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An American Icon…
Part of our deep seated and longstanding culture at NCState is a true affinity for all things mechanical and scientific and for those who do things first… and for those of us who grew up watching the early days of our Space Program on black and white TV in our elementary school classrooms, Mr./Col./Sen. Glenn’s passing at age 95 calls for a moment of reflection and a sincere smile.
… and Prayers for all.
#NCSU-North Carolina's #1 FOOTBALL school!Yep. Amazing science and exploration for this, then, 2nd grader. Awesome buzz.
…And no shabby politician, to boot!
I am fond of humanitarian heroes.
Great stories of Glenn and the original seven in The Right Stuff-he (as well as the others) had one hell of a resume.
For those of us on Medicare and perhaps having to abide by the IRS RMD rules, John Glenn was a special hero. I can remember that one of our classes which had mostly Junior and Seniors was “chosen” to have one of the TV’s that was on campus. I think since I was the school “electrical” guy, my class got chosen since I was in it and knew how to set it up and operate it (Hey, we were a primitive county), The principal brought it in there and told me to get it running. So we watched the February launch…..I still remember it….thinking…..this guy must be an idiot. Those rockets blow up more times than the lift off.
If you read Mitchener’s Right Stuff, you get a flavor of what happened. If you ever talked to a bunch of NASA (and private contractors) guys about their time at Canaveral and Cocoa Beach, you learned that was the party capital of the universe (OK, ECTC ran a close second). The divorce rate there was off the meter. You also learned that the Cape Cookies (the NASA equivalent of the Sweet Carolines) were more than just a single girl or two….they were there in droves. One, supposedly, wanted to have “seduced” ALL 7 of the astronauts and was planning on writing a Tell All book. Now, as we learned from watching the Trump and Bush “locker room talk” tapes, years afterward, such conversations DO take place. However, after spending an afternoon in the NC Mountains at a HOA party where at least 80% of the residents are NASA retirees, their tongues loosened with free beer and their wives WAY OUT OF Earshot, they confirmed the stories that I had heard over the years from technicians and engineers (One that I interviewed was a programming genius that could not plug in a oscillating fan) and such.
John Glenn was the “scoutmaster” for the troop and he did NOT condone such. His wife had a speech impediment and actually would NOT let LBJ (VP then) into her house for a photo op. The 7 families were chosen for their moral fiber and strong marriages. Any documented “events” or hints of impropriety (such as getting caught with a young female) would have disqualified them for the Original 7. Good thing that rule is NOT in place, otherwise, some coaches would be “disqualified….but I digress. It has been confirmed that many of them succumbed to the groupies, some in mass and some in groups of groupies.
The astronauts families got a $500,000 Life Magazine “Contract”, split equally. In 1960 or so, a plant manager in NC with 250 employees was making about $7,500….I worked that summer making boats and earned the unGodly hourly rate of $1.25 per hour….almost as much as my parents were making. So, the Astronauts families got 10X what a senior plant manager was making….for having their pictures made. The Astronauts all got “GM Incentives” on cars. 6 of them drove Corvettes….for, supposedly, a $1 per Year Lease. However, only ONE person chose a station wagon as he had a family.
If you visit the Corvette National Museum, I THINK a couple of the cars are on display and there were ads showing the Astronauts sitting on top of their Vettes….the 50 Anniversary of Glenn’s flight was celebrated with a parade of all of the Astronauts….and they ALL were riding in Vettes…..each one chosen to match the years of their service….a LOT of classics were trucked in.
John Glenn, the Boy Scout, passed away today at age 95. He NEVER (and he was a PRIME target) strayed from his marital bonds. Or at least that is what most of the articles and personal accounts tell up.
We lost ONE of a kind….we lost some of our best….However, lest ye think that these were our BEST and BRIGHTEST….guess who was NOT included in the Original 7….and was probably the most acclaimed test pilot in history? Chuck Yeager. Chuck did NOT have a “degree” or BS in Engineering. He was the most qualified, according to many on the selection committee when it came to flying….they thought he would NOT comprehend the high level of physics and aeronautical engineering that NASA demanded of the original 7. Read his story sometime. He was the Sully of the test pilots….
RIP, John Glenn….we loved you and still admire you.
Thanks BOTB for starting this thread…..time to see if Amazon Prime has “The Right Stuff”…or maybe read “The Cape Cookies”…
B’rer ‘Roo… thanks…
It’s really much, much bigger than that…
For example…
Huntsville ALA, Whippany NJ, Burlington NC, Chicago ILL, White Sands NM
Figure out what they all had in common between 1948 and 1984.
Hundreds of NCState engineers and their kids and grandkids already know the answer.
——————–
Then start making a list..
Transistors, Capacitors, Resistors
Computers and Basic, Fortran, C+
Internet was in Burlington by 1960 — in spite of what BS Al Gore claimed.
