No comments about Black Wings: Courageous Stories of African Americans in Aviation and Space History.

5 comments about Flight My Life in Mission Control.

1. Much has been made of the harsh criticism of the Mercury astronaut Scott Carpenter in this book but little has been said of the harsher criticism of the book's main focus, Christopher C. Kraft.
   
   This autobiography reveals a lot more of Kraft's personality than maybe he actually intended. His boss (Bob Gilruth) can do no wrong, everyone else is an idiot in his (or his boss's) way. And the sad thing is, as much as this is a tribute to his boss, we learn very little about Gilruth who he admired and lots about people he didn't.
   
   Some of these unintentional insights have been mentioned in other reviews, I won't spoil it for people who haven't read the book yet, but there are at least one of these examples on each page.
   
   Be warned though. The first few chapters up to and including the Mercury flights gave me a knot in my stomach... like you were talking with someone that had one too many beers and you were trying to be careful not to do or say anything to 'set him off'.
   
   Come to think of it, read the part about Kraft's first encounter with Von Braun and try not to picture Kraft spilling a large whiskey as he staggers up to Von Braun and shouting in a loud voice "so you think you're better than me?".
   
   We all hold strong opinions, but after 40+ years it's about time to let grudges go. By hook or crook, Kraft got pretty much everything he ever wanted either by convincing or ignoring his superiors. He was insubordinate to his superiors, and spoke his mind. So did others. So why the anger?
   
   This could have been a great, even inspiring book on manned space flight(and with a superfluous trimming could still be).
   
   It's not what you said, Mr Kraft, it's the way you said it.



2. In my humble opinion this book has some very interesting information about the childhood of NASA, and this book and the book of Gene Krantz "Failure is not an option" gives a nice look into the life in the MOCR both at Cape Canaveral/Kennedy and in Houston. Mr. Kraft seems a very humble man and as I see it does not try to play up his own role in the complexity of the Mercury/Gemini/Apollo space adventure



3. At last I found the ideal person to explain the overall trials and successes of the USA space program: Christopher Columbus Kraft, Jr. A bonus was the success story of a small-town boy with no connections to become the most televised flight director in mission control of NASA, then he moved higher in the ranks of NASA.
   Here the politics of our space program, budget cutting as soon as the first moon landing succeeded (if not sooner), according also to the lack of success of the USSR, are all in here. The selection of astronauts, and the surprising problems with a couple of them, and the fights with panicky flight surgeons in approving any spaceflights at all are all in here. The lack of courage of some NASA officials who were so afraid of blame should there be an accident that they almost killed the program is all in here. As it turned out, the Apollo fire did not kill the program, and pols and press were reasonable about it. Bureaucratic overkill got its just desserts.
   The willingness of so many contractors to bid on limited-term projects was an inspiration, as was their desire to innovate and make the space program go ahead was an inspiration, but the tales of shoddy workmanship and design flaws even late in the program was not.
   The antipathy of some old NASA personnel, Kraft included, toward the Germans under Wernher von Braun was revealed, which slowly diminished. Kraft seemed to acknowledge that without the German effort in the USA to produce the big Saturn V and other boosters, the Apollo program could not have been accomplished in any reasonable period. And to this day, nobody has made such powerful boosters.
   This book was the most inspiring I have ever read on the moon landing program, with all its interim steps, and the reason for each flight. Very well written, fast reading, much thanks to James Schefter. Thankfully, much less sanitized than the early astronauts' efforts. Has index. I could not recommend it more.



4. Very few books on this period, biographical or not, are quite like this one. The information and personal details give a very complete view of NASA from the very beginning, and give some detail to the management evolution of the organization. It also gives some interesting insights into how development of mission-critical / real-time organizations and management should function.



5. What a great book. Chris Kraft has really catured those glorious years when man ventured out into the unknown whilst competing with the Russians. Really easy to read and understand. The book took me back to those early years of the space program and Chris lets you experience the development of the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo missions as if it is happening real time. What a great read

5 comments about Gus Grissom: The Lost Astronaut (Indiana Biography Series).

1. The Virgil I. "Gus" Grissom saga was long overdue for a retelling. For too many years the only thing resembling a biography was the dreadful "Starfall," a superficial patchwork. This work comes from the Indiana Historical Society Press, and while not exhaustive, it is a vast improvement over Grissom's first biography and puts a respectable current biography in schools and libraries.
   
   I have to remind myself over and over that it is nearly fifty years ago since Grissom and six other career military fighter pilots were selected by the fledgling NASA for Project Mercury, the United States' program to put a single astronaut in earth orbit. Many Americans have little or no idea of who this man was, let alone the success and controversy that swirled around his life and into the literature of nearly every retired astronaut's autobiography. If he is remembered by today's younger generations, it may be as a dim reference to "the fire" of 1967, in which Grissom and two other astronauts were killed during rehearsal for the maiden Project Apollo flight.
   
   Author Ray E. Boomhower presents Grissom's life in a rather factual way. The reader does not get unduly bogged down in technology, the Cold War, or in the jocular astronaut life, aside from a few Wally Schirra stories. There is insightful and tasteful observation from Grissom's family and friends in Indiana, including Mrs. Betty Grissom. By rooting this work in Grissom's native community, the author conveys a sense that the hometown boy from the Midwest went off to school, war, and outer space, bringing pride to the folks back home. Boomhower has given us the story of Grissom's life, not Grissom's programs; Neal Thompson's recent biography of Alan B. Shepard has many of the same characteristics.
   
   Grissom devoted much of his career to both flying and engineering, and Boomhower attends to both. Grissom became the second U.S. astronaut to venture into space, a fifteen-minute suborbital flight aboard the "Liberty Bell" in 1961. The flight itself is now long-forgotten, but memory of the events of splashdown may linger for more generations. On live TV the hatch of Grissom's spaceship blew open prematurely, flooding the craft and rendering it too heavy for the helicopter attempting to retrieve it. The craft sank to the bottom of the Atlantic, a major embarrassment more than a scientific loss per se. At the time there was muted criticism of Grissom's performance and a reluctance to accept the astronaut's explanation that "the hatch just blew." Boomhower records that even Mrs. Grissom gingerly asked her husband if he had erred while talking to him by phone after the flight [209] and the astronaut's two sons were harassed in school over the incident.
   
