NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS) 20000027506: "Before This Decade Is Out...": Personal Reflections on the Apollo Program

428 Pages·16.7 MB·English

by  NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

"BEFORE THIS DECADE
Is OUT..."
Personal Reflections on the Apollo Program
For sale by the U.S. Government Printing Office
Superintendent of Documents, Mail Stop: SSOP,Washington, DC 20402-9328
ISBN 0-16-050139-3
NASA SP-4223
"BEFORE THIS DECADE
Is OUT..."
Personal Reflections on the Apollo Program
Edited by
Glen E. Swanson
The NASA History Series
_tionaI Aeronautics and Space Administration
NASA History Office
Office of PolicY and Plans
Washington, DC 1999
Library of Congress Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
Swanson, Glen E., 1963-
"Before This Decade Is Out ...": Personal Reflecti,ms on the Apollo Program
p. cm.--(NASA SP: 4223) (The NASA History Series)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1.Project Apollo(U.S.) History.
2. Aerospace engineers_United States Interviews
I. Swanson, Glen E., t963- .11.Series. II1.Series: The NASA hi,tog" series.
TL789.8.U6A5187 1999
629.45'4'0973_dc21 99-23780
CIP
CONTENTS
Foreword ......................................... iii
Acknowledgments .................................. v
Introduction ...................................... ix
Chapter 1. James E. Webb ......................... 1
Chapter 2. Thomas O. Paine ..................... 15
Chapter 3. Wernher von Braun .................... 41
Chapter 4. Robert R. Gilruth ..................... 61
Chapter 5. George E. Mueller .................... 101
Chapter 6. Eugene E Kranz ...................... 119
Chapter 7. Arthur J. Rogers, Jr.................... 173
Chapter 8. James H. "Hart3'" Guin ................ 191
Chapter 9. Glynn S. Lunney ..................... 203
Chapter 10. Geneva B. Barnes .................... 223
Chapter 11. Charles M. Duke, Jr................... 245
Chapter 12. Harrison H. Schmitt .................. 285
Chapter 13. George M. Low ...................... 307
Chapter 14. Maxime A. Faget .................... 347
Annotated Project Apollo Bibliography ................ 379
About the Editor ................................. 387
Index .......................................... 389
The NASA History Series .......................... 403

