St. Louis Space Frontier Celebrates Recent Achievements, Successful International Space Development Conference

(SLSF graphic)

By Carmelo Turdo

Members of the St. Louis Space Frontier, a chapter of the National Space Society, gathered at the Greater St. Louis Air & Space Museum Sunday to celebrate their contributions to the successful 2017 International Space Development Conference and other recent local chapter achievements.  The chapter has received recognition from the National Space Society over the last few years, including the 2015 Chapter of the Year Award and 2016 Chapter Excellence Award for Outreach and Innovative Projects.  In 2017, St. Louis Space Frontier was the host chapter for the International Space Development Conference held at St. Louis Union Station in May.  

 

St. Louis Space Frontier President Christine Nobbe thanked the chapter members for their behind the scenes work during the conference, recognizing the efforts of individual members with tokens of appreciation.  Chapter members gave updates on projects they were leading and future events, especially concerning the upcoming solar eclipse on August 21.  The path of the rare total solar eclipse runs southeasterly through Missouri, and many communities in the state are offering viewing events throughout the day (see link above).  

The Greater St. Louis Air & Space Museum, a co-sponsor of the conference, welcomed the St. Louis Space Frontier to their location at St. Louis Downtown Airport for this special chapter event.  Dinner was enjoyed under a large tent on the unusually cool evening, and the museum was open after hours for members to browse through the St. Louis aviation and space program exhibits.  Many members also checked out the interior of the Lockheed Jetstar, once owned by Howard Hughes, on display in front of the museum's 1929 Curtiss-Wright Hangar No. 2.

Congratulations to the St. Louis Space Frontier for all they have achieved in recent years.  Here are some views of Sunday's event.

Space Pioneers Meet for Monthly Luncheon in St. Louis Following Recognition at International Conference

By Carmelo Turdo

Members of MAC's Old Team, a group of retired McDonnell Douglas employees who designed and built America's Mercury and Gemini spacecraft, met for their monthly luncheon at The Corner Pub & Grill in Chesterfield today following their May 27th appearance at the International Space Development Conference.  At the conference, members of MAC's Old Team participated in the Saturday Panel Presentation with astronaut Thomas Stafford and they received the National Space Society 2017 Space Pioneer Award for Special Merit. 

The luncheon usually serves as a casual way for these aerospace pioneers to visit and share the latest personal news, and occasionally visitors attend to give some updates on local projects or events of interest.  Today's general topics of interest were the recent conference award, the construction at The Space Museum in Bonne Terre, MO and the upcoming solar eclipse.  Here are some views of today's luncheon.

Group organizer Norm Beckel reads to award to the group

Chuck Poplstein visited from The Boeing Company 

St. Louis Space Frontier members celebrated a successful conference

Dean Purdy gives an update on the Space Museum construction

Members of MAC's Old Team frequently participate in community outreach events at The Space Museum and other venues, and are reticent to seek recognition for their contributions to the early U.S. manned space program and the subsequent advancements in the aerospace field.  The Aero Experience is privileged to recognize these American space pioneers as a national treasure, and celebrate their recognition by the National Space Society.

St. Louis Space Pioneers Relive Early U.S. Manned Space Programs at International Space Development Conference

By Carmelo Turdo

The National Space Society (NSS) wrapped up its 36th annual International Space Development Conference (ISDC) last weekend in St. Louis, the birthplace of the Mercury and Gemini spacecraft that propelled the U.S. into manned space exploration.  The ISDC was hosted by the local NSS chapter, St. Louis Space Frontier, and held in the historic St. Louis Union Station hotel and convention center.  A full agenda of presentations attracted attendees and exhibitors from around the world, and St. Louis aerospace education organizations were there to support the weekend's activities.

Of special interest was the Saturday Panel Presentation with members of Mac's Old Team, a group of St. Louis-based McDonnell Aircraft engineers who helped design, build and launch the Mercury and Gemini spacecraft at the dawn of the U.S. manned space program.  Saturday's Panel Presentation, moderated by Amy Shira Teitel, featured a two-hour session with Mac's Old Team and Gemini and Apollo Astronaut Thomas Stafford.  Here are some excerpts from the program that illustrate their experiences from the early years of U.S. manned space flight.    