   Grissom would have other reasons for career concerns. He quickly surmised that there would be no more Mercury flights for him as it became clear Mercury would end once earth orbit had been securely achieved. NASA had brought another larger team of astronauts on board. Alan Shepard and later John Glenn would be "made men" in the NASA pecking order. After his Liberty Bell flight, Grissom would speak of himself as not having a job, but anxious to prove himself, he alone of the original astronauts went to work on the design of the next generation Gemini spacecraft. Gradually other astronauts came to deeply appreciate Grissom's efforts to make Gemini a true pilot's spacecraft, and his stock among the brethren rose considerably. He became so identified with the new craft that the interior specifications were crafted to his short stature, no favor to the gangly astronaut Tom Stafford down the road. And yet it took Alan Shepard's misfortune [Meniere's disease] and John Glenn's new horizon [the U.S. Senate] to boost Grissom to the head of the line for the maiden launch of Gemini in March 1965. Grissom and John Young navigated a perfect three orbit test run marred only by later discovery of a contraband corned beef sandwich on board.
   
   His first ride with Gemini would be his last. While colleagues like Jim Lovell, Pete Conrad, and Neil Armstrong were racking up frequent space miles, Grissom began to have doubts about the space program. He considered retirement, and even contemplated flying combat missions in Viet Nam [286] or a run for Congress from Indiana. He speculated to his wife privately that he thought his chances of accidental death in the space program were high if he remained. On the other hand, his auto buddy Jim Rathmann recalled for the author that Grissom hoped to be the first man on the moon.
   
   Boomhower believes that much of Grissom's confusion and pessimism stemmed from his engineering work on the Apollo space craft itself. Gemini had been the product of McDonnell Aircraft, a company widely respected and trusted by the astronaut community. The Apollo contract, on the other hand, was awarded to North American Aviation, perhaps as Schirra surmised, to spread jobs and political good will to California. The author agrees with other researchers that the North American operation was lacking in many respects, particularly quality control. One telling example: changes on the punch list came so frequently that simulators were never adequately programmed for astronauts in training.
   
   Despite months of investigation, no one cause was definitively isolated in the tragic fire of January 27, 1967 that killed Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chafee during a ground test prior to actual flight. NASA and North American came in for harsh criticism. Boomhower tends to agree with the official investigation results which attributed the fire to a zeitgeist of speed, recklessness, poor management, and general faulty design. Grissom's involvement in the design of Apollo, and his dissatisfaction with North American, probably deserved more thorough treatment, not to mention the sometimes bizarre relations between the Grissoms, NASA, and the press. Boomhower's text is probably not the last word on America's second astronaut, but it will be adequate through the foreseeable future.



2. I hope all of those who saw "The Right Stuff" and based their opinions of Gus Grissom on that movie/book, read THIS one. Grissom was the best pilot (and I am a huge Chuck Yeager fan) and an all around good guy. I was so glad when the Liberty Bell was brought to the surface and people finally knew what this book tells the reader, and those of us who had faith in Gus all along already knew. He did NOTHING WRONG when his spacecraft sank. Having seen the Apollo Launch pad where Grissom, White and Chafee died, mourned along with the rest of the nation when the fire happened, and the memorial in Arlington, it was great to read this biography and bring Gus back for a little while. Certainly one of America's and Indiana's finest! A good book about a great man.



3. There's no doubt that Gus Grissom was an American Hero. There's no doubt that he was often maligned -- both during his life and even after his tragic death -- most notably by Tom Wolfe's depiction of Grissom in "The Right Stuff". There is also no doubt, though, that Grissom is a favorite son of Indiana (righfully so). But given that this biography is part of the "Indiana Biography Series", I believe it may go too far in attempting to vindicate Grissom and give him the credit he deserves. While the book is interesting and has some information and insight that I've not read elsewhere, I always prefer a biography to "give it to me straight", and I think this one goes a bit too far in its praise for Grissom to be considered the "straight" story. I think Ray Boomhower was well-intentioned in this effort (and as previously mentioned, I agree that Grissom deserves more than history has given him), but this probably isn't the best book for a fair and unbiased education on the life of Gus Grissom.



4. Virgil "Gus" Grissom is most commonly remembered by casual "space historians", as the only Mercury Astronaut to lose his spacecraft and for his death along with Robert Chafee and Edward White in the Apollo 1 fire. Most of these same historians think of him as a bit of a screwup as well, who may have been responsible for the loss of Friendship 7, when he in a panicked state blew the hatch while most of the spacecraft was still submerged, but for the loss of Apollo 1 as well due his insistence on not using explosive hatch bolts in later NASA programs such as Gemini and Apollo. The theory being that if NASA had developed the Apollo spacecraft with the explosive hatch, Grissom, Chafee, and White would have been able to blow the hatch and escape the fire which killed them. A minority of these folks even go so far as to blame him for the fire itself, saying that it was his movements which caused wires to short and to start the fire that killed the three of them.
   
   A more dedicated researcher however finds himself quickly at odds with these assumptions. If Grissom was the screwup the majority of people seem to think he was, then why did NASA not only select him to be the second American in space, but listened to his input to the point that they incorporated so many of his design idea's and requirements into the Gemini program that other astronauts referred to the spacecraft as the "Gusmobile" and complained that the spacecraft were tailored to fit his 5'6 140 pound frame, or why was he on the fast track to become the first American to walk on the moon? The logical conclusion is that Grissom wasn't the screw up people thought him to be. The problem facing the dedicated researcher is the lack of compiled information about Virgil Grissom.
   
   Yes, the data exists in various forms, but due to his untimely death (which results in the loss of any direct autobiographical information) and the common perception that he was a screwup no one had much interest in gathering all this information and putting it in one place.
   
   For Christmas last year among the stack of books that was so tall and so heavy I nearly broke a bone when I stubbed my toe against it, was a copy of Boomhower's "Gus Grissom - The Lost Astronaut", a part of the Indiana Biography Series.
   
   First, a word about Astronaut histories, be they biographies or autobiographies.
   
