Chapter 31: ►

_Working in a Fish Bowl_

We, among others, had anticipated Sputnik but utterly failed to predict its profound impact on the minds of all men. When it came, on October 4, 1957, we were astonished by the reaction. As the sense of public shame spread throughout the country, we--engineers on the most advanced “space” project in the United States--were overwhelmed by special misgivings. Maybe we should have pushed the X-15B, the orbiting vehicle, harder. We debated. Had we been right to lie low, virtually keeping it to ourselves? Perhaps a concerted, intelligent presentation in Washington would have sold our case, even in those days before Sputnik when space was taboo.

This painful speculation did not go on for long. No sooner did we feel the impact of Sputnik than a second rocket crashed into our camp. This one had North American insignia. It was Stormy, urging us to put together a completely detailed proposal for an orbiting X-15B _right now_. Fortunately, the preliminary design section had worked out most of the details. Ours was mainly a job of assembling various loose pieces of paper and bringing the report up to date. Within a few days it was ready and Stormy hurried off to Washington.

The X-15B concept was awe-inspiring even to those of us who had thought about it for many months. In the plan Stormy took to Washington it was a three-stage monster, tall as a seven-story building. The basic booster system, or first two stages, developed the staggering total of 1.3 million pounds of thrust. The first stage consisted of two giant Navahos, bound together and calculated to generate about 830,000 total pounds thrust. The second stage was a single Navaho, capable of 415,000 pounds thrust. The third and final stage, perched atop the cluster of boosters like some massive arrowhead, was the X-15B itself, with a slightly more powerful engine than the RMI XLR-99. As a matter of fact, the engine we had in mind for the X-15B, a proven, reliable chamber, was the North American-built Atlas “sustainer” engine, which develops about 75,000 pounds thrust.

The X-15B was a far more sophisticated ship than the craft we were then building. It was larger, capable of carrying not one pilot, but two. The skin was tougher, to withstand the higher post-orbit re-entry heating. The fuel tanks were rearranged and larger, to gain added third-stage thrust. But as for the basic shape and the systems--controls, both conventional and ballistic, pressure suit, instruments, and so on--the two airplanes were fundamentally the same. Years of development on the X-15 would save much time in perfecting the X-15B.

According to our proposed flight plan, the X-15B would be fired from a launching pad in Cape Canaveral, Florida. The huge double-Navaho first stage would lift the massive structure toward the sky. After about eighty seconds the first stage would fall away. Then the second stage would light off and boost the shrinking structure higher and faster. When the second stage burned out, it too would fall away, leaving the X-15B alone in the sky. At that point the X-15B pilot would light off the rocket engine and the 30,000-pound ship would soar into orbit, 75 miles above the earth and at a speed of 18,000 miles an hour.

After three orbits around the earth, the X-15B pilot would prepare to return. First he would fire “retro-rockets” to slow down the craft and bring it back out of orbit. When the ship neared the thick atmosphere the pilot or pilots would align the ship with the ballistic controls and then make a similar approach to that planned for the X-15, a shallow, gradual descent into the atmosphere. When the ship had fully re-entered and slowed to more or less conventional X-15 speed, the pilot would set up for a conventional landing on one of the dry lakes near Edwards. This was, in essence, my “commuter” space ship.

We were proud of that proposal and damned happy that we were in shape, that we had created a team and the think-how to carry it through to completion within a matter of four years, the terminal date we set in the proposal. But as we were soon to learn, other airframe companies had not been idle. When the space taboo was forced aside by Sputnik, hundreds of engineers descended on Washington with literally hundreds of proposals for every conceivable type of space craft. Stormy returned to the plant in a dark mood.

“When I left Washington,” he said, “there were exactly 421 new proposals before the Pentagon and NACA. There’s talk of creating a new ‘space agency,’ and I’m afraid some time is going to elapse before they get organized and sort through all those proposals. Furthermore, the President has stated publicly that he is opposed to having the Air Force and the Navy engage in big space projects unless they have some clear military application. We’ll have to take that heavy instrumentation load out of the X-15B proposal and substitute a weapons system, a bomb, reconnaissance cameras, or something like that.”

“Well, that’s certainly no problem,” Feltz said.

“The other thing is, I encountered a lot of resistance to an advanced X-15. They still want to see how a plain X-15 will do on landing and so on, before they move to any more advanced projects. Also, they don’t like the Navaho booster system and I’ll have to admit they have a point. The Navaho is proven, but the staging _is_ complicated and big. I have a feeling, as far as orbiting man is concerned, they will probably want to start with something smaller and a little less complex. My guess is that whoever is given responsibility for putting man in space will probably begin with Don Flickinger’s MIS program.”

