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

[User] We had to keep most of the stuff going together. We were doing some of the 990 stuff, but then mostly just clearing everything up. We had the crew transport vehicle in, we had to get that one ready for it. Most of it was just covering your hiney. We had to go through all our own procedures, all our own paperwork, re-verify we were doing things right. It was pretty intense. In that same time, you couldn’t hurt them flying up there on the other end, because that was sort of my job, was to make sure none of the Shuttle went up in the flight test. I was supposed to keep all the Shuttle stuff away from flying airplanes. We had to get ready for Spacelab [reusable laboratory], we redid the facilities for processing all the equipment, and then DoD came in. You know, just that every day.

[Assistant] Yes, how is that different, when those DoD flights flew, as compared to a regular one as far as your job, once it landed? Was it a completely different?

[User] You had to put up with the Air Force then.

[Assistant] Is that spoken like a Navy man?

[User] Yes, right. The difference was the security, because the DoD packages, if you got around it, you had to have a clearance. They weren’t real big packages, usually. They were nothing like a Spacelab.

[Assistant] I guess it was quite different, because you never knew what was coming off of those Shuttles, whether it was going to be completely classified and top secret, or monkeys. There was quite a variety of things that came off the Shuttle.


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

[User] You had to put up with the Air Force then.

[Assistant] Is that spoken like a Navy man?

[User] Yes, right. The difference was the security, because the DoD packages, if you got around it, you had to have a clearance. They weren’t real big packages, usually. They were nothing like a Spacelab.

[Assistant] I guess it was quite different, because you never knew what was coming off of those Shuttles, whether it was going to be completely classified and top secret, or monkeys. There was quite a variety of things that came off the Shuttle.

[User] Then a lot of it was, you just kept it in the Orbiter, and once it came down, and sort of during the processing to get it ready to go back, and then DoD would come down and take it out at night.

[Assistant] Everything was taken out before they took the Orbiter back for processing?


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

[User] Yes, right. The difference was the security, because the DoD packages, if you got around it, you had to have a clearance. They weren’t real big packages, usually. They were nothing like a Spacelab.

[Assistant] I guess it was quite different, because you never knew what was coming off of those Shuttles, whether it was going to be completely classified and top secret, or monkeys. There was quite a variety of things that came off the Shuttle.

[User] Then a lot of it was, you just kept it in the Orbiter, and once it came down, and sort of during the processing to get it ready to go back, and then DoD would come down and take it out at night.

[Assistant] Everything was taken out before they took the Orbiter back for processing?

[User] Yes, most of the time.

[Assistant] You did that until ’94?


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

[User] Then a lot of it was, you just kept it in the Orbiter, and once it came down, and sort of during the processing to get it ready to go back, and then DoD would come down and take it out at night.

[Assistant] Everything was taken out before they took the Orbiter back for processing?

[User] Yes, most of the time.

[Assistant] You did that until ’94?

[User] Yes. Then for a year, when I was at Aurora, but after that, then I ran the contract that was taking care of all of the equipment. Then I had some civil servant telling me what I should do and what I shouldn’t do.

[Assistant] I bet that was a different experience for you.


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

[User] Yes, most of the time.

[Assistant] You did that until ’94?

[User] Yes. Then for a year, when I was at Aurora, but after that, then I ran the contract that was taking care of all of the equipment. Then I had some civil servant telling me what I should do and what I shouldn’t do.

[Assistant] I bet that was a different experience for you.

[User] That was fun. I’ll show you a t-shirt, some of them said, “There ain’t nobody happy if Charlie’s not.”

[Assistant] Oh, that’s funny. Were there any other memories of that time period, and beginning with when you first started out there, and moving on through your career? Is there anything you would think of or consider your proudest achievement, or what you really enjoyed the most?


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

[User] Oh, yes. Everybody. Yes, it was a team.

[Assistant] Were a lot of the pilots like him, that they would explain more about what they were doing?

