown process has been basically: drain the systems, de-energize everything, safe it out, and walk away.\n\n We got a set of contractors running it because nobody’s giving us any money to do any sort of real tearing it apart. Our guys did the last test, we spent two weeks turning off things and de-energizing it, then Ames came out last week and pulled all the Arc Heater parts that they felt they could use, packed them up, and shipped them out to Ames. That’s where we’re at now. We got a building full of Arc Jetty type pieces of equipment and pumps and valves and tools and copper tubing and all sorts of crazy things, that we’re going to have to figure out a way to disposition. The shutdown was simple; it was turn everything off and leave.

[Assistant] It’s slated to be demolished sometime this year?

[User] No, 2017.

[Assistant] I hadn’t realized it was going to sit for a while. That seems like a shame, to sit.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] I wanted to ask sort of an, I don’t know, emotional question: what do you think that the Arc Jet Facility has meant to you, since you worked there for so many years on different projects?


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

[User] Well, and the Beatles are a great one for that, too. But this one particular event was just something that kind of sat me back as being so different, seemingly funny, but maybe not to them, but very funny to me. Because I had worked over here in our control room, I'd worked over here not on a console, but I'd worked in there. I know the decorum. I know what's expected. And this just it was good to see. I learned from that experience.

[Assistant] Well, that's good. I'm glad at least you had a light moment to get you through.

[User] Oh, there were a few, but that one there wasn't anybody I didn't have anybody sitting with me that I could have shared it with, another American. I was down there by myself. This was going on. Who do you turn to? You don't do anything. You just sit back and just admire the moment. It was fun.

[Assistant] I'm glad you were the sole observer. It was worth being on that shift at that moment.

[User] Well, yes, I guess, but it was like I said, it was eye-opening to see the difference. It was fun.

[Assistant] Well, it was an experience I'm sure you'll always remember. And your family, I'm sure they were always glad to see you come home.


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

[User] No. It came up post-flight in some of his debriefings, and I heard his comments. We never talked about it so much. I tried to compare his notes to mine, understanding what he was having to deal with, flying with a couple of guys that he hadn't trained with during his increment since they changed out the Mir crew just before launch. So he was having to deal with similar problems, in some ways extremely much more difficult, because he never had the option to say, "Let's get some more support over here. Send me some relief." That was never his option, so he had to come to grips with that change. There was a lot of changes going on back here administratively, which also made things hard, but they went on.

[Assistant] You've all gotten through it, and now it goes on to the next phase.

[User] We hope so.

[Assistant] I imagine you'll be busy until the next phase or in the midst of the next phase. What was that about your organized chaos or continual chaos?

[User] There's a certain familiarity with chaos. You just don't let it get you down.

[Assistant] That's right. At least it's never boring.


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

[User] No. The Russians didn't care.

[Assistant] I just was wondering if they asked.

[User] No. In fact, to keep things simple, I signed things with my nickname instead of my given name. I considered it binding, but if I'd signed something else, they wouldn't have known who it was. So I signed with the nickname that I was using in TsUP that they would then associate with approval by the NASA official.

[Assistant] How is your Russian now?

[User] Very poor. It was never good. I went over with a crew in April for ten days, and it took me three days to begin to get the Russian back, and I got back maybe 20 or 30 percent of what I had when I left, just in terms of being able to use it and do things quickly. It would take a while. It's not a hard language. A lot of it is cognates. They all sound the same as the American word. It's just the letters are different, and you can converse without being correct. I was never correct in the Russian language, but I was able to get across what I needed to get across. Whenever dealing with technical details that had to be specifically correct in coordination, we always used an interpreter. It was only in joking around or in light conversation that we would attempt to exchange in each other's language, which was fun. It was fun. I had a number of people on the Russian flight control team over there that I have the highest regard for and respect for. We had a relatively good time together, and they were very helpful in us getting our job done.

[Assistant]
I certainly appreciate all that you've shared. I'm going to ask Carol and Mark if they have any questions.

I just want to ask one question. What was your favorite thing to do in Moscow? I know you said you didn't have much free time, but . . .


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

[User] Yes, sir. Born in Corsicana, Texas.

[Assistant] Went to school at—?

[User] I went to Texas A&M University, class of [19]’52.

[Assistant] And then into the Army.

[User] Then I went to the Army for about 2 years. I was in Korea, and then when I got out, I went to work at Radio Corporation of America [RCA].

[Assistant] What did you do at RCA?


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

[User] I went to Texas A&M University, class of [19]’52.

[Assistant] And then into the Army.

[User] Then I went to the Army for about 2 years. I was in Korea, and then when I got out, I went to work at Radio Corporation of America [RCA].

[Assistant] What did you do at RCA?

[User] Actually, very interesting. I started my engineering career and I had the opportunity my first day or first week there to work on something called a microwave oven; and I worked on the early magnetrons that went into a microwave oven. I didn’t know what they were talking about. They said, “We’re going to design an oven that you can cook a roast in, in a few minutes.” I went home and told my wife, I said—she said, “You don’t know how to cook.” I said, “No, but we’re going to design an oven.” So, I worked on magnetrons, which is the main tube in a microwave oven; and then I worked on color television at RCA.

[Assistant] How does one make the skip from microwave ovens and color television—?


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

[User] Then I went to the Army for about 2 years. I was in Korea, and then when I got out, I went to work at Radio Corporation of America [RCA].

[Assistant] What did you do at RCA?

[User] Actually, very interesting. I started my engineering career and I had the opportunity my first day or first week there to work on something called a microwave oven; and I worked on the early magnetrons that went into a microwave oven. I didn’t know what they were talking about. They said, “We’re going to design an oven that you can cook a roast in, in a few minutes.” I went home and told my wife, I said—she said, “You don’t know how to cook.” I said, “No, but we’re going to design an oven.” So, I worked on magnetrons, which is the main tube in a microwave oven; and then I worked on color television at RCA.

[Assistant] How does one make the skip from microwave ovens and color television—?

[User] Well, it’s still electronics. Electronic tube is basically what it is. I worked on the magnetron, which is a part of the electronic tube; and then of course the colored television is basically an electronic tube. So, basically that’s the same—that’s the theme. It’s electronic systems.

[Assistant] But the move into General Dynamics took you—.


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

[User] Actually, very interesting. I started my engineering career and I had the opportunity my first day or first week there to work on something called a microwave oven; and I worked on the early magnetrons that went into a microwave oven. I didn’t know what they were talking about. They said, “We’re going to design an oven that you can cook a roast in, in a few minutes.” I went home and told my wife, I said—she said, “You don’t know how to cook.” I said, “No, but we’re going to design an oven.” So, I worked on magnetrons, which is the main tube in a microwave oven; and then I worked on color television at RCA.