   Its often said, about the Mercury 7, that they were made heros before they had ever done anything. This statement has always bothered me, because these men were heroes long before they were selected to the space program. Six of them were combat veterans, most of them were combat aces (five or more confirmed kills) and some of them were double aces, having earned five or more kills in both World War II and Korea. Each of them had also been a test pilot, where they strapped themselves into several tons of experminental steel, weapons, and jet fuel and took the skies with the intention of breaking their aircraft. Most of them served as pilot instructors at some point in their careers meaning they strapped themselves into several tons of steel, weapons, and jet fuel and took to the skies with a guy who knew next to nothing about what they were doing. Some of them took it one step further and became instructors at test pilot school.
   
   All of them, were college graduates and many of them held multiple degrees and in the course of their career published doctorate level papers about the nature of flight, weapons, carrier landings, and combat operations long before they were ever accepted into the space program.
   
   In other words, "Pretty damn big hero stuff".
   
   The problem is, these "pretty damn big heroes" came with some pretty damn big ego's. Each of them thought they were the best (or in the case of Alan Shepard, knew they were the best) and as a result biographies (and autobiographies in particular) tend to be strongly slanted in favor of the subject. This slant is compounded by the sanitized "Life" coverage of the Astronauts and their stories, with the result being anyone who spends any time reading these books will find conflicting accounts of stories and events, where each Astronaut sees himself as the hero or the center piece of the story being told.
   
   The biographer's job (or the ghost writer in the case of many of the autobiographies) is not to eliminate or even minimize this slant, but should be to remove those stories which conflict with factual, and confirmable data.
   
   For example, who came up with the idea to wire Ralph Morse's jeep with a smoke flare1? Alan Shepard or Gus Grissom? The answer is, that in the context of other events it doesn't matter. That the even occurred is far more relevant than who's idea it was.
   
   Compare that with the question of "Who was the first American in space?" John Glenn's biography ("John Glenn: A Memoir") leaves you with the impression that he was. The reality is that while Glenn was the first American to orbit the Earth he was actually the third American into space, behind Alan Shepard and Gus Grissom.
   
   It is this second type of slant that should be unacceptable and is the reason why I've never managed to struggle all the way through Wolfe's "The Right Stuff" (either the book or the movie), Cooper's "Leap of Faith", and M. Scott Carpenter's "For Spacious Skies".
   
   That said, I looked forward to Boomhower's book since it came out in 2004 and was very pleased to find it under the tree this Christmas.
   
   I can't help but feeling a bit disappointed with the book. Boomhower spends most of the preface talking not about Grissom or his family but about himself, his family's distant ties to the space program and how much effort he put into writing the book. The first three chapters are devoted, or rather would be seemingly devoted to Grissom's life before joining NASA if Boomhower didn't spend so much time skipping around in the timeline. He addresses events out of order, skips back, skips forward, and often leaves you with the impression that events in Grissom's life tied in with key events in history, when in fact the events were separated by years. It makes it tough to keep everything straight.
   
   Boomhower also uses other astronaut biographies as source material, something that should be obviously dangerous given the super charged egos involved.
   
   That said, I do feel like I know more about Gus Grissom5 than I did before I started reading...I do not feel like I know Gus Grissom like I knew Shepard after reading "Light this Candle" or like I knew Pete Conrad after reading "Rocket Man". After reading those books, I felt like Shepard and Conrad were old friends, after reading "Gus Grissom: The Lost Astronaut" I feel Grissom is like that second cousin third removed on your step mothers side...



5. If you've never read much about America's space race during the 60's, this is a good read with a lot of solid history and the story of a man who gave his life for his country.
   
   If, however, you are knowledgeable about this era the book adds little insight into Gus Grissom that hasn't already been published. The best source for this insight, Betty Grissom, was interviewed for this book but it appears nothing new was brought to light. With that said, I understand and respect her right to keep certain aspects of his life private. BTW: Her book "Starfall" was outstanding - I learned much more about Gus Grissom from that than any other source. It's a shame it's out of print.
   
   Regardless, I bought it, it's now in my collection and am glad that I did.

5 comments about Schirra's Space (Bluejacket Books).

