finally some bright young man over in the corner said, hey, the landing radar is working, but it's locked up on infinity. have them pull the switch, reset it, see if it works. so, we pulled the circuit breaker, put it back in, and sure enough, the landing radar came in. shortly after that we got cleared to land, and it's sort of a, man, that was close kind of routine. as soon as we pitched over, there was beautiful picture just the way i had seen it hundreds of times from the scale model. came on down. made a very, very soft landing. as a matter of fact, soft enough so that even though we landed on a slight crater like this, the uphill leg didn't crush like it's supposed to. we had crushable material on the landing. so, you know, it was slight right wing down. perfect landing. shutting off the switches, and ed mitchell turned to me and

said, alan, what were you going to do if the landing radar had not been working by 13,000 feet? i looked at him and i said, ed, you'll never know. >> well, there you were -- >> i would have gone down. >> of course. >> oh, yeah. i'd come that far. you see, ed, for example, had not been in the simulator, landing simulator at all. it was my job to land. and i'd done hundreds of these things, i knew if i could see the surface, man, i could get down. maybe not exactly where we were supposed to, but i could get down close to it, and -- >> and so you would have made the landing under any circumstances. you would have busted the rules. >> i would have at least -- at least been able to take a visual look. i would have pitched over and taken a visual look and then made a decision. >> fair enough. well, we finally have you on the

moon. mission accomplished, or was it? tell me about what you and ed did on the moon, as you remembered it. what were the highlights? >> well, it's -- of course, the first feeling was one of a tremendous sense of accomplishment, i guess, if you will. tremendous sense of realizing that, hey, not too long ago i was grounded. now i'm on the moon. there was that -- there was that sense of self-satisfaction you think immediately. but then that went away, because we had a lot of work to do. but i'll never forget that moment. another moment which i will never forget is after ed

followed me down and we had set up some of our equipment, taken the emergency samples. we had a few moments to look around. to look up in the black sky, totally black sky, even though the sun is shining on the surface, it's not reflected, there's no diffusion, no reflection, totally black sky, and seeing another planet, planet earth. planet earth is only four times as large as the moon. so, you can really still put your thumb and your forefinger around it at that distance. so, it makes it look beautiful. it makes it look lonely. it makes it look fragile. you think to yourself, just imagine the millions of people are living on that planet and don't realize how fragile it is.

i think this is a feeling everyone has had and expressed it in one fashion or another. but that was an overwhelming feeling, in seeing the beauty of the planet on the one hand, but the fragility of it on the other. >> being alan shepard, of course, shortly after that golden moment, you decided you'd play a little golf. >> i didn't decide to play a little golf. oh. that is a long story. i will not tell the whole story. >> tell us what you think might be all right. because it is a very famous story, and i'm sure a lot of people would like to hear your version. >> well, as you know, so far i'm the only person to have hit a golf ball on the moon. probably will be for some time.

and being a golfer, i was intrigued before the flight by the fact that the ball with the same club head speed will go six times as far. it will -- its time of flight, i won't say stay in the air, because there's no air. its time of flight will be at least six times as long. it will not curve, because there's no at atmosphere to make it slice. or hook. i thought a neat place to hit a golf ball. when i went to bob gilruth to tell him i wanted to hit a couple of golf balls. of course, absolutely no way. and there was a series when i explained that it was not a regular golf club, it was a handle that we used that the we pulled out, put a scoop on the end and scoop up samples of dust with. and that was already up there, would be thrown away.

then we had a club head which i had adapted to snap on this handle and two golf balls for which i paid, two golf balls and the club, at no expense to the taxpayer, okay? the thing that finally convinced bob was, i said, boss, i'll make a deal with you. if we have screwed up, if we have had equipment failure, anything has gone wrong on the surface where you are embarrassed or we are embarrassed, i will not do it. i will not be so frivolous. i want to wait until the very end of the mission, stand in front of the television camera, whack these golf balls with this makeshift club, pull it up, stick in my pocket, climb up the ladder, close the door and we're gone. so, he finally said okay. and that's the way it happened.

