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

[User] Yes. Everybody had their own house. Trying to make sure that was true. Some people had apartments and married couples shared a house, but yeah, everybody had their own place.

[Assistant] What was the rest of your group like?

[User] The rest of my group was a lot of fun. There were so many of us that, like after training, everybody went to their own parts of the country and it was kind of hard to get to. So whenever we had like an in-service training or mid-service training, it was just a big party because we were so excited to see everybody. And sometimes I think there is a part of the country that was easier for me to get to, it was only like five and a half hours on a bus, so I’d go up and visit them sometimes. But when we wanted to get together, because we all had our own houses, we would just like to have a party and invite everybody. And people would come in on Saturday and then just like spend the night on Saturday night and then go back on Sunday. But it was really fun. It was like, it was like an adult slumber party. People just put their sleeping bags on the floor and we'd hang out and cook a really fancy dinner. Yeah, my group was great. I'm still friends with some of them and they were wonderful. One of the older volunteers sends me an email every year on my birthday. It's really sweet.

[Assistant] How close was the closest volunteer to you?

[User] So there were two really close volunteers. One was like 20 minutes in one direction and the other was like 30 minutes in the other direction. One of my friends lived, my closest friend, like she was my best friend there, lived in Molepolole which was like 30 minutes away. And then another very close volunteer, geographically and emotionally, was like 20 minutes away. And yeah, it's really easy to get to both of them.

[Assistant] How did you, what transportation did you use?


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

[User] So there were two really close volunteers. One was like 20 minutes in one direction and the other was like 30 minutes in the other direction. One of my friends lived, my closest friend, like she was my best friend there, lived in Molepolole which was like 30 minutes away. And then another very close volunteer, geographically and emotionally, was like 20 minutes away. And yeah, it's really easy to get to both of them.

[Assistant] How did you, what transportation did you use?

[User] We took. So there's like just a regular bus or something. We called it a kombi. It has different names. It's like a 16 passenger van, like I don't know, if you had a really big family, what you would drive. But it was like some of the seats would flip up and you could get to the back and then put the seat back down and there would just be like a lot of maybe more people than it sat in there. And sometimes there would be some poultry or a stranger's baby you were holding.

[Assistant] So how did you find those vans?

[User] They drove by, you just flag them down. I was also very lucky in that I lived on a major road that went through my village. So like a lot of people would have to walk 30 minutes to get to a bus stop. But I could see the bus stop from my window, So I’d see the bus coming and just run outside.

[Assistant] How did you get to your place of work?


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

[User] We took. So there's like just a regular bus or something. We called it a kombi. It has different names. It's like a 16 passenger van, like I don't know, if you had a really big family, what you would drive. But it was like some of the seats would flip up and you could get to the back and then put the seat back down and there would just be like a lot of maybe more people than it sat in there. And sometimes there would be some poultry or a stranger's baby you were holding.

[Assistant] So how did you find those vans?

[User] They drove by, you just flag them down. I was also very lucky in that I lived on a major road that went through my village. So like a lot of people would have to walk 30 minutes to get to a bus stop. But I could see the bus stop from my window, So I’d see the bus coming and just run outside.

[Assistant] How did you get to your place of work?

[User] I walked. It's like a 30 minute walk, over some rock formations, and through some deep sand, and passing some donkeys and goats.

[Assistant] And were there roads?


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

[User] They drove by, you just flag them down. I was also very lucky in that I lived on a major road that went through my village. So like a lot of people would have to walk 30 minutes to get to a bus stop. But I could see the bus stop from my window, So I’d see the bus coming and just run outside.

[Assistant] How did you get to your place of work?

[User] I walked. It's like a 30 minute walk, over some rock formations, and through some deep sand, and passing some donkeys and goats.

[Assistant] And were there roads?

[User] There were roads. But not in the direction that I was going.

[Assistant] What was your village layout like?


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

[User] I walked. It's like a 30 minute walk, over some rock formations, and through some deep sand, and passing some donkeys and goats.

[Assistant] And were there roads?

[User] There were roads. But not in the direction that I was going.

[Assistant] What was your village layout like?

[User] Uh, I’m trying to decide how to answer that. So there's a big road that went like north and south through the middle of town. And then my house was just to the east of that road, right next to it, and then right behind my house was Thamaga Hill, just a gigantic, beautiful rock formation. And it was the tallest point in Thamaga, which really helped. So any time I wandered too far from my house, I could just, like, turn around and look for that and then walk towards it. And then that's also where the pottery shop was. There's a church out there. There is like the police station was just across the street. And the one carry-out place was right there. And all the government entities were right there. So like, if I had a problem with my water bill or something else, like a five minute walk to go talk to them. And then my school, like I said, it was like a 30 minute walk east of that road. And then west of that road wasn't anything really pertinent to my life. So I just went running over there. But otherwise I didn't really know a lot about that side of town. And then I actually I had a grocery store like a full-blown grocery store in my village, and it was like a mile south of my house. It's just like a quick 15 minute walk there and back. And it had like all the produce meat and canned goods and whatever you need.

[Assistant] When did you cook? What did you eat while you were there?


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

[User] Really starchy. It was just like some kind of mountain of starch.

[Assistant] Like potatoes?

[User] Uh, no, like rice or something called phaletšhe, which everybody was really into and even other volunteers and I just never could get into. It's like some kind of cornstarch and water. And you just boil it until it's like a playdoh consistency. And they just like, put that lump on your plate and then you pick up your other food with it. And there's just so much, it's just so many carbs. And I'm like, don't get me wrong. I love carbs, but it's a lot. So there is that. And there is like, uh.

[Assistant] Vegetables, fruits?

[User] So the thing about vegetables is, that weren’t a lot of vegetables because it's a desert. But then occasionally my host family would be like, we're having salad tonight and I would be so excited. And sometimes salad means fresh vegetables, but sometimes salad also just means something covered in mayonnaise.

[Assistant] Like chicken salad?


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

[User] Uh, no, like rice or something called phaletšhe, which everybody was really into and even other volunteers and I just never could get into. It's like some kind of cornstarch and water. And you just boil it until it's like a playdoh consistency. And they just like, put that lump on your plate and then you pick up your other food with it. And there's just so much, it's just so many carbs. And I'm like, don't get me wrong. I love carbs, but it's a lot. So there is that. And there is like, uh.

[Assistant] Vegetables, fruits?

[User] So the thing about vegetables is, that weren’t a lot of vegetables because it's a desert. But then occasionally my host family would be like, we're having salad tonight and I would be so excited. And sometimes salad means fresh vegetables, but sometimes salad also just means something covered in mayonnaise.

[Assistant] Like chicken salad?

[User] Yeah, like chicken salad or like a coleslaw or beet salad. It's just shredded beets and mayonnaise. And I'm like, I don't know. I was really sick halfway through my pre-service training. And our Peace Corps medical officer was like, does your family wash vegetables before they serve them to you when you eat raw vegetables? And I was like, I don't think I've had a raw vegetable since I got here. And he’s like, eat some vegetables, easy fix. So I started just like sneaking off to the grocery store and eating some raw vegetables. I was just like craving a good salad. The vegetable kind, not the mayonnaise kind.

[Assistant] Was it expensive to buy food there?


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

[User] So the thing about vegetables is, that weren’t a lot of vegetables because it's a desert. But then occasionally my host family would be like, we're having salad tonight and I would be so excited. And sometimes salad means fresh vegetables, but sometimes salad also just means something covered in mayonnaise.

[Assistant] Like chicken salad?

[User] Yeah, like chicken salad or like a coleslaw or beet salad. It's just shredded beets and mayonnaise. And I'm like, I don't know. I was really sick halfway through my pre-service training. And our Peace Corps medical officer was like, does your family wash vegetables before they serve them to you when you eat raw vegetables? And I was like, I don't think I've had a raw vegetable since I got here. And he’s like, eat some vegetables, easy fix. So I started just like sneaking off to the grocery store and eating some raw vegetables. I was just like craving a good salad. The vegetable kind, not the mayonnaise kind.

[Assistant] Was it expensive to buy food there?

[User] No, it was pretty cheap. And oh, they also, so I grew up in Texas and they said that Botswana was the Texas of Africa. Like, what does that even mean? They had a really big cattle industry. They also had, this is just really interesting. They had a, have still, a metal cowboy music scene. So it's like a subculture and there are people who dress in like full leather cowboy outfits. Which, it's a hundred degrees, it's so terrible to wear leather. The first leather cowboy that I saw was on like a five-hour bus ride. Nobody opened the windows because that's how you catch the flu. As the health volunteer, I contested that a lot. But, yeah. And he was just fine, I guess. I don't know. But yeah, they were really into metal music. And they have a metal cowboy festival every year in the middle of the desert.

[Assistant] That's crazy. How did that happen?


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

[User] Yeah, like chicken salad or like a coleslaw or beet salad. It's just shredded beets and mayonnaise. And I'm like, I don't know. I was really sick halfway through my pre-service training. And our Peace Corps medical officer was like, does your family wash vegetables before they serve them to you when you eat raw vegetables? And I was like, I don't think I've had a raw vegetable since I got here. And he’s like, eat some vegetables, easy fix. So I started just like sneaking off to the grocery store and eating some raw vegetables. I was just like craving a good salad. The vegetable kind, not the mayonnaise kind.

[Assistant] Was it expensive to buy food there?