[User] Not as much as Neil, but most of them. [William H. “Bill”] Dana would. Joe [Joseph A.] Walker—yes, sometimes it depends on what it was. Like, he wanted a switch done, so to get it in, I would have had to auger out a piece of structure to get the switch to go which way, so hey, it switched this way, but you had to go upwards with a switch.\n\n I said, “Joe, how about this?”\n\n “Oh, no, man, my way or no way.”\n\n “I’m sorry sir.” So we got to go the other way. He was very boisterous, or he was vocal when he wanted something. Yes, there was a lot of them.

[Assistant] Of course, being test pilots, and the danger of their jobs, and then you did lose some. I imagine that affected everybody at the Center.

[User] Oh, yes. Oh, yes.

[Assistant] Especially people working closely with those pilots.


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

[User] Not as much as Neil, but most of them. [William H. “Bill”] Dana would. Joe [Joseph A.] Walker—yes, sometimes it depends on what it was. Like, he wanted a switch done, so to get it in, I would have had to auger out a piece of structure to get the switch to go which way, so hey, it switched this way, but you had to go upwards with a switch.\n\n I said, “Joe, how about this?”\n\n “Oh, no, man, my way or no way.”\n\n “I’m sorry sir.” So we got to go the other way. He was very boisterous, or he was vocal when he wanted something. Yes, there was a lot of them.

[Assistant] Of course, being test pilots, and the danger of their jobs, and then you did lose some. I imagine that affected everybody at the Center.

[User] Oh, yes. Oh, yes.

[Assistant] Especially people working closely with those pilots.

[User] Yes. We couldn’t believe it when they tried to blame it on Joe.

[Assistant] The 104 [accident with the North American XB-70]?


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

[User] Oh, yes. Oh, yes.

[Assistant] Especially people working closely with those pilots.

[User] Yes. We couldn’t believe it when they tried to blame it on Joe.

[Assistant] The 104 [accident with the North American XB-70]?

[User] Yes, wiped out the B-70. That was a bad day, too. You’d never know, either he slowed down, or they speeded up and he didn’t know. And it was all for taking pictures.

[Assistant] Did you take part in any of the social activities, or the athletic groups, the bowling team and the different things that people would get together?


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

[User] Yes. We couldn’t believe it when they tried to blame it on Joe.

[Assistant] The 104 [accident with the North American XB-70]?

[User] Yes, wiped out the B-70. That was a bad day, too. You’d never know, either he slowed down, or they speeded up and he didn’t know. And it was all for taking pictures.

[Assistant] Did you take part in any of the social activities, or the athletic groups, the bowling team and the different things that people would get together?

[User] No. When we first started, I would play softball, but we had a softball team, but not really. I took a part in a lot of the flight parties.

[Assistant] At Johnson, they used to have splash-down parties after all the missions. Did they have that after the X-15 flights?


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

[User] Yes, wiped out the B-70. That was a bad day, too. You’d never know, either he slowed down, or they speeded up and he didn’t know. And it was all for taking pictures.

[Assistant] Did you take part in any of the social activities, or the athletic groups, the bowling team and the different things that people would get together?

[User] No. When we first started, I would play softball, but we had a softball team, but not really. I took a part in a lot of the flight parties.

[Assistant] At Johnson, they used to have splash-down parties after all the missions. Did they have that after the X-15 flights?

[User] Oh, yes, big time. There was always a flight party, 104, whatever the program was, if it had a good flight, you went and had a party. If you had a bad flight, you went and had a wake.

[Assistant] Basically same thing, just call it something different.


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

[User] No. When we first started, I would play softball, but we had a softball team, but not really. I took a part in a lot of the flight parties.

[Assistant] At Johnson, they used to have splash-down parties after all the missions. Did they have that after the X-15 flights?

