Pete Conrad | |
|---|---|
 Conrad in 1964 | |
| Born | Charles Conrad Jr. (1930-06-02)June 2, 1930 Philadelphia,Pennsylvania, U.S. |
| Died | July 8, 1999(1999-07-08) (aged 69) Ojai, California, U.S. |
| Resting place | Arlington National Cemetery |
| Education | Princeton University (BS) |
| Spouses | |
| Children | 4 |
| Awards | |
| Space career | |
| NASA astronaut | |
| Rank | Captain,USN |
Time in space | 49d 3h 38m |
| Selection | NASA Group 2 (1962) |
TotalEVAs | 4 |
Total EVA time |
|
| Missions | |
Mission insignia |     |
| Retirement | December 1973 |
Charles "Pete"Conrad Jr. (June 2, 1930 – July 8, 1999) was an AmericanNASAastronaut,aeronautical engineer,naval officer,aviator, andtest pilot who commanded theApollo 12 mission, on which he became thethird person to walk on the Moon. Conrad was selected for NASA'ssecond astronaut class in 1962.
Conrad was born inPhiladelphia,Pennsylvania. Despite havingdyslexia, he earned hisBachelor of Science degree inaeronautical engineering fromPrinceton University—being the firstIvy League astronaut—and joined the U.S. Navy. In 1954, Conrad received his naval aviator wings, served as afighter pilot and, after graduating from theU.S. Naval Test Pilot School (Class 20), as a project test pilot. In 1959, he was an astronaut candidate forProject Mercury.
Conrad set an eight-day space endurance record in 1965 along with his Command PilotGordon Cooper on his first spaceflight,Gemini 5. Later, Conrad commandedGemini 11 in 1966, and Apollo 12 in 1969. After Apollo, he commandedSkylab 2, the first crewed Skylab mission, in 1973. On the mission, he and his crewmates repaired significant launch damage to theSkylabspace station. For this,PresidentJimmy Carter awarded him theCongressional Space Medal of Honor in 1978.
After Conrad retired from NASA and the Navy in 1973, he became a vice president of American Television and Communications Company. He went on to work for McDonnell Douglas, as a vice president. During his tenure, he served as vice president of marketing, senior vice president of marketing, staff vice president of international business development, and vice president of project development. Conrad died in 1999, from internal injuries sustained in a motorcycle accident, aged 69.
Charles Conrad Jr. was born on June 2, 1930, inPhiladelphia,[1] the third child and the first son of Charles Conrad Sr. (1892–1969) and Frances De Rappelage Conrad (née Vinson; 1899–1981), into a well-to-do real estate and banking family.[2]: 17, 74
TheGreat Depression wiped out the Conrad family's fortune, just as it had those of so many others. In 1942, the family lost their manor home in Philadelphia, and then moved into a small carriage house, paid for by Frances's brother, Egerton Vinson. Eventually, Charles Sr., broken down by financial failures, left his family.[2]: 43
Conrad was considered a bright, intelligent boy, but he continually struggled with his schoolwork. He haddyslexia, a condition little understood at the time. Conrad attended theHaverford School, a private academy inHaverford, Pennsylvania, that previous generations of Conrads had attended. Even after his family's financial downturn, his uncle Egerton supported his continued schooling at Haverford. However, Pete's dyslexia continued to frustrate his academic efforts. After he failed most of his 11th grade exams, Haverford expelled him from school.[2]: 35, 43
Conrad's mother refused to believe that her son was unintelligent, and she set about finding him a suitable school. She foundDarrow School inNew Lebanon, New York. There, Conrad learned how to apply a systems approach to learning, and thus found a way to work around his dyslexia. Despite having to repeat the 11th grade, Conrad so excelled at Darrow that after his graduation in 1949, he not only was admitted toPrinceton University, but he was also awarded a fullNavy ROTC scholarship.[2]: 64–67 While at Darrow, although he was only 5 feet 6 inches (1.68 m) and weighed 135 pounds (61 kg), Conrad started as thecenter on his football team and became the team captain. "He was a very tough boy, and we won our share of games," said the school's assistant headmaster.[3]
Starting when he was 15 years old, Conrad worked during the summertime at the Paoli Airfield nearPaoli, Pennsylvania, bartering lawn mowing, sweeping, and other odd jobs for airplane flights and occasional instructional time. He learned more about the mechanics and workings ofaircraft andaircraft engines, and then he graduated to minor maintenance work. When he was 16, he drove almost 100 miles (160 km) to help a flight instructor whoseairplane had been forced to make an emergency landing. Conrad repaired the plane single-handedly. Thereafter, the instructor gave Conrad the flight lessons that he needed to earn hispilot's certificate even before he graduated fromhigh school.[2]: 54–59
Conrad continued flying while he was in college, not only keeping his pilot's certificate, but also earning aninstrument flight rating. He graduated with aBachelor of Science degree inaeronautical engineering from Princeton in 1953, after completing a 200-page-long senior thesis titled "The Design of a Turbo-Jet Military Advanced Trainer" with Richard V. Warden, Richard W. Vannata, and Calvin H. Perrine.[4] He was commissioned anEnsign in theU.S. Navy as a Naval ROTC graduate.[5]