[User] No, it was pretty cheap. And oh, they also, so I grew up in Texas and they said that Botswana was the Texas of Africa. Like, what does that even mean? They had a really big cattle industry. They also had, this is just really interesting. They had a, have still, a metal cowboy music scene. So it's like a subculture and there are people who dress in like full leather cowboy outfits. Which, it's a hundred degrees, it's so terrible to wear leather. The first leather cowboy that I saw was on like a five-hour bus ride. Nobody opened the windows because that's how you catch the flu. As the health volunteer, I contested that a lot. But, yeah. And he was just fine, I guess. I don't know. But yeah, they were really into metal music. And they have a metal cowboy festival every year in the middle of the desert.

[Assistant] That's crazy. How did that happen?

[User] How did that happen? Hard to say. What were we talking about before I got caught up on the metal cowboys?

[Assistant] Food, I think. Oh, cost of living.


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

[User] Where to find me and what I was doing. You know, I didn't have to explain to anyone what the Peace Corps was.

[Assistant] Do most people have cars?

[User] Um, well, a lot of people had cars. I don't know. I don't know how to answer that question. They expected me to have a car because they assumed that I had money. I didn't. That was hard to explain to people that I didn't have money. Also just came out of college. So I like literally, I didn't have any savings at all. So whatever my food allowance was for that month.

[Assistant] How much was your allowance?

[User] I don't remember. It's been too long. It was enough. I never went hungry. They covered my rent.

[Assistant] So did you go on vacations or take time off and travel?


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

[User] Um, well, a lot of people had cars. I don't know. I don't know how to answer that question. They expected me to have a car because they assumed that I had money. I didn't. That was hard to explain to people that I didn't have money. Also just came out of college. So I like literally, I didn't have any savings at all. So whatever my food allowance was for that month.

[Assistant] How much was your allowance?

[User] I don't remember. It's been too long. It was enough. I never went hungry. They covered my rent.

[Assistant] So did you go on vacations or take time off and travel?

[User] I did. I feel like Peace Corps is really generous with the amount of vacation days that you get. So I traveled well, like on weekends, sometimes I would go see my buddies in other villages, but I traveled to Namibia when I'd been there for a year. We took a week vacation to Namibia. It was awesome. The country was so great. And then I went to Zambia a couple of times because I loved it so much. And by the end of my service, I had like three weeks of vacation left over, like I wasn't never taking vacation, but I just had so much of it. And two of my buddies also had three weeks of vacation. So we took the last three weeks before our close of service conference, which is the last time you can take any vacation.

[Assistant] Which is, what, a couple of months before you actually leave service?


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

[User] Cultural exchange. Yeah. It's something more experienced volunteers told me a lot. They were like, you know, two of the three goals are cultural exchange. So even if you don't feel like you're accomplishing your goals at site, if you're talking to people and you're sharing things, you learn something about their country, they learn something about your country, then you're doing most of what you're here for.

[Assistant] Those are goals two and three.

[User] Yeah. Yeah.

[Assistant] What about hard things? Are there big lessons that you learned or a project that you started that didn't work or regrets or anything you want to talk about for that?

[User] Oh gosh. A really hard thing for me was living alone. Like I said, that's not something I usually do and I wasn't used to it, and it was a big learning curve. But I think that was probably the best thing for me at that time in my life, even though it was really hard after I had lived alone for a few months. I kind of fell into a pattern of it and it gave me a lot of self- reflection time. And I think being outside of your own culture teaches you a lot about yourself and what is you and what is your culture and what your values are, and I think, yeah. That was a really hard thing. Especially just learning a new culture is really hard. So all of those and then, I mean, being a young woman in a developing country, like women all over the world have it really hard. So that was tough, just trying to learn how to navigate those situations and, in turn, teaching my students, teaching my male students how to respect women and teaching my female students that they deserve to be respected. That was really tough.

[Assistant] It sounds like you had a lot of impact on the people that you worked with, especially your students. How did Peace Corps impact you and the choices you've made about your post Peace Corps life?


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

[User] No, of course not. And probably most of the guys didn’t at—you know, in the early days. When I was growing up, “astronaut” wasn’t even in our vocabulary. Nor was “cosmonaut.” Nobody even thought about that. Ironically, when I graduated from college in 1951, the Korean War was going on and I was—had a military service obligation. Decided to go in the Navy and learn how to fly, which I did in Pensacola. Took my—went to Pensacola, Florida, in that Fall of 1951. And ironically enough, at the time I was going through preflight school I hadn’t even met an airplane yet! This—some gentleman came by and was going to give a presentation in the auditorium. And they marched little cadets over there; and this guy was talking about space and hotels and orbiting objects and this sort of thing. And we all thought he was a little bit off his rocker; a little bit kooky. His name was Wernher von Braun. Yeah. Funny how that—what goes around comes around.

[Assistant] Did you—I assume that you got to know him.

[User] Oh, eventually, sure.

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] It was during the program, when I was here. But I never had any inkling that this was going to be a career. I fell in love with airplanes, and—after I met him, and chose to make that my career as opposed to going back to school and getting advanced degrees. So, that’s how that all came about.

[Assistant] Was your bitter disappointment the first time when you weren’t selected in that second group more of the competitive nature of—I mean it was just you hated to lose?


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

[User] Oh, eventually, sure.

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] It was during the program, when I was here. But I never had any inkling that this was going to be a career. I fell in love with airplanes, and—after I met him, and chose to make that my career as opposed to going back to school and getting advanced degrees. So, that’s how that all came about.

[Assistant] Was your bitter disappointment the first time when you weren’t selected in that second group more of the competitive nature of—I mean it was just you hated to lose?

[User] I think so. I—knowing most of the guys. Knowing the people that were involved in the Mercury Program. It was one of disappointment. I think when you’re in those kinds of processes, you evaluate yourself in looking around at who the other individuals are. And you know, there are test pilots and there are test pilots. And that sort of thing. And you place your skill. You try to figure out where you are within that group; and if you devalue yourself, then you’re not doing yourself a very big favor.

[Assistant] So, you were selected in ’63.


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

[User] It was during the program, when I was here. But I never had any inkling that this was going to be a career. I fell in love with airplanes, and—after I met him, and chose to make that my career as opposed to going back to school and getting advanced degrees. So, that’s how that all came about.

[Assistant] Was your bitter disappointment the first time when you weren’t selected in that second group more of the competitive nature of—I mean it was just you hated to lose?

[User] I think so. I—knowing most of the guys. Knowing the people that were involved in the Mercury Program. It was one of disappointment. I think when you’re in those kinds of processes, you evaluate yourself in looking around at who the other individuals are. And you know, there are test pilots and there are test pilots. And that sort of thing. And you place your skill. You try to figure out where you are within that group; and if you devalue yourself, then you’re not doing yourself a very big favor.

[Assistant] So, you were selected in ’63.

[User] Yes. October of ’63.

[Assistant] Now because I don’t know—okay. So, you were selected basically, you know, a month before Kennedy’s assassination, right? But you were selected and you were aware of—obviously you weren’t at his speech that he had given at Rice University declaring, “We’re going to go to the Moon.”


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

[User] Yes. October of ’63.

[Assistant] Now because I don’t know—okay. So, you were selected basically, you know, a month before Kennedy’s assassination, right? But you were selected and you were aware of—obviously you weren’t at his speech that he had given at Rice University declaring, “We’re going to go to the Moon.”

[User] No. As a matter of fact, I believe Gene [Eugene A.] Cernan and I were in post-graduate school together. We flew to Houston after the selection. We were looking for real estate, where we were going to move our families. It was at that time, I may have been the very day that President Kennedy was killed. What? November 22nd?

[Assistant] Right.

[User] I have to go back and look at my flight log to make sure that it was that time. But it was right at that time that we were flying here to Houston to buy some real estate.

[Assistant] Even though you weren’t an astronaut at the time that he made the speech, though, saying “We’re going to go to the Moon,” was it something that you remember following in the news? Did you have a reaction to it of this challenge?


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

[User] No. As a matter of fact, I believe Gene [Eugene A.] Cernan and I were in post-graduate school together. We flew to Houston after the selection. We were looking for real estate, where we were going to move our families. It was at that time, I may have been the very day that President Kennedy was killed. What? November 22nd?

[Assistant] Right.

[User] I have to go back and look at my flight log to make sure that it was that time. But it was right at that time that we were flying here to Houston to buy some real estate.

[Assistant] Even though you weren’t an astronaut at the time that he made the speech, though, saying “We’re going to go to the Moon,” was it something that you remember following in the news? Did you have a reaction to it of this challenge?

[User] Yes. I thought there was another crazy guy like Wernher von Braun that—Alan [B.] Shepard [Jr.] flew in May 5th, 1961. Twenty days later, we hadn’t even been in orbit yet, and here’s a young, vigorous President challenging the American people to go to the Moon before the decade was over! You know, how do you do that? We hadn’t even been in orbit! We didn’t know if men could survive for that length of time. We had a pretty good idea that we would, but there were those in the medical profession that kept throwing up straw men. We had to prove that we could do that.

[Assistant] Did you, when you were selected, did you realize, like, “I think I might be one of the people to help us go to the Moon?” I mean, was that what you thought was the goal?


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

[User] I have to go back and look at my flight log to make sure that it was that time. But it was right at that time that we were flying here to Houston to buy some real estate.

[Assistant] Even though you weren’t an astronaut at the time that he made the speech, though, saying “We’re going to go to the Moon,” was it something that you remember following in the news? Did you have a reaction to it of this challenge?

