A note on the notes: It is the rare source note on the pages that follow that does not contain a web address for a report, document, newspaper article, or video. To make the notes more useful, they will be posted online, at the website of the book. Go to www.onegiantleap.space.
PREFACE: The Mystery of Moondust
1 Eric M. Jones, “A Visit to the Snowman,” Apollo 12: Lunar Surface Journal, September 14, 2017, https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/a12/a12.landing.html, 109:51:50.
2 Astronauts describing the smell of lunar dust: Armstrong (Apollo 11): James R. Hansen, First Man (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2005), pp. 531–32. Aldrin (Apollo 11): Buzz Aldrin with Ken Abraham, Magnificent Desolation (New York: Three Rivers Press, 2009), p. 45. Schmitt (Apollo 17): Eric M. Jones, “Ending the Second Day,” Apollo 17: Lunar Surface Journal, April 34, 2015, https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/a17/a17.eva2post.html, 148:23:10. Irwin and Scott (Apollo 15): Eric M. Jones, “Post-EVA-1 Activities,” Apollo 15: Lunar Surface Journal, May 29, 2012, https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/a15/a15.eva1post.html, 126:16:16ff.
3 Leonard David, “The Moon Smells: Apollo Astronauts Describe Lunar Aroma,” Space.com, August 25, 2014, https://www.space.com/26932-moon-smell-apollo-lunar-aroma.html; Jeremy Pearce, “Thomas Gold, Astrophysicist and Innovator, Is Dead at 84,” New York Times, June 24, 2004, https://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/24/us/thomas-gold-astrophysicist-and-innovator-is-dead-at-84.html.
4 David, “The Moon Smells.”
5 Hansen, First Man, pp. 532–33.
6 Tony Phillips, “The Mysterious Smell of Moondust,” Science@NASA: Apollo Chronicles, January 30, 2006, https://www.nasa.gov/exploration/home/30jan_smellofmoondust.html; Conrad quote: Eric M. Jones, “Post EVA Activities in the LM,” Apollo 12: Lunar Surface Journal, June 19, 2014, https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/a12/a12.posteva1.html, 121:31:45.
7 Arlene Levinson, “Top 100 News Stories of the Century,” Associated Press, Deseret News (Salt Lake City), April 15, 1999, https://www.deseretnews.com/article/691495/Top-100-news-stories-of-the-century.html.
8 Donna Scheibe, “Woman Chute Rigger Helps Bring Back Astronauts Alive,” Los Angeles Times, July 11, 1971, pp. J1, J2, https://www.newspapers.com/image/384778395/.
9 Bernard Weinraub, “Hundreds of Thousands Flock to Be ‘There,’ ” New York Times, July 16, 1969, p. 22, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1969/07/16/78356035.html; John F. Kennedy, “Address at Rice University in Houston on the Nation’s Space Effort,” September 12, 1962, American Presidency Project, https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/address-rice-university-houston-the-nations-space-effort.
1: Tranquility Base & the World We All Live In
1 These are lines from the speech William Safire prepared for President Nixon in case the Apollo 11 astronauts encountered disaster on the Moon, and were unable to return to Earth. The typescript of the text is imaged at the National Archives, https://www.archives.gov/files/presidential-libraries/events/centennials/nixon/images/exhibit/rn100-6-1-2.pdf.
Safire, who went on to be a columnist for the New York Times, wrote about having to write the speech on the 30th anniversary of the Moon landing. William Safire, “Disaster Never Came,” New York Times, July 12, 1999, http://www.nytimes.com/1999/07/12/opinion/essay-disaster-never-came.html.
2 Playtex was born in 1932 as International Latex Corporation (ILC). The company started using latex to design and manufacture various products, including gloves and women’s lingerie, especially girdles and bras. The Playtex division—named by combining the words “play” and “latex”—was formed in 1947, in part to produce rubberized diaper pants for babies. During most of the 1960s, the division that worked on the spacesuits was considered the industrial division of Playtex, and the company was known by its best-known consumer brand. “Even at the time, people in NASA called the company Playtex, as opposed to ILC, partially as you would call someone by their nickname, partly as a kind of, can you believe we’re dealing with Playtex here?” said Nicholas de Monchaux, who wrote a book about the history and design of the Apollo spacesuit called Spacesuit: Fashioning Apollo. (De Monchauz is quoted here from the documentary “Putting Man on the Moon,” at minute 24:30, https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/aljazeeracorrespondent/2015/10/putting-men-moon-151013082436203.html.)
Located in Delaware, the industrial division of Playtex was known formally as ILC Dover, and its address through the 1960s was: Playtex Park, Dover, DE. ILC Dover still produces space suits for NASA. The address is now: One Moonwalker Drive, Frederica, DE. ILC Dover is now an independent company. The underwear portion of Playtex is now part of Hanes.
“Cross Your Heart” bra introduced in 1954: “History of the Plaxtex Brand,” https://www.playtex.co.uk/c/brand-history-70100/.
The observation “form-fitting and flexible”: Moon Machines, Episode 5: “The Space Suit,” directed by Nick Davidson, 2008, Dox Productions for The Science Channel, Discovery Communications, Playtex’s pitch to NASA starting at 8:00.
3 Eric M. Jones, “Mobility and Photography,” Apollo 11: Lunar Surface Journal, November 9, 2016, https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/a11/a11.mobility.html, 110:13:42.
The video of this part of Armstrong and Aldrin’s Moon walk runs from 52:40 to 55:00 on “Apollo 11: ‘First Moonwalk on TV’ (Restored),” YouTube, posted February 17, 2015, by Dan Beaumont Space Museum, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L9Go_j_i6o8. Aldrin comment: Jones, ed., Apollo 11 Lunar Surface Journal, “Mobility and Photography,” 110:13:42.
4 Reihm observation: Eric Ruth, “Man on the Moon,” University of Delaware Messenger, v. 25, n. 3 (Dec. 2017), p. 40, http://www1.udel.edu/udmessenger/vol25no3/stories/alumni-reihm.html.
5 Jones, ed., Apollo 11 Lunar Surface Journal, “Mobility and Photography,” 110:13:42.
6 Moon Machines, Episode 5: “The Space Suit,” Eleanor Foraker comments at 41:40, Joe Kosmo comments at 41:30.
7 Eric M. Jones, ed., Apollo 11 Lunar Surface Journal, “Post-landing activities,” https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/a11/a11.postland.html, 104:39:14.
8 Moon Machines, Episode 5: “The Space Suit,” Sonny Reihm comments at 42:00.
9 There is a three-minute compilation video of astronauts on the Moon skipping, running, falling, and singing. It’s astronauts as you’ve never seen them: Childlike with joy. (Unfortunately the astronauts in each scene are not identified.) Available on “Astronauts Tripping on the Surface of the Moon,” posted September 20, 2013, by amovees, YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2adl6LszcE. It appears to be an excerpt from Al Reinert, For All Mankind, The Criterion Collection, 1989, available from Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/All-Mankind-Neil-Armstrong/dp/B004BQTEGA.
10 Alex Wellerstein, “How Many People Worked on the Manhattan Project?,” The Nuclear Secrecy Blog, November 1, 2013, http://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/2013/11/01/many-people-worked-manhattan-project/.
Richard W. Orloff, “Apollo Program Budget Appropriations,” in Apollo by the Numbers: A Statistical Reference (Washington, D.C.: NASA History Division, 2000), p. 281.
11 Christopher Kraft, interviewed in the video “Human Spaceflight: The Kennedy Legacy,” published May 25, 2011, by NASA, starting at 01:15, YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biSdeqwcGMk.
12 Roger D. Launius, “Public Opinion Polls and Perceptions of U.S. Human Spaceflight,” Space Policy, vol. 19, no. 3, August 2003, pp. 163–75.
Frank Newport, “Despite Recent High Visibility, Americans Not Enthusiastic About Spending More Money on Space Program,” Gallup, 28 July 1999, http://www.gallup.com/poll/3688/Despite-Recent-High-Visibility-Americans-Enthusiastic-About-Spend.aspx.
13 Earthrise photo from “100 Photos: The Most Influential Images of All Time,” Time, undated, http://100photos.time.com/photos/nasa-earthrise-apollo-8.
14 “Men of the Year,” Time, January 3, 1969, pp. 9ff., http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,900486,00.html.
15 Ibid.
16 Polling in the U.S. about enthusiasm for the Moon landing and the space program: Louis Harris, “Moon Landings, Space Exploring Are Unpopular,” Burlington (VT) Free Press, February 18, 1969, p. 7, https://www.newspapers.com/image/200546246/.
The Gallup organization didn’t poll Americans with exactly the same precision about attitudes toward the Moon landing as the Harris Poll did. In January 1969, Gallup polled the question of spending more generically—“many billions of dollars on space research”—then asked if Americans favored increasing space spending, holding it the same, or decreasing it. The result: increase spending, 14%; keep spending the same, 41%; rreduce spending, 40%; no opinion, 5%. So just four weeks after Apollo 8, according to Gallup, 40% of Americans thought spending for space should be reduced. George Gallup, “55 Percent Favor Space Spending, ” Star Tribune (Minneapolis), February 27, 1969, p. 30, https://www.newspapers.com/image/185072275/.
Vietnam spending: “Vietnam Statistics—War Costs: Complete Picture Impossible,” CQ Almanac 1975, 31st ed., pp. 301–5, 1976, http://library.cqpress.com/cqalmanac/cqal75-1213988.
Vietnam casualties: “Vietnam War U.S. Military Fatal Casualty Statistics,” National Archives, https://www.archives.gov/research/military/vietnam-war/casualty-statistics.
17 Roger D. Launius, former chief historian for NASA, in-person interview, June 9, 2016.
18 For the history of Tang: Matt Blitz, “How NASA Made Tang Cool,” Food & Wine, May 18, 2017, https://www.foodandwine.com/lifestyle/how-nasa-made-tang-cool.
ABC News coverage of the Apollo 8 mission, with Jules Bergman and the Tang logo, can be seen in “Apollo 8: ‘Enters Moon’s Gravity,’ ABC News, December 23, 1968,” posted December 24, 2011, by Dan Beaumont Space Museum, YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rbYW54FUEPY.
For the Apollo 11 crew taste-testing and rejecting Tang: Hansen, First Man, pp. 417–18. For the history of Velcro: Claire Suddath, “A Brief History of: Velcro,” Time, June 15, 2010, http://content.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1996883,00.html.
NASA’s webpage clarifying that it did not invent Tang or Velcro: “Are Tang, Teflon, and Velcro NASA Spinoffs?,” NASA, undated, https://www.nasa.gov/offices/ipp/home/myth_tang.html.
19 “TV Roundup: 53.5 Million Homes Viewed Apollo Flight,” unbylined, The Philadelphia Inquirer, August 26, 1969, p. 23, https://www.newspapers.com/image/179913144/.
“Latest Nielsens: All in Family Keeps Top Rating,” Los Angeles Times, January 1, 1973, part IV, p. 24, https://www.newspapers.com/image/385960836/.
20 Richard C. Levin, “The Semiconductor Industry,” in Richard R. Nelson, ed., Government and Technical Progress (Elmsford, NY: Pergamon Press, 1982), p. 36 (integrated circuit prices), pp. 63–64 (NASA purchasing).
21 David A. Mindell, Frances and David Dibner Professor of the History of Engineering and Manufacturing and professor of aeronautics and astronautics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, telephone interview, October 29, 2017.
22 James E. Tomayko, “Computers in Spaceflight: The NASA Experience,” NASA, Contractor Report 182505 (Washington, D.C., 1988), pp. 251, 255.
23 Table No. 1098: Homes With Selected Electrical Appliances: 1953 to 1970, Statistical Abstract of the United States (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, 1970), p. 687.
24 The electric can opener is one of the true oddities that the Statistical Abstract of the United States tracked through the years. Sales data first appear in 1960 (1.2 million can openers sold). By 1965, 20% of U.S. homes had one; by 1970, 43% of U.S. homes had one. The Statistical Abstract last reports data for can opener ownership in its combined 1982–83 edition, by which point 51 million U.S. homes had one—64% nationwide ownership of electric can openers.
Handheld can openers that just peeled open the lid were apparently considered dangerous, helping explain the boom in electric versions. In 1950 the New York Times ran a story saying, “The old-fashioned can opener that leaves sharp jagged edges is the No. 1 hazard in the average New York home, the Greater New York Safety Council reported yesterday,” ahead of loose rugs on the floor and smoking in bed. “Hazards in Home Listed,” New York Times, March 5, 1950, p. 15, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1950/03/05/98603797.html.
25 “Out of Order,” Time, October 14, 1957, pp. 102–4.
26 “Just Heat and Serve,” Time, December 7, 1959, pp. 92–93.
27 Table 1167: Manufacturers Sales and Retail Value of Home Appliances, 1955–1969, Statistical Abstract of the United States, 1970, pp. 728–29.
28 “The Selectric Typewriter,” IBM, http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/ibm100/us/en/icons/selectric/. “Sony Design: History: 8FC-59,” Sony, https://www.sony.net/Fun/design/history/product/1960/8fc-59.html.
29 Touch-tone telephone service sources: AT&T introduces at the 1962 World’s Fair: “AT&T Archives: Century 21 Calling . . . ,” AT&T, company video, accessed July 8, 2018, http://techchannel.att.com/play-video.cfm/2013/7/10/AA11167-Century-21-Calling, 14:11. Washington, D.C., gets touch-tone service: Willard Clopton, “D.C. Suburbs Using Push-Button Phones: Halves Calling Time,” Washington Post, January 2, 1965, p. A10. Four million touch-tone phones in use in U.S.: “Telephone Dials,” Engineering and Technology History Wiki, accessed July 8, 2018, ethw.org/Telephone_Dials; 109 million phones total in U.S.: Statistical Abstract of the United States, 1974, Table 826: Telephones, Calls, and Rates: 1950 to 1973, p. 500.
30 Phil Hevener, “Smiling, Wide-Eyed Jeannie Wows ’Em in Cocoa Beach,” Florida Today, June 28, 1969, pp. 1A, 6A, https://www.newspapers.com/image/124882970/.
31 The lunar module briefing document describes the ladder as having nine rungs, nine inches apart, with the lowest rung being 30 inches from the Moon’s surface. “Lunar Module: Quick Reference Data,” Grumman Corporation, https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/LM04_Lunar_Module_ppLV1-17.pdf, p. LV-12.
32 As President Kennedy spoke on May 25, 1961, the U.S. had launched only a single manned spaceflight: Alan Shepard’s suborbital arc in the tiny Mercury capsule, Freedom 7, three weeks earlier on May 5, 1961. The flight lasted 15 minutes from blastoff to splashdown, Shepard went 102 miles high, was weightless for just 5 minutes, and landed only 302 miles southeast of his launch pad at Cape Canaveral. See “Mercury-Redstone 3,” https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/mercury/missions/freedom7.html.
33 Hansen, First Man, p. 304.
“Senate Report Assails NASA on Apollo Deaths,” United Press International, The New York Times, February 1, 1968, p. 8, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1968/02/01/76867119.html.
34 “Legal History of Contraceptives,” Jurist: Legal News & Research, January 28, 2014, https://www.jurist.org/archives/feature/legal-history-of-contraceptives-in-the-us/; Martha J. Bailey, “How Contraception Transformed the American Family,” Atlantic, June 16, 2015, https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/06/griswold-50th-anniversary/395867/.
35 U.S. births during the 1960s falling: Statistical Abstract of the United States, 1972, Table 8, p. 10; Statistical Abstract of the United States, 1974, Table 68, p. 53. Women 18 and over: Statistical Abstract of the United States, 1972, Table 33, p. 30. College enrollment: Statistical Abstract of the United States, 1972, Table 33, p. 108. Women and men in the workforce: Statistical Abstract of the United States, 1971, Table 349, p. 223. Women in various work categories: Statistical Abstract of the United States, 1971, Table 347, p. 222.
36 Top TV shows: “Top-Rated TV Shows of Each Season, 1950–51 to 1999–2000,” in World Almanac and Book of Facts 2001 (Mahwah, NJ: World Almanac Books, 2001), p. 317. Top music 1960 and 1969: “Hot 100 55th Anniversary: Every No. 1 Song (1955–2013),” Billboard, August 2, 2013, https://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/chart-beat/5149230/hot-100-55th-anniversary-every-no-1-song-1958-2013.
37 Decline of the bald eagle: “Bald Eagle: Fact Sheet: Natural History, Ecology, and History of Recovery,” U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, June 2007, https://www.fws.gov/midwest/eagle/recovery/biologue.html.
Smog pollution, New York City: Jim Dwyer, “Remembering a City Where the Smog Could Kill,” New York Times, March 1, 2017, p. A22, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/28/nyregion/new-york-city-smog.html. Smog pollution, Los Angeles: Douglas Smith, “Fifty Years of Clearing the Skies,” California Institute of Technology, Caltech Media Relations, April 25, 2013, http://www.caltech.edu/news/fifty-years-clearing-skies-39248.
38 “The Modern Environmental Movement: Timeline,” American Experience, PBS, accessed June 23, 2018, https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/earth-days-modern-environmental-movement/.
39 It is hard to compare large spending projects across decades and centuries; what’s the labor of Chinese immigrants building the transcontinental railroad worth compared to the technicians who assembled the lunar module? But the scale of Apollo is dramatically larger than those earlier projects.
As of 1974, NASA told Congress that Apollo cost $24.5 billion. Apollo employed 411,000 people at its peak in 1965.
The Manhattan Project cost $2 billion in 1945 dollars ($5.7 billion in 1974 dollars) and employed 125,000 people at its peak.
The Panama Canal cost $375 million in 1914 dollars ($1.9 billion in 1974 dollars) and employed 45,000 people during the peak of the U.S. effort.
Estimates of the cost and the laborers for the transcontinental railroad, built by three private railroad companies, are harder to nail down. The cost seems to have been between $110 million and $124 million in 1869 dollars. Using the Panama Canal inflation figure from 45 years later, that’s at least $500 million in 1974 dollars. Even doubling that to account for the years for which there is no CPI data gets to only $1 billion in modern dollars. Similarly, employment figures are imprecise, but at peak employment the transcontinental railroad had 30,000 or more workers at once.
One more contemporary effort that isn’t really a “project” was the Marshall Plan to provide aid to help rebuild Western Europe after World War II. Marshall Plan funding totaled $13 billion from 1947 to 1951. In 1972 dollars, that is $21 billion—the scale of Apollo, but for a much different style of effort.
Manhattan Project sources: Alex Wellerstein, “The Price of the Manhattan Project,” Restricted Data: The Nuclear Secrecy Blog, May 17, 2013, http://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/2013/05/17/the-price-of-the-manhattan-project/; Alex Wellerstein, “How Many People Worked on the Manhattan Project,” Restricted Data: The Nuclear Secrecy Blog, November 1, 2013, http://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/2013/11/01/many-people-worked-manhattan-project/.
Panama Canal sources: “End of Construction,” A History of the Panama Canal: Prepared by the Panama Canal Authority, accessed June 25, 2019, https://www.pancanal.com/eng/history/history/end.html; Azad Abdulhafedh, “The Panama Canal: A Man-Made Engineering Marvel,” International Journal of Society Science and Humanities Research 5, no. 1 (January–March 2017), p. 330, www.researchpublish.com/download.php?file=The%20Panama%20Canal-4402.pdf&act=book.
Transcontinental Railroad sources: Maury Klein, “Financing the Transcontinental Railroad,” Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History: AP US History Study Guide, accessed June 25, 2018, https://ap.gilderlehrman.org/essays/financing-transcontinental-railroad; “Construction Cost of the Transcontinental Railroad: CPRR Discussion Group,” Central Pacific Railroad Photographic History Museum, June 1, 2008, http://discussion.cprr.net/2008/06/construction-cost-of-transcontinental.html; “How Many Workers: CPRR Discussion Group,” Central Pacific Railroad Photographic History Museum, September 10, 2006, http://discussion.cprr.net/2006/09/how-many-workers.html.
Marshall Plan source: “George C. Marshall: The Marshall Plan: History of the Marshall Plan,” George C. Marshall Foundation, accessed July 2, 2018, https://www.marshallfoundation.org/marshall/the-marshall-plan/history-marshall-plan/.
40 Total forces in Vietnam: “Vietnam Conflict: U.S. Military Forces in Vietnam and Casualties Incurred: 1961 to 1975,” Table 590, Statistical Abstract of the United States, 1977, p. 369.
Total Apollo staff: NASA, NASA Historical Data Book, 1958–1968, vol. 1, Washington, D.C.: NASA SP-4012, 1976, Table 3-26: “Total NASA Employment, Selected Characteristics,” p. 106.
41 Numbers for employees at the largest U.S. firms come from the Fortune 500 list of the largest U.S. corporations for the years 1963 to 1970. Data provided by Scott DeCarlo, list editor, Fortune magazine, via spreadsheet, May 2018.
42 Total Saturn V rockets: Tim Sharp, “Saturn V Rockets & Apollo Spacecraft,” Space.com, October 17, 2018, https://www.space.com/16698-apollo-spacecraft.html.
Total Apollo command modules and their disposition: “Location of Apollo Command Modules,” Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum: Spacecraft & Vehicles, accessed January 10, 2019, https://airandspace.si.edu/explore-and-learn/topics/apollo/apollo-program/spacecraft/location/cm.cfm.
Total lunar modules and their disposition: “Location of Apollo Lunar Modules,” Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum: Spacecraft & Vehicles, accessed January 10, 2019, https://airandspace.si.edu/explore-and-learn/topics/apollo/apollo-program/spacecraft/location/lm.cfm.
