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

[User] The research end, that’s out of the secretary’s mind. All they do is do what the boss tells you to do, so I don’t know that.

[Assistant] Let’s see here. Did you have a sense of what NACA’s relationship was like with the various administrations while you were working as a secretary for NACA?

[User] Well, there were a lot of things that went on up on the Hill, but I never went up on the Hill to hear. Even in the budget hearings, we were not allowed to attend.

[Assistant] What impact do you think Sputnik had on NACA? Or what are your memories of that time at NACA?

[User] Well, it was an exciting time when you saw that thing up in the sky, you know, but we did just what we had to do. We would just follow what the brains, the Drydens and the heads did. There was nothing we could—you know. We did what our bosses told us to do.

[Assistant] When Dryden became the Director of NACA, did that change anything at NACA Headquarters?


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

[User] Well, there were a lot of things that went on up on the Hill, but I never went up on the Hill to hear. Even in the budget hearings, we were not allowed to attend.

[Assistant] What impact do you think Sputnik had on NACA? Or what are your memories of that time at NACA?

[User] Well, it was an exciting time when you saw that thing up in the sky, you know, but we did just what we had to do. We would just follow what the brains, the Drydens and the heads did. There was nothing we could—you know. We did what our bosses told us to do.

[Assistant] When Dryden became the Director of NACA, did that change anything at NACA Headquarters?

[User] No. When he came to NACA?

[Assistant] When he became Director.


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

[User] Well, it was an exciting time when you saw that thing up in the sky, you know, but we did just what we had to do. We would just follow what the brains, the Drydens and the heads did. There was nothing we could—you know. We did what our bosses told us to do.

[Assistant] When Dryden became the Director of NACA, did that change anything at NACA Headquarters?

[User] No. When he came to NACA?

[Assistant] When he became Director.

[User] When he became the Director? He succeeded Dr. Lewis who had medical problems. Nothing changed when he took over; it was the same. Incidentally, many of us old NACA-ers don’t like the idea that it’s now the John H. Glenn [Research Center, previously the Lewis Research Center, Cleveland, Ohio] facility. I still refer to it as the Lewis Lab.

[Assistant] Why is that?


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

[User] No. When he came to NACA?

[Assistant] When he became Director.

[User] When he became the Director? He succeeded Dr. Lewis who had medical problems. Nothing changed when he took over; it was the same. Incidentally, many of us old NACA-ers don’t like the idea that it’s now the John H. Glenn [Research Center, previously the Lewis Research Center, Cleveland, Ohio] facility. I still refer to it as the Lewis Lab.

[Assistant] Why is that?

[User] When you dedicate something to somebody, like the Washington Monument, for instance, would you change that to John Adams? Whoever heard of changing anything that was dedicated to a person because he contributed all—and Dr. Lewis was responsible for the Lewis Research Center being in operation, built. It’s sad. Everybody was sad about that. Even Harry [Harold B.] Finger wrote letters to congressmen saying, “Hey, in the first place, John Glenn should have refused and said, ‘Oh, no, please don’t name that after me. I didn’t do any—.’” What did he do? He didn’t do anything to create this Laboratory up here. What is this? Oh, we were [makes sound]—.\n\n The girl who worked for Dr. Dryden first, she lives in Ohio, and she’s still living, Helen Smith. Oh, boy. I said, “Helen, what do you think of this?”\n\n “What do I think of it?” she asked. That was her boss, Dr. Lewis, yes. Then she became Dr. Dryden’s boss—I mean, secretary to him. Terrible. Anyway, would you do that? I wouldn’t think of that. You know, John Glenn had this named after him and that named after him, a highway named after him. What else do you want? For heaven’s sake. To me, I still refer it as the Lewis [Flight Propulsion] Lab[oratory]. [Laughs]

[Assistant] Do you. I think a number of people still do.


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

[User] Well, sure they do. You ask any NACA-er, and they’ll tell you. But they fought it. They tried to fight it, some of the people at Lewis. They didn’t get anywhere. I don’t think that’s right. I really don’t. They’re not changing Kennedy’s, are they? You know, they tried to change something over in Florida. What was it, anyway? Yes, I think they tried to—what was the—what’s the address for the Kennedy Space Center nowadays? What is it?

[Assistant] I think it’s just Cape Canaveral, Florida.

[User] Canaveral, Cape Canaveral. That’s what it is, Cape Canaveral. It’s not Cape Kennedy. Cape Canaveral.

[Assistant] Let me ask you a couple more questions about NACA—

[User] Go ahead.

[Assistant] —and then I wanted to ask you a couple of questions about the transition to NASA. But if you had to look back over your time at NACA, could you point to something and say that that was your most significant accomplishment while working there?


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

[User] Canaveral, Cape Canaveral. That’s what it is, Cape Canaveral. It’s not Cape Kennedy. Cape Canaveral.

[Assistant] Let me ask you a couple more questions about NACA—

[User] Go ahead.

[Assistant] —and then I wanted to ask you a couple of questions about the transition to NASA. But if you had to look back over your time at NACA, could you point to something and say that that was your most significant accomplishment while working there?

[User] The whole ten years were. The whole time I worked. When I first went in ’42 until the time we became ’58, they were perfect. Great days to work, yes. I can tell you that those were the best days of my life, working in the government. There’s nothing like it. Hey, these reunions prove it, right?\n\n Okay, when I retired, they held a party for me in the NASA Building, okay? And I’m looking over all these people. I have to stand there and give this little speech of some sort. And I said, “I see a lot of my old NACA friends here,” and I happened to mention that aloud, and then those faces lit up, you know. Well, they were. Some of them were still NASA, too, but a number of them were not working, but they were old NACA friends, and that’s when I mentioned, “Oh, wouldn’t it be nice to have a reunion of the old NACA people?” And that’s when they badgered me to hold this first reunion, which I ran, in ’76. So after that, well, you can see what’s happened. I suppose my most significant accomplishment was starting the first NACA reunion. So far we’ve had eleven, and I hear Langley has committed to hold the next one, perhaps in two years.

[Assistant] Why do you think it’s so important for former NACA employees to come to these reunions, and why do they come?


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

[User] [Laughs] Do you want to know if they dated and all?

[Assistant] Sure. Dated, played any pranks on each other.

[User] One thing they used to do, one of the Budget Officers used to have a pool every time we got checks, our checks, they’d take the numbers or something, and whatever numbers came up, that person won—well, the contribution, I guess, was a dollar; whatever they did, I don’t know; budget men did all this stuff—and would win the prize every two weeks, whenever we got paid. That was one of the things they used to do, and I guess there were others that I don’t know about. I really don’t. [Laughs]\n\n Whenever we needed help from other Laboratories, they would send up maybe two or three girls from the Center—or I say the Laboratory—from the Laboratory to help us out with the reports. These engineers, whenever they did any work, would write a report, and reports were called “research memorandums” or “technical notes,” and some were classified; some were not. Whenever we needed these people, they only worked a short time and then were sent back to the Lab, and we always liked when they came to help us out, you know, to relieve us of the overload that we had. That was always nice. So we got to know some of the people at the Labs; mostly women, of course, the girls, yes. I know one friend of mine who worked at NACA, Helen Williams, she had two Langley girls working, living with her in her apartment, who came from Langley Field. To this day, they are still friends with this lady.

[Assistant] How neat.

[User] Oh yes. They’re still in touch. It’s wonderful, isn’t it?

[Assistant] Yes. And did you have that same opportunity to go out to the Laboratories while you were working for NACA?


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

[User] Well, you get a tour of the whole Lab. You get a tour wherever they take you. They take you through the wind tunnels, everywhere. Whatever work they were doing, it was a complete inspection of the entire area. Then they would take you to lunch. I remember when we went, at Langley this one time, we had lunch in their cafeteria. Guess who was sitting next to me? Orville Wright.

[Assistant] You met Orville Wright?

[User] Yes. He was sitting right next to me. We were eating together at the table. When I told them they said, “What? You were sitting next to Orville Wright?”\n\n I said, “Sure.” And do you know, at this the other night—I don’t know whether you heard about it—but what is she, a grandniece or great-grandniece, happened to be here in this hotel, and she saw “NACA.” Oh, well this sparked her. She came, and wouldn’t you know that she is—I don’t know what the relationship is, but she is related to the Wright brothers. Her son will be writing a book about the Wright brothers.\n\n Well, when she saw “NACA,” that meant something to her. It doesn’t mean anything to you—well, you work for NASA, so you would know. But any ordinary people walking in the street, “What’s NACA?” Nobody knows what NACA is, but she did. Her father was with her. We said, “Won’t you have dinner with us?” Here she was mingling around with everybody and obviously excited to be included in this unexpected encounter.

[Assistant] That’s nice.

[User] That was nice, yes. I know she was happy to be among us Friday night. They left Saturday morning.

[Assistant] When you were sitting next to Orville Wright, do you remember the conversation?


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

[User] Yes. He was sitting right next to me. We were eating together at the table. When I told them they said, “What? You were sitting next to Orville Wright?”\n\n I said, “Sure.” And do you know, at this the other night—I don’t know whether you heard about it—but what is she, a grandniece or great-grandniece, happened to be here in this hotel, and she saw “NACA.” Oh, well this sparked her. She came, and wouldn’t you know that she is—I don’t know what the relationship is, but she is related to the Wright brothers. Her son will be writing a book about the Wright brothers.\n\n Well, when she saw “NACA,” that meant something to her. It doesn’t mean anything to you—well, you work for NASA, so you would know. But any ordinary people walking in the street, “What’s NACA?” Nobody knows what NACA is, but she did. Her father was with her. We said, “Won’t you have dinner with us?” Here she was mingling around with everybody and obviously excited to be included in this unexpected encounter.