[Assistant] How does one make the skip from microwave ovens and color television—?

[User] Well, it’s still electronics. Electronic tube is basically what it is. I worked on the magnetron, which is a part of the electronic tube; and then of course the colored television is basically an electronic tube. So, basically that’s the same—that’s the theme. It’s electronic systems.

[Assistant] But the move into General Dynamics took you—.

[User] Well, that was an interesting thing. I got interested in the space program just by reading what was happening in the paper. And it turns out that General Dynamics was interviewing in New York City; and, of course, I was working in New Jersey. And I took the train across to New York City and interviewed with General Dynamics, and I got a job. And so my wife and I moved to San Diego [California] to work for General Dynamics Astronautics [Corporation] and—.

[Assistant] What was your job? Your first job at General Dynamics?


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

[User] Right.

[Assistant] And you set about doing that.

[User] Well, I was working on the team that set—

[Assistant] Yes.

[User] —about doing that. And we worked on the contract—we worked on the proposal to NASA for the Apollo spacecraft, Apollo mission. And, of course, we didn’t win. And then after that, I decided, well, I still wanted to—I got very interested in Apollo and decided I wanted to go work for NASA. And that’s when I came and worked for NASA.

[Assistant] Do you remember hearing that speech that [President] John [F.] Kennedy made?


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

[User] —about doing that. And we worked on the contract—we worked on the proposal to NASA for the Apollo spacecraft, Apollo mission. And, of course, we didn’t win. And then after that, I decided, well, I still wanted to—I got very interested in Apollo and decided I wanted to go work for NASA. And that’s when I came and worked for NASA.

[Assistant] Do you remember hearing that speech that [President] John [F.] Kennedy made?

[User] Yes, I do. Of course at that time, I believe that was (what?) in [19]’60, ’61—

[Assistant] ’61, ’62—

[User] ’62.

[Assistant] —somewhere like that.


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

[User] Yes, I do. Of course at that time, I believe that was (what?) in [19]’60, ’61—

[Assistant] ’61, ’62—

[User] ’62.

[Assistant] —somewhere like that.

[User] I joined NASA—I think I was at NASA—I got enamored with the program before the speech, I believe. And that was when we were still working on the proposal. And—but I do remember the speech. Yes, I do.

[Assistant] But do you remember thinking, “Wait a minute. I’m not sure we can do this?”


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

[User] ’62.

[Assistant] —somewhere like that.

[User] I joined NASA—I think I was at NASA—I got enamored with the program before the speech, I believe. And that was when we were still working on the proposal. And—but I do remember the speech. Yes, I do.

[Assistant] But do you remember thinking, “Wait a minute. I’m not sure we can do this?”

[User] You know, I guess maybe I—No, I didn’t. I didn’t really think that. Now you know, talking to some of the other people like Chris [Christopher C.] Kraft [Jr.] and maybe Gene [Eugene F.] Kranz or Glynn [S.] Lunney, they may’ve thought that. I really didn’t think—I probably wasn’t smart enough to think that. I probably thought it was an engineering problem. And not really recognizing what all the issues were, just decided that we could do it. Now in—at that time—the early times of the Apollo Program—I was primarily focused on the guidance, navigation, and control and the reentry heating, the thermodynamics of it, which were two big technology efforts you had to overcome. But that’s really what I was working on in the early days of the Apollo Program.

[Assistant] When you went to work for NASA, did you immediately come to Houston [Texas]? Or did you go to Langley [Research Center, Hampton, Virginia] first?


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

[User] I joined NASA—I think I was at NASA—I got enamored with the program before the speech, I believe. And that was when we were still working on the proposal. And—but I do remember the speech. Yes, I do.

[Assistant] But do you remember thinking, “Wait a minute. I’m not sure we can do this?”

[User] You know, I guess maybe I—No, I didn’t. I didn’t really think that. Now you know, talking to some of the other people like Chris [Christopher C.] Kraft [Jr.] and maybe Gene [Eugene F.] Kranz or Glynn [S.] Lunney, they may’ve thought that. I really didn’t think—I probably wasn’t smart enough to think that. I probably thought it was an engineering problem. And not really recognizing what all the issues were, just decided that we could do it. Now in—at that time—the early times of the Apollo Program—I was primarily focused on the guidance, navigation, and control and the reentry heating, the thermodynamics of it, which were two big technology efforts you had to overcome. But that’s really what I was working on in the early days of the Apollo Program.

[Assistant] When you went to work for NASA, did you immediately come to Houston [Texas]? Or did you go to Langley [Research Center, Hampton, Virginia] first?

[User] No, I went to Houston. I went—I came directly to Houston. In fact, we worked—I came to work at—on the freeway, off the freeway, Gulf Freeway—.

[Assistant] Farnsworth Chambers building?


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

[User] No, I went to Houston. I went—I came directly to Houston. In fact, we worked—I came to work at—on the freeway, off the freeway, Gulf Freeway—.

[Assistant] Farnsworth Chambers building?

[User] No, I was—

[Assistant] No?

[User] —I was in the Office City building, right on the Gulf Freeway.

[Assistant] On the Gulf Freeway. Okay.


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

[User] —I was in the Office City building, right on the Gulf Freeway.

[Assistant] On the Gulf Freeway. Okay.

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] Okay.

[User] In fact, that’s where I came to work. That’s where I worked.

[Assistant] As I recall, back in those days, there were all these bright, young men—


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

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] Okay.

[User] In fact, that’s where I came to work. That’s where I worked.

[Assistant] As I recall, back in those days, there were all these bright, young men—

[User] Right.

[Assistant] —mostly men at Farnsworth Chambers.


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

[User] In fact, that’s where I came to work. That’s where I worked.

[Assistant] As I recall, back in those days, there were all these bright, young men—

[User] Right.

[Assistant] —mostly men at Farnsworth Chambers.

[User] Right.

[Assistant] —And all these bright—


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

[User] Right.

[Assistant] —mostly men at Farnsworth Chambers.

[User] Right.

[Assistant] —And all these bright—

[User] That was—

[Assistant] —young people over at the Gulf Freeway.


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

[User] —and I was in the engineering building. There was another one—there were several other buildings.

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] The Houston—there was a little petroleum building on the freeway. And then there was a—

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] —there were a couple of other buildings that I don’t recall the names of. But Farnsworth Chambers was like the headquarters, and the Gulf Freeway was what—where the Apollo Program Office was.

[Assistant] Somebody described that as an extremely heady time for engineers. It was like you were looking for the Golden Fleece and knew you were going to find it.


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

[User] The Houston—there was a little petroleum building on the freeway. And then there was a—

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] —there were a couple of other buildings that I don’t recall the names of. But Farnsworth Chambers was like the headquarters, and the Gulf Freeway was what—where the Apollo Program Office was.

