posted 09-20-2009 11:49 AM
I attended the Walk of Honor yesterday and it was great. This was one of those days where the vortex of good luck hits at once. A few days before the event, I found a beautiful 16" long 1960's contractor model of the HL-10 signed by Bill Dana, Bruce Peterson, John Manke and Jerry Gentry. It came with a notebook with dozens of photos, awards, a few signed photos, a beautiful 1964 program signed by Joe Walker and a Bill Dana bobblehead. The seller asked if we could meet at the unveiling of the Walk of Fame and I love it when a plan comes together.Being this is the 20th year and the last induction of test pilots, it was a good sized turn out. Two of the inductees were posthumous, the families were there to accept their awards and three daughters of Skip Ziegler attended. They were 8, 6 and 4 when he was killed in 1951, when his Bell X-2 exploded in the belly of the B-50. It really hit home how much these brave men have given and the toll on the families left behind.
The widow of Jack Woodman was there to accept the award, after he died of cancer in 1987.
The atmosphere was very relaxed, I chatted with Gen. McDivitt before things got started and he's the greatest. Other notables attending were Gordon Fullerton, Gene Cernan, Bob Gilliland (SR-71 test pilot), Fitz Fulton, many former Walk of Fame winners and other test pilots. As a side note, if any of you are in So Cal, Bob Gilliland is giving a presentation at the Burbank museum in October and he's amazing to listen to. We spoke about his good friend Tony LeVier and the P38 and this guy is a wealth of aviation history.
It was a nice ceremony with the inductees making speeches, thanking their families for support and afterward talking with old friends, supporters and groupies like me. One thing that surprised me was that Gen. McDivitt was alone. Nobody from his family came out to be with him on this day and while I'm sure they've been at his side for many years, I was struck by the fact that nobody from his family was there.
Harry Andonian had a large family contingent fly in from all over the country.
John Fergione also had a large family, that featured two gorgeous girls in their early 20's and who were dressed to kill. I think a few of the older guys were checking to see if they brought their viagra or heart medicine.
At 3pm we met at the Performing Arts Center, Gene Cernan gave the keynote address and spoke about his time on the moon, plus the future for space. He told a very funny joke about McDivitt that was pretty racy, but I loved it and McDivitt thought it was funny. Someone asked McDivitt if it was true, whereby he just looked at the person and said "it was just an old joke".
When Gen. McDivitt spoke, he was hysterical and I could listen to him talk for hours. He told a story using a funny southern Texas drawl, about a conversation he had with LBJ after his Gemini 4 flight, whereby LBJ told McDivitt and White that he wanted them to come to his ranch in Texas. McDivitt was busy with other stuff, so he asked LBJ if they could meet in the White House and LBJ said fine. Then McDivitt said to LBJ, "why don't you come to Houston and meet all of the people responsible for making our mission a success". LBJ thought that was a great idea, he said he'd be coming down as soon as he could arrange the trip. McDivitt turned to the head of Houston and said "I talked LBJ into coming here", and said the head of the Manned Space Center almost passed out upon hearing the news.
Another funny story he told was about the funding for Apollo and how they were awash in money for whatever was needed. McDivitt was talking to someone at NASA about how the F-1 builders were having problems developing the engine and they asked if he had any extra money laying around. McDivitt called his finance guy to find out how much money they had and was told they had $50 million. So the NASA exec said "could you just send that $50 million down to the F-1 engine guys", where McDivitt said "sure". He laughed and said "if I did that today, they'd put me in jail".
McDivitt spoke about how NASA and this country had become so risk adverse and how everything is done by having meetings and by committee. Whereas during his time at NASA, everyone accepted the risks, the individual was encouraged to use their imagination and drive to get the job done.
One more funny story McDivitt told was when he became the head of Apollo lunar program and the first launch he was responsible for was Apollo 12. He laughed and said "so here I am the new head of the Apollo lunar program and the first spacecraft I'm in charge of gets hit twice by lightning just after launch. Then we all know what happened to Apollo 13, so I wasn't too happy to have my spacecraft blowing up.
Harry Andonian spoke to a couple of us about flying 225 missions during the Berlin Airlift and an older German woman next to me, told him she was in Berlin during the airlift. She thanked him for his hard work in helping keep the German people free. Harry said he mainly hauled coal, once he hauled dozens of racks of live chickens strung up by their feet and a load of French diplomats. He was extremely proud that he never had a missed approach when landing in Berlin, in all kinds of bad weather.
John A. Fergione was the lead test pilot for every model of the F-16 and later the F-22. He told a great story about flying chase for the F-22 in an F-16. The F-16 he was flying, had the largest engine ever put into the airframe and being super clean, he felt nothing could beat him. While the F-22 was going through it's racetrack fight program, he was waiting for it and when it was time to go home, they had 3/4 fuel load. John said he saw the F-22 a few miles ahead and decided to pour on the speed, so he firewalled his F-16. Soon he was at 1.8 mach and was starting to catch up to the F-22. As he got closer, he wanted to blow the doors off of the F-22, but as he got closer little by little, he saw that the F-22 wasn't in afterburner and was just cruising along. It kinda took the wind out of his sails and decided to get into the F-22 program.
At the end of the evening, the attendees were signing books and when McDivitt saw me, he laughed and said "you again!?!?!?". I brought my Moon book by Abrams and he signed my favorite photo from the space program, of the photo he took of Ed White in space. He said he took the photo with a Hasselblad 500 with a 70mm film back and a standard (80mm) lens. I asked if he realized, at that time, what an incredible photo it was and he said he knew it was a pretty good photo. Then he said to someone there, who said that the Ed White photo wasn't that great, laughingly he said "Oh... how many photos have you had on the cover of Life magazine?" BADDDA BOOOM!
I was talking with Gen. McDivitt in the lobby after the presentation and Fitz Fulton walked by, so McDivitt stopped him to say hello. Fitz is looking a bit frail and he's not been well, but he's still sharp. McDivitt said "Fitz is the greatest heavy airplane pilot I ever knew and he can do things with a big airplane, that you can't believe." High praise from someone like him.
Then NASA planted a Sycamore tree with a Dryden official and the vice mayor. The Sycamore seed was flown by Stu Roosa on Apollo 14, as a tribute to the forest service, because he was a smoke jumper before becoming an astronaut.
Lastly I brought the Lunar Orbiter just in case I could get an autograph and I was able to get Bob Gilliland and Gordon Fullerton to sign it. I already had McDivitt sign it at Spacefest and Cernan at Burbank in 2004.
The end of an era is approaching and soon these men will be lost to history. Having the privilege to meet these great men, is something I'll never forget.
posted 08-31-2009 08:33 AM
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