Table Of ContentAstronaut Eugene Cernan
and America’s Race in Space
The
Last Man
Moon
on the
EUGENE CERNAN AND DON DAVIS
St. Martin’s Griffin New York
THELASTMANONTHEMOON.Copyright ©1999 byEugene Cernan and Don Davis. All rights
reserved. Printed in the United States of America. For information, address St. Martin’s Press,
175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
www.stmartins.com
Book design by Bonni Leon-Berman
The Library of Congress has catalogued the hardcover edition as follows:
Cernan, Eugene.
The last man on the moon: astronaut Eugene Cernan and America’s race in space/Eugene
Cernan and Don Davis.—lst ed.
p. cm.
Includes index.
ISBN-13: 978-0-312-19906-7
ISBN-10: 0-312-19906-6
1. Project Apollo (U.S.)—History. 2. Space flight to the moon—History. 3. Space race—
History. 4. Cernan, Eugene. I. Davis, Don (Donald) II. Title.
TL789.8.U6A52435 1999
629.45’0092—dc21
[B]
98—48206
CIP
ISBN-13: 978-0-312-26351-5 (pbk.)
ISBN-10: 0-312-26351-1 (pbk.)
Tenth Anniversary Edition: June 2009
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
To Jan and Robin
Contents
1
Fire on the Pad
2
Taps
3
Sold by the Nuns
4
Wings of Gold
5
Albino Angels
6
Two Commander Shepards
7
Max and Deke
8
Any Astronauts Around Here?
9
The Suit
10
Crash
11
The Mayor of Pad 19
12
The Angry Alligator
13
The Spacewalk from Hell
14
Redemption
15
Annus Horribilis
16
Phoenix Rising
17
The Magnificent Beast
18
Burn, Baby, Burn
19
There Is No End
20
Hauling the Mail
21
The Gamble
22
The Ice Commander
23
Secret Mission
24
Beep, Beep
25
Fire and Water
26
Dr. Rock
27
I Can’t Walk!
28
Top of the Pyramid
29
Falling to the Moon
30
Down in the Valley
31
The Search
Index
For many years, I have wanted to write a book for my grandchildren. I wanted
Ashley,Carson,Kaylee,Katelyn,Whitneyandthoseyetunnamedwhoaresuretofol-
lowtohearfrommethisstoryofwhatitwasliketoliveoutadream,withthehope
thatsomedaytheymightunderstandtheirgrandfatheralittlebetter.AndIwantedto
create something special for the many, many people who helped to reach the Moon,
for without their commitment, dedication, and personal self-sacrifice, I would never
have been able to reach so far, nor would I have had the opportunity to share my
story.Althoughitwouldbeimpossibletonamethemall,Iamdeeplygratefultoeach
of them.
I want to thank those who critiqued various parts of this manuscript during the
many preliminary drafts, particularly my peers, whose insights were invaluable. I
holdthemallinthegreatestesteem.Inaddition,Iwillalwaystreasuremyfriendship
withDeke,Al,Roger,andRon,who,whiletheywerewithus,playedsuchsignificant
roles in my life.
Specialthankstomyagent,JaneDystelandherstaff,andmyeditor,CharlieSpicer
andtheteamatSt.Martin’sPress,whobelievedinthisproject,madeithappen,then
improvedit.AndtoDonandRobinDavis,myco-conspirators,withoutwhomIcould
never have done it.
Mostimportantly,Iwanttothankmyfamilyandclosefriends,whosesupportand
help was so important throughout this long project. Mom and Dad were with me
in spirit every step of the way. Dee and Jim gave safe haven while providing back-
ground about our growing-up years. Barbara Cernan dug deep into the past to help
recall and document long-ago events. Martha Chaffee painfully recalled her family’s
story and gave reassurance during critical moments. Max Ary, Norma Van Bunnen,
and the staff at the Kansas Cosmosphere and Space Center lent timely and invalu-
able assistance, uncovering documents and film that had lain unseen for more than
a quarter of a century. Skip Furlong, Fred Baldwin, and Tom and Carol Short helped
steer the story through our early years together. Claire Johnson somehow survived
the writing and publishing ordeal with her usual charm and efficiency.
My daughters Tracy, Kelly, and Danielle were a wealth of encouragement when
the task seemed insurmountable, and the end of the book was nowhere in sight.
A simple “thank you” does not seem enough for my wife, Jan, who endured the
difficult months of my reliving a life of which she was not a part. Her love and un-
derstanding made it all possible.
And to everyone who helped put American astronauts on the Moon, where ever
you are today, I salute you.
Eugene A. Cernan
Houston, Texas
September 1998
1
Fire on the Pad
FRIDAY, JANUARY 27, 1967, was another balmy southern California winter day
with temperatures in the low seventies, but a blizzard might as well have been
hammering the North American Aviation plant in Downey. Inside the altitude
chamber, where Tom Stafford, John Young and I were buckled into a titani-
um container not much larger than a kitchen table, there wasn’t any air, much
less any weather. Time, not snowfall or sunshine, was our concern. The most
experienced astronaut crew in the U.S. space program, with five completed
missions between us, we were trying to bring a new, untried and stubborn
spacecraft up to launch standards, and we weren’t having much success.
On the other side of the United States, in Florida’s afternoon sunshine, three
of our fellow astronauts were conducting similar tests in an identical space-
craft perched atop a giant Saturn 1-B rocket at Cape Kennedy. The world knew
Gus Grissom, Ed White, and Roger Chaffee as the crew of Apollo 1, and they
were scheduled to lift off in less than a month. They weren’t having much luck
either.
The days of the one-man Mercury missions seemed like distant history, and
the two-man Gemini series had proven we could walk in space, rendezvous,
and endure long flights. Now the time had come for the start of Apollo, the
gigantic undertaking that would realize President Kennedy’s dream of putting
an American on the Moon, and bringing him back alive, by the end of the dec-
ade.
My gut feeling as a test pilot was that as badly as the program needed this
flight, the bird simply wasn’t ready. In fact, I was amazed that we were so far
along the path toward launch with so many things still going wrong. Before
Apollo could fly, tens of thousands of parts in both the rocket and spacecraft
had to work flawlessly, and so far, they hadn’t. But the damned Russians were
breathing down our necks, and we were going to force that spacecraft to do
what it was supposed to do, even if we had to bend some mechanical and
physical laws through sheer willpower. Despite the problems, all signals re-
mained go for Apollo 1