43 MIT staffing for Apollo during the 1960s: MIT’s Role in Project Apollo: Final Report on Contracts NAS 9-153 and NAS 9-4065 (Cambridge, MA: Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1972), p. 7. “20,000 companies”: NASA Historical Data Book, 1958-1968, vol. 1, “Table 5-1: Total Number of Procurement Actions by Kind of Contractor: FY 1960–FY 1968,” p. 164.
44 NASA staffing and contractor staffing: NASA Historical Data Book, 1958-1968, vol. 1, “Table 3-26: Total NASA Employment, Selected Characteristics,” p. 106.
State-by-state Apollo contracting dollars from NASA: NASA Historical Data Book, 1958–1968, vol. 1, “Table 5-17: Distribution of NASA Prime Contract Awards by States: FY 1961–FY 1968,” p. 182.
45 Vietnam fatality statistics: “Vietnam Conflict: U.S. Military Forces in Vietnam and Casualties Incurred: 1961 to 1975,” Table 590, Statistical Abstract of the United States, 1977, p. 369. Vietnam cost statistics: “Vietnam Statistics—War Costs: Complete Picture Impossible—Full War Costs” listing, CQ Almanac 1975, 31st ed., 301-5, 1976, http://library.cqpress.com/cqalmanac/cqal75-1213988.
46 “Most View the CDC Favorably; VA’s Image Slips: Ratings of Government Agencies,” Pew Research Center, January 22, 2015, http://assets.pewresearch.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2015/01/1-22-15-Favorability-release.pdf (current data, p. 1; historic data on NASA, p. 10).
47 The author did an analysis of the appearance in print media of the phrase “if we can put a man on the Moon” going back to the earliest citation, before John Kennedy’s call to fly to the Moon, on May 25, 1961.The use of the phrase in the U.S. media is discussed in detail in Chapter 9, starting on page 315.
Research on the phrase was based on searching the U.S. nationwide newspaper database newspapers.com, and the databases of the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, the Chicago Tribune, and the Los Angeles Times.
The collating and citations are actually based on searching for all instances of three phrases with slightly different wording, and without the initial word “if,” because the construction in stories was often, “we can send a man to the Moon, but . . .” The three different wordings are: “we can put a man on the Moon,” “we can land a man on the Moon,” and “we can send a man to the Moon.”
The first use of the phrase occurred in the student newspaper of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, The Daily Tar Heel, on November 8, 1958. Every instance of each of those phrases from that first occurrence through the launch of the first Moon landing mission, Apollo 11, on July 16, 1969, was read and cataloged. As well, the total occurrences for the phrases for each decade from 1950 forward were tabulated. Totals for all three phrases, by decade, are below. Note that each period is 10 years long—from January 1 of the starting year through December 31 of the ending year—except for 2010 to 2018, which is 9 years.
1950 to 1959: 9
1960 to 1969: 440
1970 to 1979: 1,486
1980 to 1989: 1,938
1990 to 1991: 1,592
2000 to 2009: 771
2010 to 2018: 423
48 Tom Alexander, “The Unexpected Payoff of Project Apollo,” Fortune, July 1969, p. 156.
49 Lyndon Baines Johnson, The Vantage Point (New York: Popular Library, 1971), p. 285.
50 John M. Logsdon, John F. Kennedy and the Race to the Moon (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010), p. 101. Logsdon says Robert Seamans, the associate administrator of NASA, told McNamara that a Mars mission simply wasn’t technically feasible. In his own memoir, Aiming at Targets: The Autobiography of Robert C. Seamans, Jr. (Honolulu: University Press of the Pacific, 2004), Seamans says NASA and the country were not “in any position whatsoever to take that on as an objective” and that announcing a mission straight to Mars would have been “foolhardy” (p. 89).
51 Kennedy, “Address at Rice University in Houston on the Nation’s Space Effort.”
52 The Pew Research Center has been tracking public trust in government since 1958. At the end of 2017, the percentage of Americans who “trust the government in Washington always or most of the time” was at 18, and the moving average was also at 18. The average was lower—15% and 17%—briefly in 2011. Individual polls have put faith in government lower than 18% just five times from 2007 to 2017, out of 34 polls. “Public Trust in Government: 1958–2017,” Pew Research Center, December 14, 2017, http://www.people-press.org/2017/12/14/public-trust-in-government-1958-2017/.
53 Northrop Ventura Corp., “Project Apollo: The Last Five Miles Home,” November 1966, YouTube, posted by spaceaholic, August 7, 2010, 14:43, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDNDQQlx1JE.
54 “MIT Science Reporter: Computer for Apollo (1965),” hosted by John Fitch, YouTube, posted January 20, 2016, by the Vault of MIT, 29:20, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndvmFlg1WmE.
55 Thomas J. Kelly, Moon Lander (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Books, 2001), p. 139.
56 “Backgrounder: The Apollo Heat Shield,” press kit, Avco Space Systems Division, Lowell, Mass., Apollo 8, Contractors, Kits, Record #012863, NASA History Office, Washington, D.C.
57 The 11 missions had 33 crew members, but four Apollo astronauts from the first four missions—which didn’t land—got to fly a second time on Moon-bound missions: Jim Lovell (on Apollo 13, who didn’t get to land), David Scott, John Young, and Gene Cernan. So while there were 33 crew members, there were only 29 actual Apollo flight astronauts.
58 The statistic that every hour of Apollo space flight required 1 million hours of work on Earth was calculated using basic data from NASA. The total number of spaceflight hours—2,502—comes from Orloff, Apollo by the Numbers, p. 305.
The total number of hours worked on the ground was calculated using the total number of NASA staff members—NASA and contractor employees—for each year. That provided a basic “work years” figure. But that was total NASA and contractor staff for all NASA projects. That total “staff years worked” figure was then adjusted, based on the percent of the NASA budget that year devoted to Apollo. The staffing numbers come from NASA Historical Data Book, 1958-1968, vol. 1, p. 106. The percent of the NASA budget devoted to Apollo in each year is from Orloff, p. 281.
Those numbers are below:
YEAR |
STAFF / WORK YEARS |
% TO APOLLO |
ADJ WORK YEARS |
1960 |
47,000 |
0% |
|
1961 |
75,000 |
1% |
750 |
1962 |
139,000 |
10% |
13,900 |
1963 |
248,000 |
17% |
42,160 |
1964 |
380,000 |
57% |
216,600 |
1965 |
411,000 |
61% |
250,710 |
1966 |
396,000 |
66% |
261,360 |
1967 |
309,000 |
70% |
216,370 |
1968 |
246,000 |
64% |
157,440 |
1969 |
218,000 |
63% |
137,340 |
1970 |
100,000 |
54% |
54,000 |
1971 |
80,000 |
36% |
28,800 |
TOTAL WORK YEARS, Apollo, 1961 to 1971: 1,379,430 |
|||
If you assume a basic work year of 2,000 hours (40 hours a week for 50 weeks), then multiply 2,000 hours by the 1,379,430 work years, that comes to: 2,758,860,000 hours of work—2.8 billion hours. If you divide 2.8 billion hours of work on Earth by 2,502 hours of space flight, you get 1.1 million hours of work on Earth for every hour of space flight.
The calculation is rough in two areas. First, the percent of the NASA budget going to Apollo is only a proxy for the percent of total NASA and contractor staff members working on Apollo, but not a bad proxy. And 2,000 hours of work for each “work year” is, if anything, low. Most NASA and contractor staff members reported working extremely long days, and extremely long weeks, during the Apollo project, often including weekends, for months and years on end. But both those approximations mean that the calculation is, if anything, conservative. Each hour of spaceflight most likely required more than 1 million hours of work on the ground—but certainly required at least that.
2: The Moon to the Rescue
1 The account of Gagarin’s historic orbital flight comes from several sources: Asif A. Siddiqi, Challenge to Apollo: The Soviet Union and the Space Race, 1945–1974, NASA History Division, Office of Policy and Plans, Washington D.C., 2000, https://history.nasa.gov/SP-4408pt1.pdf (full story of Gagarin’s flight: pp. 243–98; detail of Gagarin’s landing: p. 281). All direct quotes from Gagarin are from this account. A second account, also relying on original Russian documents: Anatoly Zak, “Vostok 1: Vostok Lands Successfully,” Russian Space Web, accessed June 22, 2017, http://www.russianspaceweb.com/vostok1_landing.html. Descriptions of the field, “planting potatoes,” and the woman and her granddaughter are from Théo Pirard, “Yuri Gagarin, 12 April 1961: ‘I come from outer space!’ (1),” Reflexions, Liège Université, accessed July 10, 2018, http://reflexions.ulg.ac.be/cms/c_33931/youri-gagarine-12-avril-1961-je-viens-du-cosmos-1. On Google Maps, “The landing of Gagarin, Saratov Oblast, Russia,” is a designated landmark, including visitor photos from people who have visited the monument there.
2 “Guard parachute,” “military men safeguard spacesuit, pistol, watch, handkerchief,” all from Zak, “Vostok 1.” Russian cosmonauts armed with pistols, and one pair landed in taiga and needed it: Alexander Korolkov, “Pistol-Packing for the Final Frontier: Why Were Cosmonauts Armed?,” Russia Beyond, July 17, 2014, https://www.rbth.com/defence/2014/07/17/pistol-packing_for_the_final_frontier_why_were_cosmonauts_armed_38279.html.
3 Kennedy being warned of launch in advance: Hugh Sidey, “How the News Hit Washington—With Some Reactions Overseas,” Life, April 21, 1961, pp. 26–27, https://books.google.com/books?id=9FEEAAAAMBAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false. Clifton asks if President Kennedy wants to be woken up: Hugh Sidey, John F. Kennedy, President (New York: Crest Books, 1964), p. 110. Wiesner called by Pentagon: “The Cruise of the Vostok,” Time, April 21, 1961, p. 49, http://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,895299,00.html. New York Times reporter calls Salinger: Sidey, John F. Kennedy, p. 111.
4 “Soviet Orbits Man and Recovers Him,” United Press International, New York Times, April 12, 1961, pp. 1, 22. https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1961/04/12/issue.html.
5 “The Bay of Pigs,” JFK in History, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, accessed July 10, 2018, https://www.jfklibrary.org/JFK/JFK-in-History/The-Bay-of-Pigs.aspx; Tad Szulc, “Castro Says Attack Is Crushed; Cuba Rebels Give Up Beachhead, Report New Landings on Island,” New York Times, April 20, 1961, pp. 1, 10, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1961/04/20/issue.html.
6 George Gallup, “Most Nations Believe Soviets Will Lead in Science by 1970,” Ogden (UT) Standard-Examiner, February 12, 1960, p. 5, https://www.newspapers.com/image/28147217/; USIA Polling Data: Warren Unna, “U.S. Prestige Slip Seen in Poll of 5 Major Allies,” The Washington Post, October 29, 1960, pp. A1, A7.
7 John Kennedy was part of a run of U.S. presidents who believed in the value of press conferences. In the 34 months of his presidency, he had 65 press conferences, one every 16 days. He was the first president to have the press conferences broadcast live, on television. Kennedy had more press conferences in his three years than Reagan had in eight, more than Nixon had in six years. Kennedy averaged 23 a year, more than Obama (21 a year), Carter (15), and Ford (16). But Kennedy’s numbers are low compared to the presidents immediately surrounding him: Eisenhower averaged 24 a year, Johnson 26, and Truman met with the press almost every week (42 a year). “Presidential News Conferences,” American Presidency Project, undated, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/data/newsconferences.php.
8 Information on press conference preparation from Pierre Salinger, With Kennedy (New York: Doubleday, 1966), pp. 137–38, via JFK Library website, https://www.jfklibrary.org/Education/Students/Presidential-Press-Office.aspx. The book is available on Google Books: https://books.google.com/books?id=vx45mXCc4JoC&pg=PP5&dq=%22pierre+salinger%22+%22with+kennedy%22#v=onepage&q=%22pierre%20salinger%22%20%22with%20kennedy%22&f=false.
9 John F. Kennedy, “Excerpts from a Speech Delivered by Senator John F. Kennedy, Civic Auditorium, Portland, Oregon,” September 9, 1960, https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/excerpts-from-speech-delivered-senator-john-f-kennedy-civic-auditorium-portland-or-advance.
10 President Kennedy used “vigor” and “vigorous” in his speeches regularly—in his speech accepting the Democratic nomination for President on July 15, 1960, in Los Angeles he said, “Leadership is the ability to . . . lead vigorously”: “Acceptance speech at Democratic Convention. Nomination for President,” July 15, 1960, JFK Presidential Library and Museum, https://www.jfklibrary.org/Asset-Viewer/AS08q5oYz0SFUZg9uOi4iw.aspx.
The New York Times sometimes used the word “vigor” in headlines about Kennedy’s campaign: Damon Stetson, “A Need for Vigor Cited by Kennedy,” The New York Times, February 26, 1960, p. 2, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1960/02/26/issue.html; Clayton Knowles, “Kennedy’s Reply to Truman Asks Young Leaders: Senator Contends ‘Strength & Vigor’ Are Required in the White House,” The New York Times, July 5, 1960, p. 1, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1960/07/05/issue.html.
Speech references “an America on the march” and “Americans are tired of standing still” from “Speech by Senator John F. Kennedy, Convention Hall, Philadelphia, PA,” American Presidency Project, October 31, 1960, https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/speech-senator-john-f-kennedy-convention-hall-philadelphia-pa.
11 Kennedy, “Address of Senator John F. Kennedy Accepting the Democratic Party Nomination for the Presidency of the United States.”
12 Coverage of the “Kitchen Debate”: Harrison E. Salisbury, “Nixon and Khrushchev Argue in Public as U.S. Exhibit Opens; Accuse Each Other of Threats,” The New York Times, July 25, 1959, pp. 1, 2, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1959/07/25/issue.html; Willard Edwards, “Khrushchev, Nixon Debate,” Chicago Daily Tribune, July 25, 1959, pp. 1, 4, http://archives.chicagotribune.com/1959/07/25/; John Scali, “Khrushchev and Nixon Trade Gibes,” The Washington Post, July 25, 1959, pp. A1, A4.
Quote from Kennedy-Nixon presidential debate: “October 21, 1960 Debate Transcript,” Commission on Presidential Debates, http://www.debates.org/index.php?page=october-21-1960-debate-transcript.
13 Ted Sorenson, Kennedy: The Classic Biography (New York: Harper Perennial, 2009), p. 524.
14 Karl G. Harr, Jr., “Industry and World War II—Embryo to Vigorous Maturity,” Air Force/Space Digest, September 1965, p. 64, https://www.aia-aerospace.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/INDUSTRY-AND-WW-II.pdf.
The Soviet Union was offered U.S. rebuilding assistance through the Marshall Plan, but declined. Some scholars date the start of the Cold War to the creation of the Marshall Plan, and the Soviet Union’s suspicion that it was a way of creating an anti-Soviet alliance in Western Europe. See Scott D. Parrish and Mikhail M. Narinsky, “New Evidence on the Soviet Rejection of the Marshall Plan, 1947: Two Reports,” Working Paper No. 9, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, https://www.wilsoncenter.org/sites/default/files/ACFB73.pdf.
15 Ten cabinet members sworn in: “Swearing-in Ceremony and Reception for Cabinet Secretaries, 4:00 PM,” JFK Presidential Library and Museum, January 21, 1961, https://www.jfklibrary.org/Asset-Viewer/Archives/JFKWHP-AR6287-E.aspx. Glennan leaves without talking to anyone except for brief conversation with LBJ: The Birth of NASA: The Diary of T. Keith Glennan, NASA, https://history.nasa.gov/SP-4105.pdf (conversation with LBJ, at Glennan’s insistence, January 9, 1961, p. 300; leave to drive home, p. 309).
16 All quotes on the following pages from President Kennedy’s April 12, 1961, press conference, along with the attendance figure, are from the transcript (and audio recording) at the Kennedy Library: John F. Kennedy, “News Conference 9, April 12, 1961,” John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, https://www.jfklibrary.org/archives/other-resources/john-f-kennedy-press-conferences/news-conference-9.
17 Kennedy was captivated by desalination and the possibilities it offered for reducing poverty and suffering. On June 21, 1961, he used a switch that had been temporarily installed on his desk in the Oval Office to turn on the first commercial desalination plant in the U.S., located in Freeport, Texas, saying it represented “one of the oldest dreams of man—extracting water from the seas.”
Kennedy teamed up with Congress to invigorate the Office of Saline Waters, in the Interior Department, including winning funding for more than half a dozen desalination plants, several of which were designed to research the best methods to turn seawater into drinking water. “President Hails Desalting Plant,” United Press International, New York Times, June 22, 1961, p. 21, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1961/06/22/101467703.html; Robert C. Toth, “Efforts to Desalt Water Are Stepped Up in U.S.,” New York Times, February 21, 1963, p. 11, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1963/02/21/issue.html.
18 “Eisenhower Notes Soviet Space Feat,” Associated Press, New York Times, April 15, 1961, p. 2, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1961/04/15/118907150.html.
19 “The Cruise of the Vostok,” Time.
20 “Soviet Lands Man after Orbit of World; K Challenges West to Duplicate Feat,” Washington Post, April 13, 1961, A1, A24. The name Vostok has some historical resonance for Russians. The 130-foot-long Russian sloop-of-war Vostok, captained by Faddey Bellingshausen, discovered the continent of Antarctica on January 28, 1820, and returned to Antarctica the following January. Vostok Station, a Russian research station in Antarctica established in December 1957, is named for the ship that discovered the continent, and Antarctica’s largest subglacial lake, Vostok Lake, is in turn named for the Russian research center. The Washington Post routinely referred to Soviet premier Khrushchev simply as “K” in headlines.
21 “Gagarin in Space: ‘Jules Bergman Announces and Explains the Event,’ ABC News Special, April 12, 1961,” YouTube, posted by Dan Beaumonth Space Museum, November 14, 2011, 4:33, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYucEQFYNf0&t=4s. “Russia Reaps Praise for Mighty Deed,” Washington Post, April 13, 1961, A24.
22 Osgood Caruthers, “Gagarin Is Hailed by All of Moscow,” New York Times, April 14, 1961, pp. 1, 2, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1961/04/15/issue.html. The 2 million figure and Khrushchev’s tears, from “Reds Pay Homage to Their Space Hero,” Reuters, Chicago Daily Tribune, April 15, 1961, pp. 1, 2, https://chicagotribune.newspapers.com/image/374621899.
23 “Text of the Soviet Statement Praising First Space Flight,” Reuters, New York Times, April 13, 1961, p. 14, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1961/04/13/issue.html.
24 TV ownership: “Selected Communications Media: 1920 to 1998,” Table No. 1440, Statistical Abstract of the United States, 1999, p. 885, https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/1999/compendia/statab/119ed/tables/sec31.pdf.
Popular shows: The World Almanac 2001, p. 317.
Car ownership: “Motor-Vehicle Registration (Passenger Cars, Buses, and Trucks) by States: 1920 to 1961,” Table No. 766, Statistical Abstract of the United States, 1962, p. 563.
Interstate Highway System: Richard F. Weingroff, “The Greatest Decade: Celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the Eisenhower Interstate System,” U.S. Department of Transportation: Federal Highway Administration, https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/infrastructure/50interstate.cfm.
Park visits: Historical Statistics of the United States: Colonial Times to 1957, Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, 1960, pp. 222–23.
Shopping malls: Thomas W. Hanchett, “U.S. Tax Policy and the Shopping-Center Boom,” American Historical Review, October 1996, pp. 1082–1110.
Family income: “Money Income of Families—Median Income in Current and Constant (1997) Dollars, by Race and Type of Family: 1947 to 1997,” Table No. 1427, Statistical Abstract of the United States, 1999, p. 877, https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/1999/compendia/statab/119ed/tables/sec31.pdf.
25 Levittown: Clare Suddath, “The Middle Class,” Time, February 27, 2009, http://content.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1882147,00.html.
Pace of U.S. home building: Lizabeth Cohen, “A Consumer’s Republic: The Politics of Mass Consumption in Postwar America,” Journal of Consumer Research, vol. 31, no. 1 (June 2004), p. 237, https://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/4699747/cohen_conrepublic.pdf.
Outdoor cooking: “Yards Provide Good Trade in Equipment,” Washington Post, May 15, 1955, p. G-11.
26 Homer Bigart, “Troops Enforce Peace in Little Rock As Nine Negroes Return to their Classes; President to Meet Southern Governors,” New York Times, September 26, 1957, pp. 1, 12, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/09/26/issue.html.
27 “Halfway across Arizona”: Gladwin Hill, “2nd Atomic Blast in 24 Hours Jolts Wide Nevada Area,” New York Times, January 29, 1951, pp. 1, 25, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1951/01/29/88430448.html.
“brightened the sky in four states”: “Latest Nevada A-Blast Seen in 4 States,” Washington Post, February 2, 1951, p. A1.
“eerie sun-gold glow”: “4th A-Blast ‘Like a Quake’ in Las Vegas,” Washington Post, February 3, 1951, p. A1.
28 “Latest Nevada A-Blast Seen in 4 States,” Washington Post, February 2, 1951, p. A1.
29 “Reds Admit New Test of A-Weapon,” Washington Post, September 1, 1956, pp. A1, A6.
30 KTLA broadcasts of atomic tests: “KTLA A-Bomb Coverage April 22, 1952,” YouTube, posted by Robert Black, August 18, 2015, 10:15, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OF3JvVJMtzg. “Atomic / Nuclear Bomb Nevada Test—5/1/1952,” posted by TheShottingstar31, June 24, 2012, 9:12, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d5JsrCPWCl8. Washington Post TV critic’s review: Sonia Stein, “Incredibly, ‘Bomb’ Was Tame on TV,” Washington Post, March 22, 1953, p. L1.
31 Soldiers near bomb blast: Elton C. Fay, “Men Shaken But Safe 2 Miles from A-Blast,” Washington Post, March 18, 1953, p. A1. Monkeys and rats: “High A-Blast Seen 1000 Miles Away,” Washington Post, April 7, 1953, p. A4. Members of Congress: “Big A-Blast Shakes up 14 Congressmen: Knocks off Hats,” Washington Post, April 26, 1953, p. A1.