[Assistant] Somebody described that as an extremely heady time for engineers. It was like you were looking for the Golden Fleece and knew you were going to find it.

[User] Well, as you know, when you think about it—when you think about it, you said, did I think we couldn’t make it? That’s a very interesting question because if you really look back on it, there were not any textbooks written of how you were going to do that. We didn’t—couldn’t find a textbook of how you were going to do the aerodynamic heating. How were you going to do the guidance, navigation, and control. How you were going to build the structures. How you were going to design an environmental control system. How you were going to design the landing system. So, there were not any textbooks. So, we almost had to write the textbooks as we were going on. And as I tell my students today, I said, “You know, don’t think you can’t do something. Because you can.” We didn’t know how to do it. So, your question was a good one: did I think we couldn’t do it? I think the answer to that is I didn’t really think about that. But when I think back now and try to teach my students, I do relate to that type of problem that, you know, you’re given a problem; and don’t think you can’t do it. Because you can.

[Assistant] Was this a heady time for all of you? Or just a busy time? How do you recall it?


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

[User] I think it was a busy time. In fact, it was so busy and I—it was so busy you really lost sight of what your family was doing. You really lost sight of what—you had to have a good home life, because you had to have somebody there to take care of the children and be patient with you. But you really were dedicated with your work, almost 24 hours a day. You were—you didn’t mind working around the clock, coming in Saturdays and Sundays, because you knew that what you were doing was really something that everybody wanted and you were interested. And the question you asked (I’ll go back to it; it was a key one): could you really do it? After it was done, after we had accomplished it, then I started thinking: could we really do it? I mean—.

[Assistant] Your initial job, I think, was a structures and materials engineer. What does that mean?

[User] Well, I was really working in the—when I first got to NASA, I was working in the structures group which was looking at the thermal protection system, the heatshield, for the Apollo vehicle. So, I was working on the heatshield, which is—was the ablative material built by—made by AVCO Corporation, which is with the heatshield to go on the outside of the Apollo spacecraft for reentry.

[Assistant] And there again, we’re breaking new ground.

[User] Breaking new ground. You know, very new ground. The aerodynamic heating, how did you calculate the aerodynamic heating? How did you attach—what kind of material did you use? What—how did you test the material? How did you attach it? So, it was all very, very new and very different. But I don’t think we really thought we couldn’t do it.

[Assistant] This is 1962, and somewhere about that time you transferred to the Apollo Spacecraft Program—


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

[User] Breaking new ground. You know, very new ground. The aerodynamic heating, how did you calculate the aerodynamic heating? How did you attach—what kind of material did you use? What—how did you test the material? How did you attach it? So, it was all very, very new and very different. But I don’t think we really thought we couldn’t do it.

[Assistant] This is 1962, and somewhere about that time you transferred to the Apollo Spacecraft Program—

[User] Program Office.

[Assistant] —Office.

[User] Right.

[Assistant] What led to that?


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

[User] Program Office.

[Assistant] —Office.

[User] Right.

[Assistant] What led to that?

[User] I really wanted to get in more directly into the guidance and navigation control area. As I said, at General Dynamics I had a little bit of aerodynamic heating and a little bit of guidance, navigation, and control; and I was really more interested in the guidance, navigation, and control. And my entrée to that was to work in the Apollo Program Office, which basically was doing the guidance, navigation, and control and, at that time, working with the MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) Instrumentation Laboratory. And I was—I got involved with working with MIT Instrumentation Lab on the guidance, navigation, and control system. And that was really my desire. That really was what I really wanted to do.

[Assistant] The pat question that’s written down here seems all too simple. It’s got to be more complex than this. But, what were the challenges in developing [a] control and navigation system in those days of spaceflight? I mean we could take the whole 90 minutes for that I suppose.


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

[User] —it’s not—it has—your PC at home is much, much more powerful than that little computer we used. And it was a wire rope memory, where you actually had to—actually wire the zeros and ones in that made up the computer memory months before you decided to fly. And we had a little bit of erasable memory. So, it was a—to me, it was one of the big achievements. And really it was the forerunner, in all honesty, of many of the things we’re doing today, both in spaceflight, aircraft flight, and commercial uses of computers.

[Assistant] While you were working on that, Mercury and then Gemini were going on.

[User] Right.

[Assistant] Were you learning things from them or not?

[User] You know, we—I tell you what. And I guess—I was really not involved in the Mercury Program or the Gemini Program. The big offshoot of those two programs, though, were primarily, especially in the Gemini, was learning how to do rendezvous. Rendezvous, that was one thing. And, of course, how to really design your electrical power system with fuel cells and your environmental control system. So, those were the helps that those programs gave us.

[Assistant] How did you change jobs? Why were you promoted to Technical Assistant to the Chief of Systems Engineering Division? What does that mean?


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

[User] “—the service module, the lunar module, the launch complex, all the hardware that went in it?” And it’s very complicated, because interface control documents cannot be developed until you design. You can’t design until you have the interfaces defined. So, I was given the job to resolve the interfaces; and that was probably one of the biggest jobs and one of the best jobs and one of the most important jobs I ever had. And I was—I mean, at that point in time I didn’t recognize the significance of it. But if you couldn’t resolve those interfaces, you couldn’t put the vehicle—I think there was like 1200 interface documents to resolve.

[Assistant] Does this mean you’re running interference between all these contractors, trying to get—?

[User] All the contractors, all the—between Marshall [Spaceflight Center, Huntsville, Alabama], Kennedy [Space Center, Florida], and all the contractors. We were trying to put the thing together so we could actually bolt things together, have wire runs complete, have the functions complete. The interfaces are electrical interfaces, mechanical interfaces, functional interfaces. They all have to fit. And you have to do that before you can build a vehicle. And they have to be resolved; so one person knows what has to go on each side of the interface so they can design it.

[Assistant] Did the contractors have trouble getting together on this?

[User] Oh yeah! And one person’s got something designed. Another’s got something designed. And as simple as a bolt hole pattern, wouldn’t work. I’ll give you an example: If you go to change a tire and if your tire doesn’t fit on the rim—

[Assistant] You’re in trouble.


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

[User] Oh yeah! And one person’s got something designed. Another’s got something designed. And as simple as a bolt hole pattern, wouldn’t work. I’ll give you an example: If you go to change a tire and if your tire doesn’t fit on the rim—

[Assistant] You’re in trouble.

[User] —that’s a simple interface.

[Assistant] Right.

[User] And so, all these interfaces had to work. And—.

[Assistant] So, how’d you ever get them—?


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

[User] —that’s a simple interface.

[Assistant] Right.

[User] And so, all these interfaces had to work. And—.