Following his commission in 1953, Conrad was sent toNaval Air Station Pensacola,Florida, for flight training. He was also trained at theNaval Air Station Corpus Christi,Texas. He was designated aNaval Aviator in September 1954[5] and became afighter pilot. He excelled in Navy flight school, and he served for several years as anaircraft carrier-based fighter pilot in the Navy. Conrad also served as aflight instructor in Navy flight schools along theGulf of Mexico.[6]
Next, Conrad applied for and was accepted by theUnited States Naval Test Pilot School atNaval Air Station Patuxent River,Patuxent, Maryland. His classmates were future fellow astronautsWally Schirra andJim Lovell. He graduated in 1958, as part of Class 20, and was assigned as a Project Test Pilot.[2]: 83, 146 Conrad became a captain in the U.S. Navy on December 11, 1969.[5]
During this period, Conrad was invited to take part in the selection process for the first group of astronauts for theNational Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) (the "Mercury Seven"). Conrad, like his fellow candidates, underwent several days of what they considered to be invasive, demeaning, and unnecessary medical and psychological testing at theLovelace Clinic inNew Mexico. Unlike his fellow candidates, Conrad rebelled against the regimen. During aRorschach inkblot test, he told the psychiatrist that one blot card revealed a sexual encounter complete with lurid detail. When shown a blank card, he turned it around, pushed it back and replied, "It's upside down".[7]
Then when he was asked to deliver a stool sample to the onsite lab, he placed it in a gift box and tied a red ribbon around it. Eventually, he decided that he had had enough. After dropping his full enema bag on the desk of the clinic's commanding officer, he walked out.[2]: 113–119 His initial application to NASA was denied with the notationnot suitable for long-duration flight.[8]
After his NASA episode, Conrad returned to the Navy as a fighter pilot, serving in thePacific Fleet's second operationalF-4 Phantom II squadron,VF-96, on boardUSS Ranger.[9] Thereafter, when NASA announced its search for a second group of astronauts, Mercury veteranAlan Shepard, who knew Conrad from their time asnaval aviators andtest pilots, approached Conrad and persuaded him to reapply.[10] This time, Conrad found the medical tests less invasive, and in June 1962 he was selected to join NASA.[3]
He logged more than 6,500 hours of flying time, with more than 5,000 hours injet aircraft.[11]
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Conrad joined NASA as part of the second group of astronauts, known as theNew Nine, on September 17, 1962.[12] Regarded as one of the best pilots in the group, he was among the first of his group to be assigned a Gemini mission. As pilot ofGemini 5 he, along with his commanderGordon Cooper, set a new space endurance record of eight days. The duration of the Gemini 5 flight was actually 7 days 22 hours and 55 minutes, surpassing the then-current Russian record of five days. Eight days was the time required for the first crewed lunar landing missions. Conrad facetiously referred to the Gemini 5 capsule asa flying garbage can.[13]
Conrad tested many spacecraft systems essential to theApollo program. He was also one of the smallest of the astronauts, 5 feet6+1⁄2 inches (1.689 meters) tall,[14] so he found the confinement of the Gemini capsule less onerous than his Commander Gordon Cooper did. He was then named commander of theGemini 8 backup crew, and later commander ofGemini 11 with pilotRichard Gordon. Gemini 11 docked with anAgena target vehicle immediately after achieving orbit. Such a maneuver was an engineering and flight test similar to what the Apollo Command Module (CM) and Lunar Module (LM) would later be required to do. Also, the Gemini 11 flight holds the distinction of being the highest-apogee crewed Earth orbit ever, reaching anapogee of 1,369 kilometers (851 miles).[15]
Conrad was assigned in December 1966 to command the backup crew for the first Earth orbital test flight of the completeApollo spacecraft, including theLunar Module (LM) intolow Earth orbit. Delays in the LM's development pushed this mission to December 1968 as Apollo 8. But when one more delay occurred in readying the first LM for crewed flight, NASA approved and scheduled a lunar orbit mission without the LM asApollo 8, pushing Conrad's backup mission toApollo 9 in March 1969. Director of Flight Crew OperationsDeke Slayton's practice was to assign a backup crew as the prime crew on the third following mission. If the swap of 8 and 9 had not occurred, Conrad might have commandedApollo 11, the first mission to land on the Moon.[16]
On November 14, 1969,Apollo 12 was launched with Conrad as commander,Dick Gordon asCommand Module Pilot, andAlan Bean as Lunar Module Pilot. The launch was the most harrowing of the Apollo program, as a series of lightning strikes just after liftoff temporarily knocked out power and guidance in the Command Module. Five days later, after stepping down from the ladder of the Lunar Module onto a landing pad, Conrad joked about his own small stature by remarking:
Whoopee! Man, that may have been a small one forNeil, but that's a long one for me.