>> in full view of a huge worldwide audience, of millions of people, who have never forgotten to this day, alan shepard still is perhaps best known as the guy who played golf on the moon. >> well, it was designed to be a fun thing. fortunately it is still a fun thing. the club, the makeshift club, is with the u.s. golf association in their museum. there has been absolutely no commercialism tried -- well, there's been absolutely no commercialism. one company tried to say it was their golf ball, and we cut them off very quickly. so, it's been just a totally fun thing. >> and still is, yeah. now some general questions, if we may, i guess we have to get you home. because you've played golf, now

you pulled up the hatch and you came back. and after that it wasn't too long thereafter that you finally decided you'd completed your run with nasa. you moved on to other fields. >> well, as you recall, of course, the only scheduled missions were the skylab missions. the crews were already assigned. the soviets' crews were already assigned, so it was going to be a long -- >> deke finally got his shot at it. >> we were so pleased. we were so pleased, bless his heart. can you imagine having to learn to speak russian to be able to go into space? that's above and beyond the call of duty. but he did it. i'm not sure the russians understood him, but he did it. we were really so pleased and so happy for him. >> i'm remembering you were with me on television, because you were doing a job as a consultant on-the-air talent when the landing was accomplished and we were thinking, my, deke, they

all look great. brand and stafford, they all look great. little did we know they'd been dosed with nitric acid, was it? remember after the fact that they thought they had inhaled something or another, maybe some vapors from the ejection system, and they were in kind of bad shape for a short while. >> i'd forgotten whether there was a leak or what happened on that deal. we'd have to look that up. >> we'll look that up, we'll forget it now, because obviously it's unimportant. it's their flight. their stuff. anyway, okay, general thoughts, then. john glenn is about to fly again. you and he are pretty close to the same age. i wonder what your thoughts are about john flying. >> well, john's a couple of years older than i am. i believe he's 77. but i'd been saying for years that the taxpayers didn't get

their money's worth out of glenn because he made one flight and immediately went into the congress. and as a taxpayer, i objected to that. i've been telling john this for years and years. i called him up the other day after the announcement, and i said, john, i'm glad that you're going to give me one more flight for my tax dollars. i think it's good, quite frankly. obviously there are a lot of things about how weightlessness treats individuals and the person's reaction to weightlessness is a function of the amount of exercise or lack thereof, general physical conditioning and the kind of things that one really needs to know if you're going to be on a long-term mission. the more you find out, the better shape you'll be in.

so, he's a good data point. he thinks he's in pretty good shape, and he probably is, but his bones are still more brittle obviously, and i'm sure that there will be some lessons learned, even during that short period of time. looking at his general physical conditioning. before and after. i think -- you know, i think it's a good thing. i think we'll learn something from it. >> you think you'd like to fly again? >> oh, of course, i would. of course, i could. unfortunately i'm not in top health at the moment. >> well, that's just a subject of time. >> yeah. >> you've talked some here about nasa managers, but i'd kind of like to run down a little bit, get some evaluations from you about some of the people we've been talking about. for example, jim webb. >> well, you know, it was interesting, being involved with

the old naca and then the nasa during the formation period, because naca obviously was a group of engineers basically. they didn't have a political-type administrator. but when webb came along, i mean, what a fresh breath he was. he knew all the ins and outs of washington. he knew which chords to play. and not that he was a lobbyist by any sense of the imagination, he didn't have to be. he had a great package, men in space. and he played it well. he really did. he did us a great favor. certainly responding so quickly and so rapidly to kennedy's