[User] Oh, yes, big time. There was always a flight party, 104, whatever the program was, if it had a good flight, you went and had a party. If you had a bad flight, you went and had a wake.

[Assistant] Basically same thing, just call it something different.

[User] Yes. Neil could chugalug a beer faster than everybody else, Jack McKay, you know.

[Assistant] Didn’t his son work out there too?


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

[User] Oh, yes, big time. There was always a flight party, 104, whatever the program was, if it had a good flight, you went and had a party. If you had a bad flight, you went and had a wake.

[Assistant] Basically same thing, just call it something different.

[User] Yes. Neil could chugalug a beer faster than everybody else, Jack McKay, you know.

[Assistant] Didn’t his son work out there too?

[User] Yes. He lives right down here. John.

[Assistant] Was he working when you were there?


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

[User] Yes. Neil could chugalug a beer faster than everybody else, Jack McKay, you know.

[Assistant] Didn’t his son work out there too?

[User] Yes. He lives right down here. John.

[Assistant] Was he working when you were there?

[User] Yes, he came down and helped me in the Shuttle area, first time. Then he became a branch chief, and then he didn’t like the politics, and he got his time in and retired. I couldn’t believe it. I tried to talk him out of it.

[Assistant] Probably ran into some of the same things you were running into, I’m sure.


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

[User] Yes. He lives right down here. John.

[Assistant] Was he working when you were there?

[User] Yes, he came down and helped me in the Shuttle area, first time. Then he became a branch chief, and then he didn’t like the politics, and he got his time in and retired. I couldn’t believe it. I tried to talk him out of it.

[Assistant] Probably ran into some of the same things you were running into, I’m sure.

[User] Well, yes. He couldn’t ignore it.

[Assistant]
I was going to ask Rebecca if she has any questions.

I’ve got a couple of plane questions. You briefly talked about being an inspector on the SCA, the Shuttle Carrier Aircraft. Could you talk a little bit more about that, and when it first came online, and maybe what your thoughts were when you found out they were going to use it for transport?


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

[User] Yes, he came down and helped me in the Shuttle area, first time. Then he became a branch chief, and then he didn’t like the politics, and he got his time in and retired. I couldn’t believe it. I tried to talk him out of it.

[Assistant] Probably ran into some of the same things you were running into, I’m sure.

[User] Well, yes. He couldn’t ignore it.

[Assistant]
I was going to ask Rebecca if she has any questions.

I’ve got a couple of plane questions. You briefly talked about being an inspector on the SCA, the Shuttle Carrier Aircraft. Could you talk a little bit more about that, and when it first came online, and maybe what your thoughts were when you found out they were going to use it for transport?

[User] I wasn’t here, then; I was here after the fact. Herb Anderson, bless is soul, was the ops engineer from Dryden that was on that airplane when they modified it and did all that. When I came back, I went down to Flying Tigers, and went through flight engineer school, really, which you learn everything, the panel and all this stuff, then I was qualified to go inspect it. You’d crawl up the tail and inspect all this. All you’re doing is—the crew did it, and you’re just verifying that they did it right. But I could start it, and if I’d have had to.\n\n Someplace along the line Dryden quit inspecting the airplane and Johnson took care of all the responsibility. The guys would do their job, and then a flight engineer would come out before you flew it, and he would go through and inspect it.

[Assistant] The whole Mate-Demate, the whole mating system.


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

[User] I had the MDD. That, the hanger, everything inside the fences, plus all the rolling stock. Plus the MDD. Plus the MSBLS [Microwave Scanning Beam Landing System] the landing aids, the lights, battery shop, the labs. The astronauts’ trailer, when they’d come in. Just all the support branch. I just had to see that it was done, so I knew who did this, who did that, and I had to coordinate between facilities, that they had the hangar right, and the fire systems worked, and the fire pumps worked, and all this good stuff. I didn’t do it all, I just had to see that it was done. But if it didn’t get done, I’d do it myself.