1. Wally Schirra, perhaps more than all the other "Original Seven"
   Mercury astronauts, embodies all the great strengths along
   with the weaknesses of this group compared with the astronauts
   who entered the space program after them.
   It must be remembered that when the original astronauts were
   chosen in 1959, manned spaceflight was a great unknown. In particular,
   it was not known how the human body would responds to all the stresses
   caused by the massive accelerations and decelerations of the spacecraft
   in addition to the problems of prolonged "weightlessness". Thus,
   those astronauts chosen were found to be able to withstand worst-case
   scenarios for these things. Piloting skills were not as important
   because the astronaut didn't really have much control of the Mercury
   spacecraft.
   By the time Schirra flew on his Sigma 7 flight (the fifth of the series), it had been found that the psychological and physiological stresses were not that great. In addition, the flight before his, Aurora 7, by Scott Carpenter was a near disaster because he did a poor job doing what little
   piloting he could. Thus Schirra was called on to show that, indeed, with
   good piloting skills, precise maneuvers could be carried out. Using what
   Schirra called "the light stuff", Schirra proved that a skilled pilot can
   do what has to be done while conserving precious fuel.
   By the time the much more advanced two-man Gemini spacecraft came to fly, it was now necessary to carry out far more sophisticated missions, involving rendezvous, docking and EVA. Schirra in his Gemini 6 mission, along with Tom Stafford, spectacularly carried out the first rendezvous when his spacecraft met up with the already orbiting Gemini 7. Schirra was the perfect choice because he showed that the "light stuff" can
   allow complicated space operations of the type needed to land on the Moon using the Lunar Orbit Rendezvous mode within the fuel constraints that were available. He also saved his Gemini mission when the Titan II booster rocket's engines cut off seconds after ignition and Schirra's
   outstanding "feel" as a pilot told him NOT to carry out a very dangerous
   ejection, so the mission was saved to fly another day.
   Gemini training using simulations was far more complicated than those for Mercury and the veteran Mercury astronauts who flew Gemini like Schirra and Gordon Cooper found them more exhausting.
   After the Apollo 1 fire, Schirra was once again called in to save the manned spaceprogram and was assigned the first Apollo flight. By this time, as he put it in his own words, he was being "devoured" by the space program. Fellow crewman Walt Cunningham felt that Schirra really didn't want to fly the mission but he pushed himself to do it out of a feeling of responsibility to his friend and fellow Mercury astronaut Gus Grisson who perished in the fire. This flight (called Apollo 7) not only would break in a new spacecraft that was far more sophisticated than the already complex Gemini spacecraft. Whenever flying a new spacecraft, there are always uncertainties as to whether all the bugs have shaken out, and in addition, the simulation training was even more time consuming and exhausting. All these things took their toll on Schirra, and the pressures came bursting out of him during the flight when he became ill with a head cold. Schirra began berating the flight controllers which enraged Chris Kraft, the head of flight operations.
   Also, even though the mission was scheduled to last 11 days in order to
   test the ability to last the duration of a lunar landing flight, Schirra
   adamantly opposed carrying out more than a minimal number of scientific experiments. This was another legacy of the Mercury astronauts who loved flying but generally had little interest in the scientific aspects of space exploration. Thus, Walt Cunningham felt that the mission, although proving the spacecraft
   was spaceworthy, wasted a lot of time that could have been used to
   carry out more experiments and which would have alleviated their boredom
   on the last days of the mission. Schirra even objected to carrying at TV camera on board, but NASA management insisted, saying the taxpayers had the right to see what their billions of dollars were going for. In this matter, Schirra relented.
   Fortunately, as the moon landings approached, NASA began to choose astronauts who weren't as "tough" as the Original Seven, but they were better educated scientifically and technically, and they were better able to handle and understand the complex systems that made up the Apollo spacecraft, and they had more of a willingness to study geology and other scientific disciplines which Apollo's space exploration capabilites would enable space and planetary scientists to exploit.
   Like all the other astronaut autobiographies, with the notable exception
   of Mike Collins' "Carrying the Fire", this one does not really describe
   what spaceflight is really like, nor will the reader will not really learn much more about America's space program by reading this book.
   However, American owes Wally Schirra a lot. He stepped in twice when the
   space program was in crisis and his exceptional piloting skills (maybe the best of the Original Seven) put America on its path to the Moon.



2. As much as I was a fan of Wally Schirra during his days in the space program, or perhaps because of that, I was mildly disappointed in his autobiography. This work strikes me as typical of a number of astronaut biographies and autobiographies rushed into print over the past generation or so, rather unremarkable in literary style and adding little to the historiography of this critical era of space travel.
   
   Perhaps this should not be surprising. The author identifies himself as a technical man who throughout his military career kept his nose to the grind of precision flying and admits to little connectedness to the culture outside. No one should take up this work and expect to find Astronaut Schirra's opinion of "My Fair Lady." To the day of its publication the author through his book exudes continued pride in his association with other pilots of exceptional competence, and conversely, an avoidance of those who in his view are or were more form than substance. [Chuck Yeager, for example, will probably never grace the Schirra Thanksgiving table.] If Schirra is infected with hubris, it comes honorably.
   
   Schirra is the antithesis of the joker and clown he was sometimes depicted as in, say, "The Right Stuff." It is within the world of test flying and space exploration that the reader will best connect with Schirra: learning, for example, that Schirra had little use for the extensive battery of medical tests to which all the early astronaut candidates were subjected. He was highly critical of the early conceptualization of Project Mercury. He was among those who considered early spaceflight "Spam in a Can" and lobbied extensively for pilot control in all of the various programs in which he served. His blunt talk, however, made sense as events would prove.
   
   One can probably argue with credibility that Schirra was one of the half-dozen most competent pilots of the entire Mercury-Apollo era. His Sigma 7 flight in October, 1962, was a quantum leap for Mercury in terms of both distance and fuel economy. But his greatest contribution to the space program may have come in December, 1965, when in a four day period the author not only averted a major space catastrophe but achieved a technical breakthrough of major importance for reaching the moon.
   
   Gemini 6 was a star-crossed flight from opening day. Scheduled for October, 1965, its mission objective was rendezvous with an unmanned Agena rocket launched hours earlier. The Agena inexplicably blew up before Schirra's and Tom Stafford's craft was launched, and the mission went into temporary limbo. However, after much discussion about feasibility, Gemini 6 was rescheduled for a December launch, with its new rendezvous target being nothing less than Gemini 7, the 14-day endurance epic of Frank Borman and Jim Lovell.
   
   Gemini 7 was launched successfully early in December, and after a mere nine day turnaround of the Gemini launch pad--itself a record of sorts--the author and Stafford were ready to launch Gemini 6 in pursuit of Borman and Lovell. But in what has to be one of the more hair-raising moments of the space program, Gemini 6's launch rocket shut down a millisecond before lifting off the ground. The various disastrous scenarios were as numerous as the imagination permitted. In his own printed words Schirra is quite matter of fact about this dilemma and his now-famous choice against capsule ejection--which, incidentally, saved the rendezvous mission itself, as matters would transpire. For the historical record, Schirra sees his decision as the vindication of human pilots over computer guidance, and he seems proudest of this maneuver and the mission that followed.
   
   He is right to be proud. If Schirra's instincts served him well atop Gemini 6 on the ground, his piloting skills three days later would set the space program ahead by leaps and bounds. Gemini 6 found its target in minimum time and milked the maximum possible navigational experience from the rendezvous. Gemini 6 established that with a skilled pilot a space vehicle could pretty much go wherever needed, an indispensable technical advance for moon landing technology.
   