[Assistant] That’s nice.

[User] That was nice, yes. I know she was happy to be among us Friday night. They left Saturday morning.

[Assistant] When you were sitting next to Orville Wright, do you remember the conversation?

[User] No, I don’t. I don’t remember.

[Assistant] Let me ask you a couple of questions about the transition from NACA to NASA.


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

[User] That was nice, yes. I know she was happy to be among us Friday night. They left Saturday morning.

[Assistant] When you were sitting next to Orville Wright, do you remember the conversation?

[User] No, I don’t. I don’t remember.

[Assistant] Let me ask you a couple of questions about the transition from NACA to NASA.

[User] Busy days. Busy, busy days. That’s all I can tell you. Let me tell you, visits up the Hill and you know. Yes.

[Assistant] And at this point, were you going to Capitol Hill?


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

[User] No, I don’t. I don’t remember.

[Assistant] Let me ask you a couple of questions about the transition from NACA to NASA.

[User] Busy days. Busy, busy days. That’s all I can tell you. Let me tell you, visits up the Hill and you know. Yes.

[Assistant] And at this point, were you going to Capitol Hill?

[User] Oh, no. We were working at the office.

[Assistant] Were you typing up testimony or what sort of things were you working on?


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

[User] Busy days. Busy, busy days. That’s all I can tell you. Let me tell you, visits up the Hill and you know. Yes.

[Assistant] And at this point, were you going to Capitol Hill?

[User] Oh, no. We were working at the office.

[Assistant] Were you typing up testimony or what sort of things were you working on?

[User] Well, Paul [G.] Dembling, who didn’t come to this reunion this time, he wrote the Space Act, and we did what we had to do. There was just so much going on at that time, so much.

[Assistant] You were Dryden’s secretary. What was your feeling when Dryden wasn’t selected as the Administrator of NASA?


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

[User] Oh, no. We were working at the office.

[Assistant] Were you typing up testimony or what sort of things were you working on?

[User] Well, Paul [G.] Dembling, who didn’t come to this reunion this time, he wrote the Space Act, and we did what we had to do. There was just so much going on at that time, so much.

[Assistant] You were Dryden’s secretary. What was your feeling when Dryden wasn’t selected as the Administrator of NASA?

[User] Well, we knew the reason, we thought. It was—I don’t know. I took it philosophically. I knew that politics is politics. Glennan was the Administrator. He was in touch quite often with Dr. Dryden. You know what I mean? And same way when Webb got on board. Yes. These men knew how to handle it. Yes. I guess it was sad for the family and for all of us.

[Assistant] So did anything change when Glennan came on board or when Webb became the Administrator?


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

[User] Well, Paul [G.] Dembling, who didn’t come to this reunion this time, he wrote the Space Act, and we did what we had to do. There was just so much going on at that time, so much.

[Assistant] You were Dryden’s secretary. What was your feeling when Dryden wasn’t selected as the Administrator of NASA?

[User] Well, we knew the reason, we thought. It was—I don’t know. I took it philosophically. I knew that politics is politics. Glennan was the Administrator. He was in touch quite often with Dr. Dryden. You know what I mean? And same way when Webb got on board. Yes. These men knew how to handle it. Yes. I guess it was sad for the family and for all of us.

[Assistant] So did anything change when Glennan came on board or when Webb became the Administrator?

[User] No, it was basically a very smooth transition at the time, very smooth, as far as I know.

[Assistant] What were some of the things that you recall Dryden was working on at that point?


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

[User] No indeed. This is his signature.

[Assistant] I’m going to have to go to the archives and put that piece of paper up against a letter. [Laughs]

[User] Well, you want to do that? You could do that. That’s how he wrote. Crowley and the other boss I had, he was—[writes]. That’s Crowley. Hey, I wrote to Helen Smith, the secretary before me, and I said, “Helen, do you recognize this?” She lives in Ohio.\n\n “Where did you get that?”\n\n I told her I had written it.\n\n “Oh, for heaven’s sake.”\n\n Sometimes I would sign letters that were not very important if he wasn’t available to do so. “Do you want me to sign that for you?” And, of course, I put the little “J. D.” down there to make sure.

[Assistant] When Dr. Dryden wasn’t there, what were some of the tasks that you would work on while he was out of town?

[User] There was always a lot of work to do, even if he wasn’t there. Work always came through the desk all the time. And when he got sick, I used to go to the NIH, (National Institutes of Health), hospital unit in Bethesda, Maryland. I used to take the latest mail; he wanted that. He wanted to write, sign his name to the letters, and anything that was official, of course, I took out, and he signed them. He wanted to read them all, keep him up to date on what was going on at the office when he was hospitalized. It was very sad.

[Assistant] You must have had a very strong bond, a very strong relationship.


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

[User] Well, you want to do that? You could do that. That’s how he wrote. Crowley and the other boss I had, he was—[writes]. That’s Crowley. Hey, I wrote to Helen Smith, the secretary before me, and I said, “Helen, do you recognize this?” She lives in Ohio.\n\n “Where did you get that?”\n\n I told her I had written it.\n\n “Oh, for heaven’s sake.”\n\n Sometimes I would sign letters that were not very important if he wasn’t available to do so. “Do you want me to sign that for you?” And, of course, I put the little “J. D.” down there to make sure.

[Assistant] When Dr. Dryden wasn’t there, what were some of the tasks that you would work on while he was out of town?

[User] There was always a lot of work to do, even if he wasn’t there. Work always came through the desk all the time. And when he got sick, I used to go to the NIH, (National Institutes of Health), hospital unit in Bethesda, Maryland. I used to take the latest mail; he wanted that. He wanted to write, sign his name to the letters, and anything that was official, of course, I took out, and he signed them. He wanted to read them all, keep him up to date on what was going on at the office when he was hospitalized. It was very sad.

[Assistant] You must have had a very strong bond, a very strong relationship.

[User] Oh yes. Yes. His wife often said, “I so appreciate your taking care of my husband.”\n\n I would keep people from going into his office. I’d close the door. He needed that privacy.\n\n Have you got this on?

[Assistant] Yes. Do you want me to take it off.


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

[User] There was always a lot of work to do, even if he wasn’t there. Work always came through the desk all the time. And when he got sick, I used to go to the NIH, (National Institutes of Health), hospital unit in Bethesda, Maryland. I used to take the latest mail; he wanted that. He wanted to write, sign his name to the letters, and anything that was official, of course, I took out, and he signed them. He wanted to read them all, keep him up to date on what was going on at the office when he was hospitalized. It was very sad.

[Assistant] You must have had a very strong bond, a very strong relationship.

[User] Oh yes. Yes. His wife often said, “I so appreciate your taking care of my husband.”\n\n I would keep people from going into his office. I’d close the door. He needed that privacy.\n\n Have you got this on?

[Assistant] Yes. Do you want me to take it off.

[User] Yes. Well, I won’t tell you this. It’s all right. But I would try to keep people from going in there, because I knew that he was suffering. He was suffering so much. He had two doors; one led to the inner sanctum, you know what I mean? I often heard him go in there to go to the bathroom. Poor guy. I’d see him sitting at his desk. Because I think maybe the pressure from the cancer was getting to him so much.

[Assistant] Let me just ask you a couple more questions. I don’t want to take up too much of your time.


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

[User] Oh yes. Yes. His wife often said, “I so appreciate your taking care of my husband.”\n\n I would keep people from going into his office. I’d close the door. He needed that privacy.\n\n Have you got this on?

[Assistant] Yes. Do you want me to take it off.

[User] Yes. Well, I won’t tell you this. It’s all right. But I would try to keep people from going in there, because I knew that he was suffering. He was suffering so much. He had two doors; one led to the inner sanctum, you know what I mean? I often heard him go in there to go to the bathroom. Poor guy. I’d see him sitting at his desk. Because I think maybe the pressure from the cancer was getting to him so much.

[Assistant] Let me just ask you a couple more questions. I don’t want to take up too much of your time.

[User] Yes, you ask me questions; let me tell you all these details.

[Assistant] Who would often come by Dr. Dryden’s office? Anyone from the administration or from other agencies?


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

[User] Yes, you ask me questions; let me tell you all these details.

[Assistant] Who would often come by Dr. Dryden’s office? Anyone from the administration or from other agencies?

[User] People? He never turned anybody down, never. No matter, he saw them all. He wouldn’t refuse anybody, anytime. He always had time for whoever wanted to see him, not only adults but youngsters too. When work came in, it didn’t sit this high on his desk. [Demonstrates] He’d look at it, [gestures], or put it aside to answer, always. He did things [snaps fingers], pretty darn quick. Never anything backlogged. No backlog, no anything, and read—he could go through mail with uncanny speed. It takes something to read fast. I don’t read fast, myself; I don’t know about you.\n\n His English was impeccable. Grammar, impeccable. You couldn’t find fault with his English. Punctuation, he’d do everything, and he wouldn’t dictate. He wrote, wrote out in his little old handwriting, the little I showed you. But he wrote. He liked to write things out himself. Incredible. Incredible person. You just can’t—spiritually and intelligent, my god. He knew everything. He liked mystery books.

[Assistant] He did?

[User] Yes, and one of the gals, Helen Frye [phonetic], she read a lot of mysteries, and she supplied him sometimes with mysteries. He liked mystery books.\n\n You like to know about him, maybe—I should have told you—maybe you should meet Michael [H.] Gorn and see what he’s got on his tape.

[Assistant] Sure. Sure. Well, and I can forward him a copy of this as well, if you’d like.


