One Giant Leap

Technically, it was a miracle. The coordination of tens of thousands of tiny moving parts, moving in synchronicity to launch America beyond Earth's gravitational grip and to the moon, allowing humans to set foot on another celestial body for the first time. That coordination took teamwork and collaboration and a disparate set of skills from people of all walks of life. And if you think about it, that is the most amazing thing about the Apollo 11 mission. How do that many people work together, especially when the world around them is in turmoil? From space, we're all one blue dot, but on Earth, in America, women and minorities were, and still are sometimes, treated as inferior and underappreciated. It was one giant leap to change the social mindset from something

it had always been to create an environment where people can work together and accomplish amazing things. This is a special presentation of the Public Radio Hour, one giant leap, how the integration of NASA helped mankind reach the moon. I'm Brett Tanahill. This massive social change did not come easy as it mashed together new ideas and new people, not used to sharing space. It was unavoidable, though, as the Civil Rights Act required NASA and other governmental agencies to find ways to integrate minorities into their workforce to maintain federal funding. And that was a tough sell, especially in the segregated South. NASA was also struggling to integrate women into its workforce. And in quiet conservative Huntsville, Alabama, residents were also faced with the challenge of integrating the families of Werner von Braun's rocket team, a community of Germans, some of whom had ties to the Nazi party, and the atrocities associated with it.

When von Braun's team arrived in America, landing first in the flat hot heat of Texas, it was viewed with some suspicion. But when the Germans were later sent to live in the rolling green hills of Huntsville, von Braun's daughter, Margaret, says those outcast families finally felt like they'd found a home. Well, after World War II, I think the idea of this team of rocket scientists coming to America, of course, had some controversy around it in Texas and then certainly in Alabama. But I think after the war, everybody wanted to move on and wanted to move forward and look forward. And I think Alabama really provided that opportunity. It's kind of amazing to think about a town like Alabama, which was famous for cotton and watercress, then became Rocket City, and how it really embraced, provided an opportunity for that. My father often said luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity. And I think that's sort of the

embodiment of what happened in Huntsville. It provided an opportunity for great things to happen. But it's kind of a miracle story, I think, that they came here and they were able to work together and do such great things together, and Huntsville really provided an incredible opportunity. It was a difficult time in Alabama during the civil rights era. It brought out the worst in some of the cities. What do you remember about the civil rights era in Alabama as a resident in Huntsville? It was a little bit different here. I'm just now learning about the role that Marshall played in accelerating integration in Northern Alabama, which is a wonderful legacy. I didn't really realize it at the time. And your father played a big role in that. What are some of the things that you have learned now that you didn't know previously about your father's role in that? Yeah, one of the stories I heard was when they were developing the Center at Marshall that there were, there was a blueprint and he was trying to figure out space, you know, for production and for

offices and meeting rooms and all the usual stuff. And there was a blueprint that showed six bathrooms, one for enlisted men, enlisted women, civilian men, civilian women, black men, black women. And apparently he took out a magic marker and just said there will be one men's room and one women's room. And we're going to take the other four bathrooms over and make them into other spaces. So that was a story that I've heard. And but I think there were just a lot of efforts that that people said, you know, we need the diversity, we need the workforce development here in Huntsville. And we need to get on board with what's happening in the rest of the country. And it helped accelerate that movement. I think we're just now beginning to understand the history of some of the people who were underrepresented in that workforce and how they were still, you know, literally the hidden figures. And we're now only beginning to tell their stories, which I personally wish I had known those stories at the time, because I think it would have influenced that next generation in a much more profound way. I didn't know, for example, any women that

worked at the arsenal that weren't clerical. Years ago, I got to meet Dr. Joyce neighbors. And I saw again the other night and I just, I was so amazed at her story. She did so many things, coming from rural Alabama, working her way up in a very technical capacity at Marshall. But the story is that she was always asked just to sign her documents, J neighbors, with just the initial J, not Joyce, so that people wouldn't know there was a woman working there. And she rallied. I mean, she did her job. She was so incredibly competent. And always persevered with grace. But as I think she says, I did step on other people's toes, but I also made sure nobody stepped on line. And when I got to know her and hear some of her stories, I thought, why didn't I know any women like this growing up? Because I really didn't, I mean, there weren't that many, but there were some. And I didn't know them. And I wish I had, because I think I think that next generation, especially women's scientists would have benefited