   Gemini 6 may have been Schirra's finest hour in the space program. It would be different after that. The fiery death of his old Mercury sidekick Gus Grissom in 1967 left Schirra as the only active member of the original seven astronauts and raised doubts in his mind about the Apollo Program in general. Apollo was exponentially more complicated than the Mercury Program for which he was chosen. Schirra has plenty to say about Apollo management, but there is a hint in his reflections that the Mercury crew [which included, at least hypothetically, Cooper, Slayton, Shepard and himself] might have been "over the hill" when Apollo took center stage. [182]
   
   Schirra's comportment before and during Apollo 7, the first of the Apollo manned flights, has been the subject of considerable conjecture. This reader's impression is that Schirra had reservations about the vehicle, but more so with the management team behind it. The author complains that he was misled about guidelines for acceptable launch time wind velocities, and once in flight, pressured to perform tasks that interfered with basic shake-down procedures. The author's head cold while in space would later take on humorous proportions in his award winning Actifed TV commercials, but at the time his general health and its impact upon flight procedure became major ground to space confrontations. But in rare candor for an astronaut, Schirra admitted the unthinkable--Apollo 7 was boring him out of his mind by mid-flight. [203]
   
   Schirra had announced his retirement before Apollo 7, and if Deke Slayton is to be believed, the author would never again have to worry about space boredom, as his crewmates Eisele and Cunningham ruefully discovered. The happy ending to this tale is Schirra's personal pride and contentment at his career's body of work and the ongoing respect he enjoyed from the top professionals in his field at the time of his book`s publication in 1988.
   
   .



3. Not even factually correct in some cases.. as when Wally implies that he got the LLTV training cancelled because it was dangerous. Wrong !!! It was used through Apollo 17. I own over a hundred aviation and space books, but this one I gave to Good Will after I read it.



4. Wally Shirra doesn't lack for confidence. Then again how would a person, without the self confidence of a test pilot, strap himself to a rocket? A great insider's view of the program. However for all his confidence Shirra goes out of his way to not cast a single stone at the many people he crossed paths with through out his career. A class act. No new real information is uncovered through this book. Just a fun read.



5. I long have been a huge fan of Wally Schirra. I have always adored his keen sense of humor and wit. Furthermore, his impeccable aviator and astronaut careers always made me feel awe struck. Therefore, I greatly looked forward to reading Mr. Schirra's account of his career. My main interest was to get a real insiders look into the space program - which I believe the book did successfully on some major points. Mr. Schirra's wit pleasantly shined throughout the book - this made the reading more pallatable. Regretfully, the reason for my three star rating is the fact that the book would ramble. Without a moments notice, it would jump ahead in time and backward in time. I found this fact to be very irritating as I tried to stay focused and gain as much information as I could from my reading. I thought that maybe I was being too critical, but this sore spot was evident throughout the book. By the time that I had finished the book, I felt exaspirated from the time warps. Do not get me wrong, Mr. Wally Schirra is still a brilliant man in my eyes - I just found that the book was not a good representation of the the true great man that he is. All in all, for the average reader, I feel that this book has many good bits of information - as long as you are willing to sift through the minutia of time jumps.

5 comments about Sky Walking: An Astronaut's Memoir.

1. This is a beautifully written account of one astronaut's experiences going through the NASA space program. If you are curious about what it takes to become an astronaut, the inner-workers of the organization, and what its like to truly live in space, this is a terrific book. And, the writer has a wonderful way of translating complex information into easily digestible bites. Truly a wonderful read!



2. Not the Right Stuff for me.
   The writing is wordy, attempts to be profound and "educated" at every turn, and fails.
   
   His single most dramatic story, the stuck hatch, is anti-climatic.
   
   His second most dramatic story: too much air getting into the food packets.
   
   There is very little "inside scoop" here, as NASA is portrayed as all glorious, and almost perfect. Yet we know, and see demonstrated on a regular basis, that the opposite is true.
   
   Find this locally if you can, and browse through it first to see if its the right stuff for you.



3. There are many excellent books written by and about the Right Stuff astronauts who flew during the earlier days of the space program. However, until recently, there has been a nearly total lack of books by and about the shuttle astronauts who fly now. For better or worse, today's space program is as different from the program of the early days as the shuttle is different from the Apollo capsules. And today's astronauts are different, too.
   
   Mike Mullane was the first of the shuttle astronauts to write about his experiences in his book Riding Rockets. However, Mullane was a member of the group that made the transition from the Apollo program to the shuttle program, and the tone of his book is almost wistful; he clearly wanted to be one of the Right Stuff guys-- and he means guys-- but he ended up being a shuttle technician.
   
   Sky Walking is a memoir by a very different sort of astronaut. Tom Jones was very young during the "glory days" of the space program, so he has no Right Stuff preconceptions about astronauts as death-defying heroes. Rather, he is an Air Force Academy graduate who flew B-52s, earned a PhD in planetary sciences, and became a dedicated, professional shuttle program technician. That could have made for a dull, technical book if it weren't for his intellect and, more importantly, his powers of observation and ability to reflect on what he experienced.
   
   Jones flew four shuttle missions and took three space walks on his final mission, which was dedicated to construction on the International Space Station. His accounts of what space walks are like-- and of the hundreds of hours of training that precedes each one-- are first rate. His descriptions of the ISS and of the issues surrounding its planning, funding, and construction are excellent. I don't know of any other insider's book that deals with the ISS in such detail or with such authority. This is because Jones was an administrator in the ISS program between his third and fourth shuttle flights.
   
   The subtitle says that this is "an astronaut's memoir," and that's exactly what it is. Jones takes us trough his selection as an astronaut, his general training, his years of waiting for flights, his training for those flights, and the flights themselves. There is considerable technical information in the book, but Jones does an excellent job of clarifying it for non-experts. The real focus is on Jones himself-- what he sees, thinks, and feels about what's happening to him.
   
   This is an outstanding book. It answers the two basic questions many of us have always had: "What's it REALLY like to fly in space?" and "What are those people REALLY like?" I thoroughly enjoyed Sky Walking, and I recommend it most highly.



4. Sky Walking is the best account of the experience of space that I have ever read. It takes you deep into the physical and emotional sensations of space travel where you the reader experience what astronauts experience right down to the mundane task trying to locate an item that has floated away in the cabin or trying to use an exercise bike with zero gravity. Tom Jones is an articulate writer capable of constructing wonderful imagery and some choice metaphors about every aspect of space travel from training to launch to rentry. His descriptions of his space walks and working aboard the International Space Station are particularly memorable. Jones is also not afraid to render an opinion about this America's commitment to space what can and should be done to maintain NASA as a shining symbol of American capability. I highly recommend this book to anyone with a curiosity about what space travel is really like.
   -- Jerry Burton, author of Zora Arkus-Duntov the Legend Behind Corvette and Corvette, America's Sports Car, Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow.