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

[User] People? He never turned anybody down, never. No matter, he saw them all. He wouldn’t refuse anybody, anytime. He always had time for whoever wanted to see him, not only adults but youngsters too. When work came in, it didn’t sit this high on his desk. [Demonstrates] He’d look at it, [gestures], or put it aside to answer, always. He did things [snaps fingers], pretty darn quick. Never anything backlogged. No backlog, no anything, and read—he could go through mail with uncanny speed. It takes something to read fast. I don’t read fast, myself; I don’t know about you.\n\n His English was impeccable. Grammar, impeccable. You couldn’t find fault with his English. Punctuation, he’d do everything, and he wouldn’t dictate. He wrote, wrote out in his little old handwriting, the little I showed you. But he wrote. He liked to write things out himself. Incredible. Incredible person. You just can’t—spiritually and intelligent, my god. He knew everything. He liked mystery books.

[Assistant] He did?

[User] Yes, and one of the gals, Helen Frye [phonetic], she read a lot of mysteries, and she supplied him sometimes with mysteries. He liked mystery books.\n\n You like to know about him, maybe—I should have told you—maybe you should meet Michael [H.] Gorn and see what he’s got on his tape.

[Assistant] Sure. Sure. Well, and I can forward him a copy of this as well, if you’d like.

[User] Well, anyway, I don’t know. I don’t know whether I told him as much as I told you. He asked different questions. Go ahead.

[Assistant] Any other anecdotes or memories that you recall?


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

[User] About him, you mean?

[Assistant] Yes.

[User] Helen, his former secretary, told me when I went up to talk to her when she knew I was going to take the job, “Well, you’ll find out,” she said, “that Dr. Dryden wears one suit a week, and the next week he’ll wear something else. You’ll notice that.”\n\n I said, “Oh, Helen. Oh, okay.” He wasn’t a flashy dresser, like some men are. They have the right tie and—no, he wasn’t flashy at all.\n\n He had a very faithful driver who chauffeured him home, got him to work and home. John Freeman [phonetic] was his driver, black man, who also said to me, “Hey, Jo, one of these days,” he said, “I’m going to dance at your wedding. Don’t forget.” He even told me that when I retired.\n\n I said, “Yes, John, you’ll dance at—.” I never married, so never got the chance. [Laughter]

[Assistant] That’s nice.

[User] Yes. He was a very nice person. He was so fond of Dr. Dryden, and Dr. Dryden always called him “John,” you know, just “John.” Very nice. And so, what else?

[Assistant] Well, I think we’ve pretty much covered everything. I’m just curious if you have anything else you’d like to say.


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

[User] Helen, his former secretary, told me when I went up to talk to her when she knew I was going to take the job, “Well, you’ll find out,” she said, “that Dr. Dryden wears one suit a week, and the next week he’ll wear something else. You’ll notice that.”\n\n I said, “Oh, Helen. Oh, okay.” He wasn’t a flashy dresser, like some men are. They have the right tie and—no, he wasn’t flashy at all.\n\n He had a very faithful driver who chauffeured him home, got him to work and home. John Freeman [phonetic] was his driver, black man, who also said to me, “Hey, Jo, one of these days,” he said, “I’m going to dance at your wedding. Don’t forget.” He even told me that when I retired.\n\n I said, “Yes, John, you’ll dance at—.” I never married, so never got the chance. [Laughter]

[Assistant] That’s nice.

[User] Yes. He was a very nice person. He was so fond of Dr. Dryden, and Dr. Dryden always called him “John,” you know, just “John.” Very nice. And so, what else?

[Assistant] Well, I think we’ve pretty much covered everything. I’m just curious if you have anything else you’d like to say.

[User] I don’t have anything. I went overboard, I think, in telling you [things].

[Assistant] Well, I certainly appreciate your time today, and I’ve enjoyed hearing your stories and learning more about Headquarters.


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

[User] I don’t have anything. I went overboard, I think, in telling you [things].

[Assistant] Well, I certainly appreciate your time today, and I’ve enjoyed hearing your stories and learning more about Headquarters.

[User] Because I couldn’t answer all those things that they had in that sheet that I received from Rebecca [Wright].

[Assistant] Oh, sure.

[User] Forget it. I couldn’t answer any of those questions. Those are technical things, you know. I didn’t know anything about technical work.

[Assistant] Well, you’ve given me some good social history, I think.


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

[User] Because I couldn’t answer all those things that they had in that sheet that I received from Rebecca [Wright].

[Assistant] Oh, sure.

[User] Forget it. I couldn’t answer any of those questions. Those are technical things, you know. I didn’t know anything about technical work.

[Assistant] Well, you’ve given me some good social history, I think.

[User] But that’s about it, you know.

[Assistant] That’s important. I can’t stress that enough.


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

[User] So that I could go back and forth. Because I had to meet with the Navy people a lot and also the Grumman [Corporation] people in Long Island [New York]. I knew that I was going to have a constant battle trying to get my trips approved. So I was able to persuade the navy to set up a special travel fund for me.

[Assistant] In that position, how was the reception when you were speaking with Grumman and with the Navy people? Did they accept you in the position?

[User] Oh, absolutely. The first Navy person that I worked with, they called them the class desk, that was their title. It was a commander. He’s a retired admiral now, lives here in San Diego, and we’re still good friends. [Laughs]

[Assistant] That’s fun.

[User] I had a little trouble with some of the Grumman people. I don’t think that was because I was a woman, although I thought some of them might have thought that I was going to be easier to push around because I was a woman, but mostly they liked working with the Navy. They did a lot of things. The Navy just gave them money. A lot of times they didn’t really watch what Grumman did. NASA was, I think, much better at overseeing those kinds of things. I watched Grumman very closely. I knew what they were doing, and I think sometimes they got a little angry at that. But I had the total support of the Navy, so it went well. I think it went well.

[Assistant] Do you feel the people at Dryden, your management or maybe others, other than your management, seemed to scrutinize your work more than they would have somebody else’s?


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

[User] Oh, absolutely. The first Navy person that I worked with, they called them the class desk, that was their title. It was a commander. He’s a retired admiral now, lives here in San Diego, and we’re still good friends. [Laughs]

[Assistant] That’s fun.

[User] I had a little trouble with some of the Grumman people. I don’t think that was because I was a woman, although I thought some of them might have thought that I was going to be easier to push around because I was a woman, but mostly they liked working with the Navy. They did a lot of things. The Navy just gave them money. A lot of times they didn’t really watch what Grumman did. NASA was, I think, much better at overseeing those kinds of things. I watched Grumman very closely. I knew what they were doing, and I think sometimes they got a little angry at that. But I had the total support of the Navy, so it went well. I think it went well.

[Assistant] Do you feel the people at Dryden, your management or maybe others, other than your management, seemed to scrutinize your work more than they would have somebody else’s?

[User] I don’t think so. Not at that time.

[Assistant] Well, they must have thought you were doing a good job, because they gave you another project site.


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

[User] I had a little trouble with some of the Grumman people. I don’t think that was because I was a woman, although I thought some of them might have thought that I was going to be easier to push around because I was a woman, but mostly they liked working with the Navy. They did a lot of things. The Navy just gave them money. A lot of times they didn’t really watch what Grumman did. NASA was, I think, much better at overseeing those kinds of things. I watched Grumman very closely. I knew what they were doing, and I think sometimes they got a little angry at that. But I had the total support of the Navy, so it went well. I think it went well.

[Assistant] Do you feel the people at Dryden, your management or maybe others, other than your management, seemed to scrutinize your work more than they would have somebody else’s?

[User] I don’t think so. Not at that time.

[Assistant] Well, they must have thought you were doing a good job, because they gave you another project site.

[User] Yeah. Well, the first one was the F-15. I worked then with the F-15 project manager, and we got along fine. He ended up making me his deputy project manager. So I had had some of the management experience before I got the F-14 job.

[Assistant] Were you watching more women come in to work for Dryden at this time?


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

[User] I don’t think so. Not at that time.

[Assistant] Well, they must have thought you were doing a good job, because they gave you another project site.

[User] Yeah. Well, the first one was the F-15. I worked then with the F-15 project manager, and we got along fine. He ended up making me his deputy project manager. So I had had some of the management experience before I got the F-14 job.

[Assistant] Were you watching more women come in to work for Dryden at this time?

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Did you see more coming other than secretaries and aides?


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

[User] Yeah. Well, the first one was the F-15. I worked then with the F-15 project manager, and we got along fine. He ended up making me his deputy project manager. So I had had some of the management experience before I got the F-14 job.

[Assistant] Were you watching more women come in to work for Dryden at this time?

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Did you see more coming other than secretaries and aides?

[User] Yes. Oh, absolutely. In fact, that’s probably had a big effect on me. John had a woman working for him that he made one of his branch chiefs. I think she’s probably the first one, but there were other women coming in, a lot of other engineers coming in. At that time I wouldn’t say very many of them really got a lot of the opportunity either, maybe somewhat better than I did, but really not that much. It was even later, I think.\n\n I don’t know how it is now, except I do read the little Dryden paper, and I see a lot of women in top jobs. But when a lot of these women came in and when I saw, well, this one in particular getting ahead and some of the others also, I saw them going faster than I had, that was, I think, a time when I sort of reinvented myself, if you will. See, my daughter was getting ready to go to college, and, as I said, when I went back to school.

[Assistant] Just time for a new phase of your life.


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

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Did you see more coming other than secretaries and aides?

[User] Yes. Oh, absolutely. In fact, that’s probably had a big effect on me. John had a woman working for him that he made one of his branch chiefs. I think she’s probably the first one, but there were other women coming in, a lot of other engineers coming in. At that time I wouldn’t say very many of them really got a lot of the opportunity either, maybe somewhat better than I did, but really not that much. It was even later, I think.\n\n I don’t know how it is now, except I do read the little Dryden paper, and I see a lot of women in top jobs. But when a lot of these women came in and when I saw, well, this one in particular getting ahead and some of the others also, I saw them going faster than I had, that was, I think, a time when I sort of reinvented myself, if you will. See, my daughter was getting ready to go to college, and, as I said, when I went back to school.