[Assistant] So, how’d you ever get them—?

[User] Well, it’s an interesting story. They gave me about 10 people. We had about 1200 interface control documents, and we had to get them resolved or we weren’t going to get the [Apollo] off the ground. So, you know, that was a very, very important part of it. So, Joe Shea—in fact, I remember Joe Shea taking me to Marshall Space Flight Center, and he took me to see von Braun. He introduced me to von Braun, and he said, “This is Aaron Cohen. He’s going to resolve all the interfaces.” And of course, I felt very, very good about that until von Braun says, “What’s an interface?” So, I knew then I had a little problem with it! But the way we did it is, we identified all the interfaces. And then I had a big meeting at Cape Kennedy. I got—

[Assistant] Got all the contracts—


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

[User] And so, all these interfaces had to work. And—.

[Assistant] So, how’d you ever get them—?

[User] Well, it’s an interesting story. They gave me about 10 people. We had about 1200 interface control documents, and we had to get them resolved or we weren’t going to get the [Apollo] off the ground. So, you know, that was a very, very important part of it. So, Joe Shea—in fact, I remember Joe Shea taking me to Marshall Space Flight Center, and he took me to see von Braun. He introduced me to von Braun, and he said, “This is Aaron Cohen. He’s going to resolve all the interfaces.” And of course, I felt very, very good about that until von Braun says, “What’s an interface?” So, I knew then I had a little problem with it! But the way we did it is, we identified all the interfaces. And then I had a big meeting at Cape Kennedy. I got—

[Assistant] Got all the contracts—

[User] —all the contracts together in the big firing room. And I said, “We’re going to stay—” and we broke down into teams, and I said, “We’re going to stay here until we get all the interfaces resolved.” Well, of course, that was an overstatement because there was no way you were going to do that in one meeting. But at least—we stayed there about a week, and at least we got them all defined and found out what the issues were so everybody knew what they had to go back and work on. And then we periodically had a meeting; and I guess that over a period of 4 to 5 months, we were able to resolve it. And that to me was one of the biggest achievements I think I made and one of the biggest contributions I made to the space program in getting the interface—not many people really recognize the significance of it. But—

[Assistant] Well, the mythology always is that everybody was in lockstep. That everybody was doing exactly what they were supposed to do.


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

[User] Well, it’s an interesting story. They gave me about 10 people. We had about 1200 interface control documents, and we had to get them resolved or we weren’t going to get the [Apollo] off the ground. So, you know, that was a very, very important part of it. So, Joe Shea—in fact, I remember Joe Shea taking me to Marshall Space Flight Center, and he took me to see von Braun. He introduced me to von Braun, and he said, “This is Aaron Cohen. He’s going to resolve all the interfaces.” And of course, I felt very, very good about that until von Braun says, “What’s an interface?” So, I knew then I had a little problem with it! But the way we did it is, we identified all the interfaces. And then I had a big meeting at Cape Kennedy. I got—

[Assistant] Got all the contracts—

[User] —all the contracts together in the big firing room. And I said, “We’re going to stay—” and we broke down into teams, and I said, “We’re going to stay here until we get all the interfaces resolved.” Well, of course, that was an overstatement because there was no way you were going to do that in one meeting. But at least—we stayed there about a week, and at least we got them all defined and found out what the issues were so everybody knew what they had to go back and work on. And then we periodically had a meeting; and I guess that over a period of 4 to 5 months, we were able to resolve it. And that to me was one of the biggest achievements I think I made and one of the biggest contributions I made to the space program in getting the interface—not many people really recognize the significance of it. But—

[Assistant] Well, the mythology always is that everybody was in lockstep. That everybody was doing exactly what they were supposed to do.

[User] Yeah, right. Right.

[Assistant] In fact, they were not.


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

[User] Yeah, right. Right.

[Assistant] In fact, they were not.

[User] They were not. And not by any maliciousness. It’s just that—

[Assistant] No.

[User] —people were going off and doing their own thing, and somebody had to bring it together so that when this bolt hole pattern was made, the other person’s bolt hole pattern would meet that so you could bolt them together. That’s as simple as the electric wire—the wire runs and how you’d bolt the lunar module to the command and service module, and so forth and so on. The launch vehicle. So, that was, to me, the—one of the—I was very young at the time, but it—to me, it was one of the highlights of my career. From going from the guidance and navigation. So, we went from microwave ovens to color television to guidance and navigation and control to interface documents on the Apollo vehicle.

[Assistant] There again, nobody told you couldn’t do it. So, you did it.


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

[User] They were not. And not by any maliciousness. It’s just that—

[Assistant] No.

[User] —people were going off and doing their own thing, and somebody had to bring it together so that when this bolt hole pattern was made, the other person’s bolt hole pattern would meet that so you could bolt them together. That’s as simple as the electric wire—the wire runs and how you’d bolt the lunar module to the command and service module, and so forth and so on. The launch vehicle. So, that was, to me, the—one of the—I was very young at the time, but it—to me, it was one of the highlights of my career. From going from the guidance and navigation. So, we went from microwave ovens to color television to guidance and navigation and control to interface documents on the Apollo vehicle.

[Assistant] There again, nobody told you couldn’t do it. So, you did it.

[User] That’s right. And we did it in about the time schedule they gave us, too.

[Assistant] Was there—speaking of time schedule. Was there a feeling of tremendous pressure on everyone at that time?


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

[User] —people were going off and doing their own thing, and somebody had to bring it together so that when this bolt hole pattern was made, the other person’s bolt hole pattern would meet that so you could bolt them together. That’s as simple as the electric wire—the wire runs and how you’d bolt the lunar module to the command and service module, and so forth and so on. The launch vehicle. So, that was, to me, the—one of the—I was very young at the time, but it—to me, it was one of the highlights of my career. From going from the guidance and navigation. So, we went from microwave ovens to color television to guidance and navigation and control to interface documents on the Apollo vehicle.

[Assistant] There again, nobody told you couldn’t do it. So, you did it.

[User] That’s right. And we did it in about the time schedule they gave us, too.

[Assistant] Was there—speaking of time schedule. Was there a feeling of tremendous pressure on everyone at that time?

[User] I think there was, yes. I think time was really—I think your—I keep going back to your question: did we think we couldn’t do it? I don’t think technically, even though we didn’t know exactly what we were doing,—I don’t think technically we really had an issue. I think the time was really the thing that was bothering us the most. And I think that’s where people like George [M.] Low—then when George Low came in and Chris Kraft came in and George [E.] Mueller really made that schedule happen in my mind.

[Assistant] There is a question about hardware or software, which was the most difficult to work out?


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

[User] For the onboard system, yes, they were.