Silicon Chips
Weather Channel
Cable TV
Cell Phones
GPS——————–
Fact is …. all that ARMY money (hundreds of Millions) was spent for one purpose…
To Kill Russians.Fact is …. no one Russian died because of a US missile.
BUT… the technology they created changed the world.
———————
Yeah, John Glenn was the “Poster Boy” and a damn good one….
Fact is …. most all the rest were brilliant and crazy at the same time and had their faults…. made their mistakes, raised their kids, lived their lives…Yeager was the old man…. as you suggest…
Sheppard was my favorite.#NCSU-North Carolina's #1 FOOTBALL school!I was a EE, before I was diagnosed with a Stress Related Pr-Ulcer. I think that the Complex Frequency Plane or maybe trying to do the triple integration for solving the Neper equations was the STRESS stimuli.
However, after switching majors, I still had a lot of friends in EE and also a lot of really SHARP electronic techs (they were the Navy guys….the ones that were miles ahead of our graduate instructors). These guys had been “NASA” PCB certified. NASA had a standard for the amount of solder you could put on a board. That was for weight reduction…..something the Corvette Engineers also understand.
NASA developed a soldering technique and then “Trained” the trainers. Interesting tidbit….true?….don’t know. The assembly time of the boards went DOWN….as the operators were applying less heat and also LESS solder. NASA had some special solder requirement….it was almost as pure as gold….(refining and producing). The cost of it was about the SAME as gold as it was so pure and also was “alloyed” for reliability. I’ll bet that John Glenn thought it was worth every million that it cost. One does NOT want a bad PCB malfunction on the second booster stage.
SO, if you reduce the assembly time and also use LESS of the “gold” solder, you actually CAN make MORE money on the product. I was taught a little of the technique when I worked in the basement at WRAL and we made motel antenna distribution splitters and amplifiers.
Your list could go ON and ON. Many years ago, someone did a few interviews of the original remaining 7. They asked them WHAT was the MOST surprising or advanced development that they had seen in 20 years….I think the question was….if you were in suspended animation when you were launched and came back to earth 20 years later….what ONE thing would amaze or awe you?
They MIGHT have allowed a top 5 or so. What was NUMBER ONE….? The electronic passkey for a Motel Room door….
I recently took delivery of a new 2016 GM vehicle. My wife has a 2014 GM vehicle….which was the latest and greatest in the line and had so many features, I could NOT believe it. I have all our personal “settings” saved on a USB so that if they have to do a system update, I can simply recopy the settings for the radio, mirror, convenience, dash, etc.
NOW, in my 16, I have a FULL LED instrument cluster. There is NOT one gage or such. All the dash is strictly a VIDEO display. I can configure any combination of settings and gages….
Both have the Head Up Display. Again, the 16 is so far past the 14, that is is incredible….and I know that the next Generation will be the same.
If you look at a NASCAR dash, it NO LONGER has any hard “instruments”. In the past, they were electronic gages and were function specific.
NOW, they have a rectangular video screen that is programmed for their particular “preference” or “dashboard layout”.
I also marveled in the mid 90’s about HOW a fuel injector worked. I designed an assembly line to make them. The electronics that drove them amazed me…as we had to replicate them for testing. The “on cycle” was adjustable from about 7 milliseconds to 1000 milliseconds. The Open/Close cycle took about 2 milliseconds. I never figured out HOW they measured that….but we had test equipment that was certified and used for standardization….
Now days, instead of a fuel rail and an intake manifold….we have direct injection. My new ride has several modes and Variable Valve timing….you can watch it switch from V8 to V4 and back again….when you choose the Economy Mode (it has about 5 total modes), you can see the difference in the VVT….same for the steering….you adjust for a Sport, Tour, Economy, Track or “Weather” mode. That controls the ABS system and the engine and the steering….if it had the electronic shocks, it would also, like my wife’s car, control the FEEL of the road.
NONE of this would be possible had it not been for NASA….
Excellent info guys.
The comparison I find fascinating is the contrast between the computer power of the Apollo missions’ machines – both on board and ground control – to todays devices, especially what’s crammed into a smartphone. The magnitude of difference in computing power is staggering. I dabbled in computer science at State to fulfill my math req’s and love to tell the millennials about punch cards and hours long waits for results. They get ticked if they can’t get their 7Mbps stream for Netflix.
I was not quite three when Glenn flew, and I don’t remember seeing it. Oddly though, I do remember “helping” my Dad dig a bomb shelter around the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis. We lived in SC and my Dad worked at the nearby Savannah River Site nuclear facilities and he was convinced that it was targeted. Good thing nothing happened, our “shelter” was pretty meager and had anything come our way we would have been toast – literally.
