The Good Old Days

I can’t believe it’s been two days here. Wednesday was nonstop activity for us, but it was mostly sightseeing Clay’s old haunts. It felt like I was with my dad in Eureka being shown every house he lived in. 

Clay took us by his business townhouse where he ran Aerojet business. It was on Clear Lake with a little slip of water winding through the complex. He pointed out the party room and snickered as he told me it was pretty crazy there. I’ve heard that comment quite a few times now. He hasn’t slowed down much.

We cruised through the neighborhood he and Carol lived in. He pointed out a pretty little brick house.

A couple of streets over he pointed a boney finger out the window and said, “That’s where Armstrong lived.” It’s interesting that this was a community of engineers, scientists, and fighter pilots all in their twenties.

We drove over to the Kemah feeding out of Clear Lake into the Galveston and hooked a left to go to the Kemah Boardwalk. We ate lunch at The Flying Dutchman and walked the boardwalk with its rollercoaster and miniature train. Back into the SUV for more touring of old haunts. As we drove through one area, Clay told us about Maribelle’s. Apparently Maribelle’s was the place to go way back in the sixties. I think it got wiped out by a hurricane. She moved to a house nearby and converted part of it into a bar. Eventually that either burned down or was swept away. Clay showed us the old spot and lamented that he couldn’t show us this iconic hub of NASA activity.

For dinner we drove an hour to the other side of town, Sugarland. Floyd and Carolyn Bennett had invited us to dinner. Floyd was an engineer. His claim to fame was drawing a map of the expected terrain on the window of the Lunar Lander. They named one of the Moon mountains after him. They live at an assisted living facility with amazingly elegant grounds. Mr. and Mrs. Bennett were both gracious and elegant. Though they are considerably younger than Clay, he looked like a kid in comparison. We finally peeled away and drove home in an incoming squall. As soon as we got back to the hotel, wet and tired, Clay asked, “Who’s up for a nightcap?”

Good grief! Does this guy ever stop? So we had our usual, a scotch and water for Clay, a glass of wine for me, and a beer for Joe (or two, maybe). We got to bed late as usual.

Thursday morning was the big day. We started with breakfast. As I walked by a man having his breakfast, he stopped me and asked if Clay was an astronaut. I explained he was the Chief engineer over the Service Propulsion Main Engine. He introduced himself as David Bennett, photographer for the Washington Post and asked if he could photograph Clay. It turns out he’s a bit of a Space science nerd, much to Clay’s delight. Forty-five minutes later he shook hands and left with a promise that if a writer wanted to do a story on Clay, we’d be notified.

Clay had purchased tickets for the Space Center Houston. He’d also gotten a hold of his old chemical engineer friend, Norman Chaffe, to give us a private tour of the Saturn (which is what the Apollo mission was flown on). This thing is enormous. It took me two minutes to walk its length. It would’ve been Apollo 18, but Nixon pulled the financial plug. 

It was given to the Smithsonian, and forgotten. This spacecraft laid out on the lawn for decades, rotting. Finally Norman and a few others applied enough heat to get the Smithsonian to build a protective building around it and clean it. It sits exactly where it was abandoned. Norman’s tour was incredibly detailed, and extra special because he could point to various parts of the rocket and say, “I designed those small engines to make adjustments to its flight. And I was responsible for the design of the pyrotechnics that separated the stages from each other.”

Then Clay said, “That’s where my SPS engine would have sat.” He pointed up into the vacancy behind the command module. We had an audience by the time we were done.

The SPS is not on display at the museum, but the Lunar Lander was. Norm told us about the intensity of the Apollo 13 explosion and how he’d been recalled into the command center. When he came in they were in the middle of a discussion about shutting off the system he’d designed to keep the fuel warm enough to function on restart for re-entry. “I waved my arms and said no, you can’t do that. The fuel will freeze. They said they had to or the astronauts would come back as popsicles. 

So we had them rotate the command module to warm the little fuel pipes in the sun until they got back. The fuel had to be above a certain temperature and it was… by only a couple of degrees. When they fired up the engine, I thought I was going to wet my pants,” he laughed. (I have to point out that these conversations are from my memory. I’m sure I’ve made some technical error in my wording. But it’s how I remember it from yesterday).

Clay wanted us to go on the Command Center tour, so off we went. When we all shuffled into the hallowed grounds of the command center viewing room, Clay sat in the middle and said, “This is where I sat when I came in here. Armstrong sat here one time,” he commented patting the seat next to him.

It was late and we were tired and starving by the time we left, but the hotel bartender had told us that Maribelle’s had been opened yet again. Boy was Clay excited… I didn’t know what to expect, but after the Cockeyed Seagull experience I was prepared. He wanted to go there before dinner. Wow, what a dive! It is a carefully replicated dump. The smoke filled room was slightly better than the Seagull because they had modern ventilation and high ceilings.

Otherwise it was dark, noisy and dingy. I asked for a glass of wine and she presented a choice between two miniature bottles of Sutter Home wines. I chose the merlot and suffered through it. Joe asked for a dark beer. Nope. He asked for a Bud Light. They were out. He drank a Miller Light. We didn’t stay long, but it was all part of the experience. I begged to go back to Tommy’s for a nice meal and a real glass of wine. When we got back, Clay asked if we wanted a nightcap… No way! I was done. The ninety-year-old could keep the bar open by himself :)

Clay was thrilled to find out that an old acquaintance of his was staying at our hotel, Tom Stafford. He told me that Tom usually eats breakfast around 8:00 or so.