[User] Yes. I thought there was another crazy guy like Wernher von Braun that—Alan [B.] Shepard [Jr.] flew in May 5th, 1961. Twenty days later, we hadn’t even been in orbit yet, and here’s a young, vigorous President challenging the American people to go to the Moon before the decade was over! You know, how do you do that? We hadn’t even been in orbit! We didn’t know if men could survive for that length of time. We had a pretty good idea that we would, but there were those in the medical profession that kept throwing up straw men. We had to prove that we could do that.

[Assistant] Did you, when you were selected, did you realize, like, “I think I might be one of the people to help us go to the Moon?” I mean, was that what you thought was the goal?

[User] Oh, I—well, yeah. Obviously that was it. At that time, they had not started the Gemini Program. Mercury was just winding down. And that was the whole purpose. That was why we were selected to participate in that program.

[Assistant] Now others have talked about the climate at the time, which it’s very hard for us to imagine now just what that Cold War environment was like and the fear and the—I’m sure you find it hard to believe that we’re now friends and teamed up with Russia. I’m sure you never thought you’d see us working with them in space.


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

[User] Oh, I—well, yeah. Obviously that was it. At that time, they had not started the Gemini Program. Mercury was just winding down. And that was the whole purpose. That was why we were selected to participate in that program.

[Assistant] Now others have talked about the climate at the time, which it’s very hard for us to imagine now just what that Cold War environment was like and the fear and the—I’m sure you find it hard to believe that we’re now friends and teamed up with Russia. I’m sure you never thought you’d see us working with them in space.

[User] Well, no, I think probably not at that time, because it was a Cold War and it was a race. In the ’50s, at the heights of the Cold War, when Hungary and those things were going on—the Suez Canal—I was on the Coral Sea, an aircraft carrier in the Mediterranean, observing a lot of those happening and it was in fact a war. Philosophically, politically, economically, any other way you want to claim it. And this is one of the difficult aspects of today, is trying to relate that atmosphere that existed in those days. People don’t even believe it.

[Assistant] But did you feel like you were a warrior in a war, even as an astronaut? That you were fighting a war to get to the Moon?

[User] In a sense, sure. We were—the space race was real. We were in a race to go to the Moon. We wanted to be better than the Communist country, the Soviet Union at that time. And one of the ways that we could show we were a better society was to challenge them and do the things that we did. You bet!

[Assistant] Now when you were first became an astronaut, I understand that you were on before even Gemini, you were on this Apollo design group. And helping design the spacecraft, I take it: command module and—


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

[User] Well, no, I think probably not at that time, because it was a Cold War and it was a race. In the ’50s, at the heights of the Cold War, when Hungary and those things were going on—the Suez Canal—I was on the Coral Sea, an aircraft carrier in the Mediterranean, observing a lot of those happening and it was in fact a war. Philosophically, politically, economically, any other way you want to claim it. And this is one of the difficult aspects of today, is trying to relate that atmosphere that existed in those days. People don’t even believe it.

[Assistant] But did you feel like you were a warrior in a war, even as an astronaut? That you were fighting a war to get to the Moon?

[User] In a sense, sure. We were—the space race was real. We were in a race to go to the Moon. We wanted to be better than the Communist country, the Soviet Union at that time. And one of the ways that we could show we were a better society was to challenge them and do the things that we did. You bet!

[Assistant] Now when you were first became an astronaut, I understand that you were on before even Gemini, you were on this Apollo design group. And helping design the spacecraft, I take it: command module and—

[User] Yes. And the lunar module.

[Assistant] —and the lunar module. What? From an astronaut’s perspective?


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

[User] In a sense, sure. We were—the space race was real. We were in a race to go to the Moon. We wanted to be better than the Communist country, the Soviet Union at that time. And one of the ways that we could show we were a better society was to challenge them and do the things that we did. You bet!

[Assistant] Now when you were first became an astronaut, I understand that you were on before even Gemini, you were on this Apollo design group. And helping design the spacecraft, I take it: command module and—

[User] Yes. And the lunar module.

[Assistant] —and the lunar module. What? From an astronaut’s perspective?

[User] We—when we first came, we had ground school-type activity. We were in lectures and learning the phraseology and the business of space, I guess you might say. And then after a short period of time, when the second group had actually been assigned to flights in Gemini, we picked up the things that they were doing. And what they were doing, what that was, that we then took a particular portion of the program—boosters, communications, whatever. I had cockpit controls and displays. So, I had a overall view of things that were going on and what we needed to control particular systems in the vehicle. If we had to—we had the right information and the right switches where we could do that. That was my task, and it was an interim between first becoming acclimated to the community of space and before we became assigned to a flight crew.

[Assistant] And as part of that, my understanding is from what I read of the—your previous interview, that there were kind of three stages that you have your Preliminary Design Review, Critical Design Review, and then it would get manufactured. Take us through each of those steps and what was critical about each step, and what was your involvement in them.


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

[User] Oh, there was some of that probably. I think we had a—we were in a very unique position where we had an audience. And I think there was probably some attitudes that were portrayed, that people listened to what we had to say, and I think there was some resentment regarding that. A lot of it depends on personalities. You can rub people the wrong way sometime, but you can be effective in your own personality to get things done without ruffling a lot of feathers. So—but there was some animosity about the input that we were able to make above and beyond what maybe an engineer might be able to do.

[Assistant] Well, and you mentioned the personalities. You know, I’ve heard you and Pete Conrad kind of described as, you know, “the cockiest.” I mean like a badge of honor, you know, that you wore this proudly, of being—what do you think that they—the historians mean when they write that?

[User] I don’t know. But I’d probably plead guilty to it. Self-confidence, I think is what it really probably portrayed. It—we were better than anybody else? Sure we were!

[Assistant] And you weren’t afraid to say it?

[User] Well, we didn’t say it. We didn’t have to say it.

[Assistant] You mentioned with the hatch design being something that obviously during the fire played a role, do you remember where you were when you got news of the fire and what your reaction was? If you could—


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

[User] I don’t know. But I’d probably plead guilty to it. Self-confidence, I think is what it really probably portrayed. It—we were better than anybody else? Sure we were!

[Assistant] And you weren’t afraid to say it?

[User] Well, we didn’t say it. We didn’t have to say it.

[Assistant] You mentioned with the hatch design being something that obviously during the fire played a role, do you remember where you were when you got news of the fire and what your reaction was? If you could—

[User] Yes, I do. I was at the White House. Several of us had been invited by President [Lyndon B.] Johnson to be there and participate in the signing of the [United Nations Outer] Space Treaty with the Soviet Union. And I think Jim [James A.] Lovell, [L.] Gordon Cooper, possibly Neil [A.] Armstrong—I’m not quite sure; I don’t remember precisely that—and I was invited back because Neil and I had gotten to know President Johnson simply because he had sent us on a South American goodwill tour after my flight in—on Gemini XI. So, we were known to him on a personal—as was other people, I don’t mean to say that other people weren’t. But that probably led to my being there; and we were in the White House, at a reception after the signing of the Space Treaty when the word came in that there had been an accident at the Cape.

[Assistant] Did you know right away that it was a fatal accident?


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

[User] Well, we didn’t say it. We didn’t have to say it.

[Assistant] You mentioned with the hatch design being something that obviously during the fire played a role, do you remember where you were when you got news of the fire and what your reaction was? If you could—

[User] Yes, I do. I was at the White House. Several of us had been invited by President [Lyndon B.] Johnson to be there and participate in the signing of the [United Nations Outer] Space Treaty with the Soviet Union. And I think Jim [James A.] Lovell, [L.] Gordon Cooper, possibly Neil [A.] Armstrong—I’m not quite sure; I don’t remember precisely that—and I was invited back because Neil and I had gotten to know President Johnson simply because he had sent us on a South American goodwill tour after my flight in—on Gemini XI. So, we were known to him on a personal—as was other people, I don’t mean to say that other people weren’t. But that probably led to my being there; and we were in the White House, at a reception after the signing of the Space Treaty when the word came in that there had been an accident at the Cape.

[Assistant] Did you know right away that it was a fatal accident?

[User] I think we did. I believe that we did. I think I recall leaving there, and I think we got—made some calls when we got back and found out that it was. When somebody comes in and says, “There’s been a tragedy at the Cape” or an accident, yeah, I think you kind of possibly suspect the worst. But we may not have known immediately. We found out very shortly thereafter. It was a very long evening.

[Assistant] Did you think, “This is going to end the program.” “This is—we’ll recover.” What did you think right—?


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

[User] We didn’t give that too much thought on a personal basis. In our business, we lose friends all the time. Aviation—military aviation—is a risky business, and you go in those things with your eyes wide open. You know that there are risks involved. You lose a lot of friends along the way. My first four years in the Fleet, with two deployments in the Mediterranean we lost ten pilots in a squadron of 17. So, those are things—are acceptable. Or they go with the territory, you might say.\n\n So, those events you accept and you press on. And I don’t think any of us thought that the program was going to end at that time. We were still in a very significant race with the Soviet Union. And the Administrator at that time was James [E.] Webb, who did a tremendous job of carrying the ball along the way and making sure that the program would continue.

[Assistant] Did you see a change in the way the advice of astronauts was received by contractors and even NASA after the fire as opposed to before?

[User] No, not really.

[Assistant] No?

[User] I think our inputs were the same. I—and I don’t mean to imply that everything we said was correct and everybody did what we wanted to do. Probably a lot of cases, they didn’t or couldn’t for a lot of reasons. One of them would be schedule. Cost. All of those things would have to be evaluated. And NASA had set up a very strict Change Control Board that made those evaluations, and a lot of our ideas were probably rejected. But no, I think most of the guys conducted themselves in a manner in which the suggestions they made were taken at face value.

