Talk:Gus Grissom

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Notes to work on

More to come, will be working on these. Kees08 (Talk) 01:08, 27 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Grissom as First Man: Slayton's story is not supported by his actions

From 'Notes to work on', above:

"Slayton was probably going to select Grissom to be the first on the Moon (Fallen Astronauts page 87)"

This is an often repeated story, having been published by Michael Cassutt in his book Deke! (1994). A diligent author who strives for historical accuracy will not simply interview a person, and then publish their words presented as fact. Ok, it is clear that it is a fact that Slayton said it. But it is the job of a historian to seek supporting evidence that words like that are telling an accurate story before presenting such info as truth. A solid follow up to a statement by Slayton saying that his plan was to assign Grissom as the first to attempt the landing on the Moon would be to confirm with Slayton that Grissom was being given training prerequisites to qualify him for this mission.

And here is where we find that this story lacks supporting evidence. We know what the requirements for flying the lunar landing mission were. One requirement Deke imposed on these crews was that they had experience flying an orbital rendezvous. The entire purpose of the Gemini program was to ensure that astronauts knew how to fly a rendezvous and docking, essential for the Earth Orbit Rendezvous [CORRECTION: I meant Lunar Orbit Rendezvous] mode to be used in Apollo.

- Grissom had no rendezvous experience. He was assigned to fly the first Gemini, and then the first Apollo. Neither of these were a rendezvous mission, with no separate Agena target to connect with.

Another critical requirement to fly the lunar landing mission was being fully trained on the Lunar Lander Training Vehicle (LLTV). In order to get fully trained, this was a lengthy process of completing training in the Lunar Landing Research Facility, the gantry contraption at Langley. Then there was helicopter training. And then there was checkout in the LLTV fixed-base simulator, and then flying the LLTV in fixed-gimbal mode, and finally a full certification in flying the LLTV in lunar-simulation mode.

- 6 astronauts were in the first class to be selected for this LLTV training. Grissom was not among the six. (The six were Borman-Anders, Armstrong-Aldrin and Conrad-Williams.)

The fact that Grissom was not chosen by Slayton for LLTV training has been posted to the internet since 2001 (here). And that link has been available on the Wikipedia article on the

LLTV
for well over a decade, since 2008.

The fact that Grissom was never assigned to a rendezvous mission has been widely known since the 60s.

Anyone who had access to Deke Slayton could have asked him these simple questions as a way to provide tangible support to his words. Actions speak much louder than words. And if Deke did indeed intend to assign Grissom on the first landing mission, as he had stated according to Michael Cassutt, then he would have a lot of 'splaining to do as to why he failed to give Grissom the necessary training. The only options Slayton would have would be to send Grissom up on that mission unqualified to do the task at hand, or delay the program for months so that Grissom could catch up to these other astronauts who Slayton had picked to get the necessary qualifications.

If Slayton's words were sincere, then this leaves a huge question mark as to why he would paint himself into such a tight corner regarding his choices for who would graduate from Gemini with the necessary rendezvous experience, and also who would get trained in the LLTV. But seeing the hard facts that Slayton did not groom Grissom with the necessary training, then the evidence points to Slayton having groomed people like Armstrong, Conrad and Borman to be on the short list of those who would be fully qualified when the time came to attempt the first landing.

An alternate explanation is what is known as 'eulogizing'. Slayton was saying nice things about his friend who had died.

James Donovan is another author who did not thoroughly look into this story before presenting it as fact. He has repeated this story of how Slayton said he intended to give Grissom the first shot at landing. His new book has recently been published, and so the news headlines today include articles like this:

The man who should have taken first step on Moon – and it’s not Buzz Aldrin
Quote:
"He stated during his new book “Shoot for the Moon” that Gus Grissom should have commanded Apollo 11."

Had Donovan looked into the evidence for this, he could easily have seen that Slayton's words were not backed up by his actions. And Cassutt, who published his book in 1994, one year after Slayton died, had all of the Gemini rendezvous info widely available to him.

