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This is a NASA Johnson Space Center Oral History Project transcript of astronaut James A. McDivitt, interviewed by Doug Ward at Elk Lake, Michigan, on 29 June 1999. McDivitt talks about flying F-86s in Korea, test pilot work at Edwards, and his first class at the Aerospace Research Pilot School. He also covers turning down Dyna-soar, joining NASA in 1962 and learning to be an Apollo Program Manager. He describes the Change Board and says decisions were not second-guessed.
“Nevers”36 pages
Johnson Space Center Oral History Project James A. McDivitt 29 June 1999 12-74 MCDIVITT: Owen Morris. Yeah. And Ron Kobiche. And Suzie Cardenas. Those four people supported me and made it easy for me. WARD: One of the things that happened during your tenure as Program Manager was the solidification of the evolution of the science program. And I recall early in Apollo, you really were very reticent to put a scientist up in a press conference because you could almost expect that they would criticize the Program and the science as much as support it. Toward the end of the program, that very much changed. And I think— MCDIVITT: Yeah. Yeah. Well, that was never my attitude. That was never my attitude. As a matter of fact, we had—I had one other Deputy Program Manager—the Deputy Program Manager for Science—and I did that myself for most of the Program. Dick [Richard S.] Johnston did it for a short period of time; and then when he left to take over his other job, I did it myself. And so, I was never opposed to the science, but I was always very strongly in favor of it. Now some of the scientists were nuts! But as far as the—you know, why we were going to the Moon? It was really a scientific expedition. It wasn’t a “gee whiz!” expedition. And so, I got vitally involved in site selection; and when we redesigned the spacecraft, I led that team. Guys that put the stuff in there. And I remember one time asking everybody about the TV camera on the rover. I said, “Well, we’re going to have an opportunity to put this TV camera on it. Who would like to support that?” And the R&D [research and development] guys are—R&E [research and engineering], or whatever they called it, they didn’t want to support it. And flight controllers didn’t want it. And the scientists, they were kind of lukewarm. And the Public Affairs [PA] guys didn’t even support it! I mean, I said, “To hell with all of you! I’m going to put it on there anyway!” And then, of course, PA was up to here with it. Engineering was up to here
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