[Assistant] Now I guess your work on the Apollo command module and lunar module was kind of interrupted by your assignment to a crew, which I guess your first assignment was a backup on Gemini VIII, right?


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

[User] No, not really.

[Assistant] No?

[User] I think our inputs were the same. I—and I don’t mean to imply that everything we said was correct and everybody did what we wanted to do. Probably a lot of cases, they didn’t or couldn’t for a lot of reasons. One of them would be schedule. Cost. All of those things would have to be evaluated. And NASA had set up a very strict Change Control Board that made those evaluations, and a lot of our ideas were probably rejected. But no, I think most of the guys conducted themselves in a manner in which the suggestions they made were taken at face value.

[Assistant] Now I guess your work on the Apollo command module and lunar module was kind of interrupted by your assignment to a crew, which I guess your first assignment was a backup on Gemini VIII, right?

[User] That’s correct.

[Assistant] And so, that interrupted—


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

[User] I think our inputs were the same. I—and I don’t mean to imply that everything we said was correct and everybody did what we wanted to do. Probably a lot of cases, they didn’t or couldn’t for a lot of reasons. One of them would be schedule. Cost. All of those things would have to be evaluated. And NASA had set up a very strict Change Control Board that made those evaluations, and a lot of our ideas were probably rejected. But no, I think most of the guys conducted themselves in a manner in which the suggestions they made were taken at face value.

[Assistant] Now I guess your work on the Apollo command module and lunar module was kind of interrupted by your assignment to a crew, which I guess your first assignment was a backup on Gemini VIII, right?

[User] That’s correct.

[Assistant] And so, that interrupted—

[User] The best thing that ever happened to me.

[Assistant] So, you know, you’re training for that mission. What was the training like? I mean, what was your first reaction to going from this other job that you had to this active training? You’ve got a crewmate, etc.?


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

[User] That’s correct.

[Assistant] And so, that interrupted—

[User] The best thing that ever happened to me.

[Assistant] So, you know, you’re training for that mission. What was the training like? I mean, what was your first reaction to going from this other job that you had to this active training? You’ve got a crewmate, etc.?

[User] Well, first of all, your goal is to be assigned to a flight crew. Once you weren’t going to fly, the first step was to get assigned to a crew, a backup crew or whatever the case may be. So, I was actually elated to do that. Very pleased that I’d be working with Pete again as we were both the backup crew on Gemini VIII, backing up Neil Armstrong and Dave [David R.] Scott. It was my first involvement with the actual hardware, the Gemini vehicle and the things that we needed to train on to get ready for flight.

[Assistant] When you in terms of Gemini VIII, when they had the problem during flight and the spacecraft, you know, started this uncontrolled spin, you—I take it you were in Mission Control.


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

[User] The best thing that ever happened to me.

[Assistant] So, you know, you’re training for that mission. What was the training like? I mean, what was your first reaction to going from this other job that you had to this active training? You’ve got a crewmate, etc.?

[User] Well, first of all, your goal is to be assigned to a flight crew. Once you weren’t going to fly, the first step was to get assigned to a crew, a backup crew or whatever the case may be. So, I was actually elated to do that. Very pleased that I’d be working with Pete again as we were both the backup crew on Gemini VIII, backing up Neil Armstrong and Dave [David R.] Scott. It was my first involvement with the actual hardware, the Gemini vehicle and the things that we needed to train on to get ready for flight.

[Assistant] When you in terms of Gemini VIII, when they had the problem during flight and the spacecraft, you know, started this uncontrolled spin, you—I take it you were in Mission Control.

[User] Yes, I was.

[Assistant] What was your reaction to that? I mean, what role did you play?


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

[User] Well, first of all, your goal is to be assigned to a flight crew. Once you weren’t going to fly, the first step was to get assigned to a crew, a backup crew or whatever the case may be. So, I was actually elated to do that. Very pleased that I’d be working with Pete again as we were both the backup crew on Gemini VIII, backing up Neil Armstrong and Dave [David R.] Scott. It was my first involvement with the actual hardware, the Gemini vehicle and the things that we needed to train on to get ready for flight.

[Assistant] When you in terms of Gemini VIII, when they had the problem during flight and the spacecraft, you know, started this uncontrolled spin, you—I take it you were in Mission Control.

[User] Yes, I was.

[Assistant] What was your reaction to that? I mean, what role did you play?

[User] Well, it was very little because most of it was done outside of any information that NASA had. I think the first thing we probably heard was they got into trouble. But Neil activated and Dave activated the reentry control system without knowledge of Houston. They did that on their own to control the spacecraft. Once they did that, they were coming home. There wasn’t any question. There wasn’t any argument about it. It was part of the Mission Rules that once the reentry control system was activated, the mission was essentially over.

[Assistant] Do you remember the climate in Mission Control? I mean, was it fear? Was it—


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

[User] Yes, I was.

[Assistant] What was your reaction to that? I mean, what role did you play?

[User] Well, it was very little because most of it was done outside of any information that NASA had. I think the first thing we probably heard was they got into trouble. But Neil activated and Dave activated the reentry control system without knowledge of Houston. They did that on their own to control the spacecraft. Once they did that, they were coming home. There wasn’t any question. There wasn’t any argument about it. It was part of the Mission Rules that once the reentry control system was activated, the mission was essentially over.

[Assistant] Do you remember the climate in Mission Control? I mean, was it fear? Was it—

[User] No, I—there was a lot of the things went on without Mission Control’s knowledge because they were out of radio contact. And we heard—we knew that they had a problem. And the next thing we kind of discovered that they had to activate the reentry control system to recover.

[Assistant] So, you didn’t really know what they were going through until they came back and told—


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

[User] Well, it was very little because most of it was done outside of any information that NASA had. I think the first thing we probably heard was they got into trouble. But Neil activated and Dave activated the reentry control system without knowledge of Houston. They did that on their own to control the spacecraft. Once they did that, they were coming home. There wasn’t any question. There wasn’t any argument about it. It was part of the Mission Rules that once the reentry control system was activated, the mission was essentially over.

[Assistant] Do you remember the climate in Mission Control? I mean, was it fear? Was it—

[User] No, I—there was a lot of the things went on without Mission Control’s knowledge because they were out of radio contact. And we heard—we knew that they had a problem. And the next thing we kind of discovered that they had to activate the reentry control system to recover.

[Assistant] So, you didn’t really know what they were going through until they came back and told—

[User] Yes, that’s correct.

[Assistant] Do you think—I mean, you know, when you read it—


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

[User] No, I—there was a lot of the things went on without Mission Control’s knowledge because they were out of radio contact. And we heard—we knew that they had a problem. And the next thing we kind of discovered that they had to activate the reentry control system to recover.

[Assistant] So, you didn’t really know what they were going through until they came back and told—

[User] Yes, that’s correct.

[Assistant] Do you think—I mean, you know, when you read it—

[User] At least I should say that’s my recollection.

[Assistant] Right. It sounds like a harrowing experience for them. I mean, in that—


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

[User] Yes, that’s correct.

[Assistant] Do you think—I mean, you know, when you read it—

[User] At least I should say that’s my recollection.

[Assistant] Right. It sounds like a harrowing experience for them. I mean, in that—

[User] Probably was. The roll rates were becoming very, very excessive.

[Assistant] And from what I’ve read, it could cause blackout. And the fact—do you think the fact that Neil Armstrong was able to handle that emergency, I mean, just your opinion, played any role in him winding up being on Apollo 11?


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

[User] Probably was. The roll rates were becoming very, very excessive.

[Assistant] And from what I’ve read, it could cause blackout. And the fact—do you think the fact that Neil Armstrong was able to handle that emergency, I mean, just your opinion, played any role in him winding up being on Apollo 11?

[User] None whatsoever. That whole decision was arbitrary.

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] It was not a conscious decision that they were, in fact, going to be the first crew. That was the way the way the dice were rolled, and the crew assignments were made. And Deke [Donald K. Slayton] had a system where you essentially rotated every three flights. And that’s the way the cookie crumbled.

[Assistant] And when you say “rotated,” you mean you were the backup crew and then three flights later—


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

[User] It was not a conscious decision that they were, in fact, going to be the first crew. That was the way the way the dice were rolled, and the crew assignments were made. And Deke [Donald K. Slayton] had a system where you essentially rotated every three flights. And that’s the way the cookie crumbled.

[Assistant] And when you say “rotated,” you mean you were the backup crew and then three flights later—

[User] The prime, backup, prime if you stayed on that crew. And in my case, that’s exactly the way it happened. Backup on [Gemini] VIII, prime on Gemini XI, backup on Apollo 9, prime on [Apollo] 12. Backup on Apollo 15.

[Assistant] Okay.

[User] We had no Apollo 18.

[Assistant] We’re going to get to that. I’m saving that. I know you have some feelings about that. So, you go to prime. You go from backup on VIII to being prime on XI. And you’re training for this EVA [extravehicular activity], and people had already had problems with EVA. Take—you know, forget about what happened on your EVA because we’re going to talk about that. But I don’t want you to have that perspective. I don’t want you to think about the problems when you talk about the training. And what was your training like in terms of factoring in previous astronauts’ experience, and, you know, how did you prepare?


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

[User] We had no Apollo 18.

[Assistant] We’re going to get to that. I’m saving that. I know you have some feelings about that. So, you go to prime. You go from backup on VIII to being prime on XI. And you’re training for this EVA [extravehicular activity], and people had already had problems with EVA. Take—you know, forget about what happened on your EVA because we’re going to talk about that. But I don’t want you to have that perspective. I don’t want you to think about the problems when you talk about the training. And what was your training like in terms of factoring in previous astronauts’ experience, and, you know, how did you prepare?