It is not sufficient for Wikipedia editors to find something that has been published in a book, and then cite that to present it in one of our articles as fact, which the vast majority of readers will accept without scrutinizing the info. For us to do a thorough job, various sources must be examined, so that the references which present info which makes sense can be incorporated into our articles. And for the info that fails to stand up to a basic cross-referencing of info that is available in sources, we either discard it, or at least flag it.

Again, from the preceding section:

"Slayton was probably going to select Grissom to be the first on the Moon (Fallen Astronauts page 87)"

We have had a wealth of basic facts which have been available to us for a very long time which show Slayton's actions to be contrary to his words. -- Tdadamemd19 (talk) 04:23, 5 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Remember Alan Shepard? He came back from having an ear operation that restored his flight status and claimed the next available Apollo mission (13, later postponed to 14) without serving on a backup crew or any rendezvous experience because... well, he was one of thge Mercury Seven. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 05:40, 5 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Alan Shepard was the fifth person to step foot onto the Moon. The issue being discussed in this section is the notion of who was going to be first, and whether or not the story that Grissom was being prepared for that role stands up to scrutiny. Here is a pertinent quote from what I had posted here (underlined for emphasis):
"The only options Slayton would have would be to send Grissom up on that mission unqualified to do the task at hand, or delay the program for months so that Grissom could catch up to these other astronauts who Slayton had picked to get the necessary qualifications."
No one here has asserted that it would have been impossible for Grissom to be trained to fly the first landing mission. The point was that Slayton had several other astronauts who he had gotten into a much better position to do this. And if anyone, for whatever reason, had wanted Grissom to fly that first landing attempt, then it would have meant a long delay in the program.
That same assessment applies to Shepard, or any other astronaut in the program. It is important to note that Shepard did not step foot on the Moon until one and a half YEARS after the first landing mission had been accomplished. Any astronaut at NASA could have been sufficiently trained to fly a landing mission given one and a half years of catch up training. It is important to note, given your example, that Shepard had originally been slated to fly Apollo 13, and the reason why he got switched to Apollo 14 is for this very same reason I have been highlighting:
There was not sufficient time to get Shepard fully qualified.
So I suggest to you that Al Shepard is actually a PERFECT case study to support the points that have been made here regarding Grissom. Al did not have sufficient time to get up to speed to fly Apollo 13. And that fact underscores how Grissom could not have gotten up to speed in time to fly Apollo 11. Certainly not by July 1969. And by the time that Al launched in January of 1971, rendezvous in lunar orbit was no longer an unknown. It had been accomplished on three previous missions. There is no evidence that Slayton was willing to send anyone with no rendezvous experience to fly the first attempt of docking in the LM at the Moon. Slayton did not do this for the first, second, third or even the fourth effort to do a lunar orbit rendezvous. Shepard's mission was the fifth. His example does nothing to support the argument that Grissom was being groomed to fly the first landing attempt. At least, not in any way that I can see. -- Tdadamemd19 (talk) 16:00, 7 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
The fact remains, we are still bound by our policy of
WP:Original research, no matter how well-reasoned it seems. Alternate history is always a speculative business. JustinTime55 (talk) 16:30, 7 August 2019 (UTC)[reply
]
It appears that you are misunderstanding the purpose of why this section was created. Another possibility is that it is the WP:OR policy which is being misunderstood.
This section was not started as some push to have a bunch of new info added to the article which shows that Slayton clearly was not preparing Grissom to be that First Man. My effort here has been to curtain garbage from being included in the article. Info that does not stand up to the reliable sources which we have available.
There is no question that Grissom never got any rendezvous experience. And that Apollo 1 was not a rendezvous mission. There is no OR issue regarding this simple fact. And more importantly, WP:OR is not a policy which places prohibitions against removing statements which present clearly bogus info.
We are in agreement in what you say about alternate history. And there is even more reason for an encyclopedia to purge itself of speculative info when such supposition has been exposed as being fully unfounded. It might help here to highlight the exact statement in the article which this section pertains to.
Quote from Death and legacy:

Some contend that Grissom could have been selected as one of the astronauts to walk on the Moon. "Deke" Slayton wrote that he had hoped for one of the original Mercury astronauts to go to the Moon, noting: "It wasn't just a cut-and-dried decision as to who should make the first steps on the Moon. If I had to select on that basis, my first choice would have been Gus, which both Chris Kraft and Bob Gilruth seconded."