[Assistant] Now, did the other people who were also building components get in—try to get into the guidance business as well?

[User] Well, the guidance business was composed of the following: MIT at first was the major integrating contractor and did the software and designed the inertial measurement unit and the optical system and the computer. But as we went along, we found that MIT probably—it was too big a job for MIT to produce anything. So, we gave the job really to AC Spark Plug [Division of General Motors Corporation] at the time, which became more the integrating contractor for the guidance, navigation, and control system; and they actually did the production build of the inertial measurement unit. Raytheon [Company] built the computer; and Kollsman Instruments [Corporation] built the optical system; and MIT did all the software. And it basically was put together by AC Spark Plug. So, that’s how it was really done.

[Assistant] Do the American people realize that AC Spark Plug built that thing?

[User] Probably not. But that was part of General Motors at the time.

[Assistant] Right. I understand.


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

[User] Well, the guidance business was composed of the following: MIT at first was the major integrating contractor and did the software and designed the inertial measurement unit and the optical system and the computer. But as we went along, we found that MIT probably—it was too big a job for MIT to produce anything. So, we gave the job really to AC Spark Plug [Division of General Motors Corporation] at the time, which became more the integrating contractor for the guidance, navigation, and control system; and they actually did the production build of the inertial measurement unit. Raytheon [Company] built the computer; and Kollsman Instruments [Corporation] built the optical system; and MIT did all the software. And it basically was put together by AC Spark Plug. So, that’s how it was really done.

[Assistant] Do the American people realize that AC Spark Plug built that thing?

[User] Probably not. But that was part of General Motors at the time.

[Assistant] Right. I understand.

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] But it just seems funny to say, well, AC Spark Plug—


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

[User] Probably not. But that was part of General Motors at the time.

[Assistant] Right. I understand.

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] But it just seems funny to say, well, AC Spark Plug—

[User] Well, that’s right.

[Assistant] —is going to take care of that.


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

[User] Well, that’s right.

[Assistant] —is going to take care of that.

[User] We called it “AC Spark Plug,” and it was really a—of course, it was part of General Dynamics at the—General—

[Assistant] General Motors.

[User] —Motors, excuse me.

[Assistant] What are your impressions of the people you worked with at the MIT Instrumentation Lab?


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

[User] We called it “AC Spark Plug,” and it was really a—of course, it was part of General Dynamics at the—General—

[Assistant] General Motors.

[User] —Motors, excuse me.

[Assistant] What are your impressions of the people you worked with at the MIT Instrumentation Lab?

[User] Well, of course, I’ve got the highest regard for them. I really feel that the people at the MIT in the guidance and navigation were one of the key people in getting the Apollo Program accomplished. Dick Battin and those people, Norm Seers, Phil Felleman, Milt [Milton B.] Trageser, Ralph [R.] Ragan, all those people to me were really key. And they had a lot of lot of their expertise came from graduates of MIT right into the Instrumentation Lab. And of course, the whole Dr. Draper activity of inertial guidance to me was very, very important. So, I have to give them a lot of credit. Now that’s my own personal feeling on it. I think that the MIT people really did a fantastic job for the space program.

[Assistant] Somewhere along the line, Wally [Walter M.] Schirra [Jr.] is credited with saying, “I’m sitting on top of this thing, each part built by the lowest bidder.” I don’t know whether that’s his original line or not—


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

[User] —Motors, excuse me.

[Assistant] What are your impressions of the people you worked with at the MIT Instrumentation Lab?

[User] Well, of course, I’ve got the highest regard for them. I really feel that the people at the MIT in the guidance and navigation were one of the key people in getting the Apollo Program accomplished. Dick Battin and those people, Norm Seers, Phil Felleman, Milt [Milton B.] Trageser, Ralph [R.] Ragan, all those people to me were really key. And they had a lot of lot of their expertise came from graduates of MIT right into the Instrumentation Lab. And of course, the whole Dr. Draper activity of inertial guidance to me was very, very important. So, I have to give them a lot of credit. Now that’s my own personal feeling on it. I think that the MIT people really did a fantastic job for the space program.

[Assistant] Somewhere along the line, Wally [Walter M.] Schirra [Jr.] is credited with saying, “I’m sitting on top of this thing, each part built by the lowest bidder.” I don’t know whether that’s his original line or not—

[User] Yeah. Right.

[Assistant] —or whether he stole it from somebody—


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

[User] Well, of course, I’ve got the highest regard for them. I really feel that the people at the MIT in the guidance and navigation were one of the key people in getting the Apollo Program accomplished. Dick Battin and those people, Norm Seers, Phil Felleman, Milt [Milton B.] Trageser, Ralph [R.] Ragan, all those people to me were really key. And they had a lot of lot of their expertise came from graduates of MIT right into the Instrumentation Lab. And of course, the whole Dr. Draper activity of inertial guidance to me was very, very important. So, I have to give them a lot of credit. Now that’s my own personal feeling on it. I think that the MIT people really did a fantastic job for the space program.

[Assistant] Somewhere along the line, Wally [Walter M.] Schirra [Jr.] is credited with saying, “I’m sitting on top of this thing, each part built by the lowest bidder.” I don’t know whether that’s his original line or not—

[User] Yeah. Right.

[Assistant] —or whether he stole it from somebody—

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] —but how bad is, in fact, what we’re talking about? How difficult was it to work with all of these people and keep them on track?


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

[User] The dollars became much more significant. Time was really the constraint. Because if you listened to his need statement or his general requirement, “We’re going to send men to the Moon and return them safely at the decade,” he didn’t say anything about dollars. Now, dollars are always there. So, we had a number of reviews that tried to get the dollars back into a box; but, actually, we did have dollars to do the job for the Apollo Program.

[Assistant] Nobody worried about the budget, is that what you're telling me?

[User] No, I didn’t say that.

[Assistant] Okay.

[User] I didn’t say that. No, they were worried about the budget because they had a constraint. But the dollars were there to do the job. And we still had to go explain why we were spending money, how we were spending money. But the dollars were easier during the Apollo Program than they were during the Shuttle Program.

[Assistant] In 1966, you became the Assistant Chief of the Systems Engineering Division. What were your responsibilities there?


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

[User] No, I didn’t say that.

[Assistant] Okay.

[User] I didn’t say that. No, they were worried about the budget because they had a constraint. But the dollars were there to do the job. And we still had to go explain why we were spending money, how we were spending money. But the dollars were easier during the Apollo Program than they were during the Shuttle Program.

[Assistant] In 1966, you became the Assistant Chief of the Systems Engineering Division. What were your responsibilities there?