— Pete Conrad[17]
He later revealed that he said this in order to win a bet he had made with the Italian journalistOriana Fallaci for $500 to prove that NASA did not script astronaut comments. Fallaci was convinced that Armstrong's "One small step for man" statement had been written for him and was not his own words.[18]
Conrad's "long one" referred to the jump from the Lunar Module's ladder to a landing pad, whereas Armstrong's "small step" referred to the small step from the landing pad onto the Moon's surface. Conrad's first words on the lunar surface were:
Oooh, is that soft and queasy.
— Pete Conrad[17]
One of the photos that Conrad took during the mission with his own image visible on the helmet visor of Alan Bean was later listed onPopular Science's photo gallery of the bestastronaut selfies.[19]
Conrad's final mission was as commander ofSkylab 2, the first crew to board theSkylabspace station. The station had been damaged on its uncrewed launch, when itsmicrometeoroid shield tore away, taking one of two main solar panels with it and jamming the other one so that it could not deploy. Conrad and his crew repaired the damage on twospacewalks. Conrad managed to pull free the stuck solar panel by sheer brute force, an action of which he was particularly proud. The astronauts also erected a "parasol" solar shield to protect the station from intense solar heating, a function which the lost micrometeoroid shield was supposed to perform. Without the shield, Skylab and its contents would have become unusable.[20] PresidentJimmy Carter honored Conrad for this in 1978 by awarding him theCongressional Space Medal of Honor.[21]
During his training for Skylab 2, Conrad had to bail out from NASAT-38 N957NA on May 10, 1972. He was returning to Houston from a visit toILC Industries inDelaware. On approach toEllington AFB, he was advised that the weather had deteriorated below minimums so he diverted to Hobby. During the night,instrument flight rules (IFR) descent, he suffered a generator failure at 800 feet and broke off the approach. He elected to divert to an airfield with better weather. He ran out of fuel as he reachedBergstrom AFB and was forced to eject at 3,700 feet. He landed about 100 yards from the base operations building and his airplane crashed in an open field about two miles away.
Conrad retired from NASA and the Navy in 1973, and went to work for American Television and Communications Company. He started as the vice president of operations and chief operating officer. Conrad was in charge of the operation of existing systems and the national development of new cable television systems.[9]
In 1976, Conrad accepted a position withMcDonnell Douglas as a vice president and consultant. In 1978, he became vice president of marketing and was responsible for the commercial and military sales of Douglas Aircraft Company. After an engine fell off aMcDonnell Douglas DC-10, causing it tocrash with the loss of all passengers and crew in 1979, Conrad spearheaded McDonnell Douglas's ultimately unsuccessful efforts to allay the fears of the public and policymakers, and save the plane's reputation. In 1980, he was promoted to senior vice president of marketing. From 1982 to 1984, Conrad served as the senior vice president of marketing and product support. He was appointed staff vice president of international business development in 1984. During the 1990s he consulted for theDelta Clipper experimentalsingle-stage-to-orbit launch vehicle. He became vice president of project development in 1993.[9]
On February 14, 1996, Conrad was part of the crew on a record-breaking around-the-world flight in aLearjet owned by cable TV pioneerBill Daniels. The flight lasted 49 hours, 26 minutes and 8 seconds.[22] Today the jet is on permanent static display atDenver International Airport's Terminal C.[2]
A month before he died, Conrad appeared onABC NewsNightline and said, "I think theSpace Shuttle is worth one billion dollars a launch. I think that it is worth two billion dollars for what it does. I think the Shuttle is worth it for the work it does." In the last interview he gave before his death, Conrad sat down forPBS'sNova series and discussed where he felt the future direction of space travel should go. He considered returning to the Moon "a waste of taxpayer money", but recommended missions toMars and asteroids.[23]
In 2006, NASA posthumously awarded him the Ambassador of Exploration Award for his work for the agency and science.[24]
When you can't be good, be colorful.