Casino atomic-bomb watching parties: “How 1950s Las Vegas Sold Atomic Bomb Tests as Tourism,” YouTube, posted by Smithsonian Channel, March 31, 2017, 1:30, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FghT80tVFKo.
32 Reporters on B-25: Gladwin Hill, “Air Force Planes Chase and Test Atomic Cloud After Nevada Blast,” New York Times, March 2, 1955, pp. 1, 12, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1955/03/02/issue.html.
Testing “Survival Town”: “A-Blast Shatters ‘Survival Town,’ ” Washington Post, May 6, 1955, p. A1.
Video of “Survival Town” test: “Nuclear Bomb Tests (1955) Dummy Town,” YouTube, posted by WesternWorldHistory, June 13, 2012, 15:11, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=thPfjOt5WEo.
33 Radioactive snow: “4th A-Blast ‘Like a Quake” in Las Vegas,” Washington Post. “Tea-cup” bombs: “Tiny A-Bombs Rumor Stirs Northwest,” Washington Post, February 19, 1953, p. A1.
34 “New Film to Help in Bomb Training,” New York Times, January 25, 1952, p. 7, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1952/01/25/84299073.html. Jake Hughes, “Duck and Cover,” The Library of Congress: National Film Preservation Board, Film Essays, https://www.loc.gov/programs/static/national-film-preservation-board/documents/duck_cover.pdf.
35 George Gallup, “Many Believe Atomic Tests Caused Tornadoes This Spring,” Washington Post, June 19, 1953, p. A23. “A-Bomb Link to Tornadoes is Discounted,” Washington Post, November 18, 1954, p. A13.
36 “The Nuclear Testing Tally,” Arms Control Association, September 3, 2017, https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/nucleartesttally.
37 Max Frankel, “Russians Announce Firing Intercontinental Missile ‘Huge Distance’ to Target,” New York Times, August 27, 1957, pp. 1, 6, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/08/27/issue.html. “Text of Soviet Statement,” New York Times, August 27, 1957, p. 6, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/08/27/issue.html.
“the ultimate weapon”: Harry Schwartz, “The Real Threat of Moscow’s Missile,” New York Times Magazine, September 15, 1957, pp. 20ff., https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/09/15/167870592.html?pageNumber=282.
38 Kathleen Teltsch, “Soviet Jets to Fly Delegates to U.N.,” New York Times, August 27, 1957, pp. 1, 6, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/08/27/issue.html.
39 Marquis Childs, “Reds Fire 6 Missiles of Intercontinental Range over Siberia,” Washington Post, August 30, 1957, p. A1.
40 “5,000- Mile Missile Explodes at Test,” New York Times, June 12, 1957, pp. 1, 7, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/06/12/issue.html.
41 Sputnik: William J. Jorden, “Soviet Fires Earth Satellite into Space; It Is Circling the Globe at 18,000 M.P.H.; Sphere Tracked in 4 Crossings Over U.S.,” New York Times, October 4, 1957, pp. 1, 3, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/10/05/issue.html. Significance of weight: “Device is 8 Times Heavier Than One Planned by U.S.,” New York Times, October 5, 1957, pp. 1, 3, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/10/05/issue.html.
Interrupted network broadcasts: Roy Silver, “Satellite Signal Broadcast Here,” New York Times, October 5, 1957, pp. 1, 2, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/10/05/issue.html.
42 “Text of Satellite Report,” Reuters, New York Times, October 4, 1957, p. 3, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/10/05/issue.html.
43 Sputnik comment sources: Grumpy scientist: Richard Witkin, “U.S. Delay Draws Scientists’ Fire,” New York Times, October 4, 1957, p. 2, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/10/05/issue.html. U.S. Senators: “Senators Attack Missile Fund Cut,” New York Times, October 6, 1957, pp. 1, 43, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/10/06/issue.html. Eisenhower at his Gettysburg farm: Rutherford Poats, “Soviet Launching Brings Demand for Probe by Congress,” Washington Post, October 6, 1957, p. A1.
44 NBC News anchor: “Red Moon over the U.S.,” Time, October 14, 1957, p. 27, http://time.com/vault/issue/1957-10-14/page/29/. “Soviet Claiming Lead in Science,” New York Times, October 5, 1957, p. 2, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/10/05/issue.html.
45 “Reaction to the Soviet Satellite—A Preliminary Evaluation,” memo prepared for President Eisenhower, October 16, 1957, Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library, Museum and Boyhood Home, Research: Sputnik and the Space Race, https://www.eisenhower.archives.gov/research/online_documents/sputnik.html.
46 Official Soviet statement on Sputnik: Reuters, “Text of Satellite Report,” New York Times, October 5, 1957, p. 3, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/10/05/issue.html. Run on binoculars at New York City department stores: “Sputnik No. 1 on 34th Street,” New York Times, October 10, 1957, p. 50, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/10/10/84771386.html. Sputnik cocktail: Associated Press, “Engineers’ Cocktail Features Sour Grapes,” Great Falls (MT) Tribune, October 20, 1957, p. 13, https://www.newspapers.com/image/239205949. Albania: Constance McLaughlin Green and Milton Lomask, Vanguard: A History, NASA Historical Series (Washington, D.C.: NASA, 1970), p. 188. Life magazine: “Soviet Satellite Sends U.S. into a Tizzy,” Life, October 14, 1957, pp. 34–37. Vatican: “Vatican Sees Satellite as Infernal Toy,” Chicago Daily Tribune, October 10, 1957, part 1, p. 5, https://www.newspapers.com/image/371748773.
47 Sputnik’s beep can be heard easily on the internet and via YouTube. Here is NASA’s version: “Sputnik: Beep,” NASA Image and Video Library, March 22, 2017, https://images.nasa.gov/details-578626main_sputnik-beep.html. Arthur C. Clarke is credited with applying the word “beep” to what became known as the electronic computer tone, in his first novel, The Sands of Mars, published in 1951. Laurence Cawley, “The Ubiquity of the Modern Beep,” BBC News Magazine, May 12, 2014, https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-27308544. Clarke’s reference is on p. 82 of The Sands of Mars: http://avalonlibrary.net/ebooks/Arthur%20C%20Clarke%20-%20The%20Sands%20Of%20Mars.pdf.
48 Green and Lomask, Vanguard, p. 187.
49 Associated Press, “Soviet Fires New Satellite, Carrying Dog; Half-Ton Sphere Is Reported 900 Miles Up,” New York Times, November 3, 1957, p. 1, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/11/03/issue.html.
50 October Revolution celebration: William J. Jorden, “Khrushchev Asks East-West Talks to End ‘Cold War,’ ” New York Times, November 7, 1957, pp. 1, 11, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/11/07/issue.html. Possible nuclear “firework” at the Moon: Walter Sullivan, “Strange Radio Signals Go On; Stir Speculation of a Moon Shot,” New York Times, November 7, 1957, pp. 1, 20, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/11/07/issue.html.
51 Multiple names for canine cosmonaut: “Husky Safe, Reds Say As Protests Pour In,” Washington Post, November 4, 1957, pp. A1, A2. Nate Haseltine, “Dog Reported Alive and Well,” Washington Post, November 5, 1957, p. A1. Protests at U.N. and Soviet Embassy: “Dogs on Picket Line,” New York Times, November 5, 1957, p. 12, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/11/05/issue.html. Reuters, “Moscow Denounces Dog-Lover Protests,” Washington Post, November 6, 1957, p. A3.
52 Associated Press, “Khrushchev Asks a Satellite Race,” New York Times, November 6, 1957, pp. 1, 2, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/11/06/issue.html.
53 United Press International, “Greatest Show Off Earth Is a Soviet Circus Joke,” New York Times, November 6, 1957, p. 12, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/11/06/issue.html.
54 The job of presidential science advisor has never had anyone as prominent as its first occupant, although the third science advisor, Kennedy’s Jerome Wiesner, became president of MIT after working for Kennedy, and the fourth science advisor, Donald Horning, went on to become president of Brown University.
Text of Eisenhower’s address: Dwight D. Eisenhower, “Radio and Television Address to the American People on Science in National Security,” November 7, 1957, American Presidency Project, https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/radio-and-television-address-the-american-people-science-national-security.
55 W.H. Lawrence, “President Voices Concern On U.S. Missiles Program, But Not On Satellite,” New York Times, October 10, 1957, pp. 1, 15, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/10/10/issue.html.
56 Yanek Mieczkowski, Eisenhower’s Sputnik Moment: The Race for Space and World Prestige (Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press, 2013), p. 63.
57 George R. Price, “Arguing the Case for Being Panicky,” Life, November 18, 1957, pp. 125ff., https://books.google.com/books?id=vVYEAAAAMBAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false.
58 Milton Bracker, “U.S. Ready to Fire First Satellite Early This Week,” New York Times, December 2, 1957, pp. 1, 21, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/12/02/.
59 “The Death of TV-3,” Time, December 16, 1957, pp. 9–10, http://time.com/vault/issue/1957-12-16/page/13/. Harlen Makemson, Media, NASA, and America’s Quest for the Moon (New York: Peter Lang Publishing, 2009), p. 33–34.
60 Green and Lomask, Vanguard, pp. 208–9.
61 “Excerpts from News Conference on Vanguard Rocket Test,” New York Times, December 7, 1957, p. 8, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/12/07/issue.html.
The quote from Dorothy Kilgallen appears in several sources, but typically only the second half—“Someone should go out there and kill it.” The full quote is from the Life magazine account of the failed Vanguard launch, published the week after it happened, but attributed only to “a female reporter.”
“Too Much Talk Too Soon Adds Up To Disaster,” Life, December 16, 1957, pp. 26–30, https://books.google.com/books?id=1FUEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA25.
62 Sen. Lyndon Johnson reaction: “Ike is Glum, Orders Report on Failure,” United Press International, The Times (San Manteo, CA), December 6, 1957, pp. 1, 2, https://www.newspapers.com/image/51951625. Los Angeles Herald & Express headline: “Vanguard’s Aftermath: Jeers and Tears,” Time, December 16, 1957, p. 12, http://time.com/vault/issue/1957-12-16/page/16/. London newspaper headlines: “Enoughnik of this,” New York Times, December 8, 1957, p. 36, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/12/08/issue.html. Swiss newspaper headline: “If Ridicule Could Kill,” New York Times, December 8, 1957, p. 36, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/12/08/issue.html. Polish Army reaction: Reuters, “A Moment of Merriment,” New York Times, December 8, 1957, p. 36, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/12/08/issue.html.
Soviet offer of technical assistance: “Russians At U.N. Tweak U.S. on (Satellite) Nose,” New York Times, December 7, 1957, p. 8, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/12/07/issue.html.
63 Dudley Clendinen, “What’s Doing in Boston,” New York Times, September 12, 1982, section 10, p. 8, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1982/09/12/144946.html. Kennedy family as regulars: David Lamb, “Boston’s Historic Pub,” Los Angeles Times, May 17, 1987, p. 24.
64 Charles Murray and Catherine Bly Cox, Apollo (Burkittsville, MD: South Mountain Books, 2004), p. 45 (originally published by Simon & Schuster).
65 Logsdon, John F. Kennedy and the Race to the Moon, p. 39.
At a press conference after the Apollo 8 mission around the Moon at Christmas 1968, then President Johnson recalled being asked by President Kennedy to find a good candidate for NASA administrator—and President Johnson said he had interviewed 28 people before he could persuade James Webb to at least talk to President Kennedy in person about the job. “Transcript of President Johnson’s News Conference on Foreign and Domestic Affairs,” New York Times, December 28, 1968, p. 10, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1968/12/28/76926292.html?pageNumber=10, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1968/12/28/76926292.html.
66 Seamans, Aiming at Targets, p. 78.
67 There are multiple, overlapping, and highly entertaining accounts of the effort to bring in James Webb as NASA’s second administrator. See W. Henry Lambright, Powering Apollo: James E. Webb of NASA (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995), pp. 82–85; Logsdon, John F. Kennedy and the Race to the Moon, pp. 41–45. The quote from Webb is in Logsdon, p. 42.
68 Lambright, Powering Apollo, p. 84.
69 Ibid.
70 Logsdon, John F. Kennedy and the Race to the Moon, p. 43.
3: “The Full Speed of Freedom”
1 Eugene Kranz, Failure Is Not an Option (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2009), p. 56.
2 Fulton quote: Ken Hechler, Toward the Endless Frontier: History of the Committee on Science and Technology, 1959–1979 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1980), p. 82, https://archive.org/stream/towardendlessfro00hech#page/80/mode/2up/search/tired.
3 Luna 3’s mission to photograph the dark side of the Moon: The space probe did a single loop around the Moon and swooped back toward Earth. It took photos of 70% of the far side of the Moon, 29 pictures in all, but was able to successfully transmit digitized versions of only 17 of them. “Luna 3,” NASA Space Science Data Coordinated Archive, March 21, 2017, https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/nmc/spacecraftDisplay.do?id=1959-008A.
4 Anfuso remarks: Associated Press, “Money Cannot Buy Time for Space Projects,” Corsicana (TX) Daily Sun, April 13, 1961, pp. 1, 6, https://www.newspapers.com/image/13112535/.
Brooks remarks: United Press International, “Congressmen Call for All-Out Space Program,” Los Angeles Times, April 13, 1961, p. 2, https://www.newspapers.com/image/386211719/. Fulton remarks: Logsdon, John F. Kennedy and the Race to the Moon, p. 74.
5 There are multiple accounts of this meeting on space policy on Friday, April 14, and the afternoon meeting, without Kennedy, that preceded it. This account is based largely on Sidey, John F. Kennedy, President, pp. 117–21; Ted Sorensen, Counselor (New York: Harper, 2008), pp. 333–35; Logsdon, John F. Kennedy and the Race to the Moon, pp. 75, 77–78.
6 Oddly, Sidey did not report that Sorensen told him, “We’re going to the Moon” either in his Life magazine story about that evening in the White House (April 21, 1961, p. 26) or in his you-are-there book published in 1963. It is Sorensen who recounts that moment, in Counselor, p. 336.
7 The failed Bay of Pigs invasion is well documented. This summary account is largely drawn from these sources: Sidey, John F. Kennedy, President, pp. 122–40. Ted Sorensen, Kennedy: The Classic Biography (New York: Harper Collins, 2009), pp. 294–309. “The Bay of Pigs Invasion,” Central Intelligence Agency: News & Information, April 18, 2016, https://www.cia.gov/news-information/featured-story-archive/2016-featured-story-archive/the-bay-of-pigs-invasion.html.
8 W.H. Lawrence, “Eisenhower Urges Nation To Back Kennedy on Cuba; Khrushchev Chides U.S.,” New York Times, April 23, 1961, pp. 1, 24, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1961/04/23/issue.html.
9 The note from Kennedy to Johnson is signed “John F. Kennedy” on the right corner, which gives the conversational language a certain immediacy. Scans of it are widely available online; it’s a vivid document. “Memorandum for Vice President,” April 20, 1961, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, https://www.jfklibrary.org/Asset-Viewer/6XnAYXEkkkSMLfp7ic_o-Q.aspx.
10 “President Kennedy: Address before the American Society of Newspaper Editors,” April 20, 1961, American Presidency Project, https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/address-before-the-american-society-newspaper-editors.
11 “President Kennedy: News Conference, President Kennedy’s News Conferences,” April 21, 1961, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, https://www.jfklibrary.org/Research/Research-Aids/Ready-Reference/Press-Conferences/News-Conference-10.aspx. The Associated Press reported in its story on the press conference that the reporter asking the question about whether the U.S. should beat the Russians to the Moon was William McGaffin of the Chicago Daily News: Associated Press, “Kennedy Clams Up on Cuba,” Cincinnati (OH) Enquirer, April 22, 1961, p. 1, https://www.newspapers.com/image/101565479/.
12 There are several overlapping accounts of Johnson’s quick study of all the urgent questions related to space. The most authoritative is from Logsdon, John F. Kennedy and the Race to the Moon, pp. 84–89. Logsdon not only uses memos about the meetings, but he interviewed many of the participants. Separately, Von Braun at first meeting and Welsh observation of Johnson’s approach at the meetings: “Ed Welsh: Oral History with Edward Welsh, Executive Secretary of the National Aeronautics and Space Council,” July 18, 1969, Lyndon Baines Johnson Library Oral History Collection, via The Miller Center at the University of Virginia, pp. 12–13, 14, http://web1.millercenter.org/poh/transcripts/welsh_edward_1969_0718.pdf.
Webb’s reaction to Johnson’s full-speed approach, Wiesner’s description of April 24, 1961, meeting: Murray and Cox, Apollo, pp. 64–65.
13 Webb biographical details: Lambright, Powering Apollo, pp. 13 (horse and buggy), 22–27 (Sperry). Webb quote on being able to do what you promise: Lambright, Powering Apollo, p. 95. Webb on Johnson’s approach to the space question memos: Murray and Cox, Apollo, pp. 64–65. Johnson consults von Braun without asking Webb: Murray and Cox, Apollo, p. 64. Johnson consults Defense officials without asking McNamara: Logsdon, John F. Kennedy and the Race to the Moon, p. 86.
14 “Memorandum for the President,” April 28, 1961, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, https://www.jfklibrary.org/Asset-Viewer/DjiWpQJegkuIlX7WZAUCtQ.aspx.
15 Logsdon, John F. Kennedy and the Race to the Moon, p. 86; Welsh, “Oral History,” p. 15
16 Details of Shepard’s launch-day preparations: John W. Finney, “Shepard Had Periscope: ‘What a Beautiful View,’ ” New York Times, May 6, 1961, pp. 1, 10, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1961/05/06/101461355.html.
Rectal thermometer rides to space: “Freedom’s Flight,” Time, May 12, 1961, pp. 52–58.
17 The time of launch of Freedom 7 is confused; some sources report it as 9:34 a.m. Eastern time; some as 10:34 a.m. The confusion arises from the fact that the launch occurred during daylight savings time, which Florida didn’t start observing until 1966. So at the launchpad in Cape Canaveral the time was 9:34. In Washington, D.C., at the White House and at NASA headquarters, the launch was at 10:34 a.m.
Delays and their causes: Loyd S. Swenson, Jr., James M. Grimwood, Charles C. Alexander, This New Ocean: A History of Project Mercury, NASA, SP-4201, Washington, D.C., 1966, pp. 351–52.
18 Robert Conley, “National Exults Over Space Feat; City Plans to Honor Astronaut,” New York Times, May 6, 1961, pp. 1, 11, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1961/05/06/issue.html.
Photos of President Kennedy, Jacqueline Kennedy, and National Security Council members watching the launch—11 in all: “President Kennedy Views the Lift-Off of Astronaut Cmdr. Alan B. Shepard, Jr., on the 1st U.S. Manned Sub-Orbital Flight,” May 5, 1961, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, https://www.jfklibrary.org/asset-viewer/archives/JFKWHP/1961/Month%2005/Day%2005/JFKWHP-1961-05-05-A.
19 CBS TV coverage of Shepard flight: “Freedom 7 Flight CBS News Coverage,” zellco321, posted December 8, 2016, YouTube, 1:08:05, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2OYUykje27g.
350 Mercury reporters, five witnesses to Wright flight: Swenson, Grimwood, Alexander, This New Ocean, p. 350.
20 BBC broadcast of NBC coverage: “London Is Elated By Achievement,” New York Times, May 6, 1961, p. 11, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1961/05/06/issue.html.
Voice of America broadcast: “ ‘Voice’ Tells the World Of U.S. Space Flight,” New York Times, May 6, 1961, p. 8, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1961/05/06/issue.html.
New York City Hall: Conley, “National Exults Over Space Feat; City Plans to Honor Astronaut,” New York Times.
21 “Transcript of Space Flight Messages,” New York Times, May 6, 1961, p. 8, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1961/05/06/issue.html.
Cronkite comment: “Freedom 7 Flight CBS News Coverage,” YouTube, at 22:30.
22 Recovery details, Shepard comment, call from President Kennedy: “Freedom’s Flight,” Time, May 12, 1961, pp. 52–58.
23 “Roused the country”: Conley, “National Exults Over Space Feat; City Plans to Honor Astronaut,” New York Times.
ABC News special report: “Alan Shepard, First American in Space, ABC news coverage, May 5, 1961,” Dan Beaumont Space Museum, October 11, 2011, YouTube, 7:44, Shadell comment at 00:25, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Qjjk6THiJ4.
NBC News special report: “Frank McGee Re-cap Freedom 7, NBC (1961),” Old Movies Reborn, January 18, 2018, YouTube, 9:42, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3if-8UbjfXo.
Leonard J. Carter comment: “Freedom’s Flight,” Time.
24 Jean Sprain Wilson, “ ‘Just a Baby Step to What We Shall See,’ Says Beaming, Happy Wife of Astronaut,” Express and News (San Antonio, TX), May 6, 1961, p. 10-A, https://www.newspapers.com/image/29608961/.
25 Wiesner Committee, Report to the President-Elect of the Ad Hoc Committee on Space, January 10, 1961, pp. 15–17, https://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/report61.html.
26 Wiesner, who died in 1994, was interviewed extensively by Murray and Cox for their book, Apollo. Both his crisp analysis of Kennedy’s dilemma and the story about the exchange with President Habib Bourguiba come from Apollo, pp. 66–67.
27 Swenson, Grimwood, Alexander, This New Ocean, p. 361: “President Kennedy’s shore-to-ship radio telephone call to the astronaut was spontaneous, though difficult to link, and symbolic of the American mood that day.”
28 John F. Kennedy, “News Conference 11, May 5, 1961,” John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, https://www.jfklibrary.org/archives/other-resources/john-f-kennedy-press-conferences/news-conference-11.