[User] Well, that was the systems engineering organization was the organization to basically do all the systems aspects of it; to be sure, again, that everything played together and that we were ready to go to checkout and deliver the vehicle. So, my job was to be sure that all the analysis was completed, all the systems; when we looked at the structural analysis, the thermal analysis, all the detailed guidance analysis, that it all played together. And that was my job in that organization.

[Assistant] You set up a flight readiness review program—


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

[User] I didn’t say that. No, they were worried about the budget because they had a constraint. But the dollars were there to do the job. And we still had to go explain why we were spending money, how we were spending money. But the dollars were easier during the Apollo Program than they were during the Shuttle Program.

[Assistant] In 1966, you became the Assistant Chief of the Systems Engineering Division. What were your responsibilities there?

[User] Well, that was the systems engineering organization was the organization to basically do all the systems aspects of it; to be sure, again, that everything played together and that we were ready to go to checkout and deliver the vehicle. So, my job was to be sure that all the analysis was completed, all the systems; when we looked at the structural analysis, the thermal analysis, all the detailed guidance analysis, that it all played together. And that was my job in that organization.

[Assistant] You set up a flight readiness review program—

[User] Flight readiness review.

[Assistant] —at that time.


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

[User] Well, that was the systems engineering organization was the organization to basically do all the systems aspects of it; to be sure, again, that everything played together and that we were ready to go to checkout and deliver the vehicle. So, my job was to be sure that all the analysis was completed, all the systems; when we looked at the structural analysis, the thermal analysis, all the detailed guidance analysis, that it all played together. And that was my job in that organization.

[Assistant] You set up a flight readiness review program—

[User] Flight readiness review.

[Assistant] —at that time.

[User] We did a flight—we did what we called an FRR (flight readiness review). First we did a—first we—of course, we did a critical design review. Then we did a flight readiness review for each mission, and we had 2 weeks to get the vehicle through that.

[Assistant] What was a customer’s acceptance review?


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

[User] Flight readiness review.

[Assistant] —at that time.

[User] We did a flight—we did what we called an FRR (flight readiness review). First we did a—first we—of course, we did a critical design review. Then we did a flight readiness review for each mission, and we had 2 weeks to get the vehicle through that.

[Assistant] What was a customer’s acceptance review?

[User] Customer’s acceptance review is when you basically get together and go through all the documents and look at all the designs and be sure the design meets your specifications. And you essentially buy off on the vehicle. The customer, which is NASA in this case, basically buys off the vehicle from the builder of it. So, you look at basically what they’ve accomplished and what your requirements were. And you buy off the vehicle.

[Assistant] At this point, you—you’re—everything’s on schedule—


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

[User] We did a flight—we did what we called an FRR (flight readiness review). First we did a—first we—of course, we did a critical design review. Then we did a flight readiness review for each mission, and we had 2 weeks to get the vehicle through that.

[Assistant] What was a customer’s acceptance review?

[User] Customer’s acceptance review is when you basically get together and go through all the documents and look at all the designs and be sure the design meets your specifications. And you essentially buy off on the vehicle. The customer, which is NASA in this case, basically buys off the vehicle from the builder of it. So, you look at basically what they’ve accomplished and what your requirements were. And you buy off the vehicle.

[Assistant] At this point, you—you’re—everything’s on schedule—

[User] Right.

[Assistant] —going along. Then there’s that tragic fire. And everything comes to a grinding halt. Where did you hear about the fire?


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

[User] Well, that was interesting. If I go back and think about it, they were doing a countdown demonstration test, and I was listening to the—I can’t remember if I was listening to the results—or listening to the test, or was in a room where we were getting the results. And I think, in all honesty at the time when I think back on it—and, of course, sometimes your memories become a little bit—I think George [W. S.] Abbey and I, who’s now the current Center Director, were in a room together. George and I were listening to the results together at the time. And we—something went awry. Something went wrong. We didn’t know exactly what because we couldn’t tell. But that’s our first indication. And, of course, we got a later report. I was in Houston [Texas] at the time—

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] —I was in Houston listening to it on a hookup—

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] —in a—actually, I wasn’t in the—even in the Control Center. I think we were in an office. I think we were just in an office listening to—because it was a fairly routine test. I mean, you know, we didn’t really think that it was going to be a, you know—a countdown demonstration test is not a significant test. It’s a minor test in many people’s minds.

[Assistant] As I recall, the next day there was a deep, dark, black cloud over NASA. Everybody just—it was awful. Not just the loss of those three men but what the future might hold for the whole program.


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

[User] —I was in Houston listening to it on a hookup—

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] —in a—actually, I wasn’t in the—even in the Control Center. I think we were in an office. I think we were just in an office listening to—because it was a fairly routine test. I mean, you know, we didn’t really think that it was going to be a, you know—a countdown demonstration test is not a significant test. It’s a minor test in many people’s minds.

[Assistant] As I recall, the next day there was a deep, dark, black cloud over NASA. Everybody just—it was awful. Not just the loss of those three men but what the future might hold for the whole program.

[User] Right. Well, that’s right. And, of course, there was a lot of uncertainty. A lot of “Why did it happen? How did it happen?” And then, of course, then you go through that investigation, which is very traumatic, and you find the results. Then you go through what corrective actions you have to take. The thing that’s interesting, though, is that there were black clouds; but people did feel very motivated to fix the problem and continue on. And there was no question about the fact that we wanted to fix the problem and continue on. The astronauts, the management, and the country—the Congress and the country—wanted to fix the problem and move on.

[Assistant] When Frank Borman called you and said, “I want you on the Tiger Team.” (I don’t know whether he called you or not.) But when you—


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

[User] —in a—actually, I wasn’t in the—even in the Control Center. I think we were in an office. I think we were just in an office listening to—because it was a fairly routine test. I mean, you know, we didn’t really think that it was going to be a, you know—a countdown demonstration test is not a significant test. It’s a minor test in many people’s minds.

[Assistant] As I recall, the next day there was a deep, dark, black cloud over NASA. Everybody just—it was awful. Not just the loss of those three men but what the future might hold for the whole program.

[User] Right. Well, that’s right. And, of course, there was a lot of uncertainty. A lot of “Why did it happen? How did it happen?” And then, of course, then you go through that investigation, which is very traumatic, and you find the results. Then you go through what corrective actions you have to take. The thing that’s interesting, though, is that there were black clouds; but people did feel very motivated to fix the problem and continue on. And there was no question about the fact that we wanted to fix the problem and continue on. The astronauts, the management, and the country—the Congress and the country—wanted to fix the problem and move on.

[Assistant] When Frank Borman called you and said, “I want you on the Tiger Team.” (I don’t know whether he called you or not.) But when you—

[User] Right.

[Assistant] —how did you feel?


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

[User] Well, I felt very good. Actually it was George Low who called me.

[Assistant] Okay.

[User] George Low who called me. It was—Frank was actually—George Low actually set up the team.