[Assistant] Just time for a new phase of your life.

[User] Right. I think it was a little bit of a challenge to me in that when I came back I was—it wasn’t a sudden thing, but I decided, “Enough. I’m going to start applying for these positions,” and I did. I started applying for a number of positions. Up until then, I hadn’t aggressively pursued anything, and now I was. I think it took a little time to, I’m not sure if it’s it the right word, but get their attention.

[Assistant] Because you had changed and in their eyes—


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

[User] Yes. Oh, absolutely. In fact, that’s probably had a big effect on me. John had a woman working for him that he made one of his branch chiefs. I think she’s probably the first one, but there were other women coming in, a lot of other engineers coming in. At that time I wouldn’t say very many of them really got a lot of the opportunity either, maybe somewhat better than I did, but really not that much. It was even later, I think.\n\n I don’t know how it is now, except I do read the little Dryden paper, and I see a lot of women in top jobs. But when a lot of these women came in and when I saw, well, this one in particular getting ahead and some of the others also, I saw them going faster than I had, that was, I think, a time when I sort of reinvented myself, if you will. See, my daughter was getting ready to go to college, and, as I said, when I went back to school.

[Assistant] Just time for a new phase of your life.

[User] Right. I think it was a little bit of a challenge to me in that when I came back I was—it wasn’t a sudden thing, but I decided, “Enough. I’m going to start applying for these positions,” and I did. I started applying for a number of positions. Up until then, I hadn’t aggressively pursued anything, and now I was. I think it took a little time to, I’m not sure if it’s it the right word, but get their attention.

[Assistant] Because you had changed and in their eyes—

[User] I was still just the meek little Harriet that would sit in the corner and do all these mathematical calculations. [Laughter]

[Assistant] Now here was the Harriett that wanted—


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

[User] Right. I think it was a little bit of a challenge to me in that when I came back I was—it wasn’t a sudden thing, but I decided, “Enough. I’m going to start applying for these positions,” and I did. I started applying for a number of positions. Up until then, I hadn’t aggressively pursued anything, and now I was. I think it took a little time to, I’m not sure if it’s it the right word, but get their attention.

[Assistant] Because you had changed and in their eyes—

[User] I was still just the meek little Harriet that would sit in the corner and do all these mathematical calculations. [Laughter]

[Assistant] Now here was the Harriett that wanted—

[User] I mean, I’m exaggerating.

[Assistant] No, but now here is the Harriet that wanted the opportunity to do more.


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

[User] I was still just the meek little Harriet that would sit in the corner and do all these mathematical calculations. [Laughter]

[Assistant] Now here was the Harriett that wanted—

[User] I mean, I’m exaggerating.

[Assistant] No, but now here is the Harriet that wanted the opportunity to do more.

[User] Right. Right.

[Assistant] “Give me more. I can do more.”


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

[User] I mean, I’m exaggerating.

[Assistant] No, but now here is the Harriet that wanted the opportunity to do more.

[User] Right. Right.

[Assistant] “Give me more. I can do more.”

[User] Right.

[Assistant] Did you have a favorite project while you were there?


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

[User] Right. Right.

[Assistant] “Give me more. I can do more.”

[User] Right.

[Assistant] Did you have a favorite project while you were there?

[User] Well, the F-14.

[Assistant] And how long of a span was that in your life? Not hours.


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

[User] Right.

[Assistant] Did you have a favorite project while you were there?

[User] Well, the F-14.

[Assistant] And how long of a span was that in your life? Not hours.

[User] No. Let’s see. I guess it was like [19]‘78 that I got that job. Then I left to go to work for Congress in [19]‘82. I worked on the F-15 from [19]‘77 to [19]‘78. There were other things that—it’s hard to remember going back and all the different jobs that I had, and there were certain times that I enjoyed my work a lot.\n\n I worked with a guy, Larry [Lawrence W.] Taylor, [Jr.], for a number of years, and he was a very challenging person to work with, and I really enjoyed working with him. Again, at that time that was when computers were coming in and we did a lot of work. We did a lot of our own programming on the computer. We were doing, oh, it was called human describing functions, where we would try to mathematically model a pilot. Those things were interesting. They weren’t part of the mainstream of Dryden, though. I enjoyed doing it, but like I said, it was not part of the mainstream.\n\n Then I got into—we were doing a lot of derivative calculations using flight data and some programs that were developed. Mostly it was Larry and a professor at UCLA, and I worked in that area. That was very interesting. So, as I said, over the years there were a lot of things that were interesting. But it wasn’t until later that I really got more involved in the mainstream activities at the center.

[Assistant] One of the things when I was reading over some of the history that we had on you, you were able to help with one and then actual author a publication in the mid-fifties. Was that quite an accomplishment during that time for a woman to have done that?


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

[User] Well, see that was the first job I was assigned to. I was put in this X-3 loads office. I don’t know that that was—I did not find that terribly exciting, frankly. That was when I was working in the office with the guy who was doing the X-3 wing loads. I was doing the horizontal tail loads, and he was working on the wing loads. And I was doing a lot of his mundane work. Writing the report, I did not find that overly challenging. It was because we had so many models to work with, so I looked at other reports and just—

[Assistant] Just did it.

[User] —wrote up the data. I wrote a number of other reports, and I was trying to remember what some of them were. I know I wrote one on supersonic flybys and computing the flow. Then I did a lot of work on the wake vortex, when like a small aircraft gets in the wake of a large aircraft landing. I did a report on that. Then I did a paper on—well, I know I did a couple papers, I think, on the Lifting Body.

[Assistant] You were involved somewhat in that project.

[User] In the Lifting Body. Yeah, I was working on that project. Bertha Ryan was there at the time, and she and I were both working on the first one, was the M-2/F-1. That was when I had the problems with [Paul] Bikle not letting me go in the hangar.\n\n Then the next lifting body was the HL-10. Then I left the program. That’s when I started working with Larry Taylor on some of these other things. I wrote some papers with him and at least one by myself on these describing functions. I gave a paper at MIT at the time on that. I wasn’t as prolific as some of the engineers, but I wrote a number of papers. I just can’t remember now what they all were.

[Assistant] Was this all part of your normal day activities or was this something you had to do on your own, on your own time?


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

[User] Well, we interviewed a lot of the NASA people to find out how they went about signing off on flights and this kind of thing, to see where they could have done things differently, maybe tightened things up. Then there were, I guess, three groups. We put out a big fat report, which I always wonder how many people read those things. [Laughs]\n\n I guess I don’t know that I could see anything really that NASA could do differently, other than they pushed too hard. There was at that time a great deal of emphasis on trying to make the Shuttle a routine transportation. I think that that kind of filtered all the way down, and they probably weren’t as cautious as they could have been.

[Assistant] Were you working closely with the [Chairman William P.] Rogers Commission [Presidential Commission on the Space Shuttle Challenger Accident] or were you a separate—?

[User] We were separate, but we met with him, with Rogers, not his whole committee. But he would come and meet with our committee.

[Assistant] Certainly a different time in your life than just a few years or before.

[User] Right. Right.

[Assistant] What a different scope that you were working on. How long were you in this position?


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

[User]
Manuel said, “What do I want with this?” So he says, “You want it?”\n\n So I said, “Sure.”\n\n They had given me a silk scarf, and I don’t wear scarves, and his wife, Jean, did. So I said, “Here. I’ll make a swap.” I gave him the scarf. Because they always give you little gifts and things, so I got that. That was real fun trip.\n\n Then we went to Genoa. We went to Italy. All these things, this is—

Japan.

Yeah, we went to Japan. These things are such a joke. Taxpayers really ought to be a little more concerned about these things, because the congressmen would decide where they wanted to go. Now, this was not always the case. The one to China, I think actually there was some real serious interest in going there. But a lot of times they just want to go on a trip. They take their wives with them.\n\n When we went to China, the wives weren’t there. It was just the staffers. It was a much different trip. But most of them, they’d take their wives along. They would decide where all they wanted to go, and then they would have one of their staffers put together kind of an itinerary of where all to go to oversee something.

[Assistant] The rationale.

[User] Right. The rationale always came afterwards. But anyway, who am I to say? I mean, this one staffer who was the committee staff director, the Republican staff director, he decided he didn’t want to do it. He thought that was obscene. But he soon learned that him standing on principle wasn’t going to save the taxpayer a nickel, because they were going to continue doing it. If he didn’t go, somebody else would. So he started going.

[Assistant] Certainly a long way from the Edwards Air Force Base and the sands around them, wasn’t it?

[User] Right.

[Assistant] You could have still been in one of those offices, and here you were in China. That was quite a stretch.


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

[User] That’s right.

[Assistant] Not only have you had an adjustment in work atmosphere, but leaving Dryden and moving to D.C. was quite an adjustment as well.

[User] Yeah. Washington, D.C., it’s an interesting place to live. Well, it’s an interesting place to work. I didn’t live in D.C. I lived in Virginia, and we commuted. But that whole area, northern Virginia, it’s all in the Beltway. I mean, I know personally what it means to be in the Beltway or out of the Beltway. We lived in the Beltway. It’s exciting.\n\n In fact, I had kind of withdrawal pains when I came back, because everybody here, they kind of pooh-pooh Congress. They think all congressmen are dishonest and they don’t do anything and congressional staff doesn’t do anything, and that’s just not true. Congressmen work very, very hard.\n\n The thing that I think they ought to do is to come up with ways of not giving them so many benefits other than their salary. They should make more money, but they should not have the power to do things that—the lobbyists do things for them. That’s the kind of thing that’s bad, and I think it kind of corrupts.\n\n But most congressmen are basically very honest. They want to help their constituents. They work very hard. Staffers work long, long, long hours, much longer than most people.

