The media-books, films and movies have portrayed Mankind's finest achievement in a false light. All the public sees or hears about are the Astronauts, Cape Kennedy and Cap Com in Houston. These people made up of maybe less than 2% of the entire workforce. Yes, the astronauts deserve the glory. But enough is enough. Who made Apollo work? Who completed the tasks to make the greatest rocket in the world? Who designed and built the Command Module so our Astronauts stayed safe?
PEOPLE DID. Over 400,000 of us. We were the peons in the pits. Never mentioned. Never thanked. Ignored for over 40 years. Our greatest achievement in history is slipping away. Do you care? Dis-interest and indifference reign supreme. Our stories are those of which legends are made. Do you think of the recovery crews and sailors on the ships?
Do you have any idea of how many disasters were adverted because we cared? My team and I never forgot for whom we were really working-not the contractors, not the President of the U.S. and not NASA. We could have cared less if a Communist was lurking anywhere about. We were working for the Astronauts! Above all else, their safety was our concern and 1st priority. You astronauts were sent into space with the greatest love. That is why you all made it home safely. We loved you.
PEOPLE DID. Over 400,000 of us. We were the peons in the pits. Never mentioned. Never thanked. Ignored for over 40 years. Our greatest achievement in history is slipping away. Do you care? Dis-interest and indifference reign supreme. Our stories are those of which legends are made. Do you think of the recovery crews and sailors on the ships?
Do you have any idea of how many disasters were adverted because we cared? My team and I never forgot for whom we were really working-not the contractors, not the President of the U.S. and not NASA. We could have cared less if a Communist was lurking anywhere about. We were working for the Astronauts! Above all else, their safety was our concern and 1st priority. You astronauts were sent into space with the greatest love. That is why you all made it home safely. We loved you.
You have a fantastic point. I'm always telling my folks how 100,000 people put Neil on the Sea of Tranquillity.
ReplyDeleteIt hasn't always gotten short shrift, though. Even Ronny Howard and Tom Hanks went to pains to try to almalgemate ground teams, and in greater and greater degrees as they went from Apollo 13, to First Men on the Moon. That's three solid popular historic-fictionalizations.
And it was somewhat sexist to use the women who sewed the spacesuits as an illustration, but you were quite a pioneer before the 1970's.
You larger point about the thousands is well-taken. Perhaps if there had been more awareness of the Talent Pool involved, the Program wouldn't have appeared as disposable to President Nixon and Congress in the 1970's, and (as the National Academy of Sciences acknowledged) we wouldn't now have to be reassembling that base all over with the Lunar Sciences Institute, etc.
It's no accident Constellation looks like Apollo-Saturn. It's hard to substitute innovation for a design that worked.
But thanks for giving me the ammunition.
http://www.lunarpioneer.com
I've always been as much fascinated with the hardware of Apollo as the astronauts, and of course hardware has to be designed, built, tested.
ReplyDeleteI mention it time and again, but one of the best books I have ever read on Apollo was Apollo by Charles Murray and Catherine Bly Cox. Get a copy if you can, but they're hard to come by now. This great book focuses on those on the ground and how in the short years of the 60's problems were solved.
I agree with Joel's comments that Hanks/Howard have done wonders for an understanding of the importance of the 400 000 (Apollo 13, From the Earth to the Moon), but of course the focus was and is on the astronauts, the front men. No-one remembers the gaffer's name when a film is shown, do they?
I hope that Constellation/Ares/Orion can capture the same magic as Saturn V/Apollo, but I suspect it won't because it won't involve 1 in 500 people in the US as it did in the late 60s.
I hope to hear more about what you did to help put men on the Moon.
Joel and Hammerand feather: Somehow I missed your nice comments. You both are right and I appreciate your comments. I have a book being -published and I hope it will be out soon."Something Funny Happened on the Way to the Moon".
ReplyDelete