posted 06-27-2005 04:37 PM               

The interesting thing is that Kraft/Schefter maintain Kraft played a fearsome role in crew selection, a role that had become legendary by the time Cassutt began researching DEKE!

So legendary in fact that Cassutt says, here on cS, that he put the question to Deke directly, I think though just with respect to Carpenter. Slayton poo-pooed Kraft's role. But that was re: Carpenter, by July 1964 moot, given Carpenter's grounding injury. What was Kraft's role in other crew selections? It's been about three years since I read those sections of FLIGHT. But I recall very specific (and rather preening) Kraft anecdotes regarding specific astronauts. Of course, I don't put much store by FLIGHT. . . .

posted 06-28-2005 04:35 AM               

Same with Cunningham, if Apollo 18 and 19 had flown then chances are good that Cunningham would have flown as CDR of a Skylab mission. The fact that he was named as the original Skylab backup CDR suggests that Deke had him in mind as a potential CDR of any fourth manned mission to Skylab anyway.

I'd be interested to know how the other flight directors felt about Eisele and Cunningham, since Kraft hadn't actually worked a mission as Flight Director since the middle of the Gemini Program (bar Apollo 1). If it was known that they had no problem, would that have weakened Kraft's opposition?