tremendously. And so I think the fact that these stories are coming out now, demonstrate that there was an effort to diversify the workforce. But, but parts of that, that male dominated society wasn't sort of ready to admit it either. So good for them that they persevered. And you touched on this earlier in terms of some of the struggles that the German community may have had as it integrated and became part of the American community. Still today, there is some discomfort with the relationship that your father and some others had with the Nazi party. Did that affect your life in Huntsville in any way? Is that something that ever came up? You know, my parents, like most post-World War II families really didn't talk about the war. My husband's father was an American soldier. His family didn't talk about the war either. So I think that was a pretty common experience in the German community. They did not talk to their kids about the war. But I don't think that was unique to them. I think it was true of a lot

of American families, Russian families, probably Japanese families. So I didn't feel that affected by it at the time. I mean, I knew we were different because we were German and we ate different food and we didn't eat as good a food as the southern food. I later came to learn. But I didn't feel that affected by it at the time. So it didn't come up? People didn't, you know, mention it to you at school or it didn't come up. I don't remember that ever being an issue when I was a child here. How did members of the German community reconcile that relationship? I think their view of living in America was they were incredibly happy to be in America. They were incredibly happy to become American citizens. And they saw this as the next great chapter of opportunity in their lives. I mean, I think that was, I don't know if that's a reconciliation or just a moving on. But, you know, they were, they were, most of the parents, you know, our parents' generation became American citizens after we did because we were born as

American citizens. So my father always said, you know, you were, you and your sister were American citizens before mom and I were. But that was an incredibly proud day for all of them. And they were incredibly happy to be living in America with the opportunities that this country provided and still provides. That was Dr. Margaret von Braun, daughter of Rocket Pioneer Werner von Braun. She touched on many of the topics we'll discuss in the rest of the show. For a little more perspective on the German community and Werner von Braun's tie to the Nazi party, we talked with NASA Chief Historian Bill Berry and Marshall Space Flight Center Historian Brian Odom, who also helped us gather interviews for this documentary. Von Braun's Nazi ties are still a point of contention today as we try to understand his complicated legacy. He spent his life pursuing a dream of building rockets to explore space and that path, all intentions aside, led to thousands of deaths as he was co-opted into the Nazi party and saw his V2 rocket weaponized and used with

deadly consequences. Here's Brian Odom and Bill Berry. You know, I think about some of the decisions I made when I was in my 20s and 30s and I'm glad the consequences weren't anywhere near as high as they were for him. But I think we have to sort of sort of look at that in context and say, you know, well, you know, what would we have done in a similar situation? Ultimately, you know, his goal was clearly he was focused on exploring space and he made some choices early on that were ones that we might now in retrospect knowing how things turned out, say, well, that wasn't very, very nice or wasn't very smart or you made a deal with the devil on this thing. Was it really worth it? Could he have even reasonably known that that was how things were going to turn out? Now, once he's in the middle of it and it becomes clear that you've got Jewish and other undesirables working in slave labor camps to build V2 rockets for him.

You do have to wonder about his response to that, I suppose. And I would like to think that I might have made a braver and a wise choice than he did. I'm not sure what that would have been. But it was a difficult position to look at. Ultimately, when he comes to the United States, he and many of the others who were tied to the Nazi regime and high technology areas, the United States brought a number of them over and almost all of them their records were sanitized by other government agencies, not by NASA. And then he winds up working for the Department of the Army here in Huntsville eventually. And then eventually is what's now the Marshall Space Flight Center becomes part of NASA. He gets pulled into that. And that background is largely not known even to the people of the highest levels of NASA. But you kind of touched on it there. The thing that I have trouble wrapping my head around is that was his dream is to find an avenue to explore space and to do these things. And like you said, the decisions you make along the way, it's easy to look back and have an evaluation but at the time, that's what is interesting to me is that pursuit of

the dream at what cost. You know, there's always this idea of this Faustian bargain, right? This bargain for this is the dream, the dream of space. What do I have to do to achieve that? And then within that, there's the, you know, within Germany at the time and Nazi Germany, there's this competition that he's not called in the middle of. He's not clueless about this. But between the army, you know, and where he would like to be. And so, you know, there's a lot of careerism associated with this. I think Mike Newfield really is the best person to look at this because he really gets into the details. What are the details? What are the facts of this? What do we know? You know, and to Bill's point, you know, there are there are points along the way when it becomes obvious where, you know, you know, what you know, and there's no way you don't know that. And you know, especially when we talk about production. When we're still talking about testing of V2s, I mean, there's still, you know, V2 itself, you know, is a weapon of war, right? There, you know, thousands of people are dying in, you know, London and Belgium and France and different places in