FOREWORD
As the 20th century ends and we approach the beginning of a new
millennium, future generations will look back and recall the leav-
ing of our home planet as a defining moment in the history of
humankind.
The story of Apollo has been told and retold many times by
those fortunate enough to have experienced space travel first
hand--the astronauts themselves. Those who managed to leave
the cradle of the Earth and walk upon the surface of the Moon offer
a unique perspective shared firsthand by only a handful of people
chosen to represent humankind in the culmination of this great
adventure. As we reflect on the 30th anniversary of Apollo's first
landing, we should not overlook other accounts of this monumen-
tal achievement as offered by those representing the half a million
people associated with the program. During the 1960s, these
people joined in a national effort to bring to completion President
John E Kennedy's vision of landing Americans on the Moon and
returning them safely to Earth before the end of the decade.
For a project as massive as the Apollo program, history may
distance itself to the extent where modern interpretation distills a
feeling that such events took place without extensive human
involvement. Nothing could be further removed from the truth.
Through the verbal accounts offered by the oral histories such as
presented in this volume, we are reintroduced to the critical
human factor which is the essence of any history. People made
Apollo happen and it isimportant to preserve their thoughts, feel-
ings, and recollections for future generations. The oral histories
presented in this volume offer a sample of what NASA has done
to preserve the story of Apollo as part of our nation's human space-
flight heritage.
The accounts included in this book are a small sampling of
the large number of oral histories that have been conducted under
the auspices of the NASA history program, since near the begin-
ning of the Agency. They also represent the many personal
contributions made during Project Apollo, the single largest
iii
peacetime endeavor in American history. These recollections span
the origins, management, and completion of that enormous effort
and measurably enhance our appreciation of its difficulty. I am
pleased that the comments of some of the key individuals involved
in Project Apollo are being preserved by NASA and made avail-
able through this book.
The people who are quoted in this book were among the top
leaders of NASA. All of them played a prominent part in the con-
duct and accomplishments of Apollo. As one of those who knew
and watched these individuals lead, I have a particular sense of
their statements. I always had the feeling of having been granted a
special privilege to participate and work on the Mercury, Gemini,
and Apollo programs. The contents of this book reveal that these
people had similar experiences. They all recognized that it took lit-
erally thousands of dedicated people to bring these efforts to
fruition and that it was up to them to provide the necessary lead-
ership to allow all of the workers on the project to accomplish their
tasks. It was a wondrous thing to watch. Anyone interested in the
underlying strength of NASA in this time period will find these
accounts a fascinating read.
Christopher C. Kraft, Jr.
Director, Flight Operations,
NASA Johnson Space Center, 1963-1969
Director,
NASA Johnson Space Center, 1972-1982
iv
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This volume takes advantage ofthe large collections of oral histories
available within NASA which have been conducted and gathered
since the early beginnings of the agency. More recent efforts include
the Johnson Space Center Oral History Project (JSC OHP) which
was established in 1996, under the direction of JSC Director George
Abbey, to document and record the memories of those individuals
involved in the history of human space flight. We pursued the task
of creating this book when the opportunity presented itself to utilize
many of the oral histories resulting from this and other oral history
projects, specifically focusing on those people who had a role in the
successful completion of Project Apollo in order to publish their per-
sonal reflections in commemoration of the 30th anniversary of
Apollo 11. In doing so, we incurred numerous debts.
A great deal of time and effort went into researching, inter-
viewing, transcribing, and duplicating each of the oral histories
present in this volume. For those interviews conducted and used in
this volume as part of the JSC OHP, a special note of thanks is
extended to Bill Larsen, Carol Butler, Summer Chick Bergen,
Rebecca Wright, Michelle Kelly, Kevin Rusnak, Tim Farrell, and
Sasha Adams Tarrant. In addition, a special note of thanks to my
JSC Branch Manager, Peggy Wooten, who was patient in allowing
me time to do research.
Numerous past oral histories were also researched and utilized.
Those that helped in locating these include Janet Kovacevich of
the JSC Science and Technical Information Center. Joan Ferry and
Lois Morris of the JSC Collection at Rice University were invalu-
able in researching, locating, and making copies of hundreds of
pages of interview transcripts for review. Early interviews used in
this work include those conducted by H. George Frederickson,
Henry J. Anna, Barry Kelmachter, Roger E. Bilstein, Robert
Sherrod, John Beltz, Eugene M. Emme, Jay Holmes, Addison
Roghrock, Ivan Ertel, and James M. Grimwood.
Among the many prev|ous oral history projects conducted by
and through NASA, one stands out as being the most complete in
"BEFORTEHIS DECADE IS OUT ..."
both size and detail. Much gratitude is given to the late Robert
Sherrod who, from 1968-1974, interviewed dozens of key players in
the Apollo program. A career journalist, he covered General
MacArthur's campaign against the Japanese in the South Pacific
during WWII. After the war, he was one of Time-Life's leading cor-
respondents, specializing in defense matters as well as covering the
early years of the U.S. manned space program. He was the final
editor of the Saturday Evening Post before its demise. Time-Life con-
tracted Sherrod to research and write a detailed history of the
Apollo program but sadly enough, the book never materialized. In
its wake, he left to NASA hundreds of pages of detailed transcripts
meticulously annotated for future researchers, several of which were
used for this book.
For those interviews that survive only in audio tape form,
recovery and restoration work was needed during the course of
research. JSC OHP technical support members Paul Rollins and
Franklin Tarazona proved invaluable in quickly responding to var-
ious duplication requests and technical questions.
The numerous photos that appear throughout the text were
gleaned from several sources, including the editor's own personal
collection. Mike Gentry of the JSC Media Resource Center came
through with several last minute photo requests. Mary Wilkerson
and Linda Turney of the JSC Still Image Repository also spent time
in responding to numerous photo queries. Many photos also came
to be used in this book as a result of Brian Nicklas, of the
Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum, who led this
editor to their research office's newly acquired Herb Desind
Collection.
Much of this text would not have been possible initially without
the willingness of those individuals (both past and present) featured
in these chapters to take the time and effort to share their personal
reflections. A special thank you is extended to James E. Webb,
Thomas O. Paine, Wemher von Braun, Robert R. Gilruth, George E.
Mueller, Eugene E Kranz, Arthur J. Rogers, Jr., James H. "Harry"
Guin, Glynn S. Lunney, Geneva B. Barnes, Charles M. Duke, Jr.,
Harrison H. "Jack" Schmitt, George M. Low, and Maxime A. Faget.
Numerous people at other NASA Centers associated with his-
v/