[Assistant] It’s quite an operation, that’s for sure.

[User] It was. And the thing is, you had to see it all done, but you really didn’t have the big bang. When I first went down there, it was such a battle all the time. I went back and I told Milt, “Dryden can’t do this. They’ll eat us alive, Milt. Let us just support them.” Then after that, everything started going smooth.

[Assistant] When you started out there, I would imagine there weren’t any women working in your area at all. Did that change over time?

[User] Oh, yes. The women worked tool crib, they worked procurement, they worked the personnel, and secretaries, the libraries. We didn’t have any aircraft mechanics, women aircraft mechanics until the ’70s.

[Assistant] How did that work, as far as that environment being such a male-dominated field, and then having women come in? Did that create any issues, or was it relatively smooth, as long as they did their job?


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

[User] It was. And the thing is, you had to see it all done, but you really didn’t have the big bang. When I first went down there, it was such a battle all the time. I went back and I told Milt, “Dryden can’t do this. They’ll eat us alive, Milt. Let us just support them.” Then after that, everything started going smooth.

[Assistant] When you started out there, I would imagine there weren’t any women working in your area at all. Did that change over time?

[User] Oh, yes. The women worked tool crib, they worked procurement, they worked the personnel, and secretaries, the libraries. We didn’t have any aircraft mechanics, women aircraft mechanics until the ’70s.

[Assistant] How did that work, as far as that environment being such a male-dominated field, and then having women come in? Did that create any issues, or was it relatively smooth, as long as they did their job?

[User] The ones that proved themselves, yes. The ones that didn’t, yes, it was tough on them. They’d usually get moved to a non-critical position of some kind.

[Assistant] The other question I had for you, in your early days, when your teams were so close with the X-planes, were you able to teach the pilots what to listen for when they were up there? How were you able to do that?


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

[User] No.

[Assistant] You knew they were all doing a good job?

[User] They were all good guys. There were some that, personality, your personalities didn’t click too much. The Air Force—we were lower because we were civil servants. If we’d have been master sergeant or something, which is the crew, they’d have given you a little more. Just like [Charles E. “Chuck”] Yeager hated NASA. He’d come over and be showing someone something, and he’d say, “Well, what do you think they’re doing?” I heard him tell this senator, or whoever he was, “Oh, they don’t know what in the hell they’re doing. Lucky they get it together.” That’s how bad he hated us.\n\n I’ll tell you another little story if you want to listen to it.

[Assistant] Okay.

[User] Marty Knutson was a [Lockheed] U-2 pilot. I don’t know if you knew about Marty or not.

[Assistant] Yes, I’ve read a little bit about it.


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

[User] I guess the first thing that I was really concerned about was [Neil A.] Armstrong was dilly-dallying around out there, and he wasn't coming down, and we got run out of propellant. I thought he ought to get that thing on the ground, but he was just as cool as an icicle, and when we had thirteen seconds worth of propellant or something like that left when he touched down, not very much. But once we got down, I had all the confidence in the world that we were going to be able to make it back home.\n\n By that time, I had a lot of confidence in the hardware that I was responsible for. I thought we would lose an RCS engine or two on some of the programs, or some of the flights. I didn't expect them to be all totally error-free. The pyrotechnics I had a great deal of confidence in that hardware all working exactly the way it was supposed to. So, from my standpoint, I thought we were ready to go to the Moon, and I thought it would be successful.

[Assistant] It was.

[User] And the night when it landed, we had people walking—I came driving down NASA Road 1 here that evening, or my wife did, and we just had to poke along because those streets were just solid people, wall to wall people. You were threading your car down through people just walking across the road everywheres out there. Everybody was celebrating. When I got off work, I went out and went home, and my wife had the car loaded and we put the kids in it and pulled out to the country. So I didn't go to any of the celebrations. I just went to the country and relaxed for a while, because it had been a long, long two weeks, not much sleep. Matter of fact, I lay down in the back of the station wagon and went to sleep.

