Documents / Document
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 12-95 to mention that as we go. WARD: Yeah. Yeah. When you look back at your own career, what other things that really stand out that you remember most fondly, or that you got the greatest sense of accomplishment from? MCDIVITT: Well, let me do the military career, because that was—we touched on that a little bit earlier. When I—when the Air Force—when Colonel Peterson I think his name was, threw me off the X-15 Program and then we got on with it anyway. Well, when I went to Washington for the Air Force screening of astronauts, there were, I don’t know 100-some guys there probably. And they screened it down to nine people that they submitted to NASA. And out of that nine, they selected four—Borman and White and [Thomas P.] Stafford and myself. Then when they selected us, they brought us back to Washington and we got a Charm School course. You know, keep your socks pulled up. Be nice to the secretaries. Don’t cough in somebody’s face. How to use the knives and the spoons are over here. The forks are over here. But anyway, they looked after us, were extremely supportive of us—at the General level. General being, that’s a capital G, you know; one star, two star. Very, very supportive of us at that level. And so, we—and they said, “You know, you guys are always part of the Air Force and don’t ever forget it. And we’re here. And if you need any help, call us,” and all that kind of stuff. And so, then we went off to NASA; and I felt that when I went there, that I had 100% support from the Air Force, other than my Colonel. When I was in Korea, I got promoted quickly from Second Lieutenant to First Lieutenant. And then when I came back, I got promoted very quickly to Captain. So, I was a Captain two or three years before my contemporaries were. And in those days, you
Document, cited by the archive. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is under it. 110 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.