[User] Number one: I don’t think we did a very good job of previous astronaut experiences with EVA. I didn’t learn about some of their problem until well after books were written—

[Assistant] Really?

[User] —to be perfectly frank about it. And I guess there’s probably a logical reason for that. We didn’t have enough time really to assimilate the information or we didn’t grasp the significance of the information that was being brought back. Now, remember: we were on 2-month launch centers. It was almost like just passing each other to and from the pad. And there wasn’t a great deal of opportunity to assimilate the information from previous flights. So, I don’t think we did a very good job of transmitting to each other the things that were happening. And in the training for XI, I certainly didn’t anticipate any problems with the EVA. As a matter of fact, the training we did was basically in a zero-g airplane.

[Assistant] You don’t remember any discussion about handholds, footholds, any—


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

[User] —to be perfectly frank about it. And I guess there’s probably a logical reason for that. We didn’t have enough time really to assimilate the information or we didn’t grasp the significance of the information that was being brought back. Now, remember: we were on 2-month launch centers. It was almost like just passing each other to and from the pad. And there wasn’t a great deal of opportunity to assimilate the information from previous flights. So, I don’t think we did a very good job of transmitting to each other the things that were happening. And in the training for XI, I certainly didn’t anticipate any problems with the EVA. As a matter of fact, the training we did was basically in a zero-g airplane.

[Assistant] You don’t remember any discussion about handholds, footholds, any—

[User] Nope. We didn’t have any.

[Assistant] Right.

[User] If there had been discussions about that, we would have probably thought about it and said, “Hey, maybe we should supply some of these things.” As a matter of fact, it wasn’t until I read Gene Cernan’s book that I realized the problems he had handling an umbilical and free-floating outside the vehicle. I was totally aware of the problems he had of his face plate fogging over and everything in the night side pass when he was in fact back in the adapter section. And I didn’t realize Mike [Michael Collins] had all the difficulties he had on Gemini X, when he was free-floating over to the Agena spacecraft from VIII to get an emulsion package off of it. I didn’t realize at the time, if I knew it, it didn’t—I mean, it didn’t sink in.

[Assistant] And it didn’t lead to changes in your training as a result of things.


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

[User] Nope. We didn’t have any.

[Assistant] Right.

[User] If there had been discussions about that, we would have probably thought about it and said, “Hey, maybe we should supply some of these things.” As a matter of fact, it wasn’t until I read Gene Cernan’s book that I realized the problems he had handling an umbilical and free-floating outside the vehicle. I was totally aware of the problems he had of his face plate fogging over and everything in the night side pass when he was in fact back in the adapter section. And I didn’t realize Mike [Michael Collins] had all the difficulties he had on Gemini X, when he was free-floating over to the Agena spacecraft from VIII to get an emulsion package off of it. I didn’t realize at the time, if I knew it, it didn’t—I mean, it didn’t sink in.

[Assistant] And it didn’t lead to changes in your training as a result of things.

[User] No. No, it sure didn’t.

[Assistant] Hmm. Very interesting. There wasn’t any even discussion about, like, tethering yourself to, like, tie you down a little bit more to the spacecraft? Nothing like that.


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

[User] If there had been discussions about that, we would have probably thought about it and said, “Hey, maybe we should supply some of these things.” As a matter of fact, it wasn’t until I read Gene Cernan’s book that I realized the problems he had handling an umbilical and free-floating outside the vehicle. I was totally aware of the problems he had of his face plate fogging over and everything in the night side pass when he was in fact back in the adapter section. And I didn’t realize Mike [Michael Collins] had all the difficulties he had on Gemini X, when he was free-floating over to the Agena spacecraft from VIII to get an emulsion package off of it. I didn’t realize at the time, if I knew it, it didn’t—I mean, it didn’t sink in.

[Assistant] And it didn’t lead to changes in your training as a result of things.

[User] No. No, it sure didn’t.

[Assistant] Hmm. Very interesting. There wasn’t any even discussion about, like, tethering yourself to, like, tie you down a little bit more to the spacecraft? Nothing like that.

[User] No. No. If we had tethers and had handrails and handholds, the task would’ve been easier. Except I had a problem with my EVA before I ever got out of the spacecraft.

[Assistant] I take it that when you and Pete Conrad were training for Gemini XI, you spent a lot of time at the Cape and Cocoa Beach [Florida]. I just want you to kind of give us a sense of what that was like, I mean, in terms of the extracurricular activities and the—just what that area was like in terms of being at this place where everyone has this purpose of—you know, it’s basically a place created with this one space goal. And it kind of, you know, has this reputation; it’s like a wild, wild west town or something.


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

[User] No. No, it sure didn’t.

[Assistant] Hmm. Very interesting. There wasn’t any even discussion about, like, tethering yourself to, like, tie you down a little bit more to the spacecraft? Nothing like that.

[User] No. No. If we had tethers and had handrails and handholds, the task would’ve been easier. Except I had a problem with my EVA before I ever got out of the spacecraft.

[Assistant] I take it that when you and Pete Conrad were training for Gemini XI, you spent a lot of time at the Cape and Cocoa Beach [Florida]. I just want you to kind of give us a sense of what that was like, I mean, in terms of the extracurricular activities and the—just what that area was like in terms of being at this place where everyone has this purpose of—you know, it’s basically a place created with this one space goal. And it kind of, you know, has this reputation; it’s like a wild, wild west town or something.

[User] Well, I was going to say it was a frontier town, wasn’t it?

[Assistant] Like, in a way, it was.


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

[User] No. No. If we had tethers and had handrails and handholds, the task would’ve been easier. Except I had a problem with my EVA before I ever got out of the spacecraft.

[Assistant] I take it that when you and Pete Conrad were training for Gemini XI, you spent a lot of time at the Cape and Cocoa Beach [Florida]. I just want you to kind of give us a sense of what that was like, I mean, in terms of the extracurricular activities and the—just what that area was like in terms of being at this place where everyone has this purpose of—you know, it’s basically a place created with this one space goal. And it kind of, you know, has this reputation; it’s like a wild, wild west town or something.

[User] Well, I was going to say it was a frontier town, wasn’t it?

[Assistant] Like, in a way, it was.

[User] In a way, yes, it was. It was a concentration. It was a very, very—two attitudes. It was a very tense environment, because of the work and the pressures of work. And it was a relaxing place to be as well.

[Assistant] Was it a party town?


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

[User] Well, I was going to say it was a frontier town, wasn’t it?

[Assistant] Like, in a way, it was.

[User] In a way, yes, it was. It was a concentration. It was a very, very—two attitudes. It was a very tense environment, because of the work and the pressures of work. And it was a relaxing place to be as well.

[Assistant] Was it a party town?

[User] Yeah, you might say that if you wanted to. There was parties you could participate in. We made a lot of friends at the Cape, and we still have a lot of friends there that we still communicate. They’d have us to their homes and they’d throw parties. We were normal human beings, and we played hard and worked hard.

[Assistant] Was there this sense of just what it was that you guys were going to do? I mean, at the time you are really putting your lives on the line in a way. I mean, you know, you look at the early rocket launches and, you know, primarily before Mercury and—


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

[User] In a way, yes, it was. It was a concentration. It was a very, very—two attitudes. It was a very tense environment, because of the work and the pressures of work. And it was a relaxing place to be as well.

[Assistant] Was it a party town?

[User] Yeah, you might say that if you wanted to. There was parties you could participate in. We made a lot of friends at the Cape, and we still have a lot of friends there that we still communicate. They’d have us to their homes and they’d throw parties. We were normal human beings, and we played hard and worked hard.

[Assistant] Was there this sense of just what it was that you guys were going to do? I mean, at the time you are really putting your lives on the line in a way. I mean, you know, you look at the early rocket launches and, you know, primarily before Mercury and—

[User] You mean, when things were blowing up?

[Assistant] Yes! I mean, was there that sense of, you know, “Wow! These guys are, you know, really something special.” Or—


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

[User] Yeah, you might say that if you wanted to. There was parties you could participate in. We made a lot of friends at the Cape, and we still have a lot of friends there that we still communicate. They’d have us to their homes and they’d throw parties. We were normal human beings, and we played hard and worked hard.

[Assistant] Was there this sense of just what it was that you guys were going to do? I mean, at the time you are really putting your lives on the line in a way. I mean, you know, you look at the early rocket launches and, you know, primarily before Mercury and—

[User] You mean, when things were blowing up?

[Assistant] Yes! I mean, was there that sense of, you know, “Wow! These guys are, you know, really something special.” Or—

[User] I don’t think we felt that way. You know, I mentioned before that that was a risk of our occupation. We were involved in those kind of things. And we had so much confidence in ourselves and each other and the people that were involved in the program that, you know, we wouldn’t have gone if we thought we weren’t going to come back. I mean, that’s idiocy! And I think, those—what people thought outside the program, I have no idea really what they thought about. But yeah, we were in a very unique position in those kind of terms.

[Assistant] The—your first launch, you know, just describe what it was like to finally, like, launch.


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

[User] You mean, when things were blowing up?

[Assistant] Yes! I mean, was there that sense of, you know, “Wow! These guys are, you know, really something special.” Or—

[User] I don’t think we felt that way. You know, I mentioned before that that was a risk of our occupation. We were involved in those kind of things. And we had so much confidence in ourselves and each other and the people that were involved in the program that, you know, we wouldn’t have gone if we thought we weren’t going to come back. I mean, that’s idiocy! And I think, those—what people thought outside the program, I have no idea really what they thought about. But yeah, we were in a very unique position in those kind of terms.