29 Chalmers M. Roberts, “President to Address Congress: To Discuss Urgent National Needs in Person Today,” Washington Post, May 25, 1961, pp. A1, A9.
30 Quotes from the final Johnson report: “James E. Webb, NASA Administrator, and Robert S. McNamara, Secretary of Defense, to the Vice President, May 8, 1961, with attached: ‘Recommendations for Our National Space Program: Changes, Policies, Goals,’ ” in John M. Logsdon, ed., Exploring the Unknown: Selected Documents in the History of the U.S. Civil Space Program (Washington, D.C.: National Aeronautics and Space Administration, 1995). “Disappointing results”: p. 448; “Soviets get there first”: p. 446; “National vigor”: p. 447; “Lunar exploration before the end of this decade”: p. 446.
31 Logsdon, John F. Kennedy and the Race to the Moon, p. 107.
32 Orloff, Apollo by the Numbers, p. 281.
33 John G. Norris, “U.S. to Race Russians to Moon,” Washington Post, May 20, 1961, pp. A1, A4; Jerry T. Baulch, “JFK to Ask Space, Aid Fund Boost,” Washington Post, May 24, 1961, p. A1; W. H. Lawrence, “President to Ask Urgent Effort to Land on Moon,” New York Times, May 24, 1961, p. 1, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1961/05/24/101464643.html?pageNumber=1.
34 Chalmers M. Roberts, “President to Address Congress,” The Washington Post, May 25, 1961, p. A1.
35 Text of Kennedy’s “Second State of the Union”: John F. Kennedy, “Special Message to the Congress on Urgent National Needs,” May 25, 1961, American Presidency Project, https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/special-message-the-congress-urgent-national-needs. The full audio of Kennedy’s address is widely available. White House Audio Recordings, 1961–63, https://www.jfklibrary.org/Asset-Viewer/Archives/JFKWHA-032.aspx. There is no video of the full address available on the internet. The eight-minute space section is available at the JFK Library: Video excerpt, John F. Kennedy, “Special Message to Congress on Urgent National Needs,” via CBS News, https://www.jfklibrary.org/Asset-Viewer/Archives/TNC-200-2.aspx.
36 Seamans, Aiming at Targets, p. 91; Lambright, Powering Apollo, p. 101.
37 Kennedy, “Address at Rice University, Houston, on the Nation’s Space Effort.”
38 Johnson’s “peace through space” quote: Alvin Shuster, “Congress Wary on Cost, but Likes Kennedy Goals,” New York Times, May 26, 1961, pp. 1, 13, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1961/05/26/issue.html. Republican lawmaker quote on Kennedy’s deficits: Robert C. Albright, “President’s Arms, Space Aims Get Full Backing by Congress,” Washington Post, May 27, 1961, p. A6.
39 Christian Davenport, “Pence Vows America Will Return to the Moon: The History of Such Promises Suggests Otherwise,” Washington Post, October 11, 2017, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2017/10/10/presidents-love-evoking-jfks-iconic-moon-speech-now-its-the-trump-administrations-turn/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.48264c55df86; John H. Logsdon, “Ten Presidents and NASA,” NASA.gov, accessed August 20, 2018, https://www.nasa.gov/50th/50th_magazine/10presidents.html; David E. Sanger and Richard W. Stevenson, “Bush Backs Goal of Flight to Moon to Establish Base,” New York Times, January 15, 2004, https://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/15/us/bush-backs-goal-of-flight-to-moon-to-establish-base.html; Tariq Malik, “Obama Aims to Send Astronauts to an Asteroid, Then to Mars,” Space.com, April 15, 2010, https://www.space.com/8222-obama-aims-send-astronauts-asteroid-mars.html.
40 John W. Finney, “Washington Cheers Shepard as Hero,” New York Times, May 9, 1961, p. 1, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1961/05/09/issue.html.
41 Fifty-fifty chance of beating the Russians: Seamans, Aiming at Targets, p. 88. Kranz on Kennedy speech: Kranz, Failure Is Not an Option, p. 56. Kraft on Kennedy speech: “Man on the Moon: The Kennedy Challenge,” 172HoursontheMoon, posted March 23, 2012, YouTube, 3:38 (Kraft at 1:17), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvHldoh5JF0.
42 Papers of John F. Kennedy, “Special Message to Congress on Urgent National Needs.”
43 As of November 1958, with 13 years of increasing passenger flights on commercial airlines during the post–World War II era, 70 percent of Americans still hadn’t taken an airplane flight. At that point, just 250,000 U.S. travelers accounted for 40% of all passengers. “Jets across America,” Time, November 17, 1958, p. 89.
4: The Fourth Crew Member
1 Robert G. Chilton, oral history, transcript, NASA Johnson Space Center Oral History Project, interviewed by Summer Chick Bergen, Houston, Texas, April 5, 1999, https://historycollection.jsc.nasa.gov/JSCHistoryPortal/history/oral_histories/ChiltonRG/ChiltonRG_4-5-99.htm.
2 NASA has a set of detailed websites called the Apollo Lunar Surface Journal and the Apollo Flight Journal about each of the Apollo Moon flights and landings. They have been assembled and meticulously curated—the surface journals by Eric M. Jones, a Ph.D. space scientist who spent most of his career at the Los Alamos National Laboratory; the Flight Journals by M. David Woods, a video editor at the BBC and a space historian and author of several authoritative books on the Apollo missions.
The main index pages for each:
Apollo Flight Journal: https://history.nasa.gov/afj/index.html
Apollo Surface Journal: https://history.nasa.gov/alsj/
One element of the Journal compilations is an edited transcript of recorded communications—between Mission Control and the spacecraft and also between the astronauts onboard the spacecraft. Those edited transcripts include commentary—in the style of the Talmud—from the technical debriefings with the astronauts after the missions were finished, and also from interviews. The transcripts are interrupted by explanations from the astronauts of what they were thinking or why they did a particular thing at that moment in the mission. The journals are indispensible and works of scholarship and art. In citing them, I’m including the time reference where the information—including the thinking of the astronauts—is located.
Armstrong, thinking about low-fuel: Eric M. Jones, ed., “The First Lunar Landing,” Apollo 11: Lunar Surface Journal, 102:44:45 and 102:45:32, https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/a11/a11.landing.html.
3 Gene W. Harms, an engineer for Grumman, the aerospace company that designed and built the lunar modules, remembers showing John Glenn an early mock-up design of the LM’s cockpit. “We were very naive about space travel,” said Harms. “We knew nothing about zero gravity at the time.” An early mock-up had swiveling crew seats, so the astronauts could turn to look at instruments and controls, and out the windows. Glenn came to see that early version. “He said, ‘Can I come in? My name is John Glenn.’ He was a famous man at that point, people were dying to see him.”
Inside the cockpit, Glenn turned to Harms. “Let me ask you a question: Why do you have seats?”
“Everything we have designed at Grumman always had a seat,” said Harms.
“We’re at zero-g,” said Glenn. “We weigh nothing. When we land on the Moon, we’re at one-sixth gravity. Maybe we don’t need the seat at all.” That exchange planted the idea to take the seats out completely. From a telephone interview with Harms by the author, May 5, 2016.
4 Constant weight scrubs on the lunar module: Kelly, Moon Lander; story of eliminating LM seats: p. 63; story of thinning out the crew compartment skin: p. 122.
The weight of each lunar module at launch varied depending on the mission. Basic LM dimensions: “Lunar Module: Quick Reference Data,” Grumman Corporation, p. LV-1, https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/LM04_Lunar_Module_ppLV1-17.pdf. Launch weights for Apollo 11, Eagle: Lunar module, total weight, including propellant: 33,278 pounds; LM Ascent stage, dry: 4,804 pounds; LM Descent stage, dry: 4,483 pounds. Orloff, “Launch Vehicle / Spacecraft Key Facts,” in Apollo by the Numbers, pp. 276–77.
5 Armstrong discusses running out fuel before touchdown: Jones, ed., Apollo 11: Lunar Surface Journal, “The First Lunar Landing,” 102:45:32.
6 Armstrong and Aldrin, determined to land rather than abort: Jones, ed., Apollo 11: Lunar Surface Journal, “The First Lunar Landing,” 102:38:42; 102:42:35, and 102:45:32.
7 Armstrong quote on the computer going blank: Don Eyles, Sunburst and Luminary (Boston: Four Point Press, 2018), p. 157.
8 “Apollo 11 Lunar Module Powered Descent and Landing on Moon,” Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, posted July 16, 2009, YouTube, 15:59, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kdp5bfcrHME.
9 Jones, ed., Apollo 11: Lunar Surface Journal, “The First Lunar Landing,” 102:45:31 through 102:46:16.
10 Eyles’s reaction to the computer alarms: Eyles, Sunburst and Luminary, p. 151. Garman in the staff support room at Mission Control: John R. (Jack) Garman, NASA Johnson Space Center Oral History Project, Edited Oral History Transcript, interviewed by Kevin M. Rusnak, Houston, Texas, March 27, 2001, https://historycollection.jsc.nasa.gov/JSCHistoryPortal/history/oral_histories/GarmanJR/GarmanJR_3-27-01.htm.
Transcript citation on CapCom telling Apollo 11, “Go!”: Jones, ed., Apollo 11: Lunar Surface Journal, “The First Lunar Landing,” 102:42:19.
Garman’s handwritten cheat sheet of Apollo computer codes can be seen here: “Interview: Jack Garman, Apollo Guidance Computer,” https://www.honeysucklecreek.net/interviews/jack_garman.html.
11 The Apollo command module had two computer keyboards and displays (DSKYs), one on the control panel and one on the side of the capsule alongside the star-sighting telescope and sextant, for easy entry of positioning data.
12 The Apollo Guidance Computer that flew the Moon missions had 2,048 words of erasable memory, what we call random-access memory. It had 36,864 words of fixed memory, what we call read-only memory. In the AGC, a “word” was 15 bits of data. To go from words to bytes, you multiply by 15 bits, then divide by 8 bits per byte. So 2,048 words of RAM translates to 3,840 bytes of data (3.8 KB). And 36,864 words of ROM translates to 69,120 bytes (69.1 KB). Eldon Hall, Journey to the Moon: The History of the Apollo Guidance Computer (Reston, VA: American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, 1996), p. 120.
13 James Vincent, “Apple Calls A12 Bionic Chip ‘The Smartest and Most Powerful Chip Ever in a Smartphone,’ ” The Verge, September 12, 2018: https://www.theverge.com/circuitbreaker/2018/9/12/17826338/apple-iphone-a12-processor-chip-bionic-specs-speed. Wccf Tech: https://wccftech.com/apple-a12-specifications-features-cores/. Another comparative measure: The AGC as flown had 5,600 integrated circuits, each of which had the equivalent of six transistors, for a total of 33,600 transistors. The 2018 iPhone Xs has 6.9 billion transistors (Wccf tech, above); iPhone Xs has 200,000 more transistors. iPhone Xs has, roughly, the ability to do 60 million times the transactions per second.
14 Regular at Locke-Ober: Multiple interviews with MIT staff. White suit: pictured at Don Eyles, Sunburst & Luminary website, “Picture Gallery,” accessed September 10, 2018, https://www.sunburstandluminary.com/SLgallery.html. Ballroom dancing: from a recollection by Apollo astronaut Michael Collins: David L. Chandler, “Michael Collins: ‘I could have been the last person to walk on the moon,’ ” MIT News, April 2, 2015, http://news.mit.edu/2015/michael-collins-speaks-about-first-moon-landing-0402. Several of Draper’s dancing awards are stored in the Draper collection of papers with the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, accessed September 18, 2018, https://sova.si.edu/details/NASM.2001.0019?s=0&n=10&t=C&q=&i=0#ref39.
15 Given how fascinating Charles Stark Draper’s life was, and how much he contributed in technological terms and in terms of the people he helped train, the biographical material on him is startlingly thin. This account comes from two principal sources: Robert A. Duffy, Charles Stark Draper, 1901–1987: A Biographical Memoir (Washington, D.C.: National Academy of Sciences, 1994), pp. 121–58, http://www.nasonline.org/publications/biographical-memoirs/memoir-pdfs/draper-charles.pdf; Philip D. Hattis, “How Doc Draper Became the Father of Inertial Guidance,” paper presented at the 2018 AAS Guidance and Control Conference, Breckenridge, Colorado, February 2018, https://www.researchgate.net/publication/322963658_How_Doc_Draper_Became_the_Father_of_Inertia_Guidance.
16 Mark 14 gun sight development and deployment: Duffy, Charles Stark Draper, pp. 139–40; Harris, “How Doc Draper Became the Father of Inertial Guidance,” pp. 5–7; “Automatic Sight on Our Navy Guns Helps to Win Brilliant Victories,” New York Times, April 9, 1945, p. 11, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1945/04/09/88212201.html; Associated Press, “Japs Foiled by New Gyro Sight: Makes American Warships Almost Invulnerable to Planes’ Attacks,” Arizona Daily Star, April 9, 1945, p. 10, https://www.newspapers.com/image/162451025.
There is a wonderful and revealing introductory manual for navy gunners learning how to use and maintain their Mark 14 gun sights, available online: “Gun Sight, Mark 14, Gunner’s Operating Bulletin No. 2,” United States Fleet, Headquarters of the Commander in Chief, https://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USN/ref/Ordnance/GS-Mk14/index.html.
17 Lambright, Powering Apollo, p. 26.
18 Moon Machines, Episode 3: “The Navigation Computer,” directed by Nick Davidson and Christopher Riley, 2008, Dox Productions for The Science Channel, Discovery Communications, clean room material at 10:15. Duffy, Charles Stark Draper, pp. 139–40; Norman Sears, telephone interview with the author, January 22, 2016.
19 Details of the flight: Arthur A. Riley, “Pilot Tells How Nature Aided ‘Flying Lab’ Test,” The Boston Globe, April 25, 1957, p. 2, https://www.newspapers.com/image/433410673.
Quote from pilot Collins: Bruce Brandon, “Gone West: Col. Charles L. ‘Chip’ Collins,” Aero-News Network, Feb. 25, 2015, http://www.aero-news.net/bannertransfer.cfm?do=main.textpost&id=b3bf1d53-d5ec-4afe-9f40-22b20fbd62cf.
20 Thomas Wildenberg, “Origins of Inertial Navigation,” Air Power History, Winter 2016, pp. 23–24; Don Murray, “ ‘Doc’ Draper’s Wonderful Tops,” Reader’s Digest, September 1957, p. 64.
21 Richard Witkin, “Device Guides Plane Across U.S. Without Help of Outside Objects,” New York Times, April 18, 1957, pp. 1, 15, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/04/18/84959308.html. John B. Knox, “New Jamming-Proof Gyro Pilot Guides Any Kind of Craft Anywhere On Earth,” Associated Press, The Washington Post, April 18, 1957, pp. A1, A19.
Eric Sevareid flight: John P. Shanley, “Conquest Explains Weather Research,” New York Times, April 14, 1958, p. 47, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1958/04/14/81919069.html.
22 Christopher Morgan, Draper at 25: Innovations for the 21st Century (Cambridge, MA: Charles Stark Draper Laboratory Inc., 1998), p. 12 (pages unnumbered), http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.371.1536&rep=rep1&type=pdf.
23 Ibid., pp. 13–14.
24 “Countdown for Polaris,” 1960, posted by Periscope Films, August 4, 2014, YouTube, 10:25, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6whcf9R_lds; Hanson W. Baldwin, “Seagoing Missile Base,” New York Times, January 3, 1960, p. 33, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1960/01/03/105172035.html; Mike Billington, “Silent Runners,” Sun-Sentinel (Fort Lauderdale, FL), August 1, 1993, p. G1, https://www.newspapers.com/image/238299602/.
25 Harris, “How Doc Draper Became the Father of Inertial Guidance,” pp. 10–12; Donald MacKenzie and Graham Spinardi, “The Shaping of Nuclear Weapon System Technology: U.S. Fleet Ballistic Missile Guidance and Navigation: From Polaris to Poseidon,” Social Studies of Science 18, no. 3 (August 1988): pp. 419–63, https://www.jstor.org/stable/285232; On Two Fronts: A War-Time Story of the AC Spark Plug Division, General Motors Corporation, 1943, 64-page booklet, scanned copy via David D. Jackson, “The American Automobile Industry in World War Two,” accessed October 1, 2018, http://usautoindustryworldwartwo.com/General%20Motors/ac-sparkplug-twofronts.htm.
26 Hanson W. Baldwin, “2 Polaris Missiles Fired by Submerged Submarine; Hit Mark 1,150 Miles Off,” New York Times, July 21, 1960, pp. 1, 3 https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1960/07/21/issue.html.
27 Harris, “How Doc Draper Became the Father of Inertial Guidance,” pp. 10–12.
28 Richard H. Battin, transcript of an oral history conducted by Rebecca Wright, April 18, 2000, Lexington, MA, Johnson Space Center Oral History Project, https://historycollection.jsc.nasa.gov/JSCHistoryPortal/history/oral_histories/BattinRH/BattinRH_4-18-00.htm.
29 There are several accounts of Hal Laning, Walt Trageser, and Richard Battin working on the MIT Mars probe, the navigation it would require and the computer that would fly it. Each of those accounts has some unique details. David G. Hoag, “The History of Apollo Onboard Guidance, Navigation and Control,” Journal of Guidance, Control, and Dynamics 6, no. 1 (January–February 1983): 4; David A. Mindell, Digital Apollo (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2011), pp. 99–101; Richard H. Battin, “Second Breakwell Memorial Lecture: 1961 and All That,” Acta Astronautica 39, no. 6 (1996): 409–11, https://ac.els-cdn.com/S0094576596001531/1-s2.0-S0094576596001531-main.pdf.
30 “List of Lunar Probes,” Wikipedia, updated January 4, 2019, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_lunar_probes#1958%E2%80%931960. Elizabeth Howell, “A Brief History of Mars Missions,” March 17, 2015, Space.com, https://www.space.com/13558-historic-mars-missions.html.
31 MIT staff member aboard a Polaris submarine: Robert G. Chilton, transcript of oral history conducted by Summer Chick Berger, April 5, 1999, Johnson Space Center Oral History Project, p. 30, https://historycollection.jsc.nasa.gov/JSCHistoryPortal/history/oral_histories/ChiltonRG/ChiltonRG_4-5-99.htm.
The MIT Mars computer, built and working, August 1961: R. L. Alonso, A. I. Green, H. E. Maurer, and R. E. Oleksiak, “R-358: A Digital Control Computer: Developmental Model 1B,” Cambridge, MA: Instrumentation Laboratory, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, for the U.S. Air Force, April 1962, pp. 9, 35, https://www.ibiblio.org/apollo/hrst/archive/1712.pdf.
32 Accounts of the selection of the MIT Instrumentation Lab include Mindell, Digital Apollo, pp. 104–8; Morgan, Draper at 25, p. 31; Courtney G. Brooks, James M. Grimwood, and Loyd S. Swenson Jr., Chariots for Apollo: A History of Manned Lunar Spacecraft (Washington, D.C.: NASA, 1979), pp. 38–41.
Webb had confidence in Draper: Lambright, Powering Apollo, p. 106.
Seamans called Draper his “mentor”: Seamans, Aiming at Targets, pp. 26-28, 45-49.
An image of the yellowed telegram to MIT has been posted online by MIT, via Ian A. Waltz, “Perspective Is Everything,” AeroAstro Magazine, 2008–9, http://web.mit.edu/aeroastro/news/magazine/aeroastro6/intro.html. A larger version of the image itself is at http://web.mit.edu/aeroastro/news/magazine/aeroastro6/img/apollotelegram-lrg.jpg.
33 Hugh L. Dryden was brilliant and an important figure in the history of rocketry and flight in the U.S. He earned a PhD in physics and math from Johns Hopkins University at age 20, in 1919, the youngest person ever to receive a PhD from Hopkins. He supervised development of the X-15 rocket plane and was director of the National Advisory Committee on Aeronautics, the agency that preceded NASA. He was acting administrator of NASA until Webb was appointed by Kennedy, and Webb insisted to Kennedy that Dryden be allowed to stay on as deputy administrator if Webb were to take the top job, to provide both continuity and technical expertise in the administrator’s office. Lambright, Powering Apollo, p. 84.
34 “In June”: the time of the meeting is offered differently in different accounts, but NASA’s own history says specifically that Draper went to Washington in June and met with Webb, Seamans, and Dryden, Brooks, Grimwood, and Swenson in Chariots for Apollo, p. 41. The dialogue is reproduced to varying degrees of detail in Brooks, Grimwood, and Swenson, Chariots for Apollo, p. 41; Eyles, Sunburst and Luminary, p. 35; Morgan, Draper at 25, p. 31. Sometimes when Draper told the story of assuring Webb that MIT could do the Apollo navigation, Draper said the software would be ready “when you need it,” and sometimes he said “before you need it.” In the account from the Smithsonian’s Paul Ceruzzi, Draper said “before you need it.” Paul E. Ceruzzi, Beyond the Limits: Flight Enters the Computer Age (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1989), p. 97. In an account from the annual magazine of MIT’s Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics, which includes quotes from Draper recalling the meeting, he also said “before you need it.” John Tylko, “MIT and Navigating the Path to the Moon,” AeroAstro, no. 6 (2008–9), p. 1, http://web.mit.edu/aeroastro/news/magazine/aeroastro6/aeroastro6.pdf.
Given Draper’s enthusiasm for the project and his style of salesmanship, “before you need it” would seem to fit his manner.
35 Draper’s letter to Seamans: “MIT and Project Apollo,” MIT Institute Archives and Special Collections, accessed October 4, 2018, https://libraries.mit.edu/archives/exhibits/apollo/. An image of the letter itself in the MIT archives: “Letter from Charles Stark Draper to Robert C. Seamans, Jr., November 21, 1961,” MIT Institute Archives and Special Collections, https://libraries.mit.edu/archives/exhibits/apollo/letter.html.