Stormy, as usual, had shrewdly sized up the Washington scene. A few months after his informal report to us, Congress did, in fact, create a new space agency--the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). NACA formed the nucleus for the new agency. Dr. T. Keith Glennan moved in as NASA Administrator, and NACA’s former boss, Dr. Hugh L. Dryden, remained as Glennan’s deputy. The President gave NASA responsibility for almost all non-military space projects. And as Stormy had predicted, NASA selected Flickinger’s MIS program as a start for putting man in space. MIS became Project Mercury. (Late in 1959 Walt Williams moved from Edwards to NASA’s Langley Laboratory to help push the Mercury program.) NASA awarded the contract to build the orbiting, manned Mercury capsule to McDonnell Aircraft Company in St. Louis, Missouri. Then NASA selected seven members of the armed forces, all of them test pilots, to serve as our first spacemen. NASA labeled these seven men Mercury Astronauts. Although both the X-15 and Project Mercury came under NASA jurisdiction, they were separate, distinct programs. The X-15 has frequently been confused with Project Mercury, and I have often been mistaken for one of the seven Astronauts, but there is no connection between the two projects other than a friendly rivalry and a complete exchange of information.

* * * * *

Sputnik hit us hard in more ways than one. The press, inquisitive by nature and eagerly seeking an answer to Soviet space triumphs, turned klieg lights on the X-15 project. Reporters, radio and television commentators, and a variety of other media descended on us in droves, seriously complicating our already difficult task. These endless news reports, stories, and feature articles generally exaggerated the X-15 mission. The X-15 was confused with the X-15B proposal, which had been published in a trade journal, or else it was deliberately misrepresented. Quite soon our research airplane had the title of “the U. S.’s first space ship.”

We were astonished and baffled by this activity, and especially concerned when the government removed the secrecy from all but the most obscure technical details of the X-15. For the first time in history an aircraft company found itself building a research airplane completely in the open. All details, failures as well as successes, were available almost day by day to the nation. It was like working in a fish bowl. It made us uncomfortable, not to say edgy. It is disconcerting to build an airplane as revolutionary as the X-15 with a reporter leaning over one’s shoulder.

Believe me, under such circumstances the multifarious demands of the modern communications media can be overwhelming. I should know. As the X-15’s first test pilot, I was naturally singled out for special press treatment. Invitations to interviews, to make speeches, to appear on television shows, came by the hundreds. There were so many that I could have stopped all work on the X-15 itself then and there and devoted full-time to fulfilling these requests. In some special cases--those I thought would particularly benefit the project--I _did_ make time for them. But although I rejected about ninety per cent of these invitations and ducked the press whenever possible, I was soon glamorously and erroneously tagged “Our First Man in Outer Space.”

It is not easy to deal with the press. It is a time-consuming and delicate operation. If you grant one man an interview and refuse another, the latter becomes angry. In the press, as in the aircraft industry and elsewhere, there are many good men but there are also many small-minded and bigoted prima donnas. For months upon months I walked this tightrope, desperately hoping that I would not offend someone who would take out his anger on the X-15 project itself, or on Charlie Feltz or Stormy. I tried, actually, to steer the reporters to Charlie and Stormy, the two men who deserve the real credit for building the X-15. But the press was not too interested. They kept returning to me, the pilot, kept on giving me undue credit. This constant publicity, unsought but unavoidable, considerably strained my day-to-day working relationship with the fine X-15 project team at North American and with our customers, the Air Force, the Navy, and NASA.

To all of the press there was one line I refused to cross: the threshold of my home. Each newsman, naturally, wanted to interview Alice and our tribe of children, five of them by that time. Since my Mach 2 flight in the Skyrocket, I had conscientiously shielded my family from the press. There were many reasons for this. First and foremost, this attention embarrassed Alice and made the children uncomfortable. I was willing to give my all for the X-15 and nation, but I saw no compelling reason to involve the members of my family against their wishes. Another reason was my uncertainty about what effect the publicity might have on the children. There was always the chance that, seeing their pictures in a newspaper or magazine, their young heads might be turned early in life. I wanted to avoid this at all costs. My adamant policy in this regard made many of the newsmen, especially the photographers, furious. Some of these men suspected that I had some mysterious ulterior motive. Perish the thought!

Behind the scenes, ironically, my role in the flight test of the X-15 was being cast in almost inverse ratio to my press clippings. From the outset NACA or, as we now call it, NASA, had deliberately seized a firm technical grip on the X-15 flight-test program. Unlike most previous rocket-research airplanes, the X-15 would not go first to the Air Force for shake-down flights and then later to NASA. After contractor demonstration flights the ship would go direct from contractor to NASA. The complete flight-test program would be laid out by NASA. The Air Force, Navy, and NASA would contribute one pilot plus a “back-up” pilot for the airplane. But these men would fly under strict NASA supervision.