[Assistant] It seems like you have to have a lot of the answers before the questions are asked.

[User] Right. Well, see, when they had hearings, we wrote all the questions for the members. These members come across looking so smart. It’s the staffers that provide all the questions for them and all the answers so they know.

[Assistant] What to expect and not to expect?


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

[User] Yeah. Washington, D.C., it’s an interesting place to live. Well, it’s an interesting place to work. I didn’t live in D.C. I lived in Virginia, and we commuted. But that whole area, northern Virginia, it’s all in the Beltway. I mean, I know personally what it means to be in the Beltway or out of the Beltway. We lived in the Beltway. It’s exciting.\n\n In fact, I had kind of withdrawal pains when I came back, because everybody here, they kind of pooh-pooh Congress. They think all congressmen are dishonest and they don’t do anything and congressional staff doesn’t do anything, and that’s just not true. Congressmen work very, very hard.\n\n The thing that I think they ought to do is to come up with ways of not giving them so many benefits other than their salary. They should make more money, but they should not have the power to do things that—the lobbyists do things for them. That’s the kind of thing that’s bad, and I think it kind of corrupts.\n\n But most congressmen are basically very honest. They want to help their constituents. They work very hard. Staffers work long, long, long hours, much longer than most people.

[Assistant] It seems like you have to have a lot of the answers before the questions are asked.

[User] Right. Well, see, when they had hearings, we wrote all the questions for the members. These members come across looking so smart. It’s the staffers that provide all the questions for them and all the answers so they know.

[Assistant] What to expect and not to expect?

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] Looking back over your career with the government, what was the greatest challenge that you had to meet and overcome in order for you to keep moving along?


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

[User] Right. Well, see, when they had hearings, we wrote all the questions for the members. These members come across looking so smart. It’s the staffers that provide all the questions for them and all the answers so they know.

[Assistant] What to expect and not to expect?

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] Looking back over your career with the government, what was the greatest challenge that you had to meet and overcome in order for you to keep moving along?

[User]
Well, I think I’ve already kind of gone over that, and that was sort of the reinvention of myself to convince myself. I mean, maybe reinventing myself isn’t quite the thing, but to change from being just an employee and a wife and a mother—I mean, I worked there for the paycheck, and to make that transition to somebody who was looking for a career, that didn’t happen to me until I was probably close to forty. I think a lot of it was the times. I was forty in—

[19]‘74.

—in 1974. That was when things started changing. So it was a combination of my second wind, if you will, and women getting more opportunities.

[Assistant] Did you have an opportunity in this second wind to help other women along, or were you so busy in the sense that you didn’t have those types of opportunities because of the stage you were in?


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

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] Looking back over your career with the government, what was the greatest challenge that you had to meet and overcome in order for you to keep moving along?

[User]
Well, I think I’ve already kind of gone over that, and that was sort of the reinvention of myself to convince myself. I mean, maybe reinventing myself isn’t quite the thing, but to change from being just an employee and a wife and a mother—I mean, I worked there for the paycheck, and to make that transition to somebody who was looking for a career, that didn’t happen to me until I was probably close to forty. I think a lot of it was the times. I was forty in—

[19]‘74.

—in 1974. That was when things started changing. So it was a combination of my second wind, if you will, and women getting more opportunities.

[Assistant] Did you have an opportunity in this second wind to help other women along, or were you so busy in the sense that you didn’t have those types of opportunities because of the stage you were in?

[User]
The only thing I can remember is that we had—and I don’t know who set it up, but we had a meeting. It was not a meeting so much as all these women came. It was in the little auditorium at NASA, and I was one of the speakers. They had me talking about—

It was a career thing, wasn’t it?

Yeah, it was some kind of a career. But other than that, I don’t know of any—

[Assistant] At least you’ve been able to watch other women move up—


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

[User]
Well, I think I’ve already kind of gone over that, and that was sort of the reinvention of myself to convince myself. I mean, maybe reinventing myself isn’t quite the thing, but to change from being just an employee and a wife and a mother—I mean, I worked there for the paycheck, and to make that transition to somebody who was looking for a career, that didn’t happen to me until I was probably close to forty. I think a lot of it was the times. I was forty in—

[19]‘74.

—in 1974. That was when things started changing. So it was a combination of my second wind, if you will, and women getting more opportunities.

[Assistant] Did you have an opportunity in this second wind to help other women along, or were you so busy in the sense that you didn’t have those types of opportunities because of the stage you were in?

[User]
The only thing I can remember is that we had—and I don’t know who set it up, but we had a meeting. It was not a meeting so much as all these women came. It was in the little auditorium at NASA, and I was one of the speakers. They had me talking about—

It was a career thing, wasn’t it?

Yeah, it was some kind of a career. But other than that, I don’t know of any—

[Assistant] At least you’ve been able to watch other women move up—

[User] Oh, yeah.

[Assistant] —and have opportunities to do all types of work and not just have an application reviewed and marked as a typist because they were female.


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

[User]
The only thing I can remember is that we had—and I don’t know who set it up, but we had a meeting. It was not a meeting so much as all these women came. It was in the little auditorium at NASA, and I was one of the speakers. They had me talking about—

It was a career thing, wasn’t it?

Yeah, it was some kind of a career. But other than that, I don’t know of any—

[Assistant] At least you’ve been able to watch other women move up—

[User] Oh, yeah.

[Assistant] —and have opportunities to do all types of work and not just have an application reviewed and marked as a typist because they were female.

[User] Right.

[Assistant] I’m glad that you’ve been able to watch that happen and see that work as well.


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

[User] Oh, yeah.

[Assistant] —and have opportunities to do all types of work and not just have an application reviewed and marked as a typist because they were female.

[User] Right.

[Assistant] I’m glad that you’ve been able to watch that happen and see that work as well.

[User] Yeah, I don’t think that would ever happen today.

[Assistant] No, and that’s the good news.


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

[User] Right.

[Assistant] I’m glad that you’ve been able to watch that happen and see that work as well.

[User] Yeah, I don’t think that would ever happen today.

[Assistant] No, and that’s the good news.

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] So the doors are open. You’ve done so much, even in your first wind and your second wind phase of your life, but is there something that you feel like you’re the most proudest of while you worked for the government that you’re so glad if nothing else you at least had that opportunity to do that project or that task?


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

[User]
[Laughs] You were asking about my first impression. Muroc at that time particularly was very desolate, but I don’t remember being particularly shocked by it.

That’s because you lived and grew up in Bakersfield. It’s barren anyway.

[Assistant] It was a time to begin.

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] It was a beginning that you kept growing.

[User] Right. As I said, I lived in the dormitory with the other women, and I made some good friends there.

[Assistant] Had an opportunity to go back in your other part of your career.


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

[User] And they all said, “Well, how did you get that?” So I had to explain what I did, and they said, “Oh.” The Langley paper was correct.\n\n So then later I found out that Roxy apparently had been asked by De, “How is the new computer working out?” or whatever, and she said, “Well, she’d like something more challenging.” So it was clear to me later that it wasn’t that they needed this done. They were convinced they had the right answer. They just gave it to me just to amuse me. [Laughs]

[Assistant] Oops.

[User] Maybe to see what she’d do.

[Assistant] And you tested well.

[User] Anyway, I still remember that incident. But the thing that I can remember is De Beeler just totally ignoring me in the office. I was such a scared little bunny at the time.

[Assistant] Well, like you said, you were a woman of those times.


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

[User] Maybe to see what she’d do.

[Assistant] And you tested well.

[User] Anyway, I still remember that incident. But the thing that I can remember is De Beeler just totally ignoring me in the office. I was such a scared little bunny at the time.

[Assistant] Well, like you said, you were a woman of those times.

[User] Right.

[Assistant] You got an opportunity to grow into the woman of the new times.


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

[User] Anyway, I still remember that incident. But the thing that I can remember is De Beeler just totally ignoring me in the office. I was such a scared little bunny at the time.

[Assistant] Well, like you said, you were a woman of those times.

[User] Right.

[Assistant] You got an opportunity to grow into the woman of the new times.

[User] Right. Right.

[Assistant] Now you’re enjoying your life in these times.


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

[User] Right.

[Assistant] You got an opportunity to grow into the woman of the new times.

[User] Right. Right.

[Assistant] Now you’re enjoying your life in these times.

[User] Right. Yeah.

[Assistant] It’s a good life to look back on.


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

[User] Right. Right.

[Assistant] Now you’re enjoying your life in these times.

[User] Right. Yeah.

[Assistant] It’s a good life to look back on.

[User] It is. It is. I was very fortunate. I feel particularly fortunate because I never felt like I personally chose my career. As I said, I didn’t know what was available, and I did get sort of pushed into something that turned out to be very fulfilling.

[Assistant] I think that’s a good place to stop.


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

[User] Yes, there’s a story—

[Assistant] The—crew were very—

[User] ——there’s a story that at one point Gus hung a lemon somewhere, perhaps on the spacecraft, when he was frustrated with one of the tests. And I think that was real frustration. And it was a bit of a condition that was in the program at that time in that Apollo was a big step, a lot of complicated equipment onboard, and it was difficult to make it work first time out. Actually, in a kind of a way that’s sad, the Apollo fire probably contributed to not only the time, but perhaps a renewed sense of attention. And I don’t mean to say that people weren’t paying attention before. But a different kind of attention, perhaps, was applied to the Apollo spacecraft hardware. And it paid off. It paid off in that during the Apollo flights, Earth orbit, and going to the Moon, for the most part—except for Apollo 13—for the most part, the command service module performed extremely well.