[Assistant] The—your first launch, you know, just describe what it was like to finally, like, launch.

[User] Well, we had made several attempts to launch in Gemini XI. I think it may have been the third one, and our backup crew—Neil Armstrong and Bill [William A.] Anders—said this was our last chance. They were going to go next! And I think we were on, this was the third attempt that we had a launch on XI. I guess the real reality of those things, you’ve been trained for so long and so well that you’re really anxious to go. I mean, you know, “Let’s get the show on the road!”\n\n And in reality, when the show does hit the road it’s a lot easier than the training cycle, as far as those missions are. So, it’s kind of a release that you’re finally going to get to go. The adrenaline’s flowing. Sure you’re excited. It’s a great adventure, one that you’ve not experienced before. Other people have and they try to relate that to you a little bit, so you have a sense of what’s going to happen. But it’s all brand new!

[Assistant] What was it like to have that experience of being the first one to try to dock with the Agena after just one orbit?


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

[User] If he hadn’t let me do that, I’d have thrown him out of the spacecraft!

[Assistant] So, you knew he was going to let you. Or was it on that mission manifest?

[User] I don’t even recall whether it was or wasn’t. But I—in reflection, I fully anticipated I was going to get to do that. And I think—well, I practiced it. So, it must’ve been somewhere along in there—

[Assistant] Okay.

[User] —but I—he did several dockings, and I did a couple. More than one for sure. And just my first sense of flying a vehicle.

[Assistant] Did you find that the experience of docking—I mean, obviously docking with the Agena, as you said, it was kind of a pathfinder for Apollo, for docking the command module with the LM [lunar module]. But did you find when you actually did that as a command module pilot in Apollo that there was a sense of familiarity? I mean, did it really help train you for what was to come?


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

[User] I don’t even recall whether it was or wasn’t. But I—in reflection, I fully anticipated I was going to get to do that. And I think—well, I practiced it. So, it must’ve been somewhere along in there—

[Assistant] Okay.

[User] —but I—he did several dockings, and I did a couple. More than one for sure. And just my first sense of flying a vehicle.

[Assistant] Did you find that the experience of docking—I mean, obviously docking with the Agena, as you said, it was kind of a pathfinder for Apollo, for docking the command module with the LM [lunar module]. But did you find when you actually did that as a command module pilot in Apollo that there was a sense of familiarity? I mean, did it really help train you for what was to come?

[User] Oh sure. I think it gives you a sense that there’s no perturbation. It’s very smooth. It’s very easily controlled. You make small inputs. It’s a very precise maneuver. Not difficult at all. And I think you have those sense and—well, you align the vehicles, even though they were different way to do that; we had a docking target in Apollo. We didn’t have that in Gemini, and we had docked with the Agena barely in a visual reference. But you get the nose of the Gemini about that far away [gestures] from the Agena and you can stop and just sit there and look at it. There’s no wind or no perturbations; nothing’s moving the spacecraft around. When it moves, you made it move.

[Assistant] So, you’re docked with this and you’re doing your experiments. And then it comes time for your spacewalk. Walk us through the—you know, the spacewalk experience and when you started realizing you were having trouble and what it was like. What that—what do we mean by trouble?


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

[User] No. Because we weren’t ready for that kind of activity.

[Assistant] You didn’t have the foot restraints and the handholds.

[User] Not only the foot restraints. But we weren’t—you know, it wasn’t until Bruce McCandless finally went in the Shuttle Program, many, many years later, that we were successful in doing that.

[Assistant] Do you—did you know—

[User] I think we might’ve been in serious trouble if we had have gotten the backpacks on.

[Assistant] Really. But it—just the equipment wouldn’t have worked?


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

[User] Not only the foot restraints. But we weren’t—you know, it wasn’t until Bruce McCandless finally went in the Shuttle Program, many, many years later, that we were successful in doing that.

[Assistant] Do you—did you know—

[User] I think we might’ve been in serious trouble if we had have gotten the backpacks on.

[Assistant] Really. But it—just the equipment wouldn’t have worked?

[User] No, it probably worked. It would just—the manner in which zero-g and the laws of physics operate in space just as they do everywhere else in the universe. I think we could’ve had some real problems.

[Assistant]
Now— [Recorder turned off.]

Okay. We were talking about the spacewalk and how we got into, to put it mildly, trouble. I’m curious. I mean, I’ve read and I’m sure you know, since you’re such good friends with Pete Conrad, that he has said that it was the scariest experience he ever had. And I mean, you know, we’re going to talk about Apollo 12 later. You all had a scare on Apollo 12. So, for him to say that his concern for you and your condition during that spacewalk was the scariest thing. And you know Pete. I don’t think you all scare easily. And I mean, what do you think about that?


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

[User] I think we might’ve been in serious trouble if we had have gotten the backpacks on.

[Assistant] Really. But it—just the equipment wouldn’t have worked?

[User] No, it probably worked. It would just—the manner in which zero-g and the laws of physics operate in space just as they do everywhere else in the universe. I think we could’ve had some real problems.

[Assistant]
Now— [Recorder turned off.]

Okay. We were talking about the spacewalk and how we got into, to put it mildly, trouble. I’m curious. I mean, I’ve read and I’m sure you know, since you’re such good friends with Pete Conrad, that he has said that it was the scariest experience he ever had. And I mean, you know, we’re going to talk about Apollo 12 later. You all had a scare on Apollo 12. So, for him to say that his concern for you and your condition during that spacewalk was the scariest thing. And you know Pete. I don’t think you all scare easily. And I mean, what do you think about that?

[User] I hadn’t thought about it really. I’ve heard him make that comment; I heard that comment being made. And I think he knew the extremis, the situation that I was in, because he could hear the frustration, the voice, the breathing. If you go back and listen to those tapes, it scares me just to hear them! And I don’t know. I appreciate his concern. I think his concern if something happened to any of us on an EVA, if we had died or expired, we were an object in—we were a satellite in space, because he was coming back without us.

[Assistant] He was going to have to cut you loose.


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

[User] No, it probably worked. It would just—the manner in which zero-g and the laws of physics operate in space just as they do everywhere else in the universe. I think we could’ve had some real problems.

[Assistant]
Now— [Recorder turned off.]

Okay. We were talking about the spacewalk and how we got into, to put it mildly, trouble. I’m curious. I mean, I’ve read and I’m sure you know, since you’re such good friends with Pete Conrad, that he has said that it was the scariest experience he ever had. And I mean, you know, we’re going to talk about Apollo 12 later. You all had a scare on Apollo 12. So, for him to say that his concern for you and your condition during that spacewalk was the scariest thing. And you know Pete. I don’t think you all scare easily. And I mean, what do you think about that?

[User] I hadn’t thought about it really. I’ve heard him make that comment; I heard that comment being made. And I think he knew the extremis, the situation that I was in, because he could hear the frustration, the voice, the breathing. If you go back and listen to those tapes, it scares me just to hear them! And I don’t know. I appreciate his concern. I think his concern if something happened to any of us on an EVA, if we had died or expired, we were an object in—we were a satellite in space, because he was coming back without us.

[Assistant] He was going to have to cut you loose.

[User] Absolutely. And we knew that going in. It was accepted, and I think he was—he probably was starting to have that concern. But once I got back to the hatch and stood there and rested a while—I just wanted to stop and catch my breath, which I did—I wanted to continue the EVA. But smarter people prevailed, and we ended the EVA right about that time.

[Assistant] Well, who made the decision? In—


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

[User] I hadn’t thought about it really. I’ve heard him make that comment; I heard that comment being made. And I think he knew the extremis, the situation that I was in, because he could hear the frustration, the voice, the breathing. If you go back and listen to those tapes, it scares me just to hear them! And I don’t know. I appreciate his concern. I think his concern if something happened to any of us on an EVA, if we had died or expired, we were an object in—we were a satellite in space, because he was coming back without us.

[Assistant] He was going to have to cut you loose.

[User] Absolutely. And we knew that going in. It was accepted, and I think he was—he probably was starting to have that concern. But once I got back to the hatch and stood there and rested a while—I just wanted to stop and catch my breath, which I did—I wanted to continue the EVA. But smarter people prevailed, and we ended the EVA right about that time.

[Assistant] Well, who made the decision? In—

[User] The ground.

[Assistant] The ground made the decision. I mean, you agreed with it? Do—you and Pete didn’t argue?


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

[User] Absolutely. And we knew that going in. It was accepted, and I think he was—he probably was starting to have that concern. But once I got back to the hatch and stood there and rested a while—I just wanted to stop and catch my breath, which I did—I wanted to continue the EVA. But smarter people prevailed, and we ended the EVA right about that time.

[Assistant] Well, who made the decision? In—

[User] The ground.

[Assistant] The ground made the decision. I mean, you agreed with it? Do—you and Pete didn’t argue?

[User] I was not in any position to argue about it.

[Assistant] Was the EVA only, what? about half an hour long or—


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

[User] The ground.

[Assistant] The ground made the decision. I mean, you agreed with it? Do—you and Pete didn’t argue?

[User] I was not in any position to argue about it.

[Assistant] Was the EVA only, what? about half an hour long or—

[User] It was 45 minutes. Something. I forget what.

[Assistant] How long did it seem to you? Longer?


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

[User] I was not in any position to argue about it.

[Assistant] Was the EVA only, what? about half an hour long or—

[User] It was 45 minutes. Something. I forget what.