[Assistant] Okay.

[User] And, of course, I was elated to do it because I felt it was a way that I could really get involved in getting the vehicle ready to fly again. And that’s what I felt was important, is to get the vehicle ready to fly again. So, I was elated in some respects. I was a little bit—then I really felt the problem that you asked me: could you do it? I was really concerned: could we really get the vehicle ready to fly again? Because it was so important, and we had to overcome all the issues that were there.

[Assistant] At Downey [California—the North American plant], things—there really was a black cloud over things at Downey, were there not?


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

[User] George Low who called me. It was—Frank was actually—George Low actually set up the team.

[Assistant] Okay.

[User] And, of course, I was elated to do it because I felt it was a way that I could really get involved in getting the vehicle ready to fly again. And that’s what I felt was important, is to get the vehicle ready to fly again. So, I was elated in some respects. I was a little bit—then I really felt the problem that you asked me: could you do it? I was really concerned: could we really get the vehicle ready to fly again? Because it was so important, and we had to overcome all the issues that were there.

[Assistant] At Downey [California—the North American plant], things—there really was a black cloud over things at Downey, were there not?

[User] Yes, there was. Yes, there was.

[Assistant] Tell me what that was like.


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

[User] Yes, there was. Yes, there was.

[Assistant] Tell me what that was like.

[User] Well, the issue—unfortunately, whenever you have an accident or a bad problem, you go through the fact of: what happened? Why did it happen? And then unfortunately you start thinking: whose fault was it—

[Assistant] That’s right.

[User] —this thing?

[Assistant] Fingers start being pointed.


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

[User] Whose fault was it? Why did this happen? Why did that happen?

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] And that is really the—something you have to overcome before you can really get going again. Once you get going, though, you forget that part of it. And so, we got over that pretty quick. The team—I think that’s where the team was really important. With Frank Borman’s charisma, with his dedication, with his can-do attitude, him being out there overcame that problem. I think that, in my mind, was the biggest thing that Frank was able to do, which was monumental. He already—he was able to focus on the fact we wanted to get this thing flying again. He had a team to do it. He wanted—we needed Rockwell to do it. Or North American Aviation at the time.

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] We needed North American to do it, and so Frank saw that. And he had the blessings of George Low and Bob [Robert R.] Gilruth to get that done. And so, with Frank as the leader, I think we were able to accomplish that. So, that was the big thing, was to overcome this finger-pointing.

[Assistant] You started, though, at ground zero all over again—


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

[User] And that is really the—something you have to overcome before you can really get going again. Once you get going, though, you forget that part of it. And so, we got over that pretty quick. The team—I think that’s where the team was really important. With Frank Borman’s charisma, with his dedication, with his can-do attitude, him being out there overcame that problem. I think that, in my mind, was the biggest thing that Frank was able to do, which was monumental. He already—he was able to focus on the fact we wanted to get this thing flying again. He had a team to do it. He wanted—we needed Rockwell to do it. Or North American Aviation at the time.

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] We needed North American to do it, and so Frank saw that. And he had the blessings of George Low and Bob [Robert R.] Gilruth to get that done. And so, with Frank as the leader, I think we were able to accomplish that. So, that was the big thing, was to overcome this finger-pointing.

[Assistant] You started, though, at ground zero all over again—

[User] Exactly.

[Assistant] —and rewired that thing, reconfigured it.


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

[User] We needed North American to do it, and so Frank saw that. And he had the blessings of George Low and Bob [Robert R.] Gilruth to get that done. And so, with Frank as the leader, I think we were able to accomplish that. So, that was the big thing, was to overcome this finger-pointing.

[Assistant] You started, though, at ground zero all over again—

[User] Exactly.

[Assistant] —and rewired that thing, reconfigured it.

[User] Yeah, in fact we did even more than that. What we did is, we started and we went through system by system, subsystem by subsystem, system by system, to find out, even if it had nothing—not a thing to do with the failure, we went through each point and tried to see what type of corrective action did we have to take to fix it so it was as good as possible. Now, in later years, I found out after the Challenger [51-L] accident there’s a saying that “A ship in the harbor is safe, but that’s not what ships are built for.” So, you could not make this perfect. And we knew we couldn’t make it perfect. But we certainly could make it better than it was within the time, money, and schedule and dollars constraints we had, and make it essentially safer. And we did do that. But we went through every system, point by point. And that’s where George Low had meeting after meeting, where we—each person brought up issues they had. The flight control people did, the engineering people did, the contractors did, and we addressed each problem. We didn’t fix everything everybody wanted us to fix. But we—but when we didn’t do it, we let them know why we weren’t doing it and then the job we really had in the [time] was to get those things implemented and get the spacecraft built again.

[Assistant] Tell me about how the decision was made on the oxygen blend.


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

[User] Well, in fact I was out at Downey during that time with the Borman team and I got a call from George Low. And he said that “The testing’s that being done by Max [Maxime A.] Faget’s people with the materials we have will not allow us to use the oxygen atmosphere we have. So, we need to—there is no materials that will be self-extinguishing.” That was a criteria. The materials that, once ignited, had to be self-extinguishing.

[Assistant] Right.

[User] And, of course, what is a fire? A fire is oxygen; it’s fuel, which is material; and it’s some type of ignition source. In fact, this room right now has ignition sources in it.

[Assistant] Sure.

[User] I mean, it has a fire—but in a spacecraft where you 100% oxygen and you have electrical wiring and you have a fuel, such as even metal, you’ve got to do something to correct it. And they couldn’t find any way out. So, he said, “Would you please—would you take it—I want you to have a design team and come up with what you could do.” So, I had a design team that was one person from Rockwell, Dave [David S.] Levine, John Zacarro was on the team, Joe [Joseph P.] Kerwin, who was a medical team and later became an astronaut for Skylab, and myself. [We] actually went about seeing what we could do, and we came up with a 60% oxygen, 40% nitrogen on the pad, which in testing the materials became self-—could itself self-extinguish—the materials were self-extinguishing. And we started that out at 14.7 psi. Now the next thing we had to do was figure out how we could get this back to 100% oxygen—

[Assistant] Get rid of it, yes.


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

[User] I mean, it has a fire—but in a spacecraft where you 100% oxygen and you have electrical wiring and you have a fuel, such as even metal, you’ve got to do something to correct it. And they couldn’t find any way out. So, he said, “Would you please—would you take it—I want you to have a design team and come up with what you could do.” So, I had a design team that was one person from Rockwell, Dave [David S.] Levine, John Zacarro was on the team, Joe [Joseph P.] Kerwin, who was a medical team and later became an astronaut for Skylab, and myself. [We] actually went about seeing what we could do, and we came up with a 60% oxygen, 40% nitrogen on the pad, which in testing the materials became self-—could itself self-extinguish—the materials were self-extinguishing. And we started that out at 14.7 psi. Now the next thing we had to do was figure out how we could get this back to 100% oxygen—

[Assistant] Get rid of it, yes.