5. This is a highly readable and expertly written account by Tom Jones about his astronaut career.
   He writes from his heart, and has clearly thought a lot about how to effectively communicate his experiences.
   His use of imagery puts this book in the realm of literature, though it is definitely non-fiction.
   A must for your Christmas list if you are or once were an aspiring astronaut, an aspiring writer of topics related to space and technology or just interested in knowing what it is like up there. It is a great read; I laughed, I cried, learned something about space, space policy and history, and was amazed by it all!

5 comments about Fallen Astronauts: Heroes Who Died Reaching for the Moon.

1. As a keen observer of the space program from Mercury through Apollo, I was very impressed by the scholarship and professionalism of this book. Although I have researched many of these incidents, this book provided details that I had never seen. Congratulations on an excellent tribute to these brave individuals.



2. I'm keeping it short and sweet - If you want to know about the "unsung heroes" of the early space programs in the USA and former USSR, pick this book up and read it - you will see who these men really were, and how any one of them (Americans) could have been first on the moon, instead of Neil Armstrong.



3. Another excellent book from Mr. Burgess. I especially enjoyed the great level of detail in this book. Mr. Burgess even provides the astronauts' mothers' and wives' maiden names, their childhood addresses and many obscure yet interesting facts about their early careers. It was also interesting to learn how many of the astronauts had interacted with each other in the years before they joined NASA. While you know the eventual outcome of each chapter, I still found myself hoping it would somehow turn out differently.
   
   I had just started working for McDonnell Aircraft on Gemini 9 a few months before the crash of See and Bassett into the Gemini manufacturing building in St. Louis. This book clarified several details of the accident that had become fuzzy over the years.
   
   The epilogue was of interest to learn how many of the relatives and colleagues have moved on.



4. I read this book about three years ago, and enjoyed learning more about Elliot See, Ted Freeman, C.C. Williams, Ed Givens, Charlie Bassett, and Roger Chaffee. I didn't know that Freeman graduated from Annapolis in the same class as Ross Perot (1953), and I didn't know that both See and Chaffee were both Eagle Scouts. See is often noted as a "civilian", but he was a Navy Reservist, and stayed that way throughout his time in the Astronaut Corps.
   
   It was nice to learn about the Russian Cosmonauts, since I was familar with the deaths of Vladmir Komarov and the Soyuz 11 crew only. However, I was disappointed that Robert Lawrence was omitted. Lawrence was a MOL astronaut who was killed in a plane crash in October 1967. MOL was cancelled around the end of 1968. There were two other former MOL astronauts who were killed in plane crashes, but not while they were part of the Manned Orbiting Laboratory (MOL) project.
   
   The gravesites of Freeman, Williams, Chaffee, See, and Bassett can be found at Arlington National Cemetery. A few years ago, I found them and put flags on their graves. There's also a section of the Electrical Engineering Building at Texas Tech University named for Charlie Bassett. The library in Clear Lake is named for Ted Freeman. Colleagues of Freeman and Bassett have said that these men would most likely have had moon missions if they had not succumbed to early deaths. Buzz Aldrin dedicated his first book Return to Earth to Charlie Bassett, saying "to Charlie..whose place I took."



5. If you grew up in the 1960s and could name every astronaut and recount the details of each Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo mission (or, if you didn't), this outstanding work is a very important milestone and accurate record that enables us to remember the sacrifices made to reach the Moon. In great detail from the impressive research conducted by the authors, this book provides very rare insights into the lives of Astronauts Freeman, See, Bassett, Grissom, White, Chaffee, Givens, Williams, and the cosmonauts from the former Soviet Union. The book also dispels some rumors with respect to the accidents that took the lives of these skilled pilots and astronauts, as many of those rumors have been reported, merely repeated, and accepted in other accounts unfortunately as facts.
   
   Thank you for reminding us of a time when America tackled a monumental challenge, and allowing us to be more fully grateful for the lives lived and lost so that we could meet that national challenge and extend the spirit of exploration to the heavens.

5 comments about Moondust : In Search of the Men Who Fell to Earth.

1. The NASA version of the Apollo moon landings is one thing (see the 5 DVD compilation: NASA The Story of America's Courageous Space Explorers!). 'Moondust: In Search of the Men Who Fell to Earth' is another. The cover says a lot. It shows Gene Cernan, Buzz Aldrin, John Young, Neil Armstrong, Charlie Duke, James Irwin, Alan Bean, and Jack Schmitt as heros worthy of being on collectible bubble gum cards. The author Andrew Smith was the perfect age when Neil Armstrong stepped foot on the moon. He was a kid. The moonwalkers are his heros. I was born later and equivalent heros for me are Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, and Yoda. The amazing thing about Andrew Smith's story is that he's able to actually meet those space-men and to come face to face with the realities of their lives after having walked on the moon. How much was an astronaught's salary? If I were standing on the face of the moon looking up at Earth, what effect would that have on my sense of God? What does a landscape devoid of atmosphere really look like? How does it feel to be alone inside the vehicle in orbit around the moon waiting for your colleagues to return from the moon surface? Especially when you're on the back side of the moon and you have no radio contact with Earth and you're more alone than any other human being in the history of our existence? What do you do with yourself after you return to Earth, after you retire from NASA, after your fame begins to fade away? Maybe you go into liquor sales, start your own religion or maybe you take up a career as a painter obsessively painting scenes from your lunar memories. Andrew Smith is a down to Earth writer who infuses wit, humor, and astute observation into this amazing book that I couldn't put down. Moondust ranks high among my favorite true account books which would also include Al Santoli's 'Everything We Had' and Joannis van Loon's 'The Life & Times of Rembrandt van Rijn'.



2. This book was very disappointing for all the reasons already stated, factually inaccurate, rambling, author being self absorbed, etc. The title is misleading and should have been "Andrew Smith: My thoughts on the Apollo Program (With an a few astronaut interviews thrown in)".
   
   I give it two stars because some of the interviews were interesting.
   
   Thankfully I borrowed this book from the library and didn't pay for it. I suggest if you're really interested in reading this book that you do the same...



