My grandson wanted to know how to get to be an astronaut (seven) it's amazing how these kids can read today .... so i took a shot and told him to read THE RIGHT STUFF with me by Tom Wolfe He loved every minute of it and asked questions that i couldn't answer! but one stood out!
Why Didn't Chuck Yeager ever go UP! Hey mouths of babes!
Exactly. They only took college graduates. Most if not all of them were engineers. Yeager had a GED if memory serves correctly. He only got a comission because he was a flying NCO and white at the end of WW2. The black flying NCO's of WW1 and WW2 were not that lucky.
The Monkey they sent up instead of Shepard put us behind the Rusians.... The heavy lift program still went on out in Edwards witch gave birth to the shuttle! General Yeager has a college degree if not in fact then in life exper. I have my degree and i can tell you it did not in any way shape or form help me in battle it was the old timers who explained combat fighter / bomber tactics that paved my way! Oh and while were at it the morons who thought missles vs guns were proven wrong!!!
I sent your question to my husband (Yeager buff), here is his response:
"Too old for initial selection criteria...plus he thought they were just a bunch of young whippersnappers who didn't know anything about real important aviation stuff like being a test pilot and breaking the sound barrier..."
I guess I was as clear as mud on that one. My bad, as we computer experts say! I should have said, Capt Joe McConnell. He also was killed testing in the new, at the time, F100 at George AFB. A guy stationed there showed me where he went in.
Colonei, I got your e-mail, but the contents wouldn't come up. I'm guessing it was about the British jet car. There was a special on one of the education channels about that car. Very interesting, for sure.
Well, is my face red! I said Joe McConell was killed at George in an F100. In reality he was killed at Edwards in an F86H. The guy who gave me the erroneous info either was trying to be funny or maybe he had been told the same thing. He took me up in a building on the flightline and pointed out a large dark damaged area area across the ramp as the point of impact. So, I do apologize for the misinformation.
Not only that, my typing finger hit the wrong button spelling Colonel.
I'm guessing you are referring to Col. Kittinger, but I do recall that he ALMOST broke the barrier, but that the official word on that form the AF was that it was under the barrier. It was in the 600 range, though...pretty quick...with a malfunctioning pressure suit that was causing a lot of pain.
I couldn't find it on the Wiki, but I'm sure it's out there.
And BTW, Caninedale...If you gave me $100 for spitting out in under 1 second who was the first man in space and/or the first man to break the barrier...I can guarantee that Yeager's name would pop into my head faster than Sheppard's.
But alas, there is a whole generation of kids who've never read the book or seen the movie The Right Stuff (on AMC now, I'm sure). They couldn't name Yeager if they tried...nor can they pick out Wisconsin on a map of the USA, but that's another thing entirely.
I met Gen. Yeager at an airshow when I was much younger. Also got to meet Pappy Boyington in Watsonville, CA (Memorial Day West Coast Antique Fly-In...an airshow I strongly recommend), and got a personalized autograph.