[User] —at a reduced pressure, and without tearing the vehicle apart. And we found, interestingly enough, a penetration of the vehicle that had a nozzle on it, and you could open the nozzle. The nozzle was very much like your garden faucet. You could turn it. You could put a—essentially a fixed penetration of the vehicle, so we could vent it down and then have the regulator—oxygen regulator resupply the oxygen. So, by the time we got on orbit, we were at 5 psi, 100% oxygen, which also was self-extinguishing. So, we were able to do it without any changes to hardware or software; it was just procedures. And, of course, that was a really an interesting way. And they flew every mission that way. They flew every mission that way.

[Assistant] But had it not been for that fire, you never would have figured that out—

[User] That’s right.

[Assistant] —and the fire was just an accident waiting to happen—


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

[User] —at a reduced pressure, and without tearing the vehicle apart. And we found, interestingly enough, a penetration of the vehicle that had a nozzle on it, and you could open the nozzle. The nozzle was very much like your garden faucet. You could turn it. You could put a—essentially a fixed penetration of the vehicle, so we could vent it down and then have the regulator—oxygen regulator resupply the oxygen. So, by the time we got on orbit, we were at 5 psi, 100% oxygen, which also was self-extinguishing. So, we were able to do it without any changes to hardware or software; it was just procedures. And, of course, that was a really an interesting way. And they flew every mission that way. They flew every mission that way.

[Assistant] But had it not been for that fire, you never would have figured that out—

[User] That’s right.

[Assistant] —and the fire was just an accident waiting to happen—

[User] That’s right.

[Assistant] —somewhere, was it not?


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

[User] That’s right.

[Assistant] —somewhere, was it not?

[User] Yeah, well, that’s right. And there are a lot of reasons for it. People have varied reasons. But we were 100% oxygen at 16 psi. You can go back in history why we were at that way. There were reasons why.

[Assistant] Sure.

[User] Whether they were right or wrong, there were reasons why we got to that point, which obviously was not the right place to be in hindsight. But it’s like many things, you can correct things in hindsight that you couldn’t do beforehand.

[Assistant] Take you to 1968 and you’re the Chief of the Command and Service Modules Project, Engineering Division.


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

[User] Yeah, well, that’s right. And there are a lot of reasons for it. People have varied reasons. But we were 100% oxygen at 16 psi. You can go back in history why we were at that way. There were reasons why.

[Assistant] Sure.

[User] Whether they were right or wrong, there were reasons why we got to that point, which obviously was not the right place to be in hindsight. But it’s like many things, you can correct things in hindsight that you couldn’t do beforehand.

[Assistant] Take you to 1968 and you’re the Chief of the Command and Service Modules Project, Engineering Division.

[User] Right.

[Assistant] What does that mean?


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

[User] Whether they were right or wrong, there were reasons why we got to that point, which obviously was not the right place to be in hindsight. But it’s like many things, you can correct things in hindsight that you couldn’t do beforehand.

[Assistant] Take you to 1968 and you’re the Chief of the Command and Service Modules Project, Engineering Division.

[User] Right.

[Assistant] What does that mean?

[User] That’s getting each vehicle—it means getting each command and service module ready to fly. So, we would get each vehicle from Downey; ship the command and service module from Downey to the Cape; and then once at the Cape, get it ready to fly. And then once it’s flown, you get the next one ready. So, our job was to—and then actually take it through the flight readiness reviews. Take—to take each vehicle through the flight readiness reviews. So, that was the job. That was a (you might say) was a detailed engineering job but more of an operational engineering job of getting a designed vehicle ready to fly.

[Assistant] I have some friends who work at NASA who swear to me they never read the paper and there was no race with the Russians involved anywhere. They were racing with themselves doing all sorts of things. But all of a sudden, were you one of those people who’s looking at the paper and wondering what the Russians are doing or not?


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

[User] Right.

[Assistant] What does that mean?

[User] That’s getting each vehicle—it means getting each command and service module ready to fly. So, we would get each vehicle from Downey; ship the command and service module from Downey to the Cape; and then once at the Cape, get it ready to fly. And then once it’s flown, you get the next one ready. So, our job was to—and then actually take it through the flight readiness reviews. Take—to take each vehicle through the flight readiness reviews. So, that was the job. That was a (you might say) was a detailed engineering job but more of an operational engineering job of getting a designed vehicle ready to fly.

[Assistant] I have some friends who work at NASA who swear to me they never read the paper and there was no race with the Russians involved anywhere. They were racing with themselves doing all sorts of things. But all of a sudden, were you one of those people who’s looking at the paper and wondering what the Russians are doing or not?

[User] Well, you know, I’m not sure I really was at the time. I guess I was so busy doing what I was doing that I’m not sure I really paid too much attention to it, although probably more than I recognized. But I really wasn’t paying too much attention to it.

[Assistant] So, were you taken aback when someone calls you in and says, “[Apollo] 8’s going to do—”


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

[User] My wife didn’t. But I have the signature. We delivered it.

[Assistant] —you know, as you type up the report and you and your wife took it over to Mr. Low—

[User] Right.

[Assistant] —no question in your mind that it could be done.

[User] No. No question. No.

[Assistant] Never looked back?


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

[User] No. No question. No.

[Assistant] Never looked back?

[User] Never looked back. I felt it was—that was what it was designed to do, and there was no reason to feel that the design wouldn’t work on all the systems we had, including the guidance and navigation system. I remember the one issue Frank had. You know, we changed—one of the big changes after the fire, which we didn’t talk about, was the fact from an inward opening hatch to an outward opening hatch. Because Apollo had—on the fire had an inward opening hatch—

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] —primarily because of Gus Grissom’s flight [Mercury-Redstone 4, Liberty Bell 7], which caused the outward opening hatch to cause the failure. So, we went back to an outward opening hatch. It turns out, on the pad, you’re safer with an outward opening hatch for escape; but in space, you’re safer with an inward opening hatch because the pressure tends—the pressure inside is higher than outside and it tends to seal. And an outward opening hatch, it tends to want to blow it open. And that was Frank—one of Frank Borman’s biggest issues. He wanted us to be sure that thing wouldn’t open on him. And it was designed like a vault anyway, so it wasn’t going to open. But that was his biggest issue, I think.

[Assistant] Around you other people at NASA, as I recall, seemed to be terribly surprised that things were moving at this kind of Mach speed, that you were going to do—that 8 was going to do what they thought 9 or 10 was going to do.