Europe. But this is a weapon of war. And I think in it, you know, from the American military's perspective, they understood that as part of it, right? So there's no, there's, you know, there's no Faustian bargain there. But yes, it's once you begin to see, once you get to, to where these things go into production, the V2 facilities. And then development of the facility itself, which was one of the, you know, one of the largest loss of life, and to dig basically dig a production facility in the side of a mountain. There, you know, thousands of people die. Concentration camp labor there. Who knows this? When does he know this? In Vumbrown, actually, in his later life, he kind of reflects on these things. And you know, and he talks about these. He wishes, you know, he wishes he'd done something at that time. But, you know, how do you, you know, how do you take someone at their word then when that's behind them? The best thing is historians what we do is we just look at this and we try to develop the context of, of these lives and of these events as much as we can to paint a clear of picture of what happened. But, you know, you still look at the idea of, in the judgment is for the population to determine.

I mean, we talk about, you know, this is not the only topic we talk about this. In America, we talk about the history of slavery, you know, built, you know, an economy built on the backs of enslaved labor, you know, and we have the Confederate memorials, you know, and so there's all these different decisions. You know, Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence, you know, owns hundreds of slaves throughout his life. As historians, we look at those and we develop a deep context and paint a clear picture of what their lives were like and somehow reserve judgment of that. But, Vumbrown is definitely somebody who's characterized by this. When people think of his name now, that's the association with the V2 and with the concentration camp labor. It's still something that people have to have to, you know, seriously consider. So, I'm sorry, go ahead, Bill. One of the other things I think is really interesting about Vumbrown is you look at, you know, what happened there, but then what happens in the 1960s when he's here in Huntsville? Vumbrown's role in helping to desegregate Huntsville so that we could bring African-American

engineers and work talent here to work. Because many, they tried to recruit people to come work here and many would say, I'm not going to Huntsville. I can't give buy a house. I can't go out to eat in a restaurant, you know, and all these other things that were lifestyle issues. And quietly, largely behind the scenes, but now we now know, you know, Vumbrown was out there pushing the government of Alabama, particularly the governor himself, say, you know, if we don't find a way to make this work and allow African-Americans to work here at this federal facility, you know, the U.S. government is going to pull this facility out of here and move it someplace else. And that was a huge amount of leverage to help encourage change here in Huntsville area. But is that also connected, connects back to that drain that he's still is pursuing in terms of? Yeah, there's a level of opportunities associated with that as well. You know, because ultimately, why do you decide that, you know, none of us are free from this. Why do we make the

decisions that we make? Well, it's sometimes it's obvious and sometimes it's complex. Why does Vumbrown see that equal employment is in his best interest? Is it because he really has a passion for civil rights? Or is it because he'd like to see the funding for the space program continue? And this is a weak point. And again, we can't get inside of his mind. We can't see what he, you know, the one thing I will tell you is, you know, he would comment from time to time in a personal way on what was going on with civil rights. It was very interesting. In fact, you mentioned George Wallace, you know, he was never a fan of George Wallace. And Vumbrown's daughter, Margaret Vumbrown, you know, she is somebody who grows and as a young woman actually gets involved in civil rights moving herself. But Vumbrown himself, you know, once commented that the state of Alabama had drawn a burlin wall around the ballot box, well, there were a lot of people in Alabama who were very angry at that comment. And this goes back to his history, right?

I mean, if he's someone who's done what he's done in the past, you know, how dare he say something about Alabama politics, you know, so it's a lot of unique moments like that in this whole process. But, you know, Vumbrown, from what we know, Vumbrown was someone who did take actual steps in a positive way for civil rights in state of Alabama. And you really can't deny that. Why he did it is left for other people to debate. You're listening to One Giant Leap, how integration at NASA helped mankind reach the moon on this special edition of the Public Radio Hour. You can also find the podcast at www.lhrh.org. Look under programs for the Public Radio Hour, where you can also find long form interviews with all the voices we'll hear in this program. Finding a home for the German rocket team so it could focus on its rocketry was a first step. Taken at a time when minorities and women were struggling to take their own steps forward

in the workplace and in society. You heard Margaret Vumbrown mention the name Joyce Neighbors, one of the earliest female engineers at Marshall Space Flight Center. Neighbors says she came from nothing, no electricity as she grew up as a child, no encouragement to get an education. But she was eager to learn, so she fought for it. Worked her way through school as one of the few women in her field, and all the challenges that came with that. Neighbors became heavily involved in NASA's Explorer program, and then Apollo, always battling to move ahead and stay on the team. She's retired now, but invited Brian Odom and myself to hear her story. When we went to the moon, we had thousands and thousands of people working on that project. And we didn't have support for that after we landed. The money was cut back. I think there were several thousand engineers that worked at Marshall, so there was a big layoff, but my boss told me