As contractor test pilot I would fly the airplane first. We would demonstrate many points, such as engine reliability, flight stability under negative G and positive G, Lox top-off and launch capability, and safe landings. These flights would be short-legged, conducted over or near the Edwards base. I had been specifically told that I would have speed and altitude restrictions which would keep me well within established records. NASA did not want a long delay in contractor demonstrations just seeking new records. We protested this at first, not because North American was interested in establishing records, but because some of the restrictions made the demonstration points more difficult and dangerous. For example, at high speed and altitude we could demonstrate high-speed controllability without fear of disaster, but at lower speed and altitude it was far more ticklish and less fruitful. Nevertheless, NASA had the final say-so, and very early in the game they set North American flight limits on the airplane of Mach 2.0 and 100,000 feet.

Iven Kincheloe, who had earned the name “Mr. Space” in four flights of the X-2 before Apt crashed, was selected as the Air Force X-15 pilot. A handsome, eager young blond, with wavy hair and deep blue eyes, he was the press agent’s dream of a test pilot. But Kinch, as we called him, was much more than that. He was an engineering test pilot, an educated man, dedicated, fearless, and able. During the building of the X-15, he was constantly in the plant going over the plans and discussing the technical details of the ship. Kinch was obviously a winner and we were glad to have him on the X-15 team. His back-up on the Air Force team was Major Robert White, a graduate of the Edwards test-pilot school and a very able pilot. White had never flown a rocket plane--by the time he came along they were all either retired or crashed--but he had plenty of experience with all of the Air Force’s supersonic fighters and bombers.

NASA selected its most senior pilot, Joe Walker, to fly the X-15. I knew Walker well. He had worked with me for years at NACA, Edwards. He learned to fly rocket planes and the other weird vehicles in NACA’s stable, including the X-4, X-5, and the underpowered X-3. In his tour of duty at NACA, Edwards, Walker had accumulated thirty-one rocket-powered flights in the X-1-A (in which he narrowly escaped death when it exploded in the mother-plane belly), X-1-B, and the X-1-E. He was well qualified for the X-15 assignment.

Since the Navy had contributed a small percentage of the X-15 cost, it, too, was entitled to assign a pilot to the flight-test program. Lt. Comdr. Forrest (“Pete”) Petersen, a pilot from the Navy’s Patuxent River Test Station, was selected. Petersen had helped wring out most of the new Navy carrier-based fighters, such as the F11F, F8U, and F4H. A quiet-spoken man who liked to stay out of the limelight--and did--Petersen impressed me as a “sleeper,” a man of Colonel Marion Carl’s caliber. I was certain that, given the opportunity, Petersen would perform very well for the Navy.

* * * * *

In due time the government considered the X-15B proposal which we had submitted in the wake of Sputnik and, as Stormy had predicted, rejected it. Convinced that our approach was a sound follow-on, or parallel program, with NASA’s Project Mercury, we kept trying to sell it as a laboratory or weapons system. We greatly simplified the booster system, switching from Navaho to Martin’s newer and more powerful Titan ballistic missile. But NASA had its hands full with Mercury. The President was not yet convinced that the Air Force could mount a weapons system in space. Communications and early-warning satellites were obviously valuable, but there was considerable controversy about the efficiency and practicability of launching a bomb from space. Pending the President’s final decision, the Air Force awarded a long-range study contract to Boeing and Martin for an orbital, or sub-orbital, vehicle known as DYNA-SOAR.

Meanwhile, our X-15, which was then beginning to take shape in the manufacturing division, was regarded with new and increasing respect, not only throughout the nation and aircraft industry, but also at North American. Our baffling stepchild had suddenly ballooned into the nation’s front-running vehicle to put man into space. Our project group increased in size from 65 to over 250 people. Every division of the plant was eager to help us with our problems. Beaming proudly, North American erected with pride a huge neon sign over the main production buildings proclaiming:

HOME OF THE X-15

From the very beginning of the X-15 project we worked with a sense of urgency. Our goal was to build a research aircraft to provide data for military combat airplanes in time. Now, having seen the psychological impact of Sputnik, we realized that a safe flight of the X-15 to the fringes of space would not only provide these data but also, as a by-product, bring the nation great prestige, especially if we got our man there--and back--before the Russians. Frankly, considering the size and advanced state of development of the Soviet booster rockets, we believed our chances of getting there first were slim indeed. Nevertheless, following Sputnik, we of the X-15 group felt we were engaged in a kind of private race with the Russian scientists, and we ran to win despite the odds.