[Assistant] I’ve heard it said that the Apollo 1 fire, in a very peculiar way, actually had to happen before the Apollo spacecraft and the space program could go ahead. That it was an accident waiting to happen—

[User] Well,—

[Assistant] —because nobody really saw that it was there. From an engineer’s point of view, would you go along with that?


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

[User] ——there’s a story that at one point Gus hung a lemon somewhere, perhaps on the spacecraft, when he was frustrated with one of the tests. And I think that was real frustration. And it was a bit of a condition that was in the program at that time in that Apollo was a big step, a lot of complicated equipment onboard, and it was difficult to make it work first time out. Actually, in a kind of a way that’s sad, the Apollo fire probably contributed to not only the time, but perhaps a renewed sense of attention. And I don’t mean to say that people weren’t paying attention before. But a different kind of attention, perhaps, was applied to the Apollo spacecraft hardware. And it paid off. It paid off in that during the Apollo flights, Earth orbit, and going to the Moon, for the most part—except for Apollo 13—for the most part, the command service module performed extremely well.

[Assistant] I’ve heard it said that the Apollo 1 fire, in a very peculiar way, actually had to happen before the Apollo spacecraft and the space program could go ahead. That it was an accident waiting to happen—

[User] Well,—

[Assistant] —because nobody really saw that it was there. From an engineer’s point of view, would you go along with that?

[User] I think—I don’t know that it had to happen for Apollo to go forward. But, it was there; and it was just not paid—it just didn’t pay enough attention to it. I don’t know if I can say “overlooked,” because I’m sure somewhere in the system people paid some attention to it and were concerned about it. But the flammability risk was there and just was not treated as significantly as it—nowhere near as significantly, I don’t think, as a number of the other risks that were inherent in the program.

[Assistant] It took about a year to redesign and rebuild that spacecraft. That’s a remarkably short time, isn’t it?


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

[User] Well,—

[Assistant] —because nobody really saw that it was there. From an engineer’s point of view, would you go along with that?

[User] I think—I don’t know that it had to happen for Apollo to go forward. But, it was there; and it was just not paid—it just didn’t pay enough attention to it. I don’t know if I can say “overlooked,” because I’m sure somewhere in the system people paid some attention to it and were concerned about it. But the flammability risk was there and just was not treated as significantly as it—nowhere near as significantly, I don’t think, as a number of the other risks that were inherent in the program.

[Assistant] It took about a year to redesign and rebuild that spacecraft. That’s a remarkably short time, isn’t it?

[User] It really is. When you go back and look at it: January ’67 was the fire, and then in about October of ’68 we flew the Apollo 7 mission. And that included not only an awful lot of redesign, but it also included then getting the—getting that redesign put into the spacecraft and getting the spacecraft ready to fly, shipped to the Cape [Canaveral, Florida], going through the checkout, and so on. So that’s, what? Close to 20 months, 21 months. But the truth is, the redesign was probably done in half that time. And then the rest of the time was spent getting that redesign built into the spacecraft and tested.

[Assistant] Was there any pressure, other than among yourselves, to get that job done as rapidly as it was done?


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

[User] I think—I don’t know that it had to happen for Apollo to go forward. But, it was there; and it was just not paid—it just didn’t pay enough attention to it. I don’t know if I can say “overlooked,” because I’m sure somewhere in the system people paid some attention to it and were concerned about it. But the flammability risk was there and just was not treated as significantly as it—nowhere near as significantly, I don’t think, as a number of the other risks that were inherent in the program.

[Assistant] It took about a year to redesign and rebuild that spacecraft. That’s a remarkably short time, isn’t it?

[User] It really is. When you go back and look at it: January ’67 was the fire, and then in about October of ’68 we flew the Apollo 7 mission. And that included not only an awful lot of redesign, but it also included then getting the—getting that redesign put into the spacecraft and getting the spacecraft ready to fly, shipped to the Cape [Canaveral, Florida], going through the checkout, and so on. So that’s, what? Close to 20 months, 21 months. But the truth is, the redesign was probably done in half that time. And then the rest of the time was spent getting that redesign built into the spacecraft and tested.

[Assistant] Was there any pressure, other than among yourselves, to get that job done as rapidly as it was done?

[User] The recovery from the fire that is?

[Assistant] Yeah. To get that spacecraft redesigned, redeveloped, built?


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

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] We, the media, tended to downplay that somewhat. We kept it up, of course; but basically we didn’t know that much about what the Russians were doing anyway.

[User] That’s true.

[Assistant] They’d just do something, and we knew what was going on here. So we, to a great degree, tended to say, “Okay, NASA’s doing this,” and ignore what the Russians were doing. Until they had done it.

[User] Right.

[Assistant] When, of course, is a bad time to have big news come to the fore. They went through, however, the failure of their big booster. They lost not one but two crews during a key period of time.


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

[User] That’s true.

[Assistant] They’d just do something, and we knew what was going on here. So we, to a great degree, tended to say, “Okay, NASA’s doing this,” and ignore what the Russians were doing. Until they had done it.

[User] Right.

[Assistant] When, of course, is a bad time to have big news come to the fore. They went through, however, the failure of their big booster. They lost not one but two crews during a key period of time.

[User] Right.

[Assistant] And there were decisions, which I’d like to get to in a couple of minutes, made by NASA, which generated the resurgence of the Apollo Program—


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

[User] Right.

[Assistant] When, of course, is a bad time to have big news come to the fore. They went through, however, the failure of their big booster. They lost not one but two crews during a key period of time.

[User] Right.

[Assistant] And there were decisions, which I’d like to get to in a couple of minutes, made by NASA, which generated the resurgence of the Apollo Program—

[User] Right.

[Assistant] —and eventually—you won the race.


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

[User] Right.

[Assistant] And there were decisions, which I’d like to get to in a couple of minutes, made by NASA, which generated the resurgence of the Apollo Program—

[User] Right.

[Assistant] —and eventually—you won the race.

[User] Right. Right.

[Assistant] So, let’s get to that; and, as we move along—.


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

[User] Right.

[Assistant] —and eventually—you won the race.

[User] Right. Right.

[Assistant] So, let’s get to that; and, as we move along—.

[User] And I think it was real. We felt it, and we were in the same boat that you were. We were not privy, most of the folks here were not privy, to any intelligence briefings as to what was going on. If indeed there even were some, and I have heard that there had been but I don’t—I can’t attest to that. But we had this sense of a big competitor who was continuing to do things; and sometimes they did things which seemed to us were a little hard to figure out, why they did them and so on. But nevertheless, they were continuing to press it. And we felt very much like we were in a race, a competition. And our competitor had the advantage of being somewhat shrouded in secrecy. That’s also a disadvantage, we’ve come to learn. But that left us always feeling like he was ahead of us or breathing down our neck if we were ahead at any particular time. So, there was not a leeway, not any slack, in the sense of feeling any relief in that competition. It was there all the time. And I don’t know that it was the first thing people thought of when they woke up in the morning, but it was an environmental background for us; and it was very real.

[Assistant] Against that background, along came Apollo 7. And here came Commander Walter M. ["Wally"]…Schirra along with his crew. And they started getting the spacecraft prepared. You were lead flight director for that mission.


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

[User] Right. Right.

[Assistant] So, let’s get to that; and, as we move along—.

[User] And I think it was real. We felt it, and we were in the same boat that you were. We were not privy, most of the folks here were not privy, to any intelligence briefings as to what was going on. If indeed there even were some, and I have heard that there had been but I don’t—I can’t attest to that. But we had this sense of a big competitor who was continuing to do things; and sometimes they did things which seemed to us were a little hard to figure out, why they did them and so on. But nevertheless, they were continuing to press it. And we felt very much like we were in a race, a competition. And our competitor had the advantage of being somewhat shrouded in secrecy. That’s also a disadvantage, we’ve come to learn. But that left us always feeling like he was ahead of us or breathing down our neck if we were ahead at any particular time. So, there was not a leeway, not any slack, in the sense of feeling any relief in that competition. It was there all the time. And I don’t know that it was the first thing people thought of when they woke up in the morning, but it was an environmental background for us; and it was very real.

[Assistant] Against that background, along came Apollo 7. And here came Commander Walter M. ["Wally"]…Schirra along with his crew. And they started getting the spacecraft prepared. You were lead flight director for that mission.

[User] Yes, I was.

[Assistant] So, can we relive some of the preparation stage, right now, before the launch? Living through that phase when Wally was working with the spacecraft, and his crew were working with the spacecraft? And what you and your flight directors were doing with Mission Control to make it all happen?


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

[User] Well—

[Assistant] Would that be a fair statement or not?

[User] ——well, I think—I mean, I think it’s fair to say that everybody—safety is everybody’s problem. And I think, in the flight business especially, people know that going in. I think the accident, though, the fire, caused the crews to be more vocal about concerns that they might have had in—prior to the fire but not as—expressed as—perhaps as strongly as they would have expressed them afterwards. So, I think the program saw a rededication, also, and a—more of an inclination to be vocal about things that the crews would view as a safety concern.\n\n So, I think it was there all along. I mean, I think both the people on the ground, the engineering teams, the designers, the safety and reliability people, all tried to do the best they could at—before, and during, and afterwards. And I think what we saw, also, was that the crew became more vocal and more willing to jump into a subject and rattle it around in order to be sure that they were satisfied. But they didn’t—frankly, that’s a very healthy thing. I mean to experience.

[Assistant] Some of that took place during the flight.

[User] Oh yes.

[Assistant] On open air-to-ground.