when they were cutting back that my husband had a good job, and they were going to take my job. And I said, Mr. Mandel, I don't accept that. And he said, well, there's not anything you can do about it. I said, you may be surprised. And he was, and I was, too. I was very surprised. The fact was, and I learned this later, I found, and when I was cleaning up, some correspondence to the head of NASA and the subheads all the way down to the centers, that there was mandatory rules being in place, that they were not treating women well. And I did not know that at the time, because I figured I can find enough aggravation to keep them busy just on my own. But anyway, that was, I think, the thing that

turned it around. I've heard that scenario play out several times where women were approached during riffs, reduction in forces where they said, well, your husband has a job. So why would you need a job? And so that's such a common... Well, I told my boss, I'll divorce him and just live with him if that's a problem. I'm serious. He wasn't going to have my job. I had 16 years. I wasn't going to start over. And I was just going to be a troublemaker if that's the way it was. But as it turned out, I never told anybody, if anybody approached me wanting to talk about it, I would not talk about it, because I was keeping my end of the bargain. I was staying on the team. And my team was the number one reprioritied me. Now, I'm talking about it because I do think it's important to

illuminate how far we have come and how far NASA has come. Women probably still have to be a little bit better than their competitors or their co-workers until they get known. When I got known, I never even crossed my mind that I was talking to some sexist. When I went to GPB, I did interview a guy. He was a manager on a space lab project and he was not very diplomatic and I think he was removed because of that. He's dead now. And he came to me to interview me for my deputy. So he come in, he had a shirt that had western, I don't know, western shirt. Great big old belt

buckle. His big tall fellow standing up as tall as he could be. I told him, come over and sit down at the table. And he said, well, before I sit down, I just need you to know that I don't have never worked for a woman before. And I said, well, I hadn't either, so I really couldn't help you. Joyce neighbors worked her way up at the NASA hierarchy, but what's continuously reminded that even if you're the boss, respect was hard to come by in the early days of America's space program. Fighting for your spot in a white male dominated workplace was hard enough. So imagine if you were trying to get your foot on the door as a woman who was also an African American in the Jim Crow South. Jeanette Sism faced discrimination due to her gender from her mostly male African

American classmates and teachers as she worked her way through school. It was an issue of gender and race as she sought her first job at Marshall Space Flight Center. Despite several rejections, she kept trying at the urging of an influential and white friend of her family. But he said, you feel out the application. I bring it to you and I take it out to personnel. You know, see what happens. Well, I did. And they responded and said, I was highly qualified, but they didn't have any vacancies. Well, I applied again. Same thing. I applied three times, same as. And then I said, I can you be qualified and keep not having vacancy for you. And I knew they were looking for co-ops. So my mother was a domestic. She worked for some very influential people over in Gunnersville, like Art Sanderson's wife, my mother. And the less the family of lawyers

and so forth. And then my mother told me, you know, it's having trouble. You know, that was after I graduated. I kept applying it after I graduated. Especially after I decided I didn't want to teach. My mother talked to arts about them. And she said, tell her to go over and talk to art because I know that they are looking for minorities. And so I went over there and I talked to art. Art set me up some interviews. First interview didn't go to where I was. He didn't want to talk about anything, but my music, I see you take music. Do you sing? And you say, and I took a few questions like that. I just said, I don't understand. That's not what I'm interviewing for. Never asked me anything about my major or my mother. So he got a little irritated

and said, you sing, I'm gonna hire you. Got up and left. So I got up and went to art and told him what happened. So he sent me up another interview with Bob Smith, Robert Smith, who was an meteorologist. And a great man. I was supposed to probably ever have. He hired me. And I worked with him all the time. I was there at Marshall. CISM helped NASA study sunspots and worked with the Apollo program, but eventually wanted to do something more and started working with Marshall's Office of Equal Employment Opportunity. She took up the fight for fair treatment of her African-American co-workers, male and female. And sometimes did her job too well. Because of some things that I see, some things that I'd experienced, I wanted to work in that area to try to change things a little bit if I could.