3. This book turned out to be more about the author than about the astronauts. It was disappointing. The book was also hard to finish. It was uninteresting in most parts. Not recommended if you are looking for insight on the astronauts.



4. This particular book does a great job of getting into the insights of the astronauts when they were front page news. Apollo was truly the pinnacle of NASA and Andrew Smith does a great job of creating the aura that still surrounds the 9 men still living, that walked on another world.
   
   I could've done without some of his personal musings, as he paints a picture that you would rather he keep to himself. I have my own personal perspectives and if you didn't grow up in U.K. or CA, you'll probably agree that Andrew should've kept some of his memories out of the pages.
   
   Even with the author's anecdotes, the book is 5 stars and worthy reading for any space history buff.



5. It's hard to review this book. Everyone agrees that it offers a fascinating insight into the astronauts who walked on the moon. This book isn't really asking "what was it like?" because that's been done too many times. Instead, it asked "what was it like for you?" to each astronaut, and got some interesting answers.
   The remainder of the book is mostly about the journey of discovery that the author takes as he realizes that it had a relatively profound effect on his own life. Some reviewers (myself included) buy into this concept and found it made the whole package very engaging. Others (including some of my friends) found it annoying and distracting.
   So, if you would rather just read biographies of astronauts, try the book about Pete Conrad. If you ever wondered, "gosh, whatever happened to those guys?" or "well, what did it mean for the US to go to the moon anyway?" I think this is an entertaining, engrossing and ultimately enlightening read.
   I only gave it four and a half stars because it's not the best book I've ever read, merely one of the most memorable.

2 comments about Destination Moon: 15 Year Anniversary Edition.

1. Interesting chronology of James Irwin's life, and the meaning for it that God gave him. Wonderful to see a scientist/astronaut have a Christian view of this unique place we have in the universe. Thanks, James!



2. Jim Irwin was the Lunar Module Pilot on the Apollo 15 mission to the moon and became the eight man to walk on the moon. Prior to this book, he had written two others books (To Rule the Night and More than Earthlings) about his adventures in space; however unlike this book, these books were geared for the adult audience.

   In this book, the author, writing in the first person, describes his life from slightly before the time he applied to be an astronaut, his selection as an astronaut, his training and his eventual trip to and from the moon. There was a fair amount of material dedicated to the training needed to be an astronaut and moon walker, more than I've seen in the usual astronaut biographies. The book also includes many photographs in both color and black and white, to help the reader understand Jim Irwin's life and times at NASA.

5 comments about For Spacious Skies: The Uncommon Journey Of A Mercury Astronaut.

1. Scott Carpenter and his daughter were "inspired" to write this book in response to Gene Kranz's characterizations of Carpenter in "Failure is Not An Option." Ordinarily, a "defensive" book is not especially interesting. Kranz accused Carpenter of having too laid-back a personality, and that he would be found laying on a beach, strumming a guitar and contemplating. Kranz biggest beef was a blow to Kranz's pride, when Carpenter essentially told the media that for a period of time on his Mercury mission, Mission Control, Kraft and Kranz did not know where Carpenter was...
   
   However, this is a well-written, well-paced entry into the history of America's space effort, and is fun to read "against" the Kranz book.
   
   My grandpa used to say that there's no such thing as a one-sided story. Getting so many different strong personalities to work together to get us into space was quite an accomplishment, and both these books (and others) help us understand the "miracle" that we pulled off.
   
   It was one of our nation's greatest and proudest accomplshments for so many reasons.



2. M. Scott Carpenter and his daughter Kris have certainly written a fascinating biography that is unlike most others I have read about astronauts. For starters, it is written mostly in the third person. I asked Scott about that recently and he said that was a decision by Kris to do that. I must say, it was risky to go that route with an autobiography. But from the standpoint of what the story was trying to tell, I think it was worth the risk since this is more then just a biography about Scott as it discusses his early life, his relatives and the early developments of the Mercury space program. As such, you get so much more here then just the life story of a Mercury astronaut.
   
   Carpenter's life was certainly an interesting one. Born in New York, he moved back to Colorado as a very young child with his mom while she battled the effects of TB (a battle which she fought for far longer then anyone would have predicted as she didn't die until after Scott's Mercury flight). His father remained apart from his life for the most part as he spent his childhood being raised by his grandparents on both sides of his family. A well grounded education, coupled with living a very healthy youth in Colorado produced a smart individual with the body of an athlete who could have done anything in life he wanted when WW2 provided him with the calling to join the military. Unable to see combat in the big war due to delays in his flight training, Scott's flying talents didn't get utilized until Korea when he was part of a P2V Neptune patrol bomber unit. Later, he became a test pilot until a lucky set of circumstances landed him in a prime spot as one of the Mercury 7 astronauts. But then again, that is still just the beginning of the story.
   
   Scott's Aurora 7 flight is told in the first person and it gives a full description of what happened in orbit from his perspective as well as discussing some technical problems that weren't fully understood until after the flight (such as a fault with the attitude control system on the spacecraft, which resulted in a higher fuel useage when operated in automatic mode). To me at least, this description coupled with information printed in other sources paints a much more accurate picture IMHO of what happened to get Scott about 200 miles off course then what has been described in other early biographies about the space program. It just goes to show it is always a good idea to get the story from more then one viewpoint.
   
   Not too much is discussed about Scott's work on the Sealab project (certainly not in the depth that Mercury was discussed). But it is mentioned since that more then anything seemed to have more to do with his not flying another space flight then what happened on Aurora 7 (read it and make your own conclusion). Scott certainly has a unique perspective among other astronauts from the Mercury days and it seems to me that if he were a lot younger and flying shuttle missions, he might make a perfect mission specialist, even though he could certainly fill the role of a commander or a pilot as well.
   
   Probably the most insight I got from this book was a looking into the life of a military family from the 1950s, while they were trying to raise three young children. Those readers who have been in similar situations (regardless of the branch of service) will probably recognize the situations where the wife tries to raise the children at home in base housing while the husband is off to some of the most interesting duty stations in the world and dealing with his own set of challenges as an officer in the Navy. It certainly shows that the plights of military families are by no means unique (and my mom had similar tales to tell from her days as an Army wife while Dad was off on TDY assignments).
   