[Assistant] Most of your work had been done to that point. You kind of had to watch.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Is there anything else from the Apollo era that stands out in your mind, that you have special memories of?


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

[User] And the night when it landed, we had people walking—I came driving down NASA Road 1 here that evening, or my wife did, and we just had to poke along because those streets were just solid people, wall to wall people. You were threading your car down through people just walking across the road everywheres out there. Everybody was celebrating. When I got off work, I went out and went home, and my wife had the car loaded and we put the kids in it and pulled out to the country. So I didn't go to any of the celebrations. I just went to the country and relaxed for a while, because it had been a long, long two weeks, not much sleep. Matter of fact, I lay down in the back of the station wagon and went to sleep.

[Assistant] Most of your work had been done to that point. You kind of had to watch.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Is there anything else from the Apollo era that stands out in your mind, that you have special memories of?

[User] You know, I think that's another one of those that I need to just go back and reflect on and think about a little bit, and maybe we could touch on it some later date a little bit, because it's been a long time, and a lot of water run under the bridge since those days.

[Assistant]
Okay. We're kind of at a good stopping point before we go into Shuttle, but before we end, I'd like to ask Tim and Carol if they have any questions. Do you have any questions, Carol?

I have one question. You were talking about the pyrotechnics briefly there and that you had a lot of confidence in that system. Then looking at Apollo 12, when the rocket launched and it was hit by lightning on the launch and all the rest of the systems were able to be checked out, but the parachutes and the pyrotechnics for releasing the parachutes, there was some concern about that. Were you involved at all in that?


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

[User] About 212 of them on every flight.

[Assistant] I did have one last question. You mentioned that on Apollo 11, you wanted Neil to put it down, land it, but where were you at the time? Were you in the Control Center?

[User] I was in Building 45 in the MER [Mission Evaluation Room]. You know, Engineering had their own little room over in Building 45 over there, and we called it the Mission Evaluation Room. That's where most of the engineering took place, and things fed back and forth. I was in there. I was in there for nearly all of the Apollo flights, pulled a shift in there.

[Assistant]
Thank you.

Tim, no questions? Is there anything you'd like to say in conclusion?

[User] Well, I guess the one thing that I could say is that in the entire history of humankind, there have been very, very few people in this world that had the opportunity to work on a project such as the Apollo Program and to have as much fun in their career doing the kinds of things that they wanted to do as I have.

[Assistant] That's wonderful. It was great to be able to say that at the end of your career, to say that you enjoyed it.


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

[User] Yes. I went to, of course, a lot of meetings. We were talking at the time, on Echo, we had to fit the Echo into a launch system, so I had a lot of dealings with universities, a lot of dealings with the aerospace companies, and a lot of dealings with the other Centers, because the other Centers, even on the Scout, the Johnson Center—well, I had a lot of dealings with Wernher von Braun and his people at the time. As a matter of fact, Headquarters wanted to transfer the Scout because—this was before NASA—wanted to transfer it to Houston. So Thompson sent me down to Houston to talk to von Braun about it.\n\n Well, von Braun had this conference room and welcomed me graciously, and he had all of his head-knockers sitting around the table, and behind them was their American counterpart—all [the principles were] German that time, and behind them were their American counterpart. When I made my presentation as what a great system this was, how cheap it was, what all this could accomplish, he said, "Well, I don't think this is quite the scale of the thing we are going to be doing here," and he said, "But we'll take a vote on it." Well, they went around, you know how that came out. That was unanimous. So I went back with my tail between my legs, and the Scout stayed at Langley throughout its history, [which in retrospect was a very good decision].

[Assistant] The Scout Program, you were using off the shelf products. Is that correct, to create the Scout?

[User] The first stage was a new contract. The second stage was a military missile. And the third stage was a military missile. The fourth stage was a new contract, so half of it was military missiles, and half of it was new.