The Panel Presentation with MAC's Old Team and Thomas Stafford

Moderator Amy Shira Teitel checks on the panelists

Bob Schepp 

Bob Schepp was attending Washington University and was working in the evenings doing pre-flight inspections on the jets at McDonnell Aircraft at the dawn of the space age.  He was very familiar with the F-101 Voodoo autopilot, which would be used for the Mercury spacecraft, and so he was moved to the Mercury program.  "We didn't think anything about whether this was history.  We were working 12-hour days, seven days a week...It was an engineering job.  Later in life we realized how historic these events were."   

The Gemini program was an essential step toward the successful Apollo lunar landings. "Had the Gemini program not been successful, we would not have gone to the moon.  It developed the capability to rendezvous two vehicles and also to rendezvous and dock...That's how important the Gemini program was."

Jerry Roberts

Inspired by Buck Rogers comics and the impact of the 1957 Sputnik 1 launch, Jerry Roberts joined McDonnell Aircraft to work on the Mercury spacecraft stabilization and control system in 1959.  "The big attraction was here's a chance to do something that had never been done before."   

Launching a man as a warhead on a missile with the technology at that time was a significant accomplishment.  "It's hard to imagine now just how primitive the technology was...We had a long way to go and really didn't know what we were going to end up with...We had fifteen minutes of flight experience when he (President Kennedy) said we were going to the moon."

"The thing that made it possible in the time frame was the dedication of the individuals...An engineer knows that sooner or later, every system and every machine will fail.  But every engineer that worked on that (Mercury spacecraft) said, 'The failure is not going to be my fault.' The actual design intent was to postpone that failure until they were back home."  The long work days and time away from families resulted in a 48% divorce rate for McDonnell engineers on the program.

Thomas Stafford

Thomas Stafford, a 1952 U.S. Naval Academy graduate, was a U.S. Navy test pilot when the call for another class of NASA astronauts was made in 1962.  This group of nine astronauts made many of the Gemini and Apollo flights in the race to the moon.  "The event that changed the world was Sputnik, because after that, the Congress, the Administration started DARPA, started NASA and the National Space Council."  He credited Senate Majority Leader, later Vice President, Lyndon Johnson, with accelerating the manned space program development to accomplish the moon landing mission ahead of the then Soviet Union.       

"The main thing was President Kennedy's speech on May 25, 1961, that we would go to the moon and safely return.  Alright, we WILL go.  But the question was HOW?"  Several methods were discussed, with multiple boosters, earth orbit rendezvous, and other complex maneuvers.  The method that was actually used, lunar orbit rendezvous, was to be learned through the Gemini program.

Three developments made the lunar landing missions possible: development of the F-1 rocket engine, the management and use of liquid hydrogen fuel, and the lunar orbit rendezvous.

Stafford worked on backup procedures for failures that may occur involving the radar, the inertial platform or the computer during rendezvous maneuvers in the Gemini program.  After Stafford and Wally Schirra requested assistance during dinner with James S. McDonnell, he arranged to provide the computer resources needed to compute the backup data charts.  "Mr. McDonnell was such a wonderful person - he was a hero to me.  He said, 'Any time you boys have any problems, come and see me.'  So we all got to know him very well."  Schirra and Stafford would fly the Gemini 6A mission that rendezvoused with Gemini 7 to prove that capability.  

Norm Beckel 

Norm Beckel recalled an interest in the Buck Rogers and other space-based comic characters of his youth, but did not think it was ever going to happen!  In 1957 and beyond, the first U.S. Vanguard satellite program failure and the Soviet Union's Sputnik 1 success began the Cold War space race.  The U.S. manned space program received a new urgency, and history was made.   

"What made the Mercury and Gemini programs so successful was the engineering leadership that we had...They brought us along (young engineers), let us do our thing as far as design, and corrected us when we needed correcting.  The thing that really made the program work was that we were always allowed to fail.  If you did something and it didn't work, you didn't cover it up.  You put it out on the table and say, 'Here I am, this didn't work.' This is the type of leadership we had, starting with Mr. McDonnell coming down to the lower-level engineering at that time.  We learned a lot.  Our main thrust was we were not going to fail.  We did not want to let these men down (the astronauts) in our spacecraft."

"As an engineer, it was a time that could never be repeated again.  We were able to do things very quickly, make changes very quickly, and do what was right."

Dean Purdy 

Dean Purdy joined McDonnell Aircraft in 1955 to work on the F-4 program, and maintained a casual interest in the developments for satellite launches planned for the International Geophysical Year 1957-1958.  Manned spaceflight was the next logical step. 