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

[User] ——well, I think—I mean, I think it’s fair to say that everybody—safety is everybody’s problem. And I think, in the flight business especially, people know that going in. I think the accident, though, the fire, caused the crews to be more vocal about concerns that they might have had in—prior to the fire but not as—expressed as—perhaps as strongly as they would have expressed them afterwards. So, I think the program saw a rededication, also, and a—more of an inclination to be vocal about things that the crews would view as a safety concern.\n\n So, I think it was there all along. I mean, I think both the people on the ground, the engineering teams, the designers, the safety and reliability people, all tried to do the best they could at—before, and during, and afterwards. And I think what we saw, also, was that the crew became more vocal and more willing to jump into a subject and rattle it around in order to be sure that they were satisfied. But they didn’t—frankly, that’s a very healthy thing. I mean to experience.

[Assistant] Some of that took place during the flight.

[User] Oh yes.

[Assistant] On open air-to-ground.

[User] Oh yes.

[Assistant] So, the world shared your problem, as the flight director—


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

[User] Oh yes.

[Assistant] On open air-to-ground.

[User] Oh yes.

[Assistant] So, the world shared your problem, as the flight director—

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] —with the crew as you were wrangling these problems back and forth.


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

[User] Oh yes.

[Assistant] So, the world shared your problem, as the flight director—

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] —with the crew as you were wrangling these problems back and forth.

[User] Yes, Yes.

[Assistant] And I wonder what effect, if any, that had on the way in which that flight was flown.


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

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] —with the crew as you were wrangling these problems back and forth.

[User] Yes, Yes.

[Assistant] And I wonder what effect, if any, that had on the way in which that flight was flown.

[User] Well, I don’t—in the end, I don’t think it had any effect on the flight itself in terms of the accomplishments and what we were trying to do. I think it was unfortunate in that it left a kind of a sour taste in people’s mouth. And certainly—certainly there’s a way to make a point, especially when you’re in public—or, in this case, in front of the whole world—there’s a way to make a point that’s less confrontational than some of the means that were chosen. But, you know, we are who we are, and we do what we think we have to do at the time. And, so I’ve sort of mellowed about it a little bit. But it was difficult at the time.\n\n Didn’t affect the mission. Didn’t affect what we were trying to do, I don’t believe. But it was an irritant. It was more than an irritant. It was a major annoyance and difficulty, and I mean it’s like a marriage. When people get to shouting at each other, then the communications is really not what it ought to be and something is going to suffer for that, one way or another. In our case, none of the mission parameters suffered. But there was a kind of an emotional feeling to it that was unfortunate.

[Assistant] The fact the crew had a bad cold—all of them, collectively—had something to do with that, too, didn’t it?


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

[User] Yes, Yes.

[Assistant] And I wonder what effect, if any, that had on the way in which that flight was flown.

[User] Well, I don’t—in the end, I don’t think it had any effect on the flight itself in terms of the accomplishments and what we were trying to do. I think it was unfortunate in that it left a kind of a sour taste in people’s mouth. And certainly—certainly there’s a way to make a point, especially when you’re in public—or, in this case, in front of the whole world—there’s a way to make a point that’s less confrontational than some of the means that were chosen. But, you know, we are who we are, and we do what we think we have to do at the time. And, so I’ve sort of mellowed about it a little bit. But it was difficult at the time.\n\n Didn’t affect the mission. Didn’t affect what we were trying to do, I don’t believe. But it was an irritant. It was more than an irritant. It was a major annoyance and difficulty, and I mean it’s like a marriage. When people get to shouting at each other, then the communications is really not what it ought to be and something is going to suffer for that, one way or another. In our case, none of the mission parameters suffered. But there was a kind of an emotional feeling to it that was unfortunate.

[Assistant] The fact the crew had a bad cold—all of them, collectively—had something to do with that, too, didn’t it?

[User] Yeah, it probably did.

[Assistant] You had some of that here in Mission Control, I’ve heard.


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

[User] Well, I don’t—in the end, I don’t think it had any effect on the flight itself in terms of the accomplishments and what we were trying to do. I think it was unfortunate in that it left a kind of a sour taste in people’s mouth. And certainly—certainly there’s a way to make a point, especially when you’re in public—or, in this case, in front of the whole world—there’s a way to make a point that’s less confrontational than some of the means that were chosen. But, you know, we are who we are, and we do what we think we have to do at the time. And, so I’ve sort of mellowed about it a little bit. But it was difficult at the time.\n\n Didn’t affect the mission. Didn’t affect what we were trying to do, I don’t believe. But it was an irritant. It was more than an irritant. It was a major annoyance and difficulty, and I mean it’s like a marriage. When people get to shouting at each other, then the communications is really not what it ought to be and something is going to suffer for that, one way or another. In our case, none of the mission parameters suffered. But there was a kind of an emotional feeling to it that was unfortunate.

[Assistant] The fact the crew had a bad cold—all of them, collectively—had something to do with that, too, didn’t it?

[User] Yeah, it probably did.

[Assistant] You had some of that here in Mission Control, I’ve heard.

[User] Probably did. Yeah.

[Assistant] Some of your flight controllers had caught the same bug at about the same time.


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

[User] Yeah, it probably did.

[Assistant] You had some of that here in Mission Control, I’ve heard.

[User] Probably did. Yeah.

[Assistant] Some of your flight controllers had caught the same bug at about the same time.

[User] Yes. Well, that was an effect, I think, that caused them to be upset. So—.

[Assistant] Did you learn anything from those problems that affected future missions and the ways in which they were trained, simulated?


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

[User] Probably did. Yeah.

[Assistant] Some of your flight controllers had caught the same bug at about the same time.

[User] Yes. Well, that was an effect, I think, that caused them to be upset. So—.

[Assistant] Did you learn anything from those problems that affected future missions and the ways in which they were trained, simulated?

[User] I don’t think we did anything in a procedural sense to change anything. But if Apollo 7 could be viewed as a kind of a schism that was opened up between the air crews and the ground crews, I think the follow-on crews, starting with Apollo 8 and then on, fixed that problem by their performance and the way in which they cooperated with it all around—both prior to flights and during flights and so. So—and I think that got healed on the next flight, for example. And most of them felt like this was too important to let emotional baggage be a problem of any kind. We had to depend too much on each other; and, therefore, they worked very hard, I think. And, I mean, you followed the other flights, the follow-on flights. And the performance of the crews and the interaction with the ground was exactly as it had been in the past. So, in that sense, Apollo 7 was a bit of an anomaly on the front of the interaction between the ground and the air crews.

[Assistant] Well, your next commander was [James A.] McDivitt.


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

[User] Yes. Well, that was an effect, I think, that caused them to be upset. So—.

[Assistant] Did you learn anything from those problems that affected future missions and the ways in which they were trained, simulated?

[User] I don’t think we did anything in a procedural sense to change anything. But if Apollo 7 could be viewed as a kind of a schism that was opened up between the air crews and the ground crews, I think the follow-on crews, starting with Apollo 8 and then on, fixed that problem by their performance and the way in which they cooperated with it all around—both prior to flights and during flights and so. So—and I think that got healed on the next flight, for example. And most of them felt like this was too important to let emotional baggage be a problem of any kind. We had to depend too much on each other; and, therefore, they worked very hard, I think. And, I mean, you followed the other flights, the follow-on flights. And the performance of the crews and the interaction with the ground was exactly as it had been in the past. So, in that sense, Apollo 7 was a bit of an anomaly on the front of the interaction between the ground and the air crews.

[Assistant] Well, your next commander was [James A.] McDivitt.

[User] No, it was—

[Assistant] No, it wasn’t.


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

[User] I don’t think we did anything in a procedural sense to change anything. But if Apollo 7 could be viewed as a kind of a schism that was opened up between the air crews and the ground crews, I think the follow-on crews, starting with Apollo 8 and then on, fixed that problem by their performance and the way in which they cooperated with it all around—both prior to flights and during flights and so. So—and I think that got healed on the next flight, for example. And most of them felt like this was too important to let emotional baggage be a problem of any kind. We had to depend too much on each other; and, therefore, they worked very hard, I think. And, I mean, you followed the other flights, the follow-on flights. And the performance of the crews and the interaction with the ground was exactly as it had been in the past. So, in that sense, Apollo 7 was a bit of an anomaly on the front of the interaction between the ground and the air crews.

[Assistant] Well, your next commander was [James A.] McDivitt.

[User] No, it was—

[Assistant] No, it wasn’t.

[User] ——it was Frank [Borman].

[Assistant] The next was up to the Moon.


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

[User] No, it was—

[Assistant] No, it wasn’t.

[User] ——it was Frank [Borman].

[Assistant] The next was up to the Moon.

[User] Yes. Frank Borman.

[Assistant] Perhaps the most daring choice of them all.


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

[User] ——it was Frank [Borman].

[Assistant] The next was up to the Moon.

[User] Yes. Frank Borman.

[Assistant] Perhaps the most daring choice of them all.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Let me—let me get into that—


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

[User] Yes. Frank Borman.

[Assistant] Perhaps the most daring choice of them all.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Let me—let me get into that—

[User] Okay.

[Assistant] —then, because now—now we are into a real ballgame. Here you had just had this troublesome flight, but it worked perfectly.


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

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Let me—let me get into that—

[User] Okay.

[Assistant] —then, because now—now we are into a real ballgame. Here you had just had this troublesome flight, but it worked perfectly.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] As a matter of fact, I think Wally Schirra said, “We were 110% successful.”


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

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] As a matter of fact, I think Wally Schirra said, “We were 110% successful.”

[User] I think we quoted that after the flight.

[Assistant] Yes.

[User] I think we did.

[Assistant] So, now you’ve had this tremendously successful event. And at that point, can you scene set as to the way in which the decision was made on Apollo 8 to go to the Moon, and the influencing factors?