[Assistant] You actually worked with the contractor and had a long relationship with LTV Missiles and Electronics Group of Dallas that worked on the Scout?

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] What was that like, that relationship of working with a contractor developing that program?


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

[User] The first stage was a new contract. The second stage was a military missile. And the third stage was a military missile. The fourth stage was a new contract, so half of it was military missiles, and half of it was new.

[Assistant] You actually worked with the contractor and had a long relationship with LTV Missiles and Electronics Group of Dallas that worked on the Scout?

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] What was that like, that relationship of working with a contractor developing that program?

[User] Well, at times, it was a little testy, because we had lots of problems. First of all, we were new in project management of a major system like this. We learned as we’d go along. A fellow named Bill [William E.] Stoney [Jr.] was a co-Project Manager with me. I handled all the contracts and all the business arrangements, and he handled all the trajectory work and all that. I've lost my thought, I'm sorry.

[Assistant] That's okay. We were just talking about working with the contractors and how difficult that was at times.


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

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] What was that like, that relationship of working with a contractor developing that program?

[User] Well, at times, it was a little testy, because we had lots of problems. First of all, we were new in project management of a major system like this. We learned as we’d go along. A fellow named Bill [William E.] Stoney [Jr.] was a co-Project Manager with me. I handled all the contracts and all the business arrangements, and he handled all the trajectory work and all that. I've lost my thought, I'm sorry.

[Assistant] That's okay. We were just talking about working with the contractors and how difficult that was at times.

[User] It was a lot less difficult in those days than it was later on. They were willing to do almost anything to get in the business. For example, the contract that Ling-Temco-Vought gave us for the Scout, I'm sure it cost them twice as much to make the first Scout as what they got out of it, but it was worth it to them. They made it up later on because of repeat business. This was true of most of the companies in those days. They were perfectly willing to take a chance at very little dollars just to get in the business and establish their place in the space market.

[Assistant] The STG [Space Task Group] was forming during that same time period, and you mentioned that you were asked by Bob Gilruth to join it, but you decided to stay. When you stayed, what were you thinking you were going to be doing, and how did your career follow after that time before you went to Headquarters? What positions were you in at that time?


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

[User] Yes. I was just lucky to start out in its infancy, when we really had a blank check to do something. To go to the Moon. That will never happen again. Everybody since then, every President, said, "Well, we're going to give them another blank check. Go to Mars." That gets about that far, and then the money gets cut off. That's it.

[Assistant] Looking back over your entire career with the NACA, and then again with NASA, is there anything that stands out in your mind as the most challenging time of your career?

[User] I think the most challenging time was when I was [Acting] Associate Administrator of the [NASA] research organization, OAST, and Associate Administrator [for Management for NASA]. The headquarters time. That was the most challenging. Every 15 minutes of the day was scheduled. I mean, it was a high-stress; [however], I'm not a high-stress person. I didn't let it bother me, but that's just the way the jobs at that level are [by design].

[Assistant] Is there anything that stands out in your mind of maybe a project or something that you worked on that you're most proud of?

[User] I can think of a lot of them that I enjoyed. I'm not sure about one that I'm most proud of. The Scout, I loved that. I loved Echo. The system for evaluating people for NASA. The system I set up for training people—we've got a school at Wallops that trained people, I set that up.

[Assistant] What was that? What type of school did you set up at Wallops?


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

[User] Oh yes, very close. When I was the Associate Administrator, all of the Centers reported to me, so I had a lot of meetings with Chris and all the other Center Directors. Matter of fact, we had Center Director meetings a couple times a year, where they all came to Headquarters and we all got together. They didn't like them, but [we needed to bring the agency closer together by sharing ideas].

[Assistant] You got to see old friends and classmates?

[User] That's right, yeah. As I said, Bob Thompson was the head of the Space Shuttle. Have you met Bob?

