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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.
“Jet Propulsion Laboratory”1 page
Johnson Space Center Oral History Project James A. McDivitt 29 June 1999 12-86 program. Because when Congress asked Webb how much it was going to cost to do the Apollo Program, the numbers I’m not sure about but I think the engineering estimate was $20 billion. Now NASA management might have today come in with $10 billion. What Webb did was he went in with $40 billion. He doubled it instead of cutting it in half. He went there, he told them it was going to be $40 billion, they approved it, and the entire time I ran the Apollo Spacecraft Program I never had a problem with money. We were always on time. We were always willing to run things. And we were able to run the program in a way that got things done. WARD: And in reality, that’s probably a cheaper way to run a program. MCDIVITT: Oh, much cheaper! Much cheaper. I think it cost $23 billion to do the program that he said would cost $40 billion. And when we needed money, we had it. I remember one day Rocco called me up. Rocco Petrone was the [NASA Headquarters Apollo] Program Director. And this sort of has to do with the whole management concept and the flexibility we had in those days versus what it is today. Rocco called me up one day and said, “Jim, have you got any extra money?” I said, “Well, yeah, probably I do. What do you need?” He said, “Well, Dick Smith’s having a problem with the Saturn. He’s got an engine problem and he needs some money.” I said, “Well, how much do you need?” He said, “Well, what have you got?” So, I said—I put him on hold. I didn’t even hang up! I put him on hold, and I called my Program Control guy, and I said, “Do we have any extra money?” He said, “Well, you know, I know we have $50 million, but I don’t—” You know, we might’ve had—remember, these are ’69, ’70 dollars. He said, “I know we’ve got
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