The support presented for that statement is Deke! by Mike Cassutt, page 223.
Then in the preceding section, we see another editor who appears to want to expand upon this, and here the reference being presented is Fallen Astronauts, page 87. I have communicated with Colin Burgess, the author of that book, and my understanding is that he never spoke to Slayton. That his story is basically a repeat of what Cassutt had published.
And earlier in this current section, I cited yet another book which just came out and yet again repeats this same story.
What we have here is a positive feedback loop where one author failed to do his due diligence and published this story which has a nice warm feeling to it. There certainly is an original research problem, and that is Mike Cassutt's original research which he published in his book.
There is no prohibition in Wikipedia Policy against OR which would prevent bogus statements from being removed.
Furthermore, no edit has been done to the section of the article in question. I have not done any. And in this section here, no one has yet proposed any. So I am left scratching my head as to what exactly you are objecting to. WP:OR certainly does not prohibit removal of a statement which one author decided to publish without thoroughly vetting it first. -- Tdadamemd19 (talk) 21:10, 8 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry to waste your time, but that is just a short list of possible things to include the article or at least research further. I find a lot of information whilst looking for other information, and it seems like a waste if I put it in a document on my personal computer. The 'notes to work on' section title is accurate as to what its contents is. Feel free to ping me next time if you have anything else you need to discuss. Kees08 (Talk) 01:39, 9 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
No sweat about use of my time.
Ideally, info presented here will prove to be sufficient toward keeping bogus stories from promulgating.
Imagine if there had been a critical mass of people who had been able to nip the Moon Hoax Theories in the bud.
So if these Gus First Theories can be kept in check with a solid application of pertinent facts, then I would certainly see this investment in our time to be well spent.
Some of you all may have seen that beyond the several books that have been highlighted here, there are news outlets who have run with this story. It is clear that there are plenty of people who get paid as professionals in the news business who don't care about checking their facts before publishing them. Here are recent articles which have made some of the most brashly unfounded claims:
"Man who would have been first to walk on moon honored in Indiana hometown"
 (cached article) (orig paywall link, c-j.com search)
From all of those I have seen, here is the report which lays it on the thickest:
"The Hoosier who would’ve been the first man on the moon: How tragedy changed history"
They present so many factual errors, it is difficult to decide where to begin. Perhaps it would be better for me to not begin. Anyone can check some of the more basic facts for themselves. Particularly the tall tales being spun by Gus's cousin Steve Grissom. Particularly in the second video on that page (WTTV's web extra).
And if you work for one of these news outlets, it is your duty to do a factchecking before presenting this kind of info to the world as truth.
Ok, I've said just about everything that I came to this article to say. I will leave it to other editors on how best to proceed so that we present solid info to readers. Unless anyone has anything pressing for me, I will switch to a read-only mode here for the coming weeks, and will check back to see how the quality of this article has progressed. Thanks for everyone's input. Hawkeye, I'm glad that we got to include Al Shepard in this. His case is an important angle on the story.
I know that there are going to be people who are heavily invested in the fictionalized version of the story who are not going to be too thrilled if and when they happen to be met with the info presented here. But incontrovertible facts have a way of proving their durability when held up against tales which do not stand on a firm foundation. So I will leave here with complete trust in that, even if the process may take a lot more time than I myself might see as being ideal. I have waited patiently over the course of several years with other topics. And for this topic here, I am fine with sitting back and letting those who see the need to take an active role toward refining our article. Goodbye for now, yall. -- Tdadamemd19 (talk) 07:15, 9 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Rating as a Featured Article?

Do you believe that this article should be rated as a Featured Article? It has encyclopedic value, is of high importance to multiple projects and fits the criteria of a Featured Article. QuicksmartTortoise513 (talk) 01:41, 31 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Featured Article status is only awarded after a rigorous Featured article candidates review process. The article would not pass in its current form. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 05:20, 31 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]
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