[Assistant]
Yes, we have.

He still plays golf. Can't get him to play tennis anymore.

Well, that's all I have. Thank you.

This has been very helpful. Is there anything else that we haven't talked about that you wanted to mention?

[User] Well, there are probably a lot of things, but I can't think of them now.

[Assistant] We appreciate you taking your time out and talking to us.


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

[User] Events? Can you give me a hint? What kind of event?

[Assistant] Oh. Things like NASA administrators, new NASA administrators, or presidential administrations, 9/11 [September 11, 2001], something like that.

[User] Yes, events, events. Dan [Daniel S.] Goldin faster, better, cheaper, breaking apart the platforms. That was a huge event, and an unfortunate event, I think.

[Assistant] Why would you say that?

[User] Because I think again it broke the time series. There’s no home for MODIS [Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer] right now. MODIS was supposed to go to VIIRS [Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite]. That didn’t happen. I think if you look at a lot of the platforms and the measurement sets that were supposed to be continued, that became much harder to continue.\n\n Other big events. I think IPCC [Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change], just the nature of the IPCC assessments. That’s a series of events, but its formation really brought the assessment process into a much more mainstream regular part. I think it’s hard to keep the effort up. It tends to become assessment for assessment’s sake. But it does capture people’s attention both in the public and the political sectors as well as in the scientific community. I think that that’s really kept Earth systems in the fore.\n\n I should be able to think of more than that. But those are the ones that come to mind.

[Assistant] The big ones. Are there any major elements that you see today in terms of Earth System Science that have shaped its current direction?


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

[User] Yes, events, events. Dan [Daniel S.] Goldin faster, better, cheaper, breaking apart the platforms. That was a huge event, and an unfortunate event, I think.

[Assistant] Why would you say that?

[User] Because I think again it broke the time series. There’s no home for MODIS [Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer] right now. MODIS was supposed to go to VIIRS [Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite]. That didn’t happen. I think if you look at a lot of the platforms and the measurement sets that were supposed to be continued, that became much harder to continue.\n\n Other big events. I think IPCC [Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change], just the nature of the IPCC assessments. That’s a series of events, but its formation really brought the assessment process into a much more mainstream regular part. I think it’s hard to keep the effort up. It tends to become assessment for assessment’s sake. But it does capture people’s attention both in the public and the political sectors as well as in the scientific community. I think that that’s really kept Earth systems in the fore.\n\n I should be able to think of more than that. But those are the ones that come to mind.

[Assistant] The big ones. Are there any major elements that you see today in terms of Earth System Science that have shaped its current direction?

[User] Major elements. I think we still haven’t gotten the commitment to a long term observing system. That’s just not there. What we’ve got is a NOAA operational mission that really is focused on a permanent presence in space to meet short term forecasting needs, which is fine and good. You’ve got NASA, which is a research agency and really can’t afford to commit forever. It wants to do new things. It’s a science agency. So the two of those have not come to an agreement yet, in part because the nation hasn’t come to an agreement. The federal government hasn’t decided how to do that. Repeat that question for me again. I had another idea.

[Assistant] Are there any key elements you think that have shaped the current direction?


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

[User] Right, yes. I think if there was one other event in Earth System Science, it didn’t get the human dimension. Probably because it was such a cultural gap between social science and physical science. They tried. The latest IPCC assessment tried to get in adaptation. That’s really what people are asking for now, is how do I adapt. We’re still focusing on the mitigation side intensely. Climate change is going to happen.

[Assistant] Just shifting gears a little bit, are there any decisions that you made that have impacted the current direction of Earth System Science?