Brigadier General Donald Flickinger’s role: Tom Wolfe, The Right Stuff (New York: Picador, 1979), p. 57.
The reaction at NASA headquarters, via Robert Seamans: Robert Seamans, transcript of an oral history, #3, conducted by Carol Butler, June 22, 1999, Johnson Space Center Oral History Project, pp. 13–14, https://historycollection.jsc.nasa.gov/JSCHistoryPortal/history/oral_histories/SeamansRC/SeamansRC_6-22-99.htm.
36 The aerospace heritage was deep all around. AC Spark Plug had provided spark plugs for both Charles Lindbergh and Amelia Earhart; Kollsman Instrument had been founded by Paul Kollsman, who invented the altimeter, and so, before Doc Draper, had first enabled “instrument flying” of airplanes.
37 Hoag, “The History of Apollo Onboard Guidance, Navigation and Control,” p. 6.
38 W. David Woods provides a detailed account of the return of the Apollo command and service modules from the Moon, starting with a section titled, “The Long Fall to Earth,” right through reentry. W. David Woods, How Apollo Flew to the Moon (Chichester, UK: Praxis Publishing, 2009), pp. 444–503; discussion of velocity on the way home, p. 468.
The reentry corridor is 40 miles wide, from this NASA video: “Spacecraft Communications: ‘The Vital Link,’ 1967 NASA Goddard Space Flight Center,” posted by Jeff Quitney, March 15, 2017, YouTube, 28:41, 26:00, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4WP9dCvsMUY&feature=youtu.be.
39 Mindell, Digital Apollo, p. 158.
40 David Scott, “Speech at the Opening of the Computer Museum,” Marlboro, MA, June 10, 1982, KLabs.org, http://www.klabs.org/history/history_docs/ech/agc_scott.pdf.
41 Hall, Journey to the Moon, p. 139.
42 IBM computers in Mission Control: James E. Tomayko, “Computers in Spaceflight,” pp. 245, 248, 249–50.
43 Reparability as a strategy: Brooks, Grimwood, and Swenson, Chariots for Apollo, p. 135. Soldering iron: Hall, Journey to the Moon, p. 92.
44 Lunar module weight and repair issues: Kelly, Moon Lander, pp. 72–73, 117–20. Alan Shepard on in-flight maintenance: Jim Miller, transcript of conference proceedings, “Apollo Guidance Computer History Project: Second Conference: Trust in Automatic Systems,” Cambridge, MA, September 14, 2001, https://authors.library.caltech.edu/5456/1/hrst.mit.edu/hrs/apollo/public/conference2/automatic.htm.
45 Hoag, “The History of the Apollo Onboard Guidance, Navigation, and Control,” p. 9.
46 Eyles, Sunburst and Luminary, pp. 52–53.
47 Moon Machines, Episode 3: “The Navigation Computer,” Battin “one-cubic-foot” story at 13:35; Battin, oral history, https://historycollection.jsc.nasa.gov/JSCHistoryPortal/history/oral_histories/BattinRH/BattinRH_4-18-00.htm.
48 Hall, Journey to the Moon, pp. 87–88.
49 “The Apollo Guidance Computer, Part One: Eldon Hall,” recorded June 10, 1982, posted by Computer History Museum, October 2, 2014, YouTube, quote at 19:00, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbX8OtPe3eY, 56:09.
50 Hall, Journey to the Moon, pp. 79–82; Eldon C. Hall, “Autobiography,” IEEE Annals of the History of Computing, April–June 2000, p. 27.
51 Cline Fraser, transcript of conference proceedings, “Apollo Guidance Computer History Project: First Conference: Joe Gavin’s Introduction,” Cambridge, MA, July 27, 2001, https://authors.library.caltech.edu/5456/1/hrst.mit.edu/hrs/apollo/public/conference1/gavin-intro.htm.
52 “The Apollo Guidance Computer, Part One: Eldon Hall,” quote at 27:10. The prices MIT paid for early microchips are listed in a chart in Eldon Hall’s meticulous book—every individual chip purchase, by date, with the amount purchased, the vendor, and the price paid per chip: 13,966 chips purchased in 1962 and 1963, ranging from an order of 4 to an order of 4,100. Significantly, Hall also notes whether the order was delivered on time or was late. Hall, Journey to the Moon, p. 80.
53 Eldon Hall, transcript of conference proceedings, “Apollo Guidance Computer History Project: First Conference: Joe Gavin’s Introduction.”
54 Most of the story of the MIT IL’s leap to integrated circuits is well told by Hall in Journey to the Moon, pp. 79–85. Go-ahead letter from NASA: Hall, Journey to the Moon, p. 188. Hall quote, “heated debates”: “The Apollo Guidance Computer, Part One: Eldon Hall,” quote at 28.50.
55 “Manufacturers’ Sales and Retail Value of Home Appliances, 1950 to 1962,” p. 814, in Statistical Abstract of the United States 1963.
56 Hall, “Autobiography,” p. 30.
The first commercial computer to use integrated circuits was the RCA Spectrum 70, introduced in 1965. The first IBM model to use integrated circuits was the System/370 introduced in 1970. Paul. E. Ceruzzi, A History of Modern Computing (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2003), p. 163.
57 The MIT IL’s standards for quality, testing program, and results are reported in Jayne Partridge and L. David Hanley, “The Impact of the Flight Specifications on Semiconductor Failure Rates,” Proceedings of the 6th Annual Reliability Physics Symposium, Los Angeles, November 6–8, 1967, pp. 20–30, https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/4207753. The Freon “bath” test is described in Mindell, Digital Apollo, p. 133, and described in technical terms in M. D. Holley, W. L. Swingle, S. L. Bachman, et al., “Apollo Experience Report: Guidance and Control Systems: Primary Guidance, Navigation, and Control System Development,” NASA Technical Note D-8277, Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center, May 1976, https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19760016247.pdf.
58 Patridge and Hanley, “The Impact of Flight Specifications on Semiconductor Failure Rates,” pp. 22, 24, 26.
59 Hall, Journey to the Moon, p. 1.
60 Ibid., focused purchased, p. 84; Fairchild succeeded by Philco, p. 23.
61 Raymond D. Speer, “Strict Control Kept Out Semiconductor Flaws,” Electronic Design 17 (August 16, 1969), reproduced in full in Hall, Journey to the Moon, pp. 147–48.
62 Mindell, Digital Apollo, p. 158.
63 Ibid., pp. 96, 108.
64 Tomayko, “Computers in Spaceflight,” p. 29.
65 Details of the Manned Space Flight Network from Sunny Tsiao, “Read You Loud and Clear”: The Story of NASA’s Spaceflight Tracking and Data Network, NASA SP-2007-4232 (Washington, D.C.: NASA, 2008), accessed 15 October 2018, http://www.rvtreasure.com/NASA/STADAN%20Network%20history.pdf.
Cost information for the tracking network from William R. Corliss, “Histories of the Space Tracking and Data Acquisition Network (STADAN), the Manned Space Flight Network (MSFN) and the NASA Communications Network (NASCOM),” CR-140390 (Washington, D.C.: NASA, June 1974), p. 353.
66 Mindell, Digital Apollo, p. 138.
67 Ibid., p. 165. The comparison of the displays to a slide rule is Mindell’s.
68 The story of the verb-noun structure, and its creation, is told several places, but at least one of them gets it wrong. The correct versions include: Mindell, Digital Apollo, p. 166. Ramon Alonso, transcript of conference proceedings, “Apollo Guidance Computer History Project: First Conference: Human-Machine Interface,” Cambridge, MA, July 27, 2001, https://authors.library.caltech.edu/5456/1/hrst.mit.edu/hrs/apollo/public/conference1/interface.htm.
Another MIT staff member, Hugh Blair-Smith, attributes the verb-noun idea, incorrectly, to other colleagues at MIT in an online essay from 20 years ago, “Hugh Blair-Smith’s Annotations to Eldon Hall’s Journey to the Moon,” https://www.ibiblio.org/apollo/hrst/HughBlairSmithsAnnotations.html.
In an interview, Blair-Smith acknowledges that “indeed Ramon Alonso is inventor” of the verb-noun syntax. Hugh Blair-Smith, telephone interview with the author, October 16, 2018.
69 If you want to know what using a personal computer with Microsoft’s early operating system, MS-DOS, was like, or you want to be reminded what it was like, see Chris Hoffman, “PCs before Windows: What Using MS-DOS Was Actually Like,” How-To Geek, May 11, 2014, https://www.howtogeek.com/188980/pcs-before-windows-what-using-ms-dos-was-actually-like/.
70 Scott, “Speech at the Opening of the Computer Museum.”
71 Tomayko, “Computers in Spaceflight,” p. 123 (13,000 keystrokes), p. 58 (“like playing a piano”).
5: The Man Who Saved Apollo
1 Ed Copps, quoting Bill Tindall, in “Bill Tindall and Conflicts within Apollo,” conference proceedings, “Apollo Guidance Computer History Project: Fourth Conference,” Cambridge, MA, September 6, 2002, https://authors.library.caltech.edu/5456/1/hrst.mit.edu/hrs/apollo/public/conference4/tindall.htm.
Howard W. (Bill) Tindall Jr. was a legendary expert on rendezvous and orbital mechanics, a senior NASA engineer in Houston, and a man with several misleading and opaque job titles. During the critical late planning years of Apollo, 1967 to 1970, his official title was chief of Apollo data priority coordination, which was often shortened to chief of Apollo mission techniques. He was also deputy chief, and then chief of the Mission Planning and Analysis Division in Houston. In practice, it was Tindall’s job to figure out the navigation techniques necessary to fly to the Moon and back and make sure everything from the computer software to Mission Control was lined up to do that. See Murray and Cox, Apollo, p. 284.
2 Associated Press, “Venus Shot Fails as Rocket Strays,” New York Times, July 23, 1962, pp. 1, 2, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1962/07/23/issue.html.
Continued to send signals until it hit the Atlantic Ocean at 357 seconds: N. A. Renzetti, “Tracking and Data Acquisition Support for the Mariner Venus 1962 Mission: Technical Memorandum No. 33-212,” NASA, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, July 1, 1965, p. 9, https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19650023548.pdf.
3 “NASA Science: Solar System Exploration: Missions: Mariner 2,” accessed October 13, 2018, https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/missions/mariner-02/in-depth/.
4 There are many explanations for what happened. From the mainstream media at the time, the best is Marvin Miles, “ ‘Hyphen’ Blows Up Rocket,” Los Angeles Times, August 5, 1962, p. H1, https://www.newspapers.com/image/381425643/.
NASA has no Mariner 1 “failure panel” report available online. The most thorough and authoritative scholarly explanation is from Paul Ceruzzi of the Smithsonian in Beyond the Limits, pp. 202–3. The relevant passage can be read online: https://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?t=862715.
5 Gladwin Hill, “For Want of Hyphen Venus Rocket is Lost,” New York Times, July 28, 1962, pp. 1, 2, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1962/07/28/87314569.html. Marvin Miles, “ ‘Hyphen’ Blows Up Rocket,” Los Angeles Times, August 5, 1962, sec. H, p. 1. Arthur C. Clarke, The Promise of Space (New York: Harper & Row, 1968), p. 225.
6 George Mueller, at Space Technology Laboratories (STL), from Yvette Smith, ed., “NASA History: Remembering George Mueller, Leader of Early Human Spaceflight,” NASA, October 15, 2015, https://www.nasa.gov/feature/remembering-george-mueller-leader-of-early-human-spaceflight. STL responsibility for Mariner 1 guidance software: Hill, “For Want of a Hyphen Venus Rocket Is Lost.” Battin, oral history, https://historycollection.jsc.nasa.gov/JSCHistoryPortal/history/oral_histories/BattinRH/BattinRH_4-18-00.htm. Battin tells the same story in Richard H. Battin, “Some Funny Things Happened on the Way to the Moon,” Journal of Guidance, Control, and Dynamics 25, no. 1 (January–February 2002), p. 4.
7 The mission rules for each of the Apollo missions are posted publicly: “Mission Rules,” Apollo Lunar Surface Journal, accessed October 20, 2018, https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/alsj-MissionRules.html.
8 Shirley Hinson, who went to work for NASA calculating and then hand-plotting flight trajectories in 1959 at about age 22, describes this early era well in her oral history. Hinson went on to be part of mission planning for Gemini, Apollo, and Skylab, and then was a section chief at the Johnson Space Center. Shirley H. Hinson, oral history transcript, NASA Johnson Space Center Oral History Project, interviewed by Rebecca Wright, Louisburg, NC, May 2, 2000, https://historycollection.jsc.nasa.gov/JSCHistoryPortal/history/oral_histories/HinsonSH/HinsonSH_5-2-00.htm.
9 Kranz, Failure Is Not An Option, p. 156.
10 In Chris Kraft’s memoir Flight (New York: Plume, 2002), p. 276, the timing of his conversation with George Low is vague. It appears Kraft thinks he first sent Tindall to MIT in spring 1967. But memos and other contemporaneous accounts make it clear Tindall started going to MIT almost weekly in spring 1966. Malcolm Johnston, telephone interview #1, December 14, 2015.
11 Tindall does orbital calculations of Echo 1: “Rendezvous Planner: Howard Wilson Tindall Jr.,” New York Times, December 16, 1965, p. 29, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1965/12/16/95920363.html. Details of Echo 1: Charles Q. Choi, “1st Communications Satellite: A Giant Space Balloon 50 Years Ago,” Space.com, August 18, 2010, https://www.space.com/8973-1st-communication-satellite-giant-space-balloon-50-years.html.
The quote from Tindall’s mother comes from the reprint of a profile of Tindall from the Cape Codder newspaper, December 23, 1965, reprinted in Brown University’s alumni magazine. Tindall’s mother’s name, beyond “Mrs. Tindall Sr.,” is not provided. “Something, Indeed, to Tell His Children,” Brown Alumni Monthly, January 1966, p. 6, https://archive.org/details/brownalumnimonth664brow/page/n7.
12 Tindall’s strategic effort to always be second-in-command: Catherine T. Osgood, oral history transcript, NASA Johnson Space Center Oral History Project, interviewed by Rebecca Wright, Houston, TX, November 15, 1999, https://historycollection.jsc.nasa.gov/JSCHistoryPortal/history/oral_histories/OsgoodCT/OsgoodCT_11-15-99.htm; Shirley H. Hinson, oral history transcript, NASA Johnson Space Center Oral History Project, interviewed by Rebecca Wright, Louisburg, NC, May 2, 2000, https://historycollection.jsc.nasa.gov/JSCHistoryPortal/history/oral_histories/HinsonSH/HinsonSH_5-2-00.htm; Jane Tindall, telephone interview with the author, January 13, 2016.
13 Bill Tindall’s work, problems and thinking are documented in detail in memos he wrote, day by day during Apollo, and that were so popular and appealing they acquired the nickname Tindallgrams. There were hundreds of these memos, written with such clarity and immediacy that people across NASA looked forward to them, and they were invaluable, helping to shape important decisions about the Apollo missions. There is no comprehensive collection of the Tindallgrams on the internet. There are, rather, three separate major sets, which overlap, and which are of varying quality, in terms of the legibility of their scanning.
For purposes of citation in these Notes, they are labelled Tindallgrams #1, Tindallgrams #2, and Tindallgrams #3. In the references, the memos will be cited by title, date, NASA memo number, and page number in the collection, with all page numbers refering to the pdf page numbers, for consistency. Tindall titled the memos mostly without capitalization, and in the references, we follow his style.
Tindallgrams #1 is a collection assembled by Malcolm Johnston, an engineer at the Instrumentation Lab who worked closely with Tindall, and who assembled this partial collection as a tribute to him after his death. It includes 186 Tindallgrams on 380 pages, and the scan quality is good. https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/tindallgrams02.pdf.
Tindallgrams #2 is a collection scanned in by a NASA historian, Glen Swanson. It is more complete, at 525 pages, but suffers from uneven scan quality, and from the fact that the memos are not in date order. https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/tindallgrams01.pdf.
Tindallgrams #3 is a collection labelled “KSC” (Kennedy Space Center), broken into four files by year, 1967 to 1970. The scan quality and organization are uneven, but the total number of Tindallgrams is large—the four years total 889 pages.
1967: https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/1967_tindallgrams.pdf
1968: https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/1968_tindallgrams.pdf
1969: https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/1969_tindallgrams.pdf
1970: https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/1970_tindallgrams.pdf
A few Tindallgrams are available only in other collections outside these, and those references will be called Additional Tindallgrams, and a URL will be provided.
The data about how much over-capacity MIT’s program were from: “Spacecraft computer requirements for AS-207/208, AS-503, and AS-504, May 12, 1966, #66-FM1-59, Tindallgrams #1, pdf, p. 14. “Apollo spacecraft computer program development newsletter,” May 31, 1966, #66-FM1-68, Additional Tindallgrams, pdf, p. 2, http://web.mit.edu/digitalapollo/Documents/Chapter7/tindallgrams.pdf.
Statistics on increase in AGC computer memory from 1962 to 1966: Hoag, The History of Apollo Onboard Guidance, Navigation and Control, p. 8.
14 Fred Martin, in “Meetings with Bill Tindall,” conference proceedings, “Apollo Guidance Computer History Project: First Conference,” Cambridge, MA, July 17, 2001, https://authors.library.caltech.edu/5456/1/hrst.mit.edu/hrs/apollo/public/conference1/tindall.htm.
15 The following newspaper stories and advertisements use the word “softwear” instead of “software” in the context of computer programming, all published between 1962 and 1971, including a story in the New York Times about whether software can be patented, which spells the word both ways in the course of the story. Harold Chucker, “Courage, Cash Needed in Making Computers,” Minneapolis Star, March 7, 1962, p. 5D, https://www.newspapers.com/image/187998041; UPI, “Softwear’s Her Forte,” Quad City Times (Davenport, IA), May 24, 1963, p. 10, https://www.newspapers.com/image/302705284; “Computers: What Has Made Systems Programming Corporation the Nation’s Fastest Growing Computer Softwear Firm?,” advertisement, Los Angeles Times, January 26, 1964, p. 12, https://www.newspapers.com/image/381551029/?terms=softwear%2Band%2Bcomputer; “Computer Softwear Professionals, Control Data Corporation, Data Products Group,” advertisement, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, November 4, 1965, p. 6C, https://www.newspapers.com/image/139123536; Cornelia K. Wyatt, “Japan Agrees to Let the U.S. Enter Market for Computers,” New York Times, February 19, 1967, p. F7, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1967/02/19/83576259.html; “Capital Commerce: Heads Bethesda Firm,” Washington Post, July 10, 1968, p. F8; Stacy V. Jones, “Computer Software Unpatentable,” New York Times, October 23, 1968, p. 59, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1967/02/19/83576259.html; Dan Morgan, “Polish Passion for Technology May Breed Political Change,” Washington Post, October 15, 1970, p. A16; Maurice Corina, “British Computer Chief Calm in Crisis,” New York Times, September 5, 1971, section 5, p. 2, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1971/09/05/79152297.html.
16 Lambright, Powering Apollo, pp. 5–10.
17 It’s unclear when exactly Margaret Hamilton started using the phrase “software engineering” at MIT, and she may well have coined it herself without hearing or seeing it elsewhere. Her comments are from this interview: Jaime Rubio Hancock, “Margaret Hamilton, the Engineer Who Took the Apollo to the Moon,” Verne, December 25, 2014, https://medium.com/@verne/margaret-hamilton-the-engineer-who-took-the-apollo-to-the-moon-7d550c73d3fa.
It is worth tracking the use of the phrase “software engineering,” Hamilton’s experience aside. A comprehensive search of newspaper databases reveals the first use of “software engineering” that can be discovered in the popular press was in an advertisement, “AASLI, systems management, data processing, software engineering R&D, Associated Aero Science Laboratories, Inc.,” in the Los Angeles Times, January 9, 1966, p. I-7, https://www.newspapers.com/image/382387460. It was used commonly in computer firm employment ads starting in 1966.
The first academic or professional use of “software engineering” in a public context was apparently by the Harvard professor and information scientist Anthony Oettinger, who used it in a wry and funny scientific lecture on March 13, 1967, where he argued passionately both for the maturation of software as part of computer science and for the interconnections between computing, software, and traditional engineering. “The notion of software engineering is, thank goodness, beginning to be heard of more and more. . . . By being cut off from engineering departments, computer science departments lose sight of the fact that their symbol systems have a mission, which is to make machines work, to make them work efficiently and economically as well as elegantly.” Anthony Oettinger, “The Hardware-Software Complementarity,” lecture, “Academic Role of Computers,” Annual Meeting of the Division of Mathematical Sciences, National Academy of Sciences, March 13, 1967, reprinted in Communications of the Association for Computing Machinery 10, no. 10 (October 1967), pp. 604–6.
In October 1968 the North Atlantic Treaty Organization held a conference in Munich on software engineering. A report on that conference is online: http://homepages.cs.ncl.ac.uk/brian.randell/NATO/nato1968.PDF.
The first reference to the phrase “software engineering” in the editorial content of newspapers that I could discover was in a mention that an IBM employee, Richard C. Hastings, would be attending that conference: “U. of R. Names 2 Top Aides,” Democrat and Chronicle (Rochester, NY), October 8, 1968, p. 1C, https://www.newspapers.com/image/136854311. The phrase does not appear in the pages of the New York Times until October 1975.
18 Hoag, “The History of Apollo Onboard Guidance, Navigation and Control,” p. 10.
19 Malcolm Johnston, telephone interview #2, December 18, 2015.
20 Ed Copps, in “Bill Tindall and Conflicts within Apollo,” conference proceedings, “Apollo Guidance Computer History Project: Fourth Conference,” Cambridge, MA, September 6, 2002, https://authors.library.caltech.edu/5456/1/hrst.mit.edu/hrs/apollo/public/conference4/tindall.htm.
