years. And when I sing those songs, in my mind, I’m right back there in Korea with all those great friends.
Besides stopping the Soviet-supplied communists from North Korea in their efforts to overrun South Korea, the war also created a fringe benefit for America that often goes unnoticed. That is: Most of the early U.S. astronauts were not veterans of World War II. Most of us were fighter pilots who flew during the Korean War. In addition to the missions flown by John Glenn, Neil Armstrong flew 78 combat missions in Korea. Wally Schirra flew 90 missions; Gus Grissom flew 100 combat missions over Korea; Jim McDivitt flew 145 missions! And of course, I flew 66 missions chasing MiGs.
As fighter pilots in Korea, we learned concentration under fire, how to stay calm in the face of dangerous situations, and how to make quick, life-or-death decisions. Beyond that, because we knew that we were really fighting the Soviets as well as the North Koreans, the war spurred a passionate competition between the Americans and the Russians that would carry over into the space race. We were not going to let those “Russkies” beat us in Korea, and we were certainly not going to let them get the upper hand on us in space.
YOU NEVER KNOW WHEN the next person you meet might be someone who impacts your life for the better, or someone to whom you can give a helping hand. Shortly after I moved to Houston to become part of the U.S. space program, I was visiting with my friend Ed White when we saw a guy out roller-skating on the cement behind Ed’s house.
“Who is that?” I asked.
“Oh, that’s Neil Armstrong, another test pilot who has been accepted for the astronaut program.”
I had heard plenty of stories about Neil already—that he was a fearless test pilot with a deadpan serious personality. “That’s Neil Armstrong?” I asked, watching the roller skater. He didn’t look too serious to me.
I knew that Neil had been a fighter pilot in Korea as well, so we had that experience in common, and we soon struck up a long, lasting friendship, one that some people would later misunderstand and misrepresent, but a friendship that Neil and I knew was based on mutual admiration. My friendship with Neil Armstrong became another positive factor in my life. Neil and I became even better friends when we were selected to work together as the backup crew for Apollo 8. Neil was a man of few words and enjoyed being the strong, silent type. I, on the other hand, enjoyed talking about our work and the possibilities ahead. But we hit it off and had a mutual respect and appreciation for each other. We were a good team. We worked closely together almost every day for six years, and although one of us would sometimes rub the other the wrong way, we always brought out the best in each other.
Neil and I were selected as the crew for Apollo 11 in January 1969. In some ways, because we were selected for the first landing mission to the Moon, it created an additional strain on our friendship. We both knew there would be enormous publicity around our mission and that everything we said or did would be all over the news. When some people at NASA questioned whether I was the right man for the job, Neil came to my defense. I knew that we worked well together, and I was glad to learn that Neil felt the same way. He was quick to defend a friend, and I’ve always been honored to be known as his co-worker.
Not long ago, I visited Purdue University, where faculty and student researchers have been working with my Mars Cycler ideas—a system of spacecraft cycling between Earth and Mars, continually carrying people and materials in both directions. Outside the Neil Armstrong Hall of Engineering stands a large statue of Neil, who was an engineering student at Purdue in 1955. I slipped up next to the statue and cracked, “Hey, I want them to make a statue of me, sitting here beside Neil and holding his hand!”
Although all of the astronauts in training were extremely competitive, we were also friends. That made sense, because most other people couldn’t really relate to our intense training, our level of commitment to the cause, and how passionately we pursued our goals of catching and passing the Russians in the exploration of space. Like any team, however, some of