[PW] ? Quotations from USNA Graduates (Quotation Query #647)

Tue Mar 4 06:01:27 PST 2008

Another Wally Schirra quote
(http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/obituaries/20070504-9999-1n4schirra.
html):

After Schirra's 1962 Mercury mission, CBS newscaster Walter Cronkite
asked him what he was thinking as he sat atop the 95-foot-high Atlas
rocket on the Cape Canaveral launching pad.

Ever the jokester, Schirra replied: "You think, all these hundreds of
thousands of parts were put together by the lowest bidder."  

Charles Early                              
Library, Code 272                         (301) 286-0887, Fax (301)
286-8218
Goddard Space Flight Center               Charles.T.Early at nasa.gov

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Maryland, LLC
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-----Original Message-----
From: project-wombat-open-bounces at lists.project-wombat.org
[mailto:project-wombat-open-bounces at lists.project-wombat.org] On Behalf
Of Reed C Bowman
Sent: Sunday, March 02, 2008 2:18 PM
To: list at project-wombat.org
Subject: Re: [PW] ? Quotations from USNA Graduates (Quotation Query
#647)

This 2005 interview with the late Wally Schirra
http://www.space.com/entertainment/wally_schirra_050323.html includes
the quote "I don't particularly go along with going to Moon first to
build a launch pad to go to Mars. We should go [to Mars] from Earth
orbit. Once you are in Earth orbit all the work is done. They say we
need to go to the Moon to practice going to Mars. We have already been
to the Moon; we've already practiced."

Not wonderfully pithy or anything, but an important point of view,
agreeing with most experts, and contradicting a lot of the other Apollo
astronauts as well as political policy.

His own website's main page has the otherwise unsourced quote "Levity is
the lubricant of a crisis.  We resort to jokes, pranks and good natured
kidding to relieve tension, stress and boredom." - Wally Schirra Since
he's the famous Gotcha-man of the space program, that's a relevant and
characteristic one.

brainyquote has a pile, of course, but that's all unsourced.

I'm having difficulty finding a fuller version of the Ollie North
Iran-Contra hearings quote about the "off-the-shelf, self-financing" 
covert ops unit, but it looks like he was explicitly quoting William
Casey at the time, so it may not count. You can see if you can find a
quote from his third career as a promoter of his own line of flak
jackets, complete with extra - ahem - personal... protection.

RCB

Shapiro, Fred wrote:

>For an article I am writing on famous quotations by United States Naval
Academy graduates, I would welcome suggestions of well-known quotations
by any of the following:
>
>John S. McCain III
>Roger Staubach
>Oliver North
>James H. Webb, Jr.
>Montel Williams
>David Robinson
>Charlie Wilson
>Stansfield Tuner
>Wally Schirra
>William Appleman Williams
>William Lederer
>Richard E. Byrd
>James D. Watkins
>William D. Leahy
>Thomas C. Kinkaid
>Arleigh A. Burke
>Elmo R. Zumwalt
>Peter Pace
>
>Fred Shapiro
>_______________________________________________
>Project Wombat
>list at project-wombat.org
>http://www.project-wombat.org/
>
>  
>

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