[Assistant] How long did it seem to you? Longer?

[User] 10 minutes.

[Assistant] Really? So, it seemed—


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

[User] It was 45 minutes. Something. I forget what.

[Assistant] How long did it seem to you? Longer?

[User] 10 minutes.

[Assistant] Really? So, it seemed—

[User] Yeah. It went very fast. It went very fast.

[Assistant] Was it frustrating to you? I mean, do you remember what—I mean, you’ve said you’re somebody who—


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

[User] 10 minutes.

[Assistant] Really? So, it seemed—

[User] Yeah. It went very fast. It went very fast.

[Assistant] Was it frustrating to you? I mean, do you remember what—I mean, you’ve said you’re somebody who—

[User] It was at the time. It was frustrating because it was a failure and we don’t like those things, even though our failures are our best teachers. And I think, you know, we learn more from failures and taking risks and saying, “Okay, you’re going to fail if you take risks.” And we learn from those. We learn how to overcome them. If we were successful all the time, we haven’t learned very much because it implies that we already knew how to do it.

[Assistant] Well, and really if you had found a way to make that work, you know, like wedging yourself in things that aren’t even designed to be footholds, in a way you could’ve just perpetuated what you admit was a pretty dangerous situation.


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

[User] Could have been, yes. And you’re right. If we had taken a step back and provided the tools, which we do today, and we later learned how to do it, and actually that failure in XI and the failures from IX and X and XI or the difficulties, let me put it that way, I don’t want to say “I can fail,” but I don’t want to say anybody else failed. But if we had taken those experiences and learned from them, we’d have gone into the water facility sooner.\n\n It was after Gemini XI that Bob [Dr. Robert R.] Gilruth came up with, you know, “We’re not getting the picture on this EVA. Timelines and everything else.” So, he came up with the idea of utilizing the WIF [Water Immersion Facility] to practice those timelines. And if you don’t swim against the water because of it’s viscosity you can replicate pretty well the feeling of zero g. It’s not precise, but it’s the closest thing we have on Earth that can give us that experience. So, after XI they started doing that.

[Assistant] Did you, you know, spacewalk—I mean, the watching from the ground. You know, we had that image of, you know, that Ed [Edward H.] White [II] image; and it just—you think, “Oh, to be in his position!” You know. “To be out there. To be this human satellite, and have the chance to look around and—” Did you miss out on that? I mean, did you have any sense of awe?

[User] Oh I had a chance—oh no. I looked around. I had a chance to do that. It would’ve been great just to be on a short tether and float around out there with nothing to do. But, you know, you try to utilize these environments to do work. And I look at those pictures, too, and I say, “Man, I wish I had that opportunity to do that!”

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] But, you know, you do what you’re supposed to do.

[Assistant] Did you have, though, any sense of enjoyment? Or did you—


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

[User] Oh I had a chance—oh no. I looked around. I had a chance to do that. It would’ve been great just to be on a short tether and float around out there with nothing to do. But, you know, you try to utilize these environments to do work. And I look at those pictures, too, and I say, “Man, I wish I had that opportunity to do that!”

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] But, you know, you do what you’re supposed to do.

[Assistant] Did you have, though, any sense of enjoyment? Or did you—

[User] Oh sure. Once you open that hatch and you have this great panorama of the Earth, you’re outside the vehicle. You’re looking through your faceplate, instead of a little small window in Gemini, and you have a totally different perspective. You have a real panorama out there in front of you. And it’s—the word today I guess would be “awesome.”

[Assistant] You had your second EVA, which I take it was, you know, going to be positioned at getting the spacecraft into these positions to do this gravity gradient experiment and to simulate gravity. I mean, what was the goal of that?


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

[User] But, you know, you do what you’re supposed to do.

[Assistant] Did you have, though, any sense of enjoyment? Or did you—

[User] Oh sure. Once you open that hatch and you have this great panorama of the Earth, you’re outside the vehicle. You’re looking through your faceplate, instead of a little small window in Gemini, and you have a totally different perspective. You have a real panorama out there in front of you. And it’s—the word today I guess would be “awesome.”

[Assistant] You had your second EVA, which I take it was, you know, going to be positioned at getting the spacecraft into these positions to do this gravity gradient experiment and to simulate gravity. I mean, what was the goal of that?

[User] That was later on. That’s where—

[Assistant] Oh, I don’t mean during your EVA. That was—you all were just doing that.


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

[User] Oh sure. Once you open that hatch and you have this great panorama of the Earth, you’re outside the vehicle. You’re looking through your faceplate, instead of a little small window in Gemini, and you have a totally different perspective. You have a real panorama out there in front of you. And it’s—the word today I guess would be “awesome.”

[Assistant] You had your second EVA, which I take it was, you know, going to be positioned at getting the spacecraft into these positions to do this gravity gradient experiment and to simulate gravity. I mean, what was the goal of that?

[User] That was later on. That’s where—

[Assistant] Oh, I don’t mean during your EVA. That was—you all were just doing that.

[User] Yeah, well. The second EVA was a real pleasure actually.

[Assistant] Well, you were just taking, quote, “pictures.”


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

[User] That was later on. That’s where—

[Assistant] Oh, I don’t mean during your EVA. That was—you all were just doing that.

[User] Yeah, well. The second EVA was a real pleasure actually.

[Assistant] Well, you were just taking, quote, “pictures.”

[User] UV [ultraviolet] pictures of what they call “empty space” or “black voids.” Trying to figure out if they’re black holes or stars there. And Karl Henize, actually, who later became an astronaut, was the principal investigator on that experiment. And this was a very relaxing EVA. We finally sorted out our problem, and we were just being tethered very closely to the spacecraft, standing in the hatch. Immediate—

[Assistant] So, you just opened the hatch and stand—


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

[User] Yeah, well. The second EVA was a real pleasure actually.

[Assistant] Well, you were just taking, quote, “pictures.”

[User] UV [ultraviolet] pictures of what they call “empty space” or “black voids.” Trying to figure out if they’re black holes or stars there. And Karl Henize, actually, who later became an astronaut, was the principal investigator on that experiment. And this was a very relaxing EVA. We finally sorted out our problem, and we were just being tethered very closely to the spacecraft, standing in the hatch. Immediate—

[Assistant] So, you just opened the hatch and stand—

[User] Stand in the seat.

[Assistant] You stand in a seat—


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

[User] UV [ultraviolet] pictures of what they call “empty space” or “black voids.” Trying to figure out if they’re black holes or stars there. And Karl Henize, actually, who later became an astronaut, was the principal investigator on that experiment. And this was a very relaxing EVA. We finally sorted out our problem, and we were just being tethered very closely to the spacecraft, standing in the hatch. Immediate—

[Assistant] So, you just opened the hatch and stand—

[User] Stand in the seat.

[Assistant] You stand in a seat—

[User] Uh-hmm.

[Assistant] —and just, what? point—how much of you is out of the hatch?


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

[User] Stand in the seat.

[Assistant] You stand in a seat—

[User] Uh-hmm.

[Assistant] —and just, what? point—how much of you is out of the hatch?

[User] Oh, from the waist up. From the thighs up maybe.

[Assistant] And I’ve read that you fell asleep. Is that a true story?


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

[User] Uh-hmm.

[Assistant] —and just, what? point—how much of you is out of the hatch?

[User] Oh, from the waist up. From the thighs up maybe.

[Assistant] And I’ve read that you fell asleep. Is that a true story?

[User] True story.

[Assistant] How do you fall asleep during a—


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

[User] Oh, from the waist up. From the thighs up maybe.

[Assistant] And I’ve read that you fell asleep. Is that a true story?

[User] True story.

[Assistant] How do you fall asleep during a—

[User] Well, you get comfortable and you get that warm, fuzzy feeling, and you fall asleep. The activities of that experiment, the UV had to be done, ultraviolet experiments, the camera had to be done at nighttime during darkness. So, we were setting up and I was trying to tell Pete where to point the spacecraft. His window was bad. And so, we were trying to coordinate where we’d point the spacecraft so the camera, which was fixed in a bracket outside the spacecraft, would be pointed in the right direction. And when the night side pass was over, we had nothing to do.\n\n So, I was leaning up on the spacecraft, kind of put my head down on the vehicle, and I got warm and comfortable, dozed off. And surprisingly enough, when we came across the Cape and somebody started to talk to us we both went “Hunh?” He had fallen asleep inside at the same time I’d fallen asleep hanging outside the spacecraft.

[Assistant] That’s amazing. So, your second EVA—uneventful. You achieved the—


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

[User] True story.

[Assistant] How do you fall asleep during a—

[User] Well, you get comfortable and you get that warm, fuzzy feeling, and you fall asleep. The activities of that experiment, the UV had to be done, ultraviolet experiments, the camera had to be done at nighttime during darkness. So, we were setting up and I was trying to tell Pete where to point the spacecraft. His window was bad. And so, we were trying to coordinate where we’d point the spacecraft so the camera, which was fixed in a bracket outside the spacecraft, would be pointed in the right direction. And when the night side pass was over, we had nothing to do.\n\n So, I was leaning up on the spacecraft, kind of put my head down on the vehicle, and I got warm and comfortable, dozed off. And surprisingly enough, when we came across the Cape and somebody started to talk to us we both went “Hunh?” He had fallen asleep inside at the same time I’d fallen asleep hanging outside the spacecraft.