   Throw that same family into the media circus known as the Mercury program and things get a bit more interesting. At that point the families that were hoping to live a private life, raising kids and serving their country got thrusted into almost a rock star status. They had more money as a result, but not every change was good and marriages tended to suffer as a result (Scott's marriage was no exception).
   
   So if you are just looking for something that JUST talks about an astronaut's experiences in the Mercury program, this book probably isn't for you. Granted you do get a lot of useful Mercury information, but in addition you get an almost complete tapestry on what made Scott Carpenter tick and the lives he touched. You won't get the cliches of "Duty Honor Country" either. We all know that astronauts are patriots, but the book doesn't rub the reader's nose in it. Probably the closest I can compare this book to in terms of other astronaut bio reads is the Neil Armstrong biography "First Man". But both books are unique in their perspectives.
   
   For the sheer enjoyment I got reading this book, I do give it five stars. I agree it isn't a read for everyone. But if you don't go in with any preconceived notions, then it makes for a much more enjoyable read.
   
   My own copy is the original hardcover, but the most recent printing of the book includes a special epilog chapter which talks a bit about a similarity of emotions that were experienced during the reentries of Aurora 7 and STS-107. The outcomes of the two were very different, but people who weren't alive during the Mercury program don't remember that there was a bit of public uncertainty that existed when Scott's spacecraft landed long with low fuel. Mercury control had more data, but the press and the general public didn't know much at all. Fast forward to February 2003 and a similar uncertainty fell over the public when Columbia didn't arrive at KSC when it should have and nobody knew anything until the first footage of its breakup appeared on national TV. In terms of the Carpenter biography, this epiloge doesn't seem like a good fit. But, by using one experience to shed emotional light on the other, it does help showcase what families of astronauts feel and experience when loved ones take the ride into space knowing full well that they may not come back alive. As such, it is helpful to get the family perspective as well.



3. If your reading the other Mercury books, add this one to the list.
   Getting the book basically for the shipping is a great deal.



4. Life at NASA is not always rosey. NASA experimented with different programs and each mission helpted to determine their research progress in the main mission to be the first to do things in Space. NASA uses young, ambitious people as guinea pigs. When my son Jeff had his first NASA job, he told me he was a glorified computer operator. They used his hard-earned experience at the University of Chicago to catagorize the information coming to base at Boulder, Colorado, from the flawed Hubble telescope. He'd spent years at Kitt Peak in Arizona (his professor getting all the credit) as a grad student in astronomy, and this task was important to him so that he worked for half-salary that year. Was his work appreciated? He was kicked out the door as soon as the Hubble was corrected. So much for job security.
   
   It takes pioneer spirit to have the courage for those experimental 'flights' Scott Carpenter and his colleagues achieved. He was the 4th American in space and the second to orbit the earth. In May, 1962, he made history in the tiny spacecraft 'Aurora 7' which malfunctioned in one of its scanners , forcing him to "overshoot" the expected landing site by 250 miles. This led to a lifetime of controversy.
   
   This book, written with his daughter, explains in detail this ill-fated flight which made him famous or infamous. He clears up lingering doubts about that flight while telling history 'as he lived it.' When things don't work out exactly as projected, it is always the main person involved who takes the blame for its 'failure' as in the case of Jeff, who is again on NASA's payroll at a Center of Excellence in Nashville for which he took tours of students to the Pasadena Jet Propulsion Lab several times a year. Now that phase is over, and it seems that his job is in jeopardy again.
   
   After Project Mercury, Scott went on to take part in Naval Sealabs as an undrewater explorer and researcher. From high above the earth to deep below the ocean, he has traversed time from one dimension to another. He is one of our greatest Space hereoes, 'Commander Carpenter and his flying machine.' He's endured quite a journey and paid dearly in his personal life. Re remarried in 1988 and had son Zachary.
   
   His fellow "Right Stuff" astronauts included John Glenn, Gus Grissom, Deke Slayton, Al Shepard, Gordo Cooper, and Wally Schirra. "Journeys so perilous that farewells were in fact small prayers. 'Good-bye' is itself an invocation that God attend every step, and with 'audieu' and 'Godspeed' for that matter -- for speedy journeys bring travelers home sooner rather than later. And home soon is always good." Keep faith, Geoffrey.



5. Carpenter spends a large portion of this book refuting what Chris Kraft wrote in his book, "Flight", too large in my opinion. I did find his story interesting and I think he could of told his story without making specific rebuttals to Kraft. On the positive side, this book is a nice addition to my NASA library since it focuses so much on the Mercury missions, compared to the many books written on the Apollo program.

5 comments about High Calling: The Courageous Life and Faith of Space Shuttle Columbia Commander Rick Husband.

1. The Courage and Faith that Commander Husband exhibited in his life is to be admired! My 15 year old grandaughter wanted this for Christmas and she shared it with me. The title really tells you about his life: "High Calling".



2. I read this book and re-read it several times. Evelyn Husband did an excellent job describing the life of Rick Husband in this book. Some folks accuse her of being preachy, but what those folks need to know is that faith and religion is such a big part of Rick Husband's (and his family's) life that if she hadn't written it all, it would not have accurately portrayed the life that Rick Husband lived. This book changed my life in many more ways that not even people closest to me ever had. This book changed me from a nominal believer to a dedicated believer. This book helped me set my priorities correct in my life. It showed me the value of dedication, hard work, faith, and determination. In fact, this book has become my "Bible". After reading this book, Rick Husband and his family have and will always have a very special place in my heart.



3. I was surprised how really good this book was. As well as telling you tons of fascinating info about NASA and lots of interesting detail about the work of the astronauts, the reader is given an intimate look into what their families are put through. I highly recommend it.



4. The book High Calling is good. I recommend that if you enjoy real life novels you buy this book. It is about the astronaut Rick Husband and his wife Evelyn Husband. I liked it for that reason. Also, it gets to the point without too much detail but it has enough. It was also interesting how it told about all of the procedures that astronauts do and how their lives are. I would recommend this book to anyone who likes books about real people in real situations. Another good thing is that the book is spiritual and tells people who read it to become more spiritual.



5. Very meaningful personal testimony to a most important event in our Nation's history.
   Should be read by everyone.