Because I really did try to help people. I felt like I represented employees that I needed to make management understand what they were experiencing. Because the word got around that I did try to help the employees. I got a lot of customers. And nobody was happy about that. My office wasn't happy. They said, that's not your job. This is your job. This is what you get evaluated on. You don't get evaluated on that. No evaluation was available in the works you do in that area. I felt like they were trying to pull me out of it because I did try to help the employees. Rather than telling them, go back to the office and be quiet. I would go to the management. I would approach management. And a lot of the counselors wouldn't. They just wouldn't do it.

In fact, I know I'm ever told me once he said, that you're going to get in trouble. I said, no, I'm not going to get in trouble because I'm doing what they ask me to do. But then I was approached by someone from headquarters in the E.O. who said that they were concerned about my job because that's a management. And that's what a real and happy with me was all the complaints I was handling. I said, I don't solicit the complaints. They come to me. Am I supposed to turn them away? Yeah. That's some of the other accounts I handled. Other counselors didn't want that problem. I don't think they had the commitment that for some reason I had. I don't know why I had it. I think it was an aid in me.

Do you remember Watson Bottom? He had a degree from A&M. I think it was English. And he was working in the mailroom. And they would bring nominority people in under him. And he would train them. And they would work up and pass them. He stayed right there in the mailroom. So he came to me and I wanted to follow a complaint. And I helped him. He won his complaint. And I think he got promoted at least three grades. That was an improvement. Small but personal victories in a clash of cultures between the future and the past. Today I have stood where once Jefferson Davis stood and took an oath to our people. It is very appropriate that from this cradle of the Confederacy, this very heart of the great Anglo-Saxon Southland, that today we found the drum for freedom

as our generation of four thousand four us done time and again down through history. Let us rise to the call of freedom-loving blood that is in us. And send our answer to the tyranny that clanked its chains upon the South. In the name of the greatest people that have ever tried this earth, I draw the line in the dust and tossed it gauntlet before the feet of tyranny. And I say segregation now, segregation tomorrow, and segregation forever. Famous words from Alabama Governor George Wallace. It's the 1960s. And many parts of the South are still rebelling against growing support for the civil rights movement, which had triggered the integration of NASA's workforce in order to maintain NASA's access to federal funding. Fernervan Brown recognized the tie between integration and funding and knew it could deal a potentially fatal blow to his dream of exploring space.

He responded by challenging segregationist politics and with a strong message that was mandatory viewing for all his Marshall Space Flight Center employees. The Marshall Space Flight Center has achieved an enviable record today in successfully meeting the problems which have confronted us now a bit to place a man on the moon in this decade. This record has been the result of teamwork and our willingness to be satisfied was nothing less than a job well done. While there are many challenges still before us, now our efforts to achieve what has become a national objective, we are confronted to deal with a challenge which has all the urgency and importance of our space exploration program. The equal employment opportunity program has my complete support. But to achieve an effective program at Marshall, your support is also needed.

It is important that each of you as a federal employee become aware of your responsibility in carrying out this program. Your orientation at training today is directed towards that end. If we at Marshall are to have an affirmative program, one that will place the center above reproach, your assistance, your affirmative attitudes, and your dedication to the principle that is based upon what is right, what is just, and what is fear will be needed. As you accept this responsibility, let me assure you that you will have the complete packing of the center, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, and the United States Government. Blow all you can about this program and apply it to your own work situation. In doing so, you will become a part of what our President has turned a moral cause, moral and its best implications. You will also be doing your part in contributing to the achievement

of another job well done by Marshall Space Flight Center and by NASA. If we are to extend men's boundary to the outer reaches of the universe, it is imperative that we also resolve men's relationship with men on this earth. Not only was the lingering shadow of segregation a threat to funding for the Apollo program, but it was also a major hurdle in recruitment. When the outside world thought of Alabama, it didn't think of rockets to the moon. It thought of the sometimes brutal oppression of segregation, and what talented person of color would want to subject themselves and their family to that. That's how Dr. Ravendra Lal says he and his family thought about Alabama from his home country of India. Lal is a metallurgical scientist, and among the many NASA programs he worked on, he helped the Apollo team understand the special paints needed for the Saturn rocket so it could withstand the intense radiation of space.

As Lal made his way to Huntsville, he found a world where he didn't know how to fit in. One thing was there, surprisingly, if you look at the maps of that time, Huntsville was not listed. He was not showing in the Alabama map. Decatur was there. So when I was coming, I was looking at the map where I'm going. So I looked at the map of Alabama and I couldn't find. And my father-in-law who was also really straight in state of Rajasthan, Jaipur, he also looked at only said, why in the world you are going to Huntsville? This is not even shown in the map. So I said, this is very important. This is NASA. I said, I had quarters for the space program. So anyway, we came here and it was sort of a little bit difficult in a way that I was told by different people that don't travel to south part of Alabama. There can be a problem.

