edgar-mitchell

42
The Way of the Explorer
When our distant progeny look back and contemplate the history of
all living matter, they will view our time, with respect to the Apollo missions
in particular, as the third major transition in the evolution of living
beings. The first transition could be defined as that moment when sea
creatures finally left the primordial sea and moved about on dry land; the
second, when creatures took to the Earth’s atmosphere; the third stage
will likely be defined as that time during which we left the planet altogether
in the latter half of the 20th century.
From an anthropological point of view, space exploration must be
undertaken not only out of simple human curiosity, but also to further
ensure the survival of the species. The 20th century has seen the unprecedented
development and proliferation of magnificent technologies—many
of them, through design, ignorance, or misuse, are capable of destroying
life as well as enhancing it. Space exploration alone holds the promise of
eventual escape from a dying planet, provided we wisely manage our
resources in the meantime, and actually survive that long.
One of my first major decisions upon arriving in Houston was choosing
to work on the lunar module itself as my technical assignment. Every
week I would fly a T38 up to Bethpage, Long Island, to assist in the design,
manufacture, and testing of the lunar module at Grumman Aircraft
Corporation with Fred Haise. I recall the shock I felt the first time I saw a
prototype of the machine that would one day land on and take off from
the moon. I remember asking myself if we were really going to do it in that.
It appeared so clumsy, top-heavy; so foreign to the act of flight. The insectlike
posture seemed otherworldly. But in spite of its unconventional shape,
it would prove to be an extraordinary flying machine. No one knew what
a lunar module was supposed to look like, much less how it would respond
to the pilot’s commands. But this was an attempt by some of the finest
technical minds in aeronautics and astronautics to fill the bill. Being the
first manned craft designed to fly only in orbit, it had no aerodynamic
surfaces, and in fact would never return to the atmosphere of its home
planet. After making its rendezvous with the command module and safely
delivering its pilots, each lunar module was scheduled to be retargeted
toward the moon, and to crash into the crater-riddled surface. Its impact
would be measured by seismic equipment earlier set in place by astronauts
during their brief stay there. Innovation was a part of the daily routine, as
there was no tried-and-true blueprint for what we were doing.
During the first Apollo missions I met the German successor to my old
neighbor Robert Goddard, Wernher von Braun, in Huntsville, Alabama.
This was the man whom I had heard so much about—much of it critical of
his past. But the man I came to know was very different from the mythic