A Long Voyage to the Moon: The Life of Naval Aviator and Apollo 17 Astronaut Ron Evans

429 Pages·2021·14.963 MB·English

by  Geoffrey Bowman

A Long Voyage to the Moon
Outward Odyssey
A People’s History of Spaceflight
Series editor
Colin Burgess
A Long Voyage
to the Moon
The Life of Naval Aviator and Apollo 17
Astronaut Ron Evans
Geoffrey Bowman
Foreword by Jack Lousma
UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA PRESS • LINCOLN
© 2021 by the Board of Regents of the
University of Nebraska
All rights reserved
Manufactured in the United States of
America
Library of Congress Cataloging- in-
Publication Data
Names: Bowman, Geoffrey (Geoffrey
Alexander), author. | Lousma, Jack, 1936–
writer of foreword.
Title: A long voyage to the moon: the life
of naval aviator and Apollo 17 astronaut
Ron Evans / Geoffrey Bowman; foreword
by Jack Lousma.
Description: Lincoln: University of
Nebraska Press, [2021] | Series: Outward
odyssey: a people’s history of spaceflight |
Includes bibliographical references and
index.
Identifiers: lccn 2020051336
isbn 9781496213198 (hardback)
isbn 9781496228260 (epub)
isbn 9781496228277 (pdf)
Subjects: lcsh: Evans, Ronald E., 1933–
1990. | Astronauts— United States—
Biography. | Project Apollo (U.S.)
Classification: lcc tl789.85.e93 b69
2021 | ddc 629.450092 [B]— dc23
lc record available at
https:// lccn .loc .gov /2020051336
Set in Garamond Premier by Laura Buis.
For Jan
This is your story, too.
What is it, I wondered, that makes a man willing to sit up on top of
an enormous Roman candle, such as a Redstone, Atlas, Titan or
Saturn rocket, and wait for someone to light the fuse?
— Tom Wolfe, The Right Stuff
Contents
List of Illustrations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix
Foreword . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi
Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xvii
Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .xix
Prologue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1. Kansas Kid. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
2. Jayhawk. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
3. The Pilot and Miss Pollom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
4. Wings. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
5. Fighting Falcon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
6. Top Guns of Oriskany . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
7. Teachers and Pupils . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
8. Deke and Al . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
9. Screaming Eagle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
10. Rolling Thunder . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
11. Per Ardua ad Astra . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109
12. El Lago . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .127
13. Modules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
14. “Go Fever” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
15. Two Lives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .165
16. Footprints in the Dust. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177
17. Backups. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191
18. The Rocky Road to Taurus- Littrow. . . . . . . . 209
19. Many a Slip . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .223
20. Captain America Sets Sail . . . . . . . . . . . . . .235
21. Into the Shadow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249
22. The Big Picture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .261
23. Spaceman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279
24. Return to Ticonderoga. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 295
25. End of an Era . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .305
26. Apollo- Soyuz and Beyond . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 315
27. The Most Alien World. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 329
28. Ad Astra . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .337
Sources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 347
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .359
Illustrations
Following page 134
1. Ron Evans as a child
2. Evans family portrait
3. Ron Evans as a schoolboy
4. Ron Evans on the deck of the uss Wisconsin
5. A glimpse of life in the U.S. Marines
6. Ron Evans becomes a naval aviator
7. Ron and Jan shortly after their wedding
8. Ron Evans at nas Miramar with an f- 8 Crusader
9. vf- 142’s team for the “Top Gun” contest
10. Family man
11. Astronaut selection
12. Medal presentation by Dr. Robert Gilruth
13. Buzz Aldrin, Ron Evans, and Jack Schmitt
14. Apollo 14 backup crew during the Apollo 13 crisis
15. Ron Evans and Gene Cernan in Acapulco
16. Ron Evans and Farouk El- Baz
17. Apollo 17 crew, backup crew, and support crew
18. Apollo 17 crewmen at the base of their Saturn V