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

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] —and the practical side of the house, which you’ve just explained very carefully as being a thoroughly practical mission, even though it seemed like a daring gamble at the time.

[User] Very. Well, that’s why I think—I call it “a stroke of genius,” which to me usually means someone comes up with a solution that really fixes a whole bunch of problems that everybody’s worried about but they didn’t know how to put it together and come to the solution. The solution came as the right answer to the conditions that existed within the Apollo Program. Now, I have heard and read various accounts, and maybe speculation, that there was some intelligence information about what the Soviets were doing that might’ve played a part in that decision. I have no knowledge—no personal knowledge of that and I don’t know whether that was true or not. Nobody ever explained it to me, which was fine. I didn’t necessarily feel like I needed to know that kind of stuff.\n\n But just on its merits, within the program, it was almost immediately embraced by people after, you know, an initial reaction. Embraced in the sense that, “Boy, that seems like the right answer! Why didn’t I think of that? It just fits everything that we have, solves it, and takes us a great big step forward! Rather than just tooling around and around in some other kind of a mission, it goes out and addresses a whole bunch of problems that we’re going to have to learn how to solve and deal with before we ever do get to land.” So, that was a—I think it was a breakthrough, genius class of decision.

[Assistant] Right now, Glynn, we’re sitting in a room that’s filled with ghosts and memories. And I imagine one of the memories that’s contained within this room that must be still in your mind would be the thought as first that spacecraft came around from the far side of the Moon.

[User] Yes. Yes.

[Assistant] Can you go through that for us?


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

[User] Lots of room up there, yeah. And—but it was our first tripping over it in flight, especially when the crew called down and asked us to pay some special attention to what’s on the recorder. And the fact that they reported it indicated that it was significant to them. And so, off we went beginning to learn that, indeed, some of these things could happen to even our most fearless, toughest fighter pilots that we could find.

[Assistant] That’s what’s really amazing, that—

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] —they’re pilots!

[User] And of course, they were. And—but it shows the human body can be affected by things, and we’re all subject to some of that.

[Assistant] Along then after this marvelous and spectacular mission came Apollo 9. And essentially, this one was terribly important within the framework of Apollo. But to the public at large, it was almost ignored. It was a very quiet mission.


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

[User] I—

[Assistant] You weren’t working the mission.

[User] I don’t relate to that, so I don’t—I mean I don’t have a sense of anything that would address that.

[Assistant] Oh okay. Well, let’s—let’s move on then—

[User] Okay.

[Assistant] —perhaps rightly so, to Apollo 10 where you had a very strong commander and a very strong crew. And basically, you were going in for a full dress rehearsal of the real thing.


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

[User] I don’t relate to that, so I don’t—I mean I don’t have a sense of anything that would address that.

[Assistant] Oh okay. Well, let’s—let’s move on then—

[User] Okay.

[Assistant] —perhaps rightly so, to Apollo 10 where you had a very strong commander and a very strong crew. And basically, you were going in for a full dress rehearsal of the real thing.

[User] Right. Right.

[Assistant] Where were you for Apollo 10?


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

[User] Okay.

[Assistant] —perhaps rightly so, to Apollo 10 where you had a very strong commander and a very strong crew. And basically, you were going in for a full dress rehearsal of the real thing.

[User] Right. Right.

[Assistant] Where were you for Apollo 10?

[User] I was the lead flight director for Apollo 10. I had worked Apollo 7 as lead and Apollo 8 as a shift guy, and skipped 9, and then I was working Apollo 10. And what was interesting for me was that I had worked as the lead flight director for Gemini IX—Tom [Thomas P.] Stafford and Gene [Eugene A.] Cernan. And, of course, John [W.] Young was added to the Apollo 10 crew, with the three-man command module. So, I was involved in all of the planning for the Apollo 10 mission. We had the debates that you could expect like, “Well, if we’re going all the way there, why don’t we go ahead and land?” But it basically became a—kind of a, “How much of this rascal do you want to try to bite off at a time?” kind of a discussion.\n\n And the descent itself and then the EVA [extravehicular activity]—the surface work—was a significant addition to all of the other things we were trying to do with the lunar module in the Apollo 10 mission, which involved all of the navigation, guidance work around the Moon, and then conducting the rendezvous exercises to be sure that that worked in the lunar environment the way we expected it to, too. So in retrospect, you know, it was the correct thing to do. But we had some debates early on about, “Well, why don’t we go all the way on Apollo 10?”

[Assistant] Why didn’t you?


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

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] They were even using some language that was a little unusual for astronauts.

[User] Yes. It was unusual, yes. But it—you know, that was just a reflection of the fact that they were completely surprised. And I can’t remember the exact details of it, but I think what happened is: they either switched into—they probably—I think they switched into a mode that had been set up to do something that they were not expecting. It was set up to go someplace else in terms of the attitude of the vehicle. This was not affecting the trajectory of the vehicle in any way. It was affecting the attitude of the vehicle as it coasted around in lunar orbit. And they switched into this system that they thought was going to do this, and it turned out doing that. And it surprised them quite a bit. But they rather quickly got the vehicle back under control. You know, a good reaction on the part of the crew. Certainly not the—the spinning of the vehicle was not something that you wanted to propagate very long, or that in itself can induce some physical problems for people—including blacking out. But, they caught it pretty quickly and got it back under control; and we were fine.

[Assistant] From the standpoint of world at large, too, we were looking over your shoulder on that mission. And for the first time, we were getting literally hours and hours of color television.

[User] Oh yes.

[Assistant] They shared that whole mission with us.


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

[User] Yes. It was unusual, yes. But it—you know, that was just a reflection of the fact that they were completely surprised. And I can’t remember the exact details of it, but I think what happened is: they either switched into—they probably—I think they switched into a mode that had been set up to do something that they were not expecting. It was set up to go someplace else in terms of the attitude of the vehicle. This was not affecting the trajectory of the vehicle in any way. It was affecting the attitude of the vehicle as it coasted around in lunar orbit. And they switched into this system that they thought was going to do this, and it turned out doing that. And it surprised them quite a bit. But they rather quickly got the vehicle back under control. You know, a good reaction on the part of the crew. Certainly not the—the spinning of the vehicle was not something that you wanted to propagate very long, or that in itself can induce some physical problems for people—including blacking out. But, they caught it pretty quickly and got it back under control; and we were fine.

[Assistant] From the standpoint of world at large, too, we were looking over your shoulder on that mission. And for the first time, we were getting literally hours and hours of color television.

[User] Oh yes.

[Assistant] They shared that whole mission with us.

[User] Yes. Yes.

[Assistant] Mainly because Stafford and Cernan felt that they should.


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

[User] Oh yes.

[Assistant] They shared that whole mission with us.

[User] Yes. Yes.

[Assistant] Mainly because Stafford and Cernan felt that they should.

[User] Yes. Yes.

[Assistant] But did that mean anything to you here in Mission Control?


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

[User] Oh yes.

[Assistant] Apollo 10 really was the first pioneering effort on the part of a crew to deliver to Mission Control, and through Mission Control to the world at large the television that we saw.

[User] Yes. Yes. I would say that probably all the crews, if they—if the right timing and the right circumstances, would have stepped up to that. But in this case, Gene and Tom were naturals for it. I mean, they had a strong desire to make that available, to share it in effect. But share it for more than just sharing purposes. It actually was of help to us in the Control Center. And to provide that and to support that. Because sometimes the initial arguments about getting a television onboard the spacecraft were somewhat heated. Some people didn’t want to do it at all. And once we started using it, it was hard to imagine getting along without it. Right? It was hard to imagine that. “Why could—why have we waited to so long? Why have we waited so long to get these cameras onboard? We can see what’s going on!”\n\n And today the—the folks use it—use them in a very interactive way in terms of diagnostics, troubleshooting, etc. It’s even gotten to the point where they have a digital still camera that they can show very high accurate—high-definition pictures of. And all of that stuff is a tremendous assistance. As a matter of fact, today, when you envision the Space Station, and something that large with crews doing things with it—EVA or otherwise—the television is just going to make it so much easier for the ground controllers to know what the crews are doing and to appreciate it. And for them to contribute to whatever the crews are trying to do at a given point.

[Assistant] Now when you say EVA, in the time of Apollo an EVA was a walk on the Moon.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] And I think we’re about ready for that right now as we’re coming up on Apollo 11.


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

[User] Yes. Yes. I would say that probably all the crews, if they—if the right timing and the right circumstances, would have stepped up to that. But in this case, Gene and Tom were naturals for it. I mean, they had a strong desire to make that available, to share it in effect. But share it for more than just sharing purposes. It actually was of help to us in the Control Center. And to provide that and to support that. Because sometimes the initial arguments about getting a television onboard the spacecraft were somewhat heated. Some people didn’t want to do it at all. And once we started using it, it was hard to imagine getting along without it. Right? It was hard to imagine that. “Why could—why have we waited to so long? Why have we waited so long to get these cameras onboard? We can see what’s going on!”\n\n And today the—the folks use it—use them in a very interactive way in terms of diagnostics, troubleshooting, etc. It’s even gotten to the point where they have a digital still camera that they can show very high accurate—high-definition pictures of. And all of that stuff is a tremendous assistance. As a matter of fact, today, when you envision the Space Station, and something that large with crews doing things with it—EVA or otherwise—the television is just going to make it so much easier for the ground controllers to know what the crews are doing and to appreciate it. And for them to contribute to whatever the crews are trying to do at a given point.

[Assistant] Now when you say EVA, in the time of Apollo an EVA was a walk on the Moon.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] And I think we’re about ready for that right now as we’re coming up on Apollo 11.

[User] Yes. Apollo 11.

[Assistant] So, here we go. What is your memory of that flight?