[Assistant] That’s amazing. So, your second EVA—uneventful. You achieved the—

[User] Yes. And Bob Gilruth came back and asked a question later, if it was an acclimation problem that was the first EVA. It may very well have been. At the time, I didn’t think so; but if I’d have had the opportunity to start fresh again—without the problem with the helmet, without getting behind the power curve—we might’ve had a little more success with the EVA and been able to accomplish a little more. But I don’t think it, in reality, it made a great deal of difference. There would’ve been an acclimation by doing the stand-up EVA first and then doing the rest of it, attaching the tether so we—the follow-on experiment could be made. But that’s the way it was.

[Assistant] Well, then you had this experiment to do after the EVAs were over, this gravity gradient experiment. And I guess it was like kind of rotating them around the center of mass and—


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

[User] We knew it. There was no question about it. We rotated very slowly at first; and then Dr. Gilruth wanted us to increase the rate of rotation, which we did for the second orbit. But we knew we could feel the gravity. It was very, very low. But you could feel it. You could sense it. And you could observe it.

[Assistant] How?

[User] Put a pencil in front of you and let go of it.

[Assistant] And it would—

[User] Instead of staying right there, it would float right back to us. So, you knew right then and there that you were creating artificial gravity.

[Assistant] Now were these experiments that you were doing to learn something for the future? I mean, give us a sense of what it was that you think that these things were designed to do. And, you know, they still do tether experiments with the Space Shuttle.


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

[User] Put a pencil in front of you and let go of it.

[Assistant] And it would—

[User] Instead of staying right there, it would float right back to us. So, you knew right then and there that you were creating artificial gravity.

[Assistant] Now were these experiments that you were doing to learn something for the future? I mean, give us a sense of what it was that you think that these things were designed to do. And, you know, they still do tether experiments with the Space Shuttle.

[User] I know. And that’s basically what that whole thing is all about. They do tether experiments with the Orbiter—with the Shuttle—and that’s the basis for doing these things is to learn. But we haven’t been successful with the tether yet! But it’ll work. And it’s—Space Station will probably involve itself with some of those things.

[Assistant] Did you—when you came back and if there was any kind of debriefing, do you have a sense of what it was that was learned from the experiments that you were all were able to do? Even if it’s just, “This didn’t work for this reason” or “This worked, but here’s how we can make it work better.” I mean, did you get a sense—was there a follow up to let you know that, you know, sitting there today, “Here’s what they learned from what we did.”


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

[User] Instead of staying right there, it would float right back to us. So, you knew right then and there that you were creating artificial gravity.

[Assistant] Now were these experiments that you were doing to learn something for the future? I mean, give us a sense of what it was that you think that these things were designed to do. And, you know, they still do tether experiments with the Space Shuttle.

[User] I know. And that’s basically what that whole thing is all about. They do tether experiments with the Orbiter—with the Shuttle—and that’s the basis for doing these things is to learn. But we haven’t been successful with the tether yet! But it’ll work. And it’s—Space Station will probably involve itself with some of those things.

[Assistant] Did you—when you came back and if there was any kind of debriefing, do you have a sense of what it was that was learned from the experiments that you were all were able to do? Even if it’s just, “This didn’t work for this reason” or “This worked, but here’s how we can make it work better.” I mean, did you get a sense—was there a follow up to let you know that, you know, sitting there today, “Here’s what they learned from what we did.”

[User] Oh, there were reports written about the experiments and the things we did. Whether or not we paid any attention to them or whether I paid any attention to them was probably lost in moving beyond Gemini and moving right into Apollo.

[Assistant] Well, let’s talk about Apollo. That’s a good segue. I guess you’re training first as a backup on Apollo 9 and your crewmates are Pete Conrad and C. C. [Clifton C.] Williams [Jr.]. How soon after you’re named to this crew does C. C. Williams die in a plane crash?


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

[User] I know. And that’s basically what that whole thing is all about. They do tether experiments with the Orbiter—with the Shuttle—and that’s the basis for doing these things is to learn. But we haven’t been successful with the tether yet! But it’ll work. And it’s—Space Station will probably involve itself with some of those things.

[Assistant] Did you—when you came back and if there was any kind of debriefing, do you have a sense of what it was that was learned from the experiments that you were all were able to do? Even if it’s just, “This didn’t work for this reason” or “This worked, but here’s how we can make it work better.” I mean, did you get a sense—was there a follow up to let you know that, you know, sitting there today, “Here’s what they learned from what we did.”

[User] Oh, there were reports written about the experiments and the things we did. Whether or not we paid any attention to them or whether I paid any attention to them was probably lost in moving beyond Gemini and moving right into Apollo.

[Assistant] Well, let’s talk about Apollo. That’s a good segue. I guess you’re training first as a backup on Apollo 9 and your crewmates are Pete Conrad and C. C. [Clifton C.] Williams [Jr.]. How soon after you’re named to this crew does C. C. Williams die in a plane crash?

[User] Very soon. I don’t recall the exact dates about that, but it was very, very shortly after we were assigned as a crew. I don’t recall the opportunity to work together for any length of time. Pete may have done more with C. C., because he, C. C., was a lunar module pilot, than I may have at the time as a command module pilot. But I don’t remember any training that we conducted as a crew. Now we may have. I just don’t recall.

[Assistant] So then, was there any thought of just you moving over to lunar module pilot? Or, I mean, you know, when—


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

[User] Oh, there were reports written about the experiments and the things we did. Whether or not we paid any attention to them or whether I paid any attention to them was probably lost in moving beyond Gemini and moving right into Apollo.

[Assistant] Well, let’s talk about Apollo. That’s a good segue. I guess you’re training first as a backup on Apollo 9 and your crewmates are Pete Conrad and C. C. [Clifton C.] Williams [Jr.]. How soon after you’re named to this crew does C. C. Williams die in a plane crash?

[User] Very soon. I don’t recall the exact dates about that, but it was very, very shortly after we were assigned as a crew. I don’t recall the opportunity to work together for any length of time. Pete may have done more with C. C., because he, C. C., was a lunar module pilot, than I may have at the time as a command module pilot. But I don’t remember any training that we conducted as a crew. Now we may have. I just don’t recall.

[Assistant] So then, was there any thought of just you moving over to lunar module pilot? Or, I mean, you know, when—

[User] No.

[Assistant] I don’t know that you all get to pick what positions you have. But how do you wind up the command module—


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

[User] Very soon. I don’t recall the exact dates about that, but it was very, very shortly after we were assigned as a crew. I don’t recall the opportunity to work together for any length of time. Pete may have done more with C. C., because he, C. C., was a lunar module pilot, than I may have at the time as a command module pilot. But I don’t remember any training that we conducted as a crew. Now we may have. I just don’t recall.

[Assistant] So then, was there any thought of just you moving over to lunar module pilot? Or, I mean, you know, when—

[User] No.

[Assistant] I don’t know that you all get to pick what positions you have. But how do you wind up the command module—

[User] No, we don’t get to pick what positions we want!

[Assistant] So, Deke Slayton tells you, “You’re on this crew as command module pilot.”


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

[User] No, we don’t get to pick what positions we want!

[Assistant] So, Deke Slayton tells you, “You’re on this crew as command module pilot.”

[User] You got it. You’re absolutely right. And what his rationale at that time was that two people are going to go down to the Moon; there was going to be one person left in the command module. His criteria at that time, till we gained more experienced, was that person that was left behind in the command module by himself must have flown in space.

[Assistant] Okay.

[User] That was the ground rules at the time. So, there was no ifs, ands, or buts about it. I was the command module pilot and that was it. The same occurred with Apollo 9, 10, 11, 12. All those command module pilots had previous flight experience.

[Assistant] But after that, that wasn’t necessarily a requirement.


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

[User] You got it. You’re absolutely right. And what his rationale at that time was that two people are going to go down to the Moon; there was going to be one person left in the command module. His criteria at that time, till we gained more experienced, was that person that was left behind in the command module by himself must have flown in space.

[Assistant] Okay.

[User] That was the ground rules at the time. So, there was no ifs, ands, or buts about it. I was the command module pilot and that was it. The same occurred with Apollo 9, 10, 11, 12. All those command module pilots had previous flight experience.

[Assistant] But after that, that wasn’t necessarily a requirement.

[User] That’s correct. As a matter of fact, on 13 we showed, I guess, that it was not as difficult as anticipated! That rookies could do it!

[Assistant] They got to really prove that. You’re training and then C. C. Williams is killed, and then this substitute comes in, Alan [L.] Bean; and what was your first—you know, I don’t know if there was—you know, you knew Pete so well. How well did you know Alan Bean? And what was your first impression? And—


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

[User] That was the ground rules at the time. So, there was no ifs, ands, or buts about it. I was the command module pilot and that was it. The same occurred with Apollo 9, 10, 11, 12. All those command module pilots had previous flight experience.

[Assistant] But after that, that wasn’t necessarily a requirement.

[User] That’s correct. As a matter of fact, on 13 we showed, I guess, that it was not as difficult as anticipated! That rookies could do it!

[Assistant] They got to really prove that. You’re training and then C. C. Williams is killed, and then this substitute comes in, Alan [L.] Bean; and what was your first—you know, I don’t know if there was—you know, you knew Pete so well. How well did you know Alan Bean? And what was your first impression? And—

[User] Not—I did not know Al that well. We were at Patuxent River Test Center at the same time. I was in Class 18. Pete was in Class 20. I don’t recall which class Alan was in, but Pete was Alan’s instructor at Test Pilot School before they got into one of the Divisions. I did not know him. We were together in the second selection, so I got to know Al a little bit at that time. But, hey look, he was a naval aviator. He was acceptable!

[Assistant] Not one of those Air Force guys.