And one thing I may say, I don't know whether it's good to have your own record, when I came to get my driver's license, I went to the courthouse. The courthouse has two benches. It was in the old building on the side of this main courthouse. And the bench, one says black, one says white. And I didn't know which, where should I sit? I knew that I'm not black and I'm not white. So I kept on standing, including my wife, both were there when I was licensed. So I stood there. But when I got my license, at that time they used to give right on the license, white, race white. So when I saw double written and I said, I'm okay. So I can now sit on the white bench. But that, I'm not as the right, I think the right to Indian or something. But at that time, they didn't know how to classify.

Building mankind's most technologically advanced hardware needed the world's brightest minds. So the recruitment of specialized workers, like law, was critical. But despite Von Brown's of vocal support for integration, non-whites still had a hard time figuring out how to fit in, as the idea of segregation was so deeply entrenched. To provide more context, here's Robert Stone, writer, researcher, and producer of PBS's Chasing the Moon documentary series. And once again, Marshall Space Flight Center historian, Brian Odom. Once the Kennedy commits, at some level, to equal employment opportunity in 1961, that kind of sets its trajectory. I mean, desegregation had begun well before that. 1954, Brown versus Board of Education. But it's in 1961 where this gets tied up with the economics. Kennedy says, if federal contractors, people holding contracts with the government, if you're going to participate in this, you have to follow affirmative action in equal employment.

Well, that sets in motion this long string. In 1963, Kennedy basically comes back to that same act and doubles down on it. Well, NASA has a federal entity holding contracts worth and estimated, you know, almost 5% of the federal budget at a time. And if you consider the discretionary part of that, this is a huge amount of money. So if NASA is going to be able to effectively implement its program, it has to deal with these things. And that's what it begins to do. And it places like Marshall. So in 1963, the administrator sends around, he says, look, you know, every time I go into a meeting with the president, I'm getting killed about this, demonstrate to me that you're doing what you're supposed to do. Do the analysis, do the work, and lay this out for me in a way that we can demonstrate an effective progress. And that's basically what begins, and at Marshall, Marshall writes, you know, in its administrative report on this issue, it says, it is the decades and decades of segregation that has set us back in this. Resources have been deprived in the black

community and their own education. The excuse becomes, they're not ready for these jobs. The president says, we'll get them ready. And that's basically what begins to happen here. Marshall in 1963, really, even before the Civil Rights Act, really begins an effective campaign. And it produces two different results, but they begin a campaign to locate African-Americans who can work in this program. Locally, it's at Alabama A&M University, but there are cooperative programs with places like Tuskegee. There are places in Southern University in Baton Rouge, Louisiana to go where the engineers are, find them, convince them to come here. One of the things they do is they hire somebody to recruit and to set up these programs. And it was Charles Smoot. Charles Smoot is someone who is tasked as what was known as the, as being the Negro recruiter. And Charles would travel the country looking for this talent. Well, he goes to Arkansas at one point in 1964 and finds a fellow by the name of EC Smith. And he's trying to convince EC Smith to leave

Arkansas to come deeper into the South. And, you know, how he does that is left to EC, right? But EC says, you know, that Charles told him, well, if you think about Alabama, you think about Birmingham, Huntsville is different. Huntsville is not like Birmingham. And EC's first question was, how different is it? You know, I think, you know, that kind of speaks to this hesitation of this image problem. When people thought about Alabama in 1963, they didn't think about the space program. They thought about Birmingham. They thought about, you know, firehoses, you know, police dogs, bull Connor. And that was the image nationally. It was hard to get anybody to move to Alabama, let alone African-American engineers who saw opportunities, greater opportunities in places like Southern California. They can move to LA and make more money. Why would you move to Alabama and make less money? And so that's, that's really the context for this. But I think this whole issue, you know, the civil rights intersection with the space program is something that it,

it doesn't, it doesn't diminish from the Apollo program. It, you know, it increases its, it's, it's appeal. Because if there's something out there, a program out there that's powerful enough to send these ripples into communities like this, you know, technology itself, how, how great this technology was going to be in, you know, if it could, if we can land a man on the moon, what else can we do? And people, I think, thought about it that way. Maybe we can solve racial issues with, in it, in it, through technology programs. So I think that was a, that was a unique part of that. Yeah, there's a great story of Jim Webb, who was the head of NASA in the 1960s, coming down to Huntsville and talking to Von Braun, said, you got to hire more black engineers and Von Braun's going, well, I can't get these guys to, like, if you're a, if you're a, a black rocket engineer and you've got advanced degree, do you really want to come to Alabama, you know, when there are these other opportunities around? So they had a real recruitment problem based in exactly what you said, the sort of bad reputation that the South had at that time.