While at Princeton, Conrad met Jane DuBose, a student atBryn Mawr, whose family owned a 1,600-acre (650 ha) ranch nearUvalde, Texas. Her father, Winn DuBose, was the first person to call Conrad "Pete" rather than "Peter", the name he had used since birth. Upon his graduation from Princeton and acceptance of his navy commission, Conrad and Jane were married on June 16, 1953. They had four sons.[2]
Given the demands of his career in the Navy and NASA, Conrad and Jane spent considerable time apart, and Conrad saw less of his sons than he would have liked. In 1988, Conrad and Jane divorced, both later remarrying.[9][25][26]
In 1989, Conrad's youngest son, Christopher, was diagnosed with a malignantlymphoma. He died in April 1990, at the age of 29.[2]: 230–1
Conrad metNancy Crane, aDenver divorcee, through mutual friends. Conrad and Crane married in 1990.[27]
Conrad was aCub Scout.[28] His recreational interests includedgolf,water skiing andauto racing, such asFormula Vee.[29]
Conrad died on July 8, 1999, from internal injuries sustained in a motorcycle accident. While traveling with his wife and friends from hisHuntington Beach home toMonterey, California, his motorcycle crashed on a turn. Conrad later died in a hospital inOjai.[30] He was wearing a helmet at the time and was operating within the speed limit.[3] He was buried with full honours atArlington National Cemetery,[31] with many Apollo-era astronauts in attendance and a performance of "Amazing Grace" by music legendWillie Nelson.[32]
TheLyndon B. Johnson Space Center inHouston, Texas has a grove of trees that have been planted to honor the memory of the astronauts who have died. After Conrad's death,NASA planted a tree in his honor. During the dedication ceremony, hisApollo 12 crewmateAlan Bean used his speech to lighten the sombre occasion by injecting a little levity, pretending to "channel" Conrad's instructions from the hereafter. Bean said Conrad wanted NASA to light his tree every Christmas season with coloured lights instead of the white used for everyone else, in keeping with his motto "when you can't be good, be colourful". NASA has honoured this request, and every Christmas since then, all of the trees in the grove have been lit with white lights—except Conrad's tree, which has been lit with red lights.[2]: xiii [33]
_Pete_Conrad%2c_Dick_Gordon%2c_and_Al_Bean_pose_with_the_Apollo_12_Saturn_V.jpg)
He is inducted into several Aviation and Astronaut Halls of Fame. In 1980 he was inducted into theNational Aviation Hall of Fame.[36] He was one of ten Gemini astronauts inducted into theInternational Space Hall of Fame in 1982.[37] Conrad and his fellow Gemini astronauts were inducted into theU.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame in 1993.[38] Conrad was presented anHonoraryMaster of Arts degree from Princeton in 1966; an HonoraryDoctor of Laws degree fromLincoln-Wesleyan University in 1970, and an HonoraryDoctor of Science degree fromKings College,Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania in 1971.[9]
The three Skylab astronaut crews were awarded the 1973Robert J. Collier Trophy "For proving beyond question the value of man in future explorations of space and the production of data of benefit to all the people on Earth."[39][40]Gerald Carr accepted the 1975Dr. Robert H. Goddard Memorial Trophy from President Ford, awarded to the Skylab astronauts.[41] They were awarded AIAA's 1974Haley Astronautics Award.[42]
Conrad was afellow of theAmerican Astronautical Society;New York Academy of Sciences;American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, and theSociety of Experimental Test Pilots.[11]
Conrad was discussed at length inTom Wolfe's 1979 book,The Right Stuff, about the pilots engaged in U.S. postwar research about rockets, although he was never mentioned in the1983 film version. He played a news commentator in the 1975 made-for-TV movieStowaway to the Moon, and himself in the 1991 television moviePlymouth, about a fictional lunar base,[43] and in anAmerican Express television commercial.[3]
In the 1995 filmApollo 13, Conrad was played byDavid Andrews; in the 1998HBOminiseriesFrom the Earth to the Moon, byPeter Scolari andPaul McCrane;[43] in the 2018 filmFirst Man, byEthan Embry,[44] and in the 2019alternate history web television seriesFor All Mankind by Steven Pritchard.
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