21 There are two accounts of this meeting to air unhappiness at the Instrumentation Lab during Tindall’s early days: Martin, quoted in Moon Machines, Episode 3: “The Navigation Computer,” at 26:00; Martin, in “Meetings with Bill Tindall,” conference proceedings, “Apollo Guidance Computer History Project: First Conference,” https://authors.library.caltech.edu/5456/1/hrst.mit.edu/hrs/apollo/public/conference1/tindall.htm.
22 The quotes are from the Tindallgram cited below, but in the collections it is dated May 12, 1966, which must be a mislabelling, because it recounts events that happened on May 13 and 14: “Spacecraft computer requirements for AS-207/208, AS-503, and AS-504, May 12, 1966, #66-FM1-59, Tindallgrams #1, PDF p. 14.
23 “Apollo spacecraft computer program development newsletter,” May 31, 1966, #66-FM1-68, Additional Tindallgrams, PDF p. 2, http://web.mit.edu/digitalapollo/Documents/Chapter7/tindallgrams.pdf.
24 “Spacecraft Computer Program Development Newsletter,” February 27, 1967, #67-FM1-18, Tindallgrams #3 (1967), pdf, pp. 206–08., http://www.collectspace.com/resources/tindallgrams/1967_tindallgrams.pdf.
25 “Spacecraft computer program status report,” June 2, 1966, #66-FM1-70, Tindallgrams #1, PDF, pp. 24–25.
26 Johnston, telephone interview #1.
27 “Lunar orbit revolution counter for ‘C’,” October 2, 1968, #68-PA-T-213A, Tindallgrams #1, pdf, p. 163.
28 “Let’s have no unscheduled water dumps on the F mission,” February 24, 1968, #69-PA-T-31A, Tindallgrams #1, PDF, p. 220.
29 “How to land next to Surveyor—a short novel for do-it-yourselfers,” August 1, 1969, #69-PA-T-114A, Tindallgrams #1, pdf, pp. 311–15.
“Astronauts Pay a Visit to Surveyor 3,” Apollo 12, April 17, 2014, https://www.nasa.gov/content/astronauts-pay-a-visit-to-surveyor-3.
The precise figure that Apollo 12 landed 535 feet from Surveyor 3 comes from Orloff, Apollo by the Numbers, p. 116.
For the record, Tindall wrote a fresh Tindallgram three months later—and just 10 days before Apollo 12 blasted off—revising his prediction: “Based on things that have happened since [writing that memo] . . . my feeling now is that as long as the systems work as well as they have in the past, we have a pretty good chance of landing near the Surveyor. And I would rather be on record as predicting that, than predicting a miss.” “Apollo 12 Descent—Final comments,” November 4, 1969, #69-PA-T-142A, Tindallgrams #1, pdf, p. 353.
30 This calculation is explained in Chapter 1, Note 58, p. 350–52.
31 “Tindallgrams,” Apollo Lunar Surface Journal, https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/alsj-Tindallgrams.html.
32 “Apollo spacecraft computer programs—or, a bucket of worms,” June 13, 1966, #66-FM1-75, Additional Tindallgrams, pdf, pp 4–7. http://web.mit.edu/digitalapollo/Documents/Chapter7/tindallgrams.pdf.
33 “Another Apollo spacecraft computer program status report,” July 1, 1966, 66-FM1-78, Additional Tindallgrams, pdf, pp. 8–11, http://web.mit.edu/digitalapollo/Documents/Chapter7/tindallgrams.pdf.
34 “Program Development Plans are coming!!,” October 11, 1966, #66-FM1-124, Tindallgrams #1, pdf, pp. 55–57.
35 “AGC program for AS-501/502—Final status report,” November 3, 1966, #66-FM1-141, Tindallgrams #1, pdf, p. 74.
36 “Mission rules needed for use with AGC self-check,” September 21, 1966, #66-FM1-109, Tindallgrams #1, pdf, p. 44.
37 “More about computer self check,” January 25, 1967, #67-FM1-11, Tindallgrams #3 (1967), pdf, p. 218.
38 “LM DPS low level light fixing,” November 25, 1968, #68-PA-T-257A, Tindallgrams #3 (1968), p. 304.
39 “AS-206 Spacecraft Computer Program Newsletter,” January 31, 1967, Tindallgrams #1, pdf, pp. 102–3.
40 Murray and Cox, Apollo, p. 288.
41 “Bucket of worms”: “Apollo spacecraft computer programs—or, a bucket of worms,” June 13, 1966, #66-FM1-75, Additional Tindallgrams, pdf, pp. 4–7. http://web.mit.edu/digitalapollo/Documents/Chapter7/tindallgrams.pdf.
“Holy waste of time, Batman!”: “AGS Program Status for AS-278,” November 14, 1966, #66-FM1-148, Tindallgrams #1, pdf, p. 78.
“Some Things Ed Copps Is Worried About”: “Some Things Ed Copps Is Worried About,” May 6, 1967, #67-FM1-36, Tindallgrams #3 (1967), pdf, p. 154.
“A rather unbelievable proposal. . .”: “LM Rendezvous Radar Is Essential,” August 1, 1968, #68-PA-T-183A, Tindallgrams #3 (1968), pdf, p. 427.
42 Murray and Cox, Apollo, p. 288.
43 “Descent engine gimbal polarity error,” April 21, 1967, #67-FM1-32, Tindallgrams #3 (1967), pdf, p. 164.
44 Howard W. Tindall in “Managing the Moon Program: Lessons Learned from Project Apollo, Proceedings of an Oral History Workshop,” Johnson Spaceflight Center, Houston, TX, July 21, 1989, p. 23, https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19990053708.pdf.
45 Early discussions at MIT about using the lunar module as a “lifeboat” to bring the astronauts home: “LGC computer requirements to provide DPS backup of SPS,” September 21, 1966, #66-FM1-110, Tindallgrams #1, pdf, p. 45. “Use of DPS for lunar mission aborts,” August 24, 1966, 67-FM-T-63, Tindallgrams #3 (1967), pdf, p. 117.
As the missions to the Moon grew closer, the topic of using the lunar module and its engine to get home in an emergency came up repeatedly. See, for instance: “F and G mission cis-lunar and abort plan,” January 21, 1969, 69-PA-T-10A, Tindallgrams #1, pdf, p. 198.
Tindall passing on Faget’s analysis: “LM propulsion of the LM/CSM configuration as an SPS backup technique,” July 31, 1968, #68-PA-T-175A, Tindallgrams #3 (1968), pdf, p. 431-434.
46 Tomayko, “Computers in Spaceflight,” p. 52.
47 Norm Sears, telephone interview #4 with the author, February 3, 2016 (“commanded enough respect) and interview #5, February 10, 2016 (“it was a gift”).
48 “In which is described the Apollo spacecraft computer programs currently being developed,” March 24, 1967, #67-FM1-24, Tindallgrams #3 (1968), pdf, p. 188.
49 Hoag comment: David Hoag, “Meetings with Bill Tindall,” conference proceedings, “Apollo Guidance Computer History Project: First Conference,” Cambridge, MA, July 27, 2001, https://authors.library.caltech.edu/5456/1/hrst.mit.edu/hrs/apollo/public/conference1/tindall.htm. Copps comment: Ed Copps, “Bill Tindall and Conflicts within Apollo,” conference proceedings, “Apollo Guidance Computer History Project: Fourth Conference,” Cambridge, MA, September 6, 2002, https://authors.library.caltech.edu/5456/1/hrst.mit.edu/hrs/apollo/public/conference4/tindall.htm. Johnston comment: Malcolm Johnston, telephone interview #3, December 29, 2015.
50 “In which is described the Apollo spacecraft computer programs currently being developed,” March 24, 1967, #67-FM1-24, Tindallgrams #3 (1968), pdf, p. 188.
51 Battin, oral history, April 18, 2000.
52 Hoag, “The History of Apollo Onboard Guidance, Navigation and Control,” p. 10.
53 James A. Hand, ed., “MIT’s Role in Project Apollo: Volume 1: Project Management, Systems Development, Abstracts and Bibliography,” October 1971, MIT, Charles Stark Draper Laboratory, p. 18.
54 Kipp Teague, “Project Mercury Drawings and Technical Diagrams,” NASA, accessed November 10, 2018, https://history.nasa.gov/diagrams/mercury.html; Project Gemini Familiarization Manual: Supplement, MAC Control No. C-119162, MacDonnell, September 30, 1965, pp. 8-212 to 8-219, https://www.ibiblio.org/apollo/Documents/GeminiManualVol1Sec2.pdf.
55 Eyles, Sunburst and Luminary, p. 137.
56 Scott, “Speech at the Opening of the Computer Museum.”
57 Margaret Hamilton, “The Language as a Software Engineer,” speech, 40th International Conference on Software Engineering, May 31, 2018, Gothenburg, Sweden, YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZbVOF0Uk5lU, at 11:50.
58 The most detailed and charming account of the creation of George is from Don Eyles’s memoir, Sunburst and Luminary (pp. 121–22), which includes both the mathematical backstory and an explanation of why the compiler is named George: “Laning said the name came from the expression, ‘Let George do it’—the title of a radio drama featuring a detective who boasted, ‘If the job’s too tough for you to handle, you’ve got a job for me, George Valentine.’ ” Laning was born on February 14, 1920. Eyles says Laning wrote George in 1952. An academic paper by Laning’s friend and colleague Richard Battin says it was “finished in March 1953”: Richard H. Battin, “On Algebraic Compilers and Planetary Fly-By Orbits,” Acta Astronautica 38, no. 12 (1996), pp. 895–96.
59 Larry Hardesty, “Apollo’s Rocket Scientists,” MIT Technology Review, November–December 2009, https://www.technologyreview.com/s/415796/apollos-rocket-scientists/.
60 Lickly quote and Battin quote: Ibid.
61 Ed Copps, “Documents and Restarts,” conference proceedings, “Apollo Guidance Computer History Project: Fourth Conference,” Cambridge, MA, September 6, 2002, https://authors.library.caltech.edu/5456/1/hrst.mit.edu/hrs/apollo/public/conference4/restarts.htm.
62 Eyles, Sunburst and Luminary, pp. 78–83; Mindell, Digital Apollo, pp. 150–51.
63 Copps quotes: Ed Copps, “Documents and Restarts.” Copps paper: Edward M. Copps Jr., “Recovery from Transient Failures of the Apollo Guidance Computer,” MIT Instrumentation Laboratory, August 1968, pp. 1, 7, 8, 9.
64 In its final configuration, each Apollo guidance and navigation computer had fixed memory (core-rope memory) of 36,864 words. Each word was 16 bits, for a total core-rope memory of 589,824 bits. Hall, Journey to the Moon, p. 120.
65 There are two good video accounts of how the Apollo flight computer was constructed, including the weaving work of the women at Raytheon in Waltham: Moon Machines, Episode 3: “The Navigation Computer,” Raytheon portion at 21:00; “MIT Science Reporter: Computer for Apollo (1965),” material about manufacturing starts at 14:00.
66 Mindell, Digital Apollo, p. 171, points out that “rope mother” was an ironic designation when there were almost no women shepherding specific versions of mission software.
67 Ramon Alonso, “Software Issues,” conference proceedings, “Apollo Guidance Computer History Project: First Conference,” Cambridge, Mass., July 27, 2001, https://authors.library.caltech.edu/5456/1/hrst.mit.edu/hrs/apollo/public/conference1/software.htm.
68 David Bates, Eldon Hall, and Ed Blondin, “Ed Blondin’s Introduction,” conference proceedings, “Apollo Guidance Computer History Project: Third Conference,” Cambridge, MA, November 30, 2001, https://authors.library.caltech.edu/5456/1/hrst.mit.edu/hrs/apollo/public/conference3/blondin.htm.
69 Jack Poundstone, “On the Factory Floor,” conference proceedings, “Apollo Guidance Computer History Project: Third Conference,” Cambridge, MA, November 30, 2001, https://authors.library.caltech.edu/5456/1/hrst.mit.edu/hrs/apollo/public/conference3/floor.htm.
70 Alonso, “Software Issues.”
71 “Small program change needed in the AS-501/502 AGC program,” November 25, 1966, #66-FM1-168, Tindallgrams #1, pdf, pp. 81-82.
72 Ramon Alonso and J. H. Laning Jr., “R-276: Design Principles for a General Control Computer,” MIT Instrumentation Laboratory, April 1960, p. 8.
73 Richard Witkin, “Electrical Difficulty Aboard the Spacecraft Is Brief, Unnerving and Mysterious,” New York Times, November 15, 1969, p. 22, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1969/11/15/issue.html.
74 David Bates and Herb Briss, “Formalization of Project Management,” conference proceedings, “Apollo Guidance Computer History Project: Third Conference,” Cambridge, MA, November 30, 2001, https://authors.library.caltech.edu/5456/1/hrst.mit.edu/hrs/apollo/public/conference3/formalization.htm.
75 United Press International, “Call Apollo a Triumph of the Squares,” Chicago Tribune, December 28, 1968, p. 4A, https://chicagotribune.newspapers.com/image/376562797.
For an assessment of U.S. intelligence understanding of the state of the Soviet space program in late 1968, see, among others: Dwayne A. Day, “Spooky Apollo: Apollo 8 and the CIA,” The Space Review, December 3, 2018, http://www.thespacereview.com/article/3617/1. Time cover story: “Race for the Moon,” Time, December 6, 1968, http://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,844661,00.html.
76 Christopher C. Kraft Jr., oral history transcript, NASA Johnson Space Center Oral History Project, interviewed by Rebecca Wright, Louisburg, NC, May 23, 2008, accessed November 4, 2018, https://historycollection.jsc.nasa.gov/JSCHistoryPortal/history/oral_histories/KraftCC/KraftCC_5-23-08.htm.
77 W. David Woods and Frank O’Brien, “Apollo 8: Day 3: Lunar Encounter,” Apollo Flight Journal, August 8, 2018, https://history.nasa.gov/afj/ap08fj/12day3_lunar_encounter.html, 069:32:35. Comparison of calculated lunar orbit to actual orbit: Mindell, Digital Apollo, p. 178.
78 Moon Machines, “Episode 5: Navigation,” Kosmala comment at 34:20, Martin comment at 33:40. Johnston, interview #2 with the author, December 18, 2015.
79 Frank Borman, who was commander of Apollo 8, is widely credited with saying that the Moon is not made of green cheese, but of American cheese, a line that made front pages across the country, including in the Washington Post, and in some newspapers was given its own headline and brief story. The first citation is to the Associated Press account, crediting Borman. The confusion arises because the NASA transcript of the exchange, which paraphrases the pilot and the reply, credits the answer to Bill Anders. Credibility for the news accounts attributing the line to Borman the day after the splashdown comes from the fact that they include much more detail than the NASA transcript, including the name of the helicopter commander. Associated Press, “Astronauts Land Safely: Pinpoint Splashdown in Pacific Climaxes Historic Moon Flight,” Evening Sun (Baltimore), December 27, 1968, p. A1; David Woods and Frank O’Brien, eds., Apollo Flight Journal, “Apollo 8: Day 6: The Maroon Team—Splashdown,” https://history.nasa.gov/afj/ap08fj/28day6_maroon_splash.html, 147:02:03 and following exchanges.
80 There are multiple excellent accounts of the Apollo 14 “abort switch” problem, from different points of view but that do not conflict with each other. Backroom account, and use of flashlight for first tap: Kranz, Failure Is Not an Option, pp. 345–49; Eric M. Jones, “Apollo 14 Flight Journal: Landing at Fra Mauro,” Apollo Lunar Surface Journal, https://history.nasa.gov/alsj/a14/a14.landing.html, 105:46:23 and following exchanges.
81 Don Eyles account: Don Eyles, telephone interview #1, January 27, 2016. Don Eyles, book talk, Sunburst and Luminary, MIT Museum, March 14, 2018, posted April 10, 2018, YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eotnk1wVSB8; Eyles, Sunburst and Luminary, pp. 17–18 (hiring at MIT); 255–67 (complete account of events of Apollo 14).
82 “Apollo 14 Flight Journal: Landing at Fra Mauro,” 106:25:29.
83 Garman, transcript, oral history, March 27, 2001.
84 Eyles, Sunburst and Luminary, pp. 257–58.
85 Garman, transcript, oral history, March 27, 2001.
86 Edgar Dean Mitchell, “Guidance of Low-Thrust Interplanetary Vehicles,” SciD dissertation, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, June 1964.
87 Eric M. Jones, “Apollo 14 Flight Journal: Post-Landing Activities,” Apollo Lunar Surface Journal, accessed November 5, 2018, https://history.nasa.gov/alsj/a14/a14.postland.html, 108:21:21 and following exchanges.
88 Richard Witkin, “Defective Switch Posed a Problem,” New York Times, February 6, 1971, p. 1, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1971/02/06/issue.html; Victor K. McElheny, “Faulty Switch Made Landing a Heart-in-Mouth Thriller: MIT Experts Raced to Change Program,” Boston Evening Globe, February 5, 1971, pp. 1, 3, https://www.newspapers.com/image/435188447; Gerard Weidmann, “Apollo Team at MIT Lab Saves Day,” Boston Evening Globe, February 5, 1971, pp. 1, 2, https://www.newspapers.com/image/435188447.
89 The text of the Rolling Stone story on Don Eyles is available on the Rolling Stone website. In two separate locations there are images—one of the opening page of that issue, showing the headline and original layout; one showing the portrait of Eyles that ran with the original story, which is not part of the story posted online. Text: Timothy Crouse, “Don Eyles: EXTRA! Weird-Looking Freak Saves Apollo 14!,” Rolling Stone, March 18, 1971, https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/don-eyles-extra-weird-looking-freak-saves-apollo-14-40737/. Opening page from 1971: http://www.vasulka.org/archive/Publications/RollingStone/EverybodyOnTV.pdf. Portrait of Eyles from 1971: https://78.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lnl0g6OE1q1qz5s16o1_1280.jpg.
90 The metal tags are visible on some pieces of Apollo guidance and navigation equipment posted online. The easiest to read is at the website of Heritage Auctions, which sometimes auctions Apollo memorabilia: “Apollo Guidance Computer: Original Display and Keyboard (DSKY),” Lot #41178, Heritage Auctions, https://historical.ha.com/itm/explorers/apollo-guidance-computer-original-display-and-keyboard-dsky-unit/a/6033-41178.s?ic4.
NASA still uses the original insignia. It was retired in 1975 for a more modern logo, which just used the agency’s letters; the Apollo-era logo was brought back by Administrator Dan Goldin in 1992 to convey the idea that “the magic is back at NASA.” Steve Garber, “NASA ‘Meatball’ Logo,” NASA History Program Office, October 2, 2018, https://history.nasa.gov/meatball.htm.
91 Hoag writes, “No program errors were ever uncovered during the missions.” Hoag, “The History of Apollo Onboard Guidance, Navigation, and Control,” p. 9 (hardware), p. 10 (software).
92 Tylko, “MIT and Navigating the Path to the Moon.”
93 Hardesty, “Apollo’s Rocket Scientists.”
94 Ed Mitchell, insert at 108:18:23, in Jones, “Apollo 14 Flight Journal: Post-Landing Activities.”
95 Brooks, Grimwood, and Swenson, Chariots for Apollo, p. 283.
96 Orloff, Apollo by the Numbers, p. 305.
97 Malcolm Johnston, ed., Collected Tindallgrams: Memos by Howard W. Tindall Jr., May 1996. The Chris Kraft quote is in the one-page foreword to this informal collection, which was assembled by Johnston and distributed to Tindall’s acquaintances about seven months after his death, November 20, 1995. The collection is now available online: https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/tindallgrams02.pdf.
98 Kranz, Failure Is Not an Option, p. 261.
99 Eyles, Sunburst and Luminary, pp. 66–69.
6: JFK’s Secret Space Tapes
1 Eisenhower: United Press International, “Ike Raps Kennedy’s Fiscal Plans, Says ‘Nuts’ to Moon Race,” Tampa Tribune, June 13, 1963, p. 1, https://www.newspapers.com/image/330184888/.
Kennedy: “Transcript of Presidential Meeting in the Cabinet Room of the White House,” November 21, 1962, NASA: History, p. 17, https://history.nasa.gov/JFK-Webbconv/pages/transcript.pdf.
2 Victor Cohn, “Experts See Race for Lunar Sample,” Washington Post, July 14, 1969, p. A1.
3 “First visit by a U.S. astronaut to the Soviet Union”: Siddiqi, Challenge to Apollo, p. 693; Cohn, “Experts See Race for Lunar Sample”; Associated Press, “Apollo 11 Crewmen Given Day Off; Outlook Is Good,” Burlington (VT) Free Press, July 14, 1969, p. 1, https://www.newspapers.com/image/200521120.
4 John Noble Wilford, “Moscow Says That Luna 15 Won’t Be in Apollo’s Way; Americans Check Module,” New York Times, July 19, 1969, pp. 1, 10, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1969/07/19/issue.html.
The other New York Times stories on Luna 15 that day were: “U.S. Space Aides Cautiously Pleased by Russian Amity” (Richard D. Lyons, p. 1), “Cooperative Scientist: Mstislav Vsevolodovich Keldysh” (p.10), and “Soviet Hints Luna Will Stay in Orbit” (Lawrence Van Gelder, p. 10).