The evolution of the launch vehicles was a critical, and unknown, variable in the success of the manned space program.  From the Mercury Redstone sub-orbital flights and the Atlas orbital missions to the Gemini Titan II and later Apollo Saturn V, missile development progressed at a rapid rate beyond the capability of the Soviet Union's launch systems.  Purdy worked on, and later managed, the major space programs at McDonnell Aircraft and McDonnell Douglas including Mercury, Gemini, Manned Orbiting Laboratory, Space Shuttle and International Space Station.  

Earl Robb

Earl Robb joined McDonnell Aircraft in 1952 to design airplanes before the manned space program developed.  Company founder James S. McDonnell was already planning to get into manned space flight, and in 1957, Robb became part of the team to develop the Mercury spacecraft.  

Robb credits Dr. Wernher Von Braun for the success of the U.S. Apollo lunar space program.  He met Von Braun while working on the Skylab program at the twilight of the Apollo missions.  He recalled that Von Braun was personable and would discuss issues with young engineers like himself, and that his staff was "great to work with."

A brief time to visit after the session

Mac's Old Team with Thomas Stafford and Amy Shira Teitel

The Aero Experience was honored to be a co-sponsor and attend the Saturday sessions of the International Space Development Conference in St. Louis last weekend.  We thank the conference organizers, St. Louis Space Frontier and MAC's Old Team for their hospitality.

International Space Development Conference Convenes at Birthplace of U.S. Manned Spacecraft

By Carmelo Turdo

The National Space Society (NSS) wrapped up its 36th annual International Space Development Conference (ISDC) Monday in St. Louis, the birthplace of the Mercury and Gemini spacecraft that propelled the U.S. into manned space exploration.  The ISDC was hosted by the local NSS chapter, St. Louis Space Frontier, and held in the historic St. Louis Union Station hotel and convention center.  A full agenda of presentations attracted attendees and exhibitors from around the world, and St. Louis aerospace education organizations were there to support the weekend's activities.

Mayuko Ishii, Astrax Studio,

with The Rocket Prince book

The Aero Experience joined with other local co-sponsors, the Greater St. Louis Air & Space Museum, Missouri Aviation Historical Society, The Space Museum Bonne Terre Missouri, and Mac's Old Team, among others, to support the conference and contribute to its success.  Exhibits were available daily during the conference days Friday-Sunday, and lunch sessions included keynote speakers NASA Space Shuttle Astronaut Dr. Linda Godwin, Gemini and Apollo Astronaut and retired USAF General Thomas Stafford and World View Enterprises CEO Jane Poynter.  Of special interest was the Saturday Panel Presentation and Luncheon with members of Mac's Old Team, a group of St. Louis-based McDonnell Aircraft engineers who helped design, build and launch the Mercury and Gemini spacecraft at the dawn of the U.S. manned space program.  More from Saturday's Mac's Old Team program will be featured in an upcoming story. 

Some of the exhibitors on Saturday included:

Greater St. Louis Air & Space Museum President Mark Nankivil visits with Michael 

Mackowski from Phoenix, AZ 

Space Museum, Bonne Terre, Missouri President Earl Mullins with some

of the museum's displays

Martin Harris with Missouri Aviation Historical Society aviation and space

program display

Beautiful paintings from Janice Schoultz Mudd

Missouri University of Science and Technology Mars Rover Design

Tesla Model 90D S-Series All-Electric car

Saturday's Panel Presentation featured a two-hour session with Mac's Old Team and Astronaut Thomas Stafford.  During the luncheon that followed, Mac's Old Team and General Stafford received the NSS Space Pioneer Award.

ISDC Chair Christine Nobbe welcomes us to the morning session

Moderator Amy Shira Teitel checks on the panelists

The Panel Presentation gets underway

Bob Schepp

Earl Robb

Dean Purdy

Norm Beckel

Jerry Roberts

Astronaut Thomas Stafford

A brief time to visit after the session

Mac's Old Team with Thomas Stafford and Amy Shira Teitel

The luncheon featured the Keynote Speaker, Astronaut and Retired USAF General Thomas Stafford, and the presentation of the Space Pioneer Awards.  Accepting the awards from Mr. Philip Newell are Thomas Stafford and Norm Beckel representing Mac's Old Team.

The Aero Experience was honored to participate and record the day's activities with Mac's Old Team and General Stafford.  In the next story on the ISDC in St. Louis, we will include selected excerpts from the Panel Presentation that will take us back to the pioneering days of manned space flight!  We thank all who produced this conference and for the access needed to present this story.