One small correction Roo, Mitchener wrote “Space” and Tom Wolfe wrote “The Right Stuff”.
NASA was the pretty public face of it all… rockstars — singing all about peace and science and space while covering up the very real dark side of the whole thing.
So You GOTT to dig a little deeper to find that the Army Contractors were the real geniuses…
Those modified Redstones that carried Glenn and others on their rides was built by Army contractors – Chrysler Corporation in Huntsville, Alabama built the rocket… and the guidance / electronics systems designed and built by Bell Labs/Western Electric… at the Carolina Missile Factory…
Kinda of like an Hall of Fame Offensive Line of no-names blocking for a bunch of good QBs… the contractor grunts never really gott the public credit they deserved.
Anybody ever heard of the “The Carolina Missile Factory”?
#NCSU-North Carolina's #1 FOOTBALL school!Great comments all around guys. Obviously, I was not the only one influenced by the “space race.”
The courage of all the early astronauts (and especially the Mercury 7) is just astounding. The old Redstone which carried Shepard was just a slightly modified ballistic missile that was never designed for carrying people. As I recall, he ended up riding it because the newer, more powerful Atlas that was supposed to be their ride to space kept blowing up and they wanted to get someone up there quickly to keep from being perceived as too far behind the Russians. I’ll never forget the first time I saw a Redstone “in person” so-to-speak, and I thought, “Wow, that thing is so small! I can’t believe Shepard let them strap him to the top of that thing!” Of course, Glenn was the first American to orbit because he was the first man to fly the Atlas booster – the one that kept blowing up. Talk about guts! Just astounding.
It’s funny, but back in those days, I think most Americans (including myself) thought that NASA had everything very under control and flawlessly engineered so that we fully expected those guys to always get home. Even as things went wrong right before our eyes on TV, we didn’t realize what was happening because those guys were so cool under fire and the NASA engineers always seemed to have a “fix”. The Apollo I fire was shocking, of course, but that wasn’t a flight – and, of course, in light of the Cold War everyone was very tight-lipped about things. It was only with near-tragedy of Apollo XIII that we got a glimmer that spaceflight was still a VERY risky business.
It has been very eye-opening over the last 20-30 years as the astronauts and other folks began to tell the “behind the scenes” stories of Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo. We (the general public) have now come to realize how many “near misses” those guys encountered in those days. It is amazing that the U.S. never lost a person on a spaceflight until Challenger, yet much of the credit must go to the early astronauts who NEVER lost their cool under even the most trying of circumstances. Col. Glenn and his fellow-travelers certainly had “The Right Stuff.” Godspeed John Glenn!
Two things that I remember from reading The Right Stuff years ago, Glenn (‘the boy scout’) admonishing his six colleagues to ‘keep their pants zipped’ (LOL) and Wolfe’s recap of the aforementioned performance of our early rocket versions vs. the Russkies: AND OURS ALWAYS BLOW UP! These studs truly had The Right Stuff!
The problem with missiles wasn’t so much that they kept blowing up… of course, there’s a few mistakes when you’re trying to build the latest, greatest, biggest, fastest thing…. If not, you’re not pushing far enough out there.
The Germans knew how to build missiles. The only question about that was “Who’s Germans were smarter — ours or the Russians?”.
The real problem with missiles was making them do what you want them to do, where and when. Management Control. And no human were allowed in the “Control Room”. Remember, we’d been building unmanned missiles for two decades prior to Mercury. Nobody wanted to ride a missile with a big bomb and all those missiles carried big bombs.
The answer was really pretty simple, looking back…
1. Binary Code
2. Binary Code Machines/Processors
3. SatellitesThe rest of the headache was in the details.
#NCSU-North Carolina's #1 FOOTBALL school!Chuck Yeager. Chuck did NOT have a “degree” or BS in Engineering. He was the most qualified, according to many on the selection committee when it came to flying….they thought he would NOT comprehend the high level of physics and aeronautical engineering that NASA demanded of the original 7. Read his story sometime. He was the Sully of the test pilots….
I agree and have only the utmost respect for them all and especially Yeagar but I heard this very point discussed ( probably on Greg Norry driving to the airport in the middle of the night). Flying a space ship that is controlled and guided by ground engineers isn’t the same thing as dead-sticking a fighter jet. So I do see the point.
And as for Glenn, he had 4 lives in one any one of which would have made him a great man: fighter pilot, WWII and Korean, experimental jet pilot, astronaut, statesman.
It is truly amazing how much some do with the one life they’re given and how little others do. Most of us are somewhere in the middle.
Godspeed John Glenn.
Oh and Oakwood Elementary Hickory NC being brought into the auditorium to watch a small black and white TV on a cart…but I saw it and was a part of it and that lead to a lifetime hobby or model rockets and astronomy.
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