Astronaut Selection Hints

No one other than science teachers, Star Trek fans, and documentary filmmakers much cares what the astronauts actually do in space. "Looking at stars, pissing in jars" is the snide catchphrase for astronaut work that you hear at Kennedy [Space Center].

-- 1a

If you want to be an astronaut, the best thing you can do is read about the people who made it.

• If you can read only one book, then pick up Henry S.F. Cooper's Before Lift-Off 2.
• If you can read only one web site (apart from this one!) read and study the astronaut biographies either on-line or in convenient book form as The Astronaut Almanac.

And, of course, there is the official NASA jobs web site.

The second best thing you can do to improve your chances is join the AsHo mailing list. ("AsHo" = "astronaut hopful.") See:
http://www.ashos.org/

    These are some hints I picked up in my readings.

• NASA loves to hear that you're not interested in being an astronaut. 1b

• Minorities have an advantage at NASA 3a. The political advantage of minorities in the space program was realized as early as 1962, when, not long after John Glenn's historic flight and the adulation that followed, Lyndon Johnson remarked to President Kennedy: If only Glenn "were a Negro" 4a.

• Personality: economy of thoughts, words, actions -- prioritizing 2a Quick-witted, decisive, ambitious 2b. Behave conservatively, be somewhat laid back, dress neatly but informally 2c.

• Hobbies: flying, handball, jogging, backpacking, auto restoration, water skiing, great at softball and steak-brushing 2b.

• Pete Conrad found out the hard way that it did not pay to joke around on the psychological tests. In the 1959 selection screening he was shown a white card and asked what he saw. He puzzled over it for a time, then said in slow surprise "It's upside-down." The examiner was in the midst of getting up to check before he realized Conrad was joking. 5a

• At one time the Air Force had a "prep school" to coach its members who were going to be interviewed by NASA 5b. Michael Collins was a graduate of this school. Some of the teachings he remembered include: (1) always wear socks that are high enough to prevent bare leg skin from showing below your pants cuff when sitting, (2) if you must stand with hands on hips, the thumbs should always be in back, *never* in front. 6a

• "NASA must stop selecting astronauts that are clones of one another.... The original seven of us were all strong-willed, independent thinkers, who checked our egos for the good of the team and the mission." 7a

• Original choice for 1978 group included only one woman. Five pilots were exchanged for 5 female mission specialists. 8a

• Pre-Eisenhower desiderata were reprinted in NASA's 1966 history of Project Mercury 9a as printed in: 10a:

  An applicant also must prove: (a) willingness to accept hazards comparable to those encountered in modern research airplane flight; (b) capacity to tolerate rigorous and severe environmental conditions; and (c) ability to react adequately under conditions of stress or emergency. The officialese in the job description went on:

  These three characteristics may have been demonstrated in connection with certain professional occupations such as test pilot, crew member of experimental submarine or arctic or antarctic explorer. Or they may have been demonstrated during wartime combat or military training. Parachute jumping or mountain climbing or deep sea diving (including SCUBA) whether as occupation or sport, may have provided opportunities for demonstrating these characteristics, depending upon heights or depths obtained, frequency and duration, temperature and other environment conditions, and emergency episodes encountered. Or they may have been demonstrated by experience as an observer-under-test for extremes of environmental conditions such as acceleration, high or low atmospheric pressure, variation in carbon dioxide and oxygen concentration, high and low ambient temperatures, etc. Many other examples could be given. It is possible that the different characteristics may have been demonstrated by separate types of evidence.

  Imperfect men trying to write specifications for perfect men. When aeromedical psychologists were requested to recommend the main attributes for an astronaut, they replied the ideal might be a priest who knew how to fly. The brass scoffed at that suggestion, although it recognized several uneasy points. The job required unquestioning obedience, unswerving dedication to duty,and a large measure of mental and physical self-discipline. Planners settled for an unwritten rule that first astronauts should be married and past the more impetuous years of youth, based upon the assumption that such men would have steady heads and stabilized habits.

• Lyndon Johnson almost became an astronaut. After Alan Shepard's successful Freedom 7 flight, Shepard rode in a car with President Kennedy, Vice President Johnson, and FCC director Newton Minow to a ceremonial dinner.

  Kennedy poked the Vice President and said, "You know, Lyndon, nobody knows that the Vice President is the Chairman of the Space Council. But if that flight had been a flop, I guarantee that everyone would have known you were the Chairman." Everyone laughed except Johnson, who looked glum and angry, especially after Minow chimed in, "Mr. President, if the flight would have been a flop, the Vice President would have been the next astronaut." 4b

1. Burrough, Bryan. Dragonfly. New York: HarperCollins, 1998.

   a  p.5  b  p.349

2. Cooper, Henry S. F. Before Lift-Off. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins, 1987.

   a  pp.3-4  b  p.19  c  p.21

3. Gandt, Robert. Bogeys and Bandits: The Making of a Fighter Pilot. New York: Penguin, 1997.

   a  p.186

4. Dallek, Robert. An Unfinished Life: John F. Kennedy 1917-1963. Boston: Little, Brown, 2003.

   a  p.502  b  p.394

5. Wolfe, Tom. The Right Stuff. New York: Farrar Straus Giroux, 1979.

   a  p.99  b  p.412

6. Collins, Michael. Carrying the Fire. New York: Ballantine, 1974.

   a  p.???

7. Schirra, Walter M. Schirra's Space. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1988.

   a  p.225

8. Slayton, Donald K. Deke!: U.S. Manned Space Flight from Mercury to the Shuttle. New York: Forge: St Martin's Press, 1994.

   a  p.313

9. Swenson, Lloyd S. Jr., et al. This New Ocean: A History of Project Mercury. Washington: US Government Printing Office, 1966.

   a  p.130 Comment: Full text is available on-line at: http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/SP-4201/toc.htm

10. Grissom, Betty. Starfall. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell, 1974.

    a  pp.52-53