So that was a, that was a sticking point. I think another interesting story related to this is what happened in Houston, where the man's spacecraft center was centered in Houston, decided to be put there because of the efforts of Congressman Albert Thomas, who was a very powerful Congressman. I think it was on the O. Properations Committee. Anyway, it had something to do with the appropriating money for NASA. And he said, I, if there's going to be a new space center, I wanted in my district, which was South of Houston. And it went in property that was owned by Rice University, which was segregated, a segregated university at that time. And the, what, the deal was if you want this federal institution down here, the man's spacecraft center, you're going to have to desegregate your university because we can't deal with you. And that's exactly what happened. The board voted. And so that was, that was an example of the space where we're being as a representative of the federal government having to follow federal guidelines

and federal rules, including the Silver Rights Act, having a ripple effect across the South, where many of the facilities NASA facilities were, and having a positive impact on Silver Rights. And it's interesting. You mentioned Jim Webb, the administrator, when he comes to town here in Huntsville, and he says, you know, if, if you don't get yourself in line, if you don't improve your image problem is how he addressed it, you know, the insinuation was, this doesn't have to be here. It could be in anywhere because your development work is over. Now we're talking about the management of contracts. If I can't do that in Huntsville, I can do it in Seattle. I can do it somewhere else. And I think the interesting point about that is that the black leadership of the Civil Rights Movement understood that. They understood that leverage. When Webb comes and he talks and he says, get yourself an order. Sonny Herford, Dr. Sonny Herford, who's one of the leaders here. You know, he sends Webb a telegram and he says, thank you for your words. We appreciate, we, we, the black community of Huntsville are so grateful for the work the space program is doing. You know, don't

forget us as you move forward, you know, because we love the space. We love space as well. We love, this is a great national thing, but don't forget about us. And so he was basically, you know, doubling down on that idea of we get it. We know it's going to happen. And if the, we will let you know if the image is not good. Let's talk about Werner von Braun for a moment. Obviously a strong proponent of integration and Alabama clashing with politicians at times, sort of, you know, putting exposing himself for criticism and the press. But both of you separately have set at times that he was also an opportunist. He was, you know, part of the Nazi party, though not necessarily someone who believed in that ideology. Do you think that he truly believed in quality and civil rights? I believe he did to some level. He was a pragmatist. You know, you can say opportunists, but you could say pragmatists as well. He understood that this was a critical problem. It, the image problem at Alabama was, it was a liability. And if that liability wasn't

taken away, then the opportunities to continue to explore space would be problematic. Now, however, what I do know is when he was asked to weigh in on these issues, he did. Jim Webb sends a letter after the passage of the Civil Rights Act. He says, this is now the law of the land. You make sure this legislation is followed whether or not he's altruistic about it. It's not necessarily even relevant because he enables. He never tries to block. He understands that this, this is necessary as a way forward. And it presents opportunities for other people who are emotionally and morally committed to it to step into that vacuum and move forward. Yeah, I totally agree. I don't see any evidence that he was ideologically a Nazi. I don't, he just wanted to send rockets to the moon. That was like, he was just single-mindedly focused on that. And whatever he could do to advance

that cause, he would do. And I agree with you completely. I think he was a pragmatist and an opportunist. Opportunist has a kind of negative connotation. But he saw opportunity where he could and took advantage of it. And, you know, we would not have gone to the moon had it not been for his tenacity and single-minded focus to make sure that happened. I don't think he thought that way. It was just like, how can I manipulate the system that I'm in at this particular moment to get where I want to go? And if he was under a Hitler, it would be that if he's working for Eisenhower's building ICBMs, if he's working for Kennedy's going to the moon. You're listening to one giant leap. How integration at NASA helped mankind reach the moon. A special feature of the public radio hour produced by WLRH Huntsville Public Radio. Let's keep digging into the struggle NASA faced as it tried to integrate minorities into its workforce. It was an identity crisis for