[User] I made sure there was a fluorescence band on MODIS. I guess I could say that was one thing. I don’t know. I think I was a young assistant professor when that all started. I think that there were a lot of folks. People like Dixon [M. Butler] and Shelby [G. Tilford] and Stan. They were the ones who were making the frontline decisions. But there were a lot of us down in the trenches. It was a generation that really bought into that vision. Mark [R.] Schoeberl and I always joke that we were known as the evil twins because we were always confused as to which Mark was which, because we both had mustaches at the time. We’d sit next to each other and confuse the project scientist. He would always call one of us the other’s name. There was a whole cadre of young scientists who came in and really bought into that vision, that interdisciplinary vision, that integrated view of the Earth as a system. So I think it was a collective decision, not just a bunch of individuals.

[Assistant] Even with your involvement in Mission to Planet Earth, you were the chief scientist there.

[User] No.

[Assistant] That’s what my research [indicates].


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

[User] I made sure there was a fluorescence band on MODIS. I guess I could say that was one thing. I don’t know. I think I was a young assistant professor when that all started. I think that there were a lot of folks. People like Dixon [M. Butler] and Shelby [G. Tilford] and Stan. They were the ones who were making the frontline decisions. But there were a lot of us down in the trenches. It was a generation that really bought into that vision. Mark [R.] Schoeberl and I always joke that we were known as the evil twins because we were always confused as to which Mark was which, because we both had mustaches at the time. We’d sit next to each other and confuse the project scientist. He would always call one of us the other’s name. There was a whole cadre of young scientists who came in and really bought into that vision, that interdisciplinary vision, that integrated view of the Earth as a system. So I think it was a collective decision, not just a bunch of individuals.

[Assistant] Even with your involvement in Mission to Planet Earth, you were the chief scientist there.

[User] No.

[Assistant] That’s what my research [indicates].

[User] Oh, okay. No. Yet another long sad story. That all got announced. I was going to go back and work with Charlie [Charles F.] Kennel. The lawyers stepped in, because I still had an active research program at OSU [Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon].

[Assistant] I was going to ask you how did that work.


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

[User] No.

[Assistant] That’s what my research [indicates].

[User] Oh, okay. No. Yet another long sad story. That all got announced. I was going to go back and work with Charlie [Charles F.] Kennel. The lawyers stepped in, because I still had an active research program at OSU [Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon].

[Assistant] I was going to ask you how did that work.

[User] That didn’t. I stayed at OSU, yes.

[Assistant] What do you think are some of the greatest accomplishments that you’ve seen over these past 20 years?


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

[User] Oh, okay. No. Yet another long sad story. That all got announced. I was going to go back and work with Charlie [Charles F.] Kennel. The lawyers stepped in, because I still had an active research program at OSU [Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon].

[Assistant] I was going to ask you how did that work.

[User] That didn’t. I stayed at OSU, yes.

[Assistant] What do you think are some of the greatest accomplishments that you’ve seen over these past 20 years?

[User] The greatest accomplishments. There are an awful lot. I think you saw a lot of them today. I think you’ll see some more tomorrow. The whole ocean circulation from ocean altimetry has just revolutionized our understanding of ocean circulation, ocean color, the basin scale changes, the hints of looking at fluorescence to understand phytoplankton physiology. I’m sure if you could talk to an atmospheric science or a land person, it’s the time series that are the biggest ones, the biggest change or had the biggest impact.\n\n The second is in some sense what Waleed [Abdalati] and others were talking about. It really opened up new windows to see new processes, like the polynya in the Weddell Sea, the change in the sea ice in the Arctic, all these things that we never could have seen any other way. [James A.] Yoder’s talk about productivity. So it’s hard to pick out one specific thing. I think if I was to just step back and say, “Okay, you’re a biological oceanographer, what’s the biggest thing?” I would say it’s the mesoscale ocean eddies and their impacts on ocean biology. So those are the 20-to-200-kilometer scale circulation features and how that drives ocean ecosystems because of the way they upwell and downwell nutrients, supply nutrients into the lighted zone.\n\n There are tons of others, but those are the ones I’ll just say right now.

[Assistant] Do you think there were any major missed opportunities?