Lovell, Apollo 13 crew showed value of teamwork
Lovell, crew showed value of teamwork
Madison — Jim Lovell brought a love of model rocketry, the rank of Eagle Scout, few finances and hopes of becoming a pilot when he came to the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the fall of 1946 for the start of his freshman year.
To boost the small stipend he received for being a cadet in the U.S. Navy’s Flying Midshipman program, Lovell, who grew up in Milwaukee, washed dishes and bused tables at Gannon’s Restaurant, just west of what is now East Campus Mall. He rented a room in a house on Keyes Ave. a few blocks off Monroe St. and furthered his income by caring for the rats and mice used by university researchers.
“On weekends, I would give them water and feed them and that kind of stuff,” Lovell said. “I didn’t have any money when I graduated from high school. My future was bleak except by some miracle this Navy program came along, and I took it right away.”
It was a humble start to what would turn into a heroic career filled with dangerous military test flights and four trips into space, his last in 1970 as commander of Apollo 13. That final, well-documented mission almost ended in disaster but became one of the greatest stories in the history of space travel.
But when Lovell, 88, stepped to the podium of the Kohl Center stage on Dec. 18 to receive an honorary degree and give the commencement address, he didn’t plan to retell the epic saga that captivated the world and, in 1996, was turned into a movie with Tom Hanks playing his role.
Instead, the graduate of Milwaukee’s Juneau High School who logged 715 hours in space and circled the Earth 330 times says he wanted to deliver a message that goes beyond a single story, regardless of its place in history.
“It’s not what I did but the impression I got from what I did,” Lovell said by telephone from his home in Lake Forest, Ill. “Life is a risk no matter what you do, whether you’re in space or just driving a car. I want to relate to people some of the positives I got out of the space program, ideas of good leadership, teamwork and using your initiative, which the Apollo 13 flight expressed quite well.”
Lovell was chosen to receive his honorary degree last year but was unable to make the spring commencement ceremony.
“The Honorary Degrees Committee saw Lovell as the exemplification of the achievements we seek in an honorary degree recipient: great distinction in her or his chosen calling, allied with substantial contributions to the life of the broader community in the best traditions of the Wisconsin Idea,” said David McDonald, professor of history and chair of the committee.
Lovell was born in Cleveland, Ohio, but his father was killed in a car crash when he was about 5. He and his mother lived with a relative in Indiana for two years before they ultimately settled in Milwaukee, where Lovell and his mother had an apartment on 35th St. between Wisconsin Ave. and Wells St.
Lovell had applied to the U.S. Naval Academy while in high school but was turned down, so he entered a special program designed to school and train potential Navy pilots. He spent two years at UW-Madison before he transferred to the Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md., where he completed his bachelor of science degree in 1952.
He spent four years as a test pilot and later was the program manager for the F4H Phantom Fighter jet. He also served as a safety engineer with Fighter Squadron 101 at the Naval Air Station in Oceana, Va. He has logged more than 7,000 hours of flying time, more than half of that in jet aircraft, according to his NASA biography.
Although Lovell served on the missions of Gemini 7, Gemini 12 and Apollo 8, it would be the Apollo 13 mission in April 1970 that would bring a near-death experience, the ultimate case of problem-solving and fame to Lovell and fellow astronauts John L. “Jack” Swigert Jr. and Fred W. Haise Jr.
Two days into the trip, the ship’s cryogenic oxygen system failed, forcing the crew to work closely with Houston ground controllers to make modifications so they could return to Earth.
Lovell said landing on the moon would have been the epitome of his career and initially he was frustrated about getting so close. But while writing about the trip in his book “Lost Moon: The Perilous Voyage of Apollo 13,” Lovell said his thoughts changed.
“It suddenly dawned on me that even though I hadn’t made it I actually accomplished something and showed something to the people that the normal flights didn’t do,” Lovell said. “It showed how people working together as a team . . . how we could take an almost certain catastrophe and change it into a safe recovery. It was really a classic case of crisis management.”