5 Asif Siddiqi provides a detailed account of the mission of Luna 15 in July 1969 in Challenge to Apollo, pp. 693–96. Additional details in “Report from Jodrell Bank,” New York Times, July 22, 1969, p. 29, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1969/07/22/issue.html. Distance from Sea of Tranquility to Sea of Crises, on the surface of the Moon, via Wolfram Alpha: http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=what+is+the+distance+between+Mare+Tranquillitatis+and+Mare+Crisium+on+the+Moon%3F; Bernard Gwertzman, “Luna Mission Ends: Soviet Craft Down on Moon—Tass Says Work Is Finished,” New York Times, July 22, 1969, pp. 1, 29, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1969/07/22/issue.html.
6 Siddiqi, Challenge to Apollo, p. 696.
7 W. David Woods, Kenneth D. MacTaggart, and Frank O’Brien, “Apollo 11: Day 7, Part 1, Leaving the Lunar Sphere of Influence,” Apollo Flight Journal, February 10, 2017, 148:23:13, https://history.nasa.gov/afj/ap11fj/22day7-leave-lsi.html.
8 The samples Apollo 11 carried home included 50 individual rocks; some samples of regolith, lunar dust and dirt; and two core samples drilled out of the soil. “Apollo 11 Mission: Lunar Sample Overview,” Lunar and Planetary Institute, accessed November 8, 2018, https://www.lpi.usra.edu/lunar/missions/apollo/apollo_11/samples/.
9 John W. Finney, “Grissom Receives Medal for Flight,” New York Times, July 23, 1961, p. 35, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1961/07/23/issue.html; “Hoosier Fete for Gus Gets ‘No Go’ from NASA,” Indianapolis Star, July 25, 1961, p. 19, https://www.newspapers.com/image/106282185/; Tom Wicker, “Kennedy Gives Shepard Medal; Quiet Throngs Hail Astronaut,” New York Times, May 9, 1961, pp. 1, 35, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1961/05/09/issue.html.
10 Associated Press, “Astronomers Poll Cool to Manned Moon Trip,” New York Times, August 1, 1961, p. 3, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1961/08/01/118045731.html. United Press International, “Douglas Questions Spending Billions to Land Man on Moon,” San Bernardino County (CA) Sun, January 27, 1962, p. 1, https://www.newspapers.com/image/51567474/.
11 New York Times editorials: “To the Moon and Back,” New York Times, January 15, 1962, p. 26, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1962/01/15/issue.html; “To the Moon,” New York Times, August 4, 1962, p. 18, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1962/08/04/issue.html; “The Effort in Space,” New York Times, September 14, 1962, p. 30, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1962/09/14/issue.html.
12 Ward Cannel, “Computer Expert Is Wary about Letting Machines Do the Thinking,” Wisconsin Rapids Daily Tribune, November 1, 1961, p. 4, https://www.newspapers.com/image/244555446/; Richard Witkin, “How Far, How Fast?,” New York Times Book Review, September 27, 1964, p. 50, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1964/09/27/issue.html.
13 Audiotapes and transcripts of Kennedy’s press conferences are archived at the John F. Kennedy Library. “President Kennedy: News Conference, President Kennedy’s News Conferences,” February 7, 1962, U.S. State Department, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, https://www.jfklibrary.org/archives/other-resources/john-f-kennedy-press-conferences/news-conference-23.
“President Kennedy: News Conference, President Kennedy’s News Conferences,” June 14, 1962, U.S. State Department, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, https://www.jfklibrary.org/archives/other-resources/john-f-kennedy-press-conferences/news-conference-36.
“President Kennedy: News Conference, President Kennedy’s News Conferences,” August 22, 1962, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, https://www.jfklibrary.org/archives/other-resources/john-f-kennedy-press-conferences/news-conference-41.
14 Rudy Abramson, “Kennedy Vows U.S. to Be First in Space,” Nashville Tennessean, September 12, 1962, pp. 1, 2, https://www.newspapers.com/image/112923225/.
15 E. W. Kenworthy, “Kennedy Is Assured on Moon Program in Space-Base Tour,” New York Times, September 12, 1962, pp. 1, 13, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1962/09/12/issue.html; E.W. Kenworthy, “Kennedy Asserts Nation Must Lead in Probing Space,” New York Times, September 13, 1962, pp. 1, 16, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1962/09/13/issue.html
16 Full video of Kennedy’s speech at Rice University, September 12, 1962, is available online: “President Kennedy’s Speech at Rice University,” posted by NASA STI Program, September 13, 2011, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VaFTVR-hZqg&t=13m28s.
Quotes from the speech that follow are from the text posted at the American Presidency Project, UCSB: “Address at Rice University in Houston on the Nation’s Space Effort,” September 12, 1962, https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/address-rice-university-houston-the-nations-space-effort.
17 Bob Woodward and Patrick E. Tyler, “JFK Secretly Taped White House Talks,” Washington Post, February 4, 1982, pp. A1, A22, https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1982/02/04/jfk-secretly-taped-white-house-talks/87d23567-3ae3-4e0c-841c-5ebbe3f8e470/?utm_term=.aaa792af18fe; Edward A. Gargan, “Kennedy Secretly Taped Sessions in White House,” New York Times, February 4, 1982, p. A16, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1982/02/04/199324.html?pageNumber=16. The Kennedy Library also provides an account of the taping system: “The JFK White House Tape Recordings,” The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, https://www.jfklibrary.org/learn/about-jfk/jfk-in-history/white-house-tape-recordings.
18 A record of the November 21, 1962, meeting on NASA’s budget in the White House Cabinet Room is available as both an audio recording and a transcript. All quotes that follow are directly from the audio recording, which is sometimes hard to make out because 10 people attended, and often talked over each other. But the transcript, although posted on NASA’s website, is not completely accurate and should not be relied on without checking passages against the audiotape. The Kennedy Presidential Library never posted the entire tape or a transcript, but simply “made it available” on request. The full audio is from the University of Virginia’s Miller Center.
Transcript: “Transcript of Presidential Meeting in the Cabinet Room of the White House,” November 21, 1962, NASA, History, https://history.nasa.gov/JFK-Webbconv/pages/transcript.pdf.
Audio: “Meeting on the NASA Budget: John F. Kennedy Presidency, Secret White House Tapes,” The Miller Center of the University of Virginia, November 21, 1962, https://millercenter.org/the-presidency/secret-white-house-tapes/meeting-nasa-budget-0.
19 This central exchange from the November 21, 1962, meeting starts at 32:25 on the audio recording and p. 14 in the transcript.
20 NASA’s spending when Kennedy became president: $0.7 billion. NASA’s spending in FY64 (1963): $2.6 billion, an increase of three times in two years. NASA’s spending in FY65 (1964): $5.1 billion. NASA’s spending in FY66 (1965): $5.9 billion. Statistical Abstract of the United States, 1967, Table No. 544, Federal Administrative Budget Expenditures, by Organization Unit: 1961 to 1968, p. 389, https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/1967/compendia/statab/88ed/1967-06.pdf.
21 This exchange: audio recording, 38:00, transcript p. 17.
22 This exchange, in which Kennedy says, “I’m not that interested in space”: audio recording, 39:30, transcript, p. 17.
23 John F. Kennedy, “Excerpts from a Speech by Sen. John F. Kennedy at the Valley Forge Country Club, Valley Forge, PA” (advance release text), October 29, 1960, American Presidency Project, https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/excerpts-from-speech-senator-john-f-kennedy-valley-forge-country-club-valley-forge-pa.
24 Cabinet Room meeting, audio recording 40:55, transcript, p. 18.
25 Philip H. Abelson, “Manned Lunar Landing,” Science, vol. 140, no. 3564 (April 19, 1963), p. 267, http://science.sciencemag.org/content/140/3564; Today show appearance: Logsdon, John F. Kennedy and the Race to the Moon, p. 199; “Science Editor Skeptical of Manned Lunar Shot,” New York Times, April 19, 1963, p. 86, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1963/04/19/82058441.html; Howard Simons, “Webb Defends U.S. Men-on-Moon Plan,” Washington Post, April 21, 1963, p. A10; Howard Simons, “Moon Madness? Scientists Divided on Apollo,” Washington Post, May 12, 1963, p. A9.
26 Howard Simons, “Scientist Calls Project Apollo Drain of Talent,” Washington Post, June 11, 1963, p. A3; “Space: Some Opinions on Reaching the Moon,” Los Angeles Times, June 16, 1963, p. G4, https://www.newspapers.com/image/381588856.
27 No reporters were permitted into the breakfast where former president Eisenhower spoke, so the press accounts of what he said came from interviewing attendees afterward. The United Press International story had the line from Eisenhower as “Anybody who would spend $40 billion in a race to the Moon for national prestige is nuts.” The Associated Press account had a slightly different version: “To spend $40 billion to be the first to reach the Moon is just nuts.” Interestingly, neither the New York Times nor the Washington Post did their own story on the Eisenhower comments, and neither paper used a full quote; they both just used the word “nuts,” on which the two accounts agree. The only reason to prefer the UPI account is that in his own Oval Office conversations about space policy, Eisenhower specifically balked at doing an expensive space program for reasons of prestige, giving that line a certain credibility. If the UPI line is not correct, it was never corrected in subsequent days. UPI, “Eisenhower Calls Moon Race ‘Nuts,’ ” Times Record (Troy, NY), June 12, 1963, p. 1, https://www.newspapers.com/image/56745599/; “Eisenhower Meets Kennedy on Rights,” New York Times, June 13, 1963, pp. 1, 13, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1963/06/13/issue.html.
28 Tom Wicker, “President in Plea,” New York Times, June 12, 1963, pp. 1, 20, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1963/06/12/issue.html; Claude Sitton, “Alabama Admits Negro Students; Wallace Bows to Federal Force; Kennedy Sees ‘Moral Crisis’ in U.S.,” New York Times, June 12, 1963, pp. 1, 20, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1963/06/12/issue.html; “Transcript of President’s Address,” New York Times, June 12, 1963, p. 20, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1963/06/12/issue.html.
29 Claude Sitton, “N.A.A.C.P. Leader Slain in Jackson; Protests Mount,” New York Times, June 13, 1963, pp. 1, 12, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1963/06/13/issue.html.
30 Tad Szulc, “Kennedy Asks Break in Cold War; New Atom Parley Set in Moscow; U.S. to Forgo Atmospheric Tests,” New York Times, June 11, 1963, pp. 1, 16, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1963/06/11/issue.html; Seymour Topping, “Russians Stirred by Kennedy Talk about Cold War,” New York Times, June 13, 1963, pp. 1, 4, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1963/06/13/issue.html.
31 Stuart H. Loory, “Are We Wasting Billions in Space?,” Saturday Evening Post, September 14, 1963, pp. 13ff.
32 The complete recording of this meeting between Kennedy and Webb is available through the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library. The approximate time of the quotes used will be noted in the notes to follow. The Kennedy Library provided only a partial transcript of sections of the tape in the news release announcing the recording being made available. That partial transcript (which is not in every case correct) is also noted below. No complete transcript could be found publicly available on the internet. John F. Kennedy and James Webb, sound recording of meeting in the Oval Office, White House, September 18, 1963, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, “Meetings: Tape #111: Lunar Program (James Webb),” 46 minutes of audio, https://www.jfklibrary.org/asset-viewer/archives/JFKPOF/MTG/JFKPOF-MTG-111-004/JFKPOF-MTG-111-004; “JFK Library Releases Recording of President Kennedy Discussing Race to the Moon,” press release, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, May 25, 2011, https://www.jfklibrary.org/about-us/news-and-press/press-releases/jfk-library-releases-recording-of-president-kennedy-discussing-race-to-the-moon.
33 Kennedy-Webb Oval Office meeting, 5:45.
34 Ibid., 38:50.
35 Ibid., 39:55.
36 Ibid., 34:20.
37 Ibid., 33:10.
38 Ibid., 21:30.
39 The phrase “Kennedy’s Folly” is suggested in this essay analyzing the rhetoric of Kennedy’s speech at Rice University: John W. Jordan, “Kennedy’s Romantic Moon and Its Rhetorical Legacy for Space Exploration,” Rhetoric and Public Affairs 6, no. 2 (Summer 2003): 209–31.
40 Kennedy-Webb Oval Office meeting, 25:25.
41 Ibid., 28:00.
42 Ibid., 42:15 (“younger folks”); 42:55 (“staggering things”); 43:05 (“I predict”).
43 Ibid., 28:50.
44 John F. Kennedy, “Address before the 18th General Assembly of the United Nations,” September 20, 1963, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, text: https://www.jfklibrary.org/archives/other-resources/john-f-kennedy-speeches/united-nations-19630920; audio recording: https://jfkl.prod.acquia-sites.com/asset-viewer/archives/JFKWHA/1963/JFKWHA-218/JFKWHA-218.
45 Thomas J. Hamilton, “Kennedy Asks Joint Moon Flight by U.S. and Soviet as Peace Step,” New York Times, September 21, 1963, pp. 1, 6; John W. Finney, “Washington Is Surprised by President’s Proposal,” New York Times, September 21, 1963, pp. 1, 7, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1963/09/21/issue.html; Carol Kirkpatrick, “President Urges Joint U.S.-Soviet Moon Trip,” Washington Post, September 21, 1963, pp. A1, A10.
46 Kennedy-Webb Oval Office meeting, 37:10.
47 Finney, “Washington Is Surprised by President’s Proposal.”
48 “President Kennedy: News Conference, President Kennedy’s News Conferences,” July 17, 1963, U.S. State Department, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, https://www.jfklibrary.org/archives/other-resources/john-f-kennedy-press-conferences/news-conference-58.
49 Historian John M. Logsdon has researched deeply the details of the Kennedy administration’s repeated overtures to the Russians on space cooperation; there were several, at various levels, starting even before Kennedy’s May 25, 1961, “go to the Moon” speech. He devotes two chapters of his book on Kennedy and space just to the question of U.S.-U.S.S.R. cooperation. See Logsdon, John F. Kennedy and the Race to the Moon, pp. 159–96. “President’s 1961 Proposal on Moon Flight Revealed,” New York Times, September 22, 1963, pp. 1, 35, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1963/09/22/issue.html.
50 Richard Witkin, “Joint Moon Trip by 1970 Doubted,” New York Times, September 23, 1963, pp. 1, 13, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1963/09/23/issue.html.
51 House cuts $250 million and “boomerang effect”: John W. Finney, “Funds for Space in Peril in House,” New York Times, September 25, 1963, pp. 1, 15, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1963/09/25/issue.html. House defeats cut by $1.25 billion: “House Unit Split on Space Budget,” New York Times, September 28, 1963, p. 3, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1963/09/28/issue.html. Thomas comment on cuts: Robert C. Toth, “Outlay for Space Cut to $5.1 Billion,” New York Times, October 8, 1963, pp. 1, 26, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1963/10/08/issue.html.
52 Accounts of the House passage of the NASA budget, and the ban on use of money for a joint U.S.-U.S.S.R. mission: Robert C. Toth, “House Opposes Joint Moon Trip; Votes NASA Fund,” New York Times, October 11, 1963, pp. 1, 19, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1963/10/11/issue.html; UPI, “House Votes to Ban Joint Shot to Moon; Also Cuts Funds for Project,” Tampa (FL) Tribune, October 11, 1963, p. 1. Comment from Teague: Robert Sherrod, “Let’s Go to the Moon Together,” New York Times, June 17, 1972, p. 29, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1972/06/17/issue.html.
53 “National Security Action Memorandum #271,” November 12, 1963, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, https://www.jfklibrary.org/asset-viewer/national-security-action-memorandum-number-271; Louis Harris, “Public Puts Limits on Russian Dealings,” Iowa City Press-Citizen, December 16, 1963, p. 8, https://www.newspapers.com/image/363501064/.
54 Associated Press, “NASA Chief Sees No Early Prospect of U.S.-Soviet Team Flights to Moon,” Washington Post, October 14, 1963, p. A1.
55 Richard Witkin, “Saturn Is Orbited; Its 10-Ton Payload Tops Any of Soviet,” New York Times, January 30, 1964, pp. 1, 12, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1964/01/30/issue.html.
56 Kennedy’s visit to Cape Canaveral, November 16, 1963: Marjorie Hunter, “President, Touring Canaveral, Sees Polaris Fired,” New York Times, November 17, 1962, pp. 1, 44, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1963/11/17/167964182.html; Rex Newman and Walter Mack, “Polaris Firing Pleases Kennedy,” Orlando (FL) Sentinel, November 17, 1963, pp. 1A, 77A, 9D (pictures), https://www.newspapers.com/image/223695429; Associated Press, “Kennedy Goes to Sea for Polaris Launch,” Tampa (FL) Tribune, November 17, 1963, https://www.newspapers.com/image/330589527/.
57 John F. Kennedy, “Remarks in San Antonio at the Dedication of the Aerospace Medical Health Center,” San Antonio, Texas, November 21, 1963, American Presidency Project, https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/remarks-san-antonio-the-dedication-the-aerospace-medical-health-center.
58 John F. Kennedy, “Remarks Prepared for Delivery at the Trade Mart in Dallas,” Dallas, Texas, November 22, 1963, American Presidency Project, https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/remarks-prepared-for-delivery-the-trade-mart-dallas.
59 LBJ renames Cape Canaveral; painters hang new sign: Lyndon B. Johnson, “The President’s Thanksgiving Day Address to the Nation,” White House, November 28, 1963, American Presidency Project, https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/the-presidents-thanksgiving-day-address-the-nation; Associated Press, “Mrs. Kennedy Made Request,” New York Times, November 30, 1963, p. 8, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1963/11/30/89979688.html; “Cape Redesignation Quickly Put into Effect,” Orlando (FL) Sentinel, November 30, 1963, p. 1-B, https://www.newspapers.com/image/223701704/.
60 Overall LBJ budget figures: Associated Press, “Budget Calls Halt to Spending,” Press and Sun-Bulletin (Binghamton, NY), January 21, 1964, pp. 1, 8, https://www.newspapers.com/image/254178859/; Edwin L. Dale, Jr., “$97.9 Billion Budget Puts Stress on Poverty Fight; Reduces Cost of Defense,” New York Times, January 22, 1964, pp. 1, 18, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1964/01/22/issue.html.
“No second-class ticket”: United Press International, “Space Program Hits New High,” Record (Hackensack, NJ), January 21, 1964, p. 5, https://www.newspapers.com/image/491120987/.
7: How Do You Fly to the Moon?
1 Kelly, Moon Lander, p. 205.
2 “F6F-3 Hellcat,” National Naval Aviation Museum, accessed December 10, 2018, https://www.navalaviationmuseum.org/attractions/aircraft-exhibits/item/?item=f6f-3_hellcat; “2 Grumman Records Hailed by Navy Aide,” New York Times, April 10, 1945, p. 36, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1945/04/10/88213008.html.
3 Richard D. Lyons, “Lunar Module to Burn Up in Air,” New York Times, March 8, 1969, p. 12, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1969/03/08/88983827.html.
4 Small parts of the story of the “egress rope” and the March 1964 design review (that mock-up was designated “TM-1”) are told in several places: Kelly, Moon Lander, pp. 88–90; Brooks, Grimwood, and Swenson, Chariots for Apollo, p. 151; Gene Harms, telephone interview, May 30, 2016.
The picture of the TM-1 mock-up, with the rope along its side, appears in Joshua Stoff, Building Moonships: The Grumman Lunar Module (Portsmouth, NH: Arcadia, 2004), p. 20. The caption to that picture mentions the worry that a ladder could be damaged and become unusable while the LM was landing on the Moon. Stoff also discusses the rope in the lunar module episode of the documentary series Moon Machines, Episode 4: “The Lunar Module,” directed by Nick Davidson, June 2008, Dox Productions for The Science Channel, Discovery Communications. Stoff discusses the rope starting at 11:35, followed by video of the test of the rope and the block-and-tackle.
5 Logsdon, John F. Kennedy and the Race to the Moon, p. 146.
6 Scott, “Speech at the Opening of the Computer Museum.”
7 This complexity of orbital mechanics is why rockets on Earth, headed for orbit, can’t simply be launched when it’s convenient: they have “launch windows.” Every rocket—every spaceship, every satellite—launched from Earth is following a plan to get where its payload is going in orbit, whether that’s astronauts headed for rendezvous with the ISS or a weather satellite headed for “rendezvous” with a specific spot over the Earth. If something delays a launch 10 minutes outside “the window,” you don’t just hurry up and launch anyway, like an airliner running late. Because you won’t get where you’re going. You stand down, and try again at the next launch window that gets you where you need to go.
8 James R. Hansen, Enchanted Rendezvous, Monographs in Aerospace History #4 (Washington, D.C.: NASA, 1995), p. 2, https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19960014824.pdf.
9 Ibid., pp. 5–6.
10 Ibid.
11 Murray and Cox, Apollo, p. 100.
12 Hansen, Enchanted Rendezvous, p. 8.
13 The online, pdf version of Hansen’s Enchanted Rendezvous cited above includes, after the published manuscript, a “Key Documents” section, which includes a two-page list of all of Houbolt’s LOR presentations through the summer of 1962—he lists 29 presentations over 33 months: pdf pages 75–76.
14 Hansen, Enchanted Rendezvous, pp. 9–10.
15 Murray and Cox, Apollo, p. 96.
16 Hansen, Enchanted Rendezvous, p. 20.
17 Ibid., “Letter to Dr. Robert C. Seamans, Jr. from John C. Houbolt,” dated November 15, 1961, Key Documents, pdf, pp. 55–63.
18 Seamans, Aiming at Targets, p. 98.
19 Ibid.
20 Murray and Cox, Apollo, p. 107.
21 Hansen, Enchanted Rendezvous, p. 25.
22 Murray and Cox, Apollo, pp. 116–17.
23 Hansen, Enchanted Rendezvous, p. 25.
24 The story of Houbolt attending the practice briefing at NASA HQ is in Murray and Cox, Apollo, p. 122. The story of von Braun’s conversion to LOR is from Murray and Cox, Apollo, pp. 121–22; Hansen, Enchanted Rendezvous, pp. 25–27. The full text of von Braun’s talk endorsing LOR is reprinted (including von Braun’s signature on page 11) in Hansen, Enchanted Rendezvous, Key Documents, pdf, pp. 64–74.