law and many people of all racial backgrounds in Alabama and throughout NASA. The color of a person's skin had always mattered to a majority of people, and now suddenly it was supposed to be ignored. It was not so simple. Not for white people, not for brown people, and the path was especially difficult and confusing if you were black. That's what Arthur Hewlett discovered. Hewlett was one of the first African-American men hired at Marshall Space Flight Center, as he says, to work in some job other than as a janitor. Hewlett was an army veteran and was smart, intuitive, and could fix most anything. At one point, he made what was deemed to be an impossible repair to Apollo's wind tunnel. And it was in those days when civil rights was just beginning to heat up, and it was, it was pretty tough. The people that I had to work, had one person that I worked for. He was a, I would say, a unit supervisor maybe, but he was a very fine man. One of the finest people I could have met, and he had to assign me to work

for some more people. And these folks that are here assigned me too, they were just, you were the thought they were wearing a sheet and hood. But it was something you had to overcome. People would use ugly expressions. And when they got a chance to say things that would hurt you deep down on the inside. And at first, it bothered me, but I learned something. You got to learn how to take all of this and treat these four good and work with them. Let them know that you're a man, and I stand up for what's right. And because I wanted to see other people, black people come to work with Marshall Space. And I did. In fact, at one point, I thought they were trying to provoke me to a physical concentration. And the supervisor I had, he would probably, would have loved him, had this excuse, he thought. In fact, he told me that if we left with him and John Patterson, John Patterson was a governor at the time, I mean, I'm no yell to you, I want to know about him, but he was worse than George Wallace. He was a true segregationist. This supervisor said,

if we left with you and me and John Patterson, you'd be out there in the cotton field. And I'm sure, if he could have kept me from going to work, he would have done that. But we made it through. Why do you think that people were speaking that way to you? You mentioned that you thought they might be trying to provoke you. Why do you think they were doing that? Well, I thought they were trying to provoke me into doing something ugly so that they could use it as an alibi. They said, don't blame it more, black people out here. And I, in fact, I pretty much knew that, because they did everything except physically put their hands on them. They were all kinds of threats. And I didn't think about it. I was going to really physically. I was a pretty good man. And I didn't think about it, wanted to take me physically, you know, because when I went the red stone, they had just taken down their signs of color and white. They had, I wish I could have got one of those. It's a super there. And this cafeteria was, it was integrated, but I wouldn't, I didn't feel comfortable going to them. Like to tell you, the first cafeteria I went to,

my supervisor invited me to go with him and another fellow. When we got into that cafeteria, there were about 30 people eating breakfast. It was amazing how several of the people would go there and sit down and eat breakfast on the government time. And when I walked in, when they saw me, everybody just got up and got out of there as fast as it could. And there were some people who had their food trade on their conveyor. And they walked around left of them. There was one man tried to get his money back, because they saw me and they wouldn't give it to him. But in three or four minutes, there were only three people besides the employees in that place. So this is the type thing that happened. But it took a little time to overcome that. In fact, about it in four to four eighty at the time was the headquarters for Dr. Von Braun and General Maderas. They had a beautiful cafeteria. And I hesitated to go there because I didn't. I thought I just wanted to be as peaceful as I could. I have to tell you one day about five women called me on the elevator. And they demanded you go to the cafeteria with us. You act like you scared. Let's go. And they

took me to the cafeteria. And I wasn't comfortable because I was trying to avoid any type of racial problem. Set down. And in fact, I took a table with all two people to sit. These ladies made me get up and come and sit the table with them. And I got them and went over. But you would have thought looking at the men in that place, they were just waiting for an opportunity, probably to to explode. And they've had a problem. But nobody did anything. And it took some time to make friends. And I tell you what everybody that I met, I was as polite as I could be to the male and females. When they didn't, when they told ogrid me, I would be nice to them. And it took some time. But I won. When I left Marshall Center, I was highly respected by everybody. And I love that. That's the most beautiful part about it. The end result was indeed beautiful. As people all over our planet stopped to imagine our place in the universe as they had never

done before. The moon landing didn't solve the issue of equality, but it did provide a lasting reminder that we can accomplish great things when we work together. It also allowed the spotlight to shine on new people and let them prove they had something to offer. Of all the things we gained from the successful trip to the moon, the greatest is probably the change in how we think about people different than ourselves. And if you want proof of that, the person chosen to lead the development of NASA's next lunar landing is a woman. Dr. Lisa Watson Morgan, who previously served as deputy director of Marshall Space Flight Center's engineering directorate. That's one giant leap from the day when Joyce neighbors, geneticism, and others were fighting just to get a foot in the door. Thanks for tuning in the public radio hour, produced by Member Supported,

WLRH Huntsville Public Radio.