really surprising decision to go to the moon. he did a good job. jim did a good job. but as i said before, you know, he came to him with a technical request. got turned down. so at least, you know, he had some engineering knowledge there somewhere. >> well, speaking of engineering knowledge, let's take bob gilruth. >> i like bob, i really did. because bob had been in the aviation business forever, and being right there at langley, seeing him, not every day, but seeing him frequently, and talking to people who had been with him in the old naca days and what he had done, he's just a remarkable, remarkable gentleman. and i think that he was really

sort of a hands-on kind of guy, too. i obviously appreciate his decision to let me make the first flight. but he never told me why he made that decision the way he did. i've asked him several times over the years, and he's always said, well, you were just the right man at the right time. but i'm sure that he was very personally involved in that selection process. there were some suggestions from some of the other folks in the program that maybe he had made a mistake in the decision, that there might have been someone else who qualified better. but he did not change his mind.

so, he's one of my heroes. >> how about chris kraft? >> i like chris. i like chris. you know, it -- i guess we were really closer in the early days when he was the flight director, we were all in that little building down there at the cape. and i think i felt perhaps closer to him then, but you could see the decision-making process that he went through. and you knew that he was not making any sloppy decisions, that they'd been very well thought through. >> george lopes? >> i didn't really know george that well. never really worked directly with him. as you know, that particular stage in the game, george came along later.

and actually, deke worked with him more than i did. >> how about wernor von braun? >> he was an interesting guy. we never were together very much. by i do remember as i'm sure the rest of the original seven, we had dinner at his house one night with him and everhart reis and we went to a little hillside where they built their own observatory, and we took a look at the moon through a telescope. here you are with a great rocket scientist and he's showing you what the moon looks like from a telescope. >> you know, it seems strange, but to the public at large, bob gilruth was lost in limbo and

wernor von braun stands in line as one of the prime movers. i wonder what your evaluation would be to that? >> i think that's true. i think that his entire life had been and was dedicated to aviation and space. and he basically was an engineer. i think that perhaps von braun obviously was an engineer, but i think von braun had been involved in political aspects over in germany, where maybe it was a matter of survival. and i think he dealt with the public more easily than gilruth did. it came more naturally to him. and as a result i think that in the final analysis, the general public knew more about von braun

than they did about gilruth. but those of us on the inside, particularly the manned space aspect of it, i think owe a lot more to gilruth than we do to wernor. >> i think part of it was that wernor was a salesman of ideas. he was out selling the concept of the lunar mission? >> i think so. i think he almost felt that he had to. maybe -- maybe he felt the same way we did. yes, it was a great idea. but he might have been concerned a little bit with the pressure of the schedule. that may have been the reason. i don't know. >> here's one that comes right out of the gang at houston. what are some of the worst things that happened after your selection as an astronaut? what are some of the worst things that happened? >> the worst things? oh, well, obviously -- and this

was not a fault of the system. but obviously being grounded was the worst thing that has ever happened to me. >> when you were running the astronaut office, what was the most difficult thing that you ran into there? do you remember anything being as particularly difficult during that time in office? >> i think that -- let me say that while i was head of the astronaut office, that it was my responsibility the care and feeding of very enthusiastic, very intelligent, very dedicated, motivated bunch of guys.

there were jealousies in the ranks, people being jealous of so and so, particularly being chosen for flight or backup position or support group position, and there were instances where really harsh discussions were taken. and so to straighten things out said, look, deke and i are running this program and this is the way it's going to be run and we're sorry but eventually you'll be treated fairly. there were some that still feel they weren't but a small percentage, hopefully. >> looking back on it what do you think now of the "life" magazine contract -- good, bad, or indifferent?