25 “Lunar ferry”: John F. Finney, “$3.8 Billion Voted for Space Plans,” New York Times, July 12, 1962, pp. 1, 12, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1962/07/12/issue.html. Houbolt in Paris: Hansen, Enchanted Rendezvous, p. 27.
Although specific references have been cited above, it’s worth noting again the value and depth of the two definitive accounts of how NASA chose the way it would fly to the Moon: Hansen’s Enchanted Rendezvous is about nothing but Houbolt and the decision of how to fly to the Moon. Murray and Cox, in Apollo, devote most of three chapters (7, 8, and 9) to the debate around the decision.
26 John W. Finney, “Rendezvous of Satellites in Space by the Mid-Sixties Is Predicted,” New York Times, May 24, 1961, p. 18, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1961/05/24/101464719.html; Howard Simons, “NASA Outlines Plans to Link Craft in Orbit,” Washington Post, May 24, 1961, p. A2.
27 Barton C. Hacker and James M. Grimwood, On the Shoulders of Titans: A History of Project Gemini, SP-4203 (Washington, D.C.: NASA, 1977), p. 246.
28 Gemini 4 ground-to-air mission transcript: https://www.jsc.nasa.gov/history/mission_trans/GT04_TEC.PDF, 01:33:10.
29 “Preliminary GT-4 Flight Crew Debriefing: Part I,” NASA: Space Operations Branch, Flight Crew Support Division, June 16, 1965, pp. 60, 64, 74, https://www.scribd.com/document/57053688/Preliminary-GT-4-Flight-Crew-Debriefing-Transcript-Part-I
30 John Noble Wilford, “First Flight Test of Lunar Landing Craft Expected Tomorrow,” New York Times, January 21, 1968, p. 78, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1968/01/21/76928578.html; David Sheridan, “How an Idea No One Wanted Grew Up to Be the LM,” Life, March 14, 1969, p. 20.
31 Kelly, Moon Lander, pp. 169, 173–74.
32 “The Eagle Has Landed: The Lunar Module Story,” Grumman Corporation, 1989, posted by Dan Beaumont Space Museum, July 29, 2015, YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjDdu7WzjQw, “Tumbler” appears at 13:10.
33 Thomas J. Kelly, oral history transcript, NASA Johnson Space Center Oral History Project, interviewed by Kevin M. Rusnak, Cutchogue, NY, September 19, 2000, p. 14, https://historycollection.jsc.nasa.gov/JSCHistoryPortal/history/oral_histories/KellyTJ/KellyTJ_9-19-00.htm.
34 Kelly, Moon Lander, p. 107.
35 Fred Haise, interview by filmmaker Mike Marcucci, July 16, 2003, recording provided to the author.
36 Kelly, oral history, p. 40
37 The account of the shattered window comes from: Joe Gavin, oral history transcript, NASA Johnson Space Center Oral History Project, interviewed by Rebecca Wright, Amherst, MA, January 10, 2003, https://historycollection.jsc.nasa.gov/JSCHistoryPortal/history/oral_histories/GavinJG/GavinJG_1-10-03.htm; Gavin, interviewed in Moon Machines, Episode 4: “The Lunar Module,” starting at 28:00; Orvis E. Pigg and Stanley P. Weiss, “Apollo Experience Report: Spacecraft Structural Windows,” Houston: Johnson Space Center, NASA TN D-7493, September 1973, pp. 8, 11–13, https://www.lpi.usra.edu/lunar/documents/apolloSpacecraftWindows.pdf.
38 Kelly, Moon Lander, pp. 141–42.
39 Gavin, oral history.
40 Richard D. Lyons, “Lunar Module to Burn Up in Air,” New York Times, March 8, 1969, p. 12, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1969/03/08/88983827.html. Use and disposition of each lunar module manufactured: “Location of Apollo Lunar Modules,” Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum: Spacecraft & Vehicles, accessed 10 January 2019, https://airandspace.si.edu/explore-and-learn/topics/apollo/apollo-program/spacecraft/location/lm.cfm.
41 Kelly, Moon Lander, pp. 173–174.
42 The author added up flight times for each of the nine lunar modules piloted by astronauts using data for each mission from Orloff, Apollo by the Numbers. “Flight time” for each lunar module was calculated from the moment of undocking to touchdown on the Moon; and then from the moment of liftoff from the Moon to the moment of docking. (There was a tenth lunar module that flew, uncrewed, in Apollo 5.)
An examination of the transcripts of each Apollo flight shows that no astronauts made any kind of farewell comments as the lunar modules were jettisoned back into space.
43 Armstrong comment: Eric M. Jones, ed., “Return to Orbit,” Apollo 11 Lunar Surface Journal, https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/a11/a11.launch.html, 124:22:11.
Conrad comment: W. David Woods and Lennox J. Waugh, eds., “Apollo 12, Day 6: From the Snowman to Docking,” Apollo Flight Journal, https://history.nasa.gov/afj/ap12fj/15day6_ftstd.html, 143:21:40.
In his memoir Moon Lander (p. 206), Kelly reports that in an after-flight debriefing, the Apollo 9 astronauts Jim McDivitt and Rusty Schweickart, the first to fly the lunar module, said “[it] is a great flying machine. And when it’s just the ascent stage alone, it’s very quick. It snaps to the controls like a fighter plane, or a sports car. It was super to fly!” Kelly does not say which astronaut made those observations, although McDivitt, as commander, would likely have been at the flight controls.
44 William H. Honan, “Le Mot Juste for the Moon,” Esquire, July 1969, pp. 53-56, 139-141.
45 Grumbling about Life story on Houbolt: Murray and Cox, Apollo, pp. 99-100. Low’s endorsement of Houbolt’s importance: Hansen, Enchanted Rendezvous, pp. 36-37 (note 128). Houbolt and von Braun in Mission Control: Hansen, Enchanted Rendezvous, p. 28.
8: NASA Almost Forgets the Flag
1 United Press International, “U.S. Flag to Fly on Moon,” Panama City News, June 13, 1969, p. 7, https://www.newspapers.com/image/39141483.
2 Here is a 5-minute video clip showing Armstrong and Aldrin erecting the first American flag on the Moon, as described in this section. The video is a split screen with two views, in sync: On the left, the video from the TV camera the astronauts set up on the Moon; on the right, the video from the camera mounted in a window of the lunar module, shooting down onto the astronauts. “Apollo 11 Flag,” posted by MoonInGoogleEarth, July 13, 2009, 5:01, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_H20GUvUfl4.
The flag raising comes about 45 minutes into the Moon walk. It barely shows up in the flight transcripts, because Armstrong and Aldrin didn’t discuss it with Mission Control, and exchanged only a few words as they worked together to get the flag in place. At 110:09:05, CapCom McCandless tells Mike Collins, orbiting in the command module, “The EVA is progressing beautifully. I believe they are setting up the flag now.” At 110:10:16, Armstrong says to Aldrin, “See if you can pull that end off a little bit. Straighten that end up a little?” Jones, ed., “One Small Step,” Apollo 11 Lunar Surface Journal, https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/a11/a11.step.html.
3 Richard Nixon, “Inaugural Address,” January 20, 1969, American Presidency Project, https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/inaugural-address-1.
4 Memo, George M. Low to Robert Gilruth, January 23, 1969, files of the Johnson Space Center History Office.
5 Jack Kinzler was a great talker and a great storyteller. He has three full-length oral histories on file with NASA, in two of which he discusses the flag and the plaque he designed and fabricated for the Apollo missions. Jack A. Kinzler, oral history transcript, NASA Johnson Space Center Oral History Project, interviewed by Roy Neal, Houston, TX, April 27, 1999, https://historycollection.jsc.nasa.gov/JSCHistoryPortal/history/oral_histories/KinzlerJA/KinzlerJA_4-17-99.htm.
6 There is a definitive history of NASA’s effort to get a flag on the Moon, written by Anne Platoff, which is the starting point for the reporting in this chapter. Platoff was generous in sharing her own research and documents.
Anne M. Platoff, “Where No Flag Has Gone Before: Political and Technical Aspects of Placing a Flag on the Moon,” NASA Contractor Report 188251, Johnson Space Center, August 1993, https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19940008327.pdf.
7 The first meeting of the full committee was April 1, 1961, according to Brooks, Grimwood, and Swenson, Chariots for Apollo, p. 330, https://history.nasa.gov/SP-4205.pdf. The date of the meeting is not completely clear in Kinzler’s accounts in his oral histories with NASA.
8 Kinzler, oral history, April 27, 1999.
9 Jack A. Kinzler, oral history transcript, NASA Johnson Space Center Oral History Project, interviewed by Paul Rollins, Houston, TX, January 16, 1998, https://historycollection.jsc.nasa.gov/JSCHistoryPortal/history/oral_histories/KinzlerJA/KinzlerJA_1-16-98.htm.
10 Christopher Columbus’s flags: Steven Kreis, ed., “The Journal of Christopher Columbus (1492),” The History Guide, August 4, 2009, http://www.historyguide.org/earlymod/columbus.html; Lewis and Clark’s flags: Joseph Mussulman, “The Expedition’s Flags,” Discovering Lewis and Clark, http://www.lewis-clark.org/article/665; Roald Amundsun’s flag: Evan Andrews, “The Treacherous Race to the South Pole,” History.com, January 17, 2017, https://www.history.com/news/the-treacherous-race-to-the-south-pole; Robert Peary’s flags: “The Discoverer of the North Pole,” U.S. Capitol Visitor Center, https://www.visitthecapitol.gov/exhibitions/artifact/commander-robert-pearys-sledge-party-posing-flags-north-pole-photograph-april; Details of Peary’s wife making the flag: “Peary Polar Expedition Flags,” CRW Flags, https://www.crwflags.com/fotw/flags/us_peary.html.
11 Kinzler, oral history transcript, April 28, 1999.
12 The hand-drawn diagram for the Apollo flag is reproduced in Platoff, “Where No Flag Has Gone Before,” figure 2, p. 2.
13 Kinzler, oral history transcript, April 27, 1999.
14 Kinzler recalls the effort to keep the plaque and the flag a secret until the Moon landing itself in an hour-long interview he did with historian Anne M. Platoff, August 30, 1992, at his home. Platoff provided the author a copy of that video.
Tom Moser described his role in a telephone interview, December 12, 2017.
15 The specific details of the temperature analysis are from Kinzler, interviewed by Platoff.
16 Platoff, “Where No Flag Has Gone Before,” p. 3.
17 Neil Armstrong weighed 172 pounds when Apollo 11 was launched (29 pounds on the Moon); Buzz Aldrin weighed 167 pounds (28 pounds on the Moon). From Orloff, Apollo by the Numbers, p. 312,
18 Sheridan, “How an Idea No One Wanted Grew Up to Be the LM,” p. 20.
19 The lunar module press briefing document describes the ladder as having nine rungs, nine inches apart, with a gap of 18 inches between the front edge of the LM porch to the first rung, and with the lowest rung being 30 inches from the Moon’s surface. That’s 120 inches from the front edge of the porch to the Moon’s surface—10 feet: https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/LM04_Lunar_Module_ppLV1-17.pdf, p. LV-12.
20 Moser, telephone interview, December 12, 2017.
21 Paine’s testimony and the Congressional reaction: United Press International, “Congress Furor: Will Moon Crew Plant UN Flag?,” Detroit Free Press, June 7, 1969, p. 1A, https://www.newspapers.com/image/98919566/; United Press International, “Lawmakers Warn Space Chief Against U.N. Flag on Moon,” Tampa Tribune, June 7, 1969, p. 2-A, https://www.newspapers.com/image/331251125/.
For context, when Sir Edmund Hillary and the Nepalese Sherpa Tenzing Norgay became the first people to reach the top of Mt. Everest, the tallest mountain on Earth, on June 1, 1953, they brought with them and hoisted three flags: the British Union Jack (for Hillary), the flag of Nepal (for Norgay), and the United Nations flag. Reuters, “2 of British Team Conquer Everest; Queen Gets News as Coronation Gift; Throngs Line Her Procession Route,” New York Times, June 2, 1953, p. 1, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1953/06/02/issue.html.
22 United Press International, “Senator Wants American Flag Put on Moon,” Tennessean, June 1, 1969, p. 24-D, https://www.newspapers.com/image/113304352/.
23 Leo Rennert, “Solons Moon Over Old Glory,” Fresno Bee, June 22, 1969, p. 2-C, https://www.newspapers.com/image/25902946.
24 Muncie Evening Press: United Press International, “Roudebush Helps Put Old Glory on Moon.” Muncie Evening Press, June 11, 1969, p. 6, https://www.newspapers.com/image/250301816/; Orlando Sentinel: “Apollo 11 Crew Can Plant US Flag Only,” Orlando Sentinel, June 11, 1969, p. 1-A, https://www.newspapers.com/image/224270703; Philadelphia Inquirer: William Hines, Planting a Flag on the Moon Stirs a Foofaraw in Congress,” Philadelphia Inquirer, July 1, 1969, p. 19, https://www.newspapers.com/image/179992153/.
25 “U.S. Has Tried 5 Times to Send Rocket to Moon,” New York Times, September 14, 1959, p. 18; Vincent Buist, “860-Pound Red Missile Hits Moon, Plants Soviet Union’s Coat of Arms,” Washington Post, September 14, 1959, p. 1A; Max Frankel, “Soviet Rocket Hits Moon after 35 Hours; Arrival Is Calculated within 84 Seconds; Signals Received till Moment of Impact,” New York Times, September 14, 1959, p. 1; Harrison E. Salisbury, “Khrushchev Gets Big but Quiet Welcome from 200,000 on Arrival in Washington; Has ‘Frank’ 2-Hour Talk with Eisenhower,” New York Times, September 16, 1959, pp. 1, 18.
26 United Press International, “Transcript of the President’s News Conference on Foreign and Domestic Matters,” New York Times, September 18, 1959, p. 18, question #18, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1959/09/18/88821871.html; “President Skeptical on Moon Pennants,” New York Times, September 18, 1959, p. 2, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1959/09/18/issue.html.
27 Rod Pyle, “Fifty Years of Moon Dust: Surveyor 1 Was a Pathfinder for Apollo,” NASA, June 2, 2016, via NASA JPL, https://www.nasa.gov/feature/jpl/fifty-years-of-moon-dust-surveyor-1-was-a-pathfinder-for-apollo.
28 “A 23-Cent U.S. Flag Is on the Moon,” Tallahassee (FL) Democrat, June 2, 1966, p. 1A, https://www.newspapers.com/image/245130969/.; “ ‘Old Glory’ Flying High,” Denton (TX) Record Chronicle, June 2, 1966, p. 1A, https://www.newspapers.com/image/24376494/
29 “NASA Technical Report No. 32-1023: Surveyor 1 Mission Report,” Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA, 1966: Part 1: Mission Description and Performance, https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19660026658.pdf (“perfect soft-landing,” p. XI); Part 2: Scientific Data and Results, https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19670000738.pdf; Part 3: Television Data, https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19670007837.pdf.
30 Images of the Hughes Aircraft memos regarding the investigation into “the flag incident” are collected at this website, from a lifelong Hughes Aircraft engineer, Jack Fisher: Surveyor 1 and the American Flag, http://www.hughesscgheritage.com/surveyor-i-and-the-american-flag-jack-fisher/. The story of NASA and JPL’s irritation at Hughes over the flag is told at “The Story of Surveyor 1,” http://www.hughesscgheritage.com/the-story-of-surveyor-i-jack-fisher/.
31 Details of commemorative stamp on Iwo Jima flag-raising: “Iwo Jima 1945, the Photograph and the 3¢ Green Stamp,” Linn’s Stamp News, February 6, 2015, https://www.linns.com/news/us-stamps-postal-history/2015/february/iwo-jima-1945-the-photograph-and-the-3-green-stamp.html.
32 “Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space, including the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies,” http://www.unoosa.org/pdf/publications/ST_SPACE_061Rev01E.pdf.
33 Memo, Willis H. Shapley to Thomas O. Paine, undated (May 15, 1969, perhaps), “Report of the Committee on Symbolic Activities for First Lunar Landing,” NASA Headquarters History Office, Washington, D.C.; copy provided by Platoff.
34 The most exhaustive account of Armstrong’s thinking about the words he said when stepping on to the Moon comes from his authorized biography, Hansen, First Man, pp. 493–96. Hansen even raises and dispenses with the theory that Armstrong’s words were inspired by a phrase in J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit.
35 Platoff interview with Kinzler.
36 Personal work files of Jack Kinzler, provided to Anne Platoff in the course of her research for Where No Flag Has Gone Before. Kinzler provided various work files related to the development of the flag and the plaque to Platoff, who generously provided scans of those documents to the author in 2017.
37 Platoff interview with Kinzler. Kinzler says in both his oral history and his interview with Platoff that he installed the flag and the plaque the morning before liftoff. But he appears to be misremembering this detail. His own “Weekly Activities Report” from the period, which Platoff found in the Johnson Space Center history office, records, “The flag and plaque were installed on the LM of Apollo 11 on Wednesday, July 9, 1969, at 4:00 a.m. under the supervision of Jack A. Kinzler.”
38 Michael Collins and Edwin E. Aldrin, “The Eagle Has Landed,” in Edgar M. Cortwright, ed., Apollo Expeditions to the Moon, NASA SP-350 (NASA: Washington, D.C.), 1975, p. 216.
39 “Apollo 11 Moon Walk CBS News Coverage,” posted by zellco321, January 17, 2017, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ntyPG1xewJ8, flag planting starts at 01:53:00. Total video is 5:15:09.
40 Eric M. Jones, ed., “ALSEP Off-load,” Apollo 17 Lunar Surface Journal, 118:19:22, https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/a17/a17.alsepoff.html.
41 No warning of call, from Hansen, First Man, around pp. 506–7; the U.S. National Archives has video of the call as broadcast that night; a color photograph of President Nixon, in suit and tie, at his desk talking to the astronauts; and a separate picture of the president’s green, push-button telephone: “A Historic Phone Call,” National Archives, https://www.archives.gov/presidential-libraries/events/centennials/nixon/exhibit/nixon-online-exhibit-calls.html.
42 “Nixoning the Moon,” New York Times, July 19, 1969, p. 24, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1969/07/19/90112986.html.
43 The presidential phone call to Armstrong and Aldrin, in the Apollo 11 transcript: Jones, ed., “One Small Step,” starting at 109:52:40; in the video “Apollo 11 Moon Walk CBS News Coverage,” starting at 2:01:35.
44 “Plaque and flag for Apollo 12,” Memorandum from George M. Low to Robert R. Gilruth, September 6, 1969, Johnson Space Center History Office, copy provided to the author by Platoff.
45 Jones, ed., “ALSEP Off-load,” Apollo 16 Lunar Surface Journal, 120:23:04, https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/a16/a16.alsepoff.html.
46 Apollo 15 deployment, “million years”: Jones, ed., “EVA-2 Closeout,” Apollo 15 Lunar Surface Journal, 148:53:59, https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/a15/a15.clsout2.html; Apollo 17 deployment, “hate to touch it”: Jones, “ALSEP Off-load,” Apollo 17 Lunar Surface Journal, 118:20:35 to 118:23:09; “hate to touch it” at 118:22:18; Apollo 12 deployment, “the flag is up”: Jones, ed., “TV Troubles,” Apollo 12 Lunar Surface Journal, 116:13:40 to 116:20:02, https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/a12/a12.tvtrbls.html.
47 Eric M. Jones, ed., “Apollo 12 CDR and LMP Cuff Checklist,” Apollo 12 Lunar Surface Journal, https://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/alsj/a12/cuff12.html. For the curious, images of the cuff checklists for all 12 astronauts who walked on the Moon are indexed here: “Available Checklists,” Apollo Lunar Surface Journal, https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/surcl.html.
48 The quotes from Conrad and Bean about the Playboy playmates in their cuff checklists come from the Playboy magazine story about the prank, published 25 years after Apollo 12’s mission: D. C. Agle, “Playmates on the Moon,” Playboy, December 1994, pp. 138–39, 213.
49 The photo of Pete Conrad, taken by Alan Bean and also showing Bean’s reflection and Reagan Wilson, is image #AS12-48-7071, available from the Apollo 12 mission photo library: https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/a12/AS12-48-7071HR.jpg. Conrad’s discovery that a Playboy playmate was photographed on the Moon: Agle, “Playmates on the Moon.”
50 Washington Post: “ ‘The Eagle Has Landed’—Two Men Walk on the Moon,” in Abby Phillip, “The Eagle Has Landed”: How The Post Covered the Apollo 11 Landing,” July 21, 2014, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2014/07/21/the-eagle-has-landed-how-the-washington-post-covered-the-apollo-11-landing/?utm_term=.befc90b865da. New York Times: “Men Walk on the Moon,” https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1969/07/21/issue.html.
51 Fred Seibert, telephone interview, February 20, 2018; Siebert is cartoon producer and was working for MTV at the time the channel debuted. With his colleagues, he came up with the idea for using the NASA images of Aldrin and the flag as MTV’s first animated logo. The resulting animation ran at the top and bottom of every hour for the first five years MTV was on the air, and became closely identified with the channel. At the meeting where he came up with the idea, Siebert remembers one of his colleagues saying, “Space is very rock ’n’ roll.” MTV stopped using the animation, permanently, on January 28, 1986, the day of the space shuttle Challenger disaster.
MTV has a story explaining the origin of the animated logo: Madeline Roth, “Ever Wondered Why the VMA Statue is a Moonman?,” MTV news, August 27, 2016, http://www.mtv.com/news/2924701/vma-statue-moonman/.