you don't have to answer that one if you don't choose to. >> well, i don't know. with respect to the contract we had with "life" magazine, i think there's a little ambivalence there. first, it was attractive to us because it provided controlled access to the press, especially on personal things, personal relationships within, the within the household, personal feelings, the wives, how did you feel about your husband going into space and that sort of thing. none of us had been involved in any of that sort of publicity or recognition before, and in the

early days it got to be a little bothersome, quite frankly. so this -- i think at the start it appeared to be a way to get around -- around that. and so it was -- it seemed to be welcomed from that point of view. but then the criticism came about the amount of money involved and so i think all in all we came out about even. half the people thought it was a good deal and half the people thought it was a bad deal. >> i think somebody in houston is looking for information with this next one. would you change any of nasa's current practices in selecting, training, and assigning space crews? >> well, you know, that's a very difficult question for me to answer because i'm not involved in the process anymore.

i think one has to look at the flights which are being made, at the performance of the crews. the number of delays because of mechanical problems and that sort of thing and using these criteria i would say they're running a good ship. i would say they're running a successful program. there have been obviously no areas which have resulted in loss of life. they have used the crew to control many, correct many problems, remarkable repair of the hubbell telescope. of course, that was some years ago but these are the kind of things which indicate to me

they're doing a pretty good job. >> i'm thinking now i can't remember a single case of disaster occasioned by pilot error, which speaks well for the group doesn't it? >> yes. >> of course now they're into the broad gamut of flight crews, women, scientists, pay load specialists. >> when you consider the fact you're still -- well i suppose if you say you're still doing basic research into the operation of the shuttle as a shell, as a vehicle, that's probably not true anymore. you've probably reached the operational stage or pretty close to it. >> yeah. recently i guess it was the "columbia" flew its 26th mission if i remember correctly for one spacecraft. a remarkable circumstance.

>> so i guess you could say they're operational but, still, it's a remarkable record. >> i've asked an awful lot of questions both from my own point of view and those in houston. seems to me it's high time we let you say anything that you'd like if there's something we haven't asked that should have been asked so if so, go ahead. >> chris, it's been a great part of my life to be involved in the space program and even before that as a navy test pilot, had some real, really exciting, satisfying jobs. but i guess i would have to say that it has been a distinct pleasure to be involved in the space program specifically and being allowed to make a couple of really recognizable,

spectacular, lucky missions. i think the thing that impressed -- has impressed me the most about the whole nasa process is that it has worked to well over the years. when you take a look at a group of civilian engineers and scientists that have to work with contractors who are paid and work with somebody else, that also has to work with the military, because you've got military involved, and that things have really turned out remarkably well. now, there have been some heated discussions between the advantages of manned space

flight and unmanned space flight because there are parts of nasa as you know totally dedicated to unmanned space flight. there have been some noted discussions and differences of opinion between the engineers on space flight who would like to automate everything, leave the pilots out of there. you know, in the final analysis, i can't remember any of these decisions that were made with an absolute heart over judgment. it seems to me there always has been and still are discussions going on to get the best possible answer. when you take a look at the nasa

organization, 1958-1959, nobody would have thought what it has done over the years. nobody would have thought that the computers, which took us to the moon and back were the forerunners of today's chips and today's technology because of the money and effort that nasa spent back in the '60s. sure, we would have computers, no question about it. but we wouldn't have advanced. we wouldn't be at the position we are today without that tremendous impetus that nasa had in making the computers. satellites, incredible incredible data information flowing back and forth from satellites all springing from the nasa organization. it's remarkable what the organization has done and is

still doing. it's just a great process. >> let the record show that that commercial was totally unsolicited. that was alan shepard's own thought. i'm just making that for the record. >> you didn't have to apologize. >> i'm not apologizing. i'm making sure that somebody watching this knows very well that that was pure alan shepard and not roy neil instigating a thought or two or nasa instigating a thought or two. >> they wouldn't accuse you of that, roy. >> no, but this is a nasa tape that we're making. >> i know. >> i want to make sure the people watching it know that came out of the blue and was pure you. that's all. >> well, it's the truth. >> alan, thank you very much. it's been a real pleasure. >> you think you got enough, huh? >> well, if we don't, we'll let the powers that be tell us we ought to come back and do it again sometime. >> okay. all right.