NASA HONORS LEGENDARY FLIGHT DIRECTOR GENE KRANZ

Krantz on Console

Credit NASA
http://grin.hq.nasa.gov/IMAGES/SMALL/GPN-2000-001406.jpg

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http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2007/nov/HQ_M07170_Kranz_Ambassador_Award.html

TOLEDO, Ohio - NASA will honor Eugene Francis "Gene" Kranz with the
presentation of an Ambassador of Exploration Award for his
involvement in the U.S. space program. Kranz will receive the award
during a ceremony at 2 p.m. CST on Dec. 6 at the Central Catholic
High School.
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The Apollo missions are long past, and hopefully soon a new history will be
created with humans on the Moon.
It is good to remember those that helped make it happen before and hopefully
this will interest the generation coming up to help in the next quest. 

What are your kids thinking about?
- LRK -

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http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/imagegallery/AofEphotos.html
NASA Ambassador of Exploration Award
The Ambassador of Exploration Award recognizes the sacrifices and
dedication of the Apollo, Gemini and Mercury astronauts. Each astronaut
or their surviving families will be presented a lunar sample, part of
the 842 pounds of moon rocks and soil returned during the six lunar
expeditions from 1969 to 1972.

An inscription describes the rock as "a symbol of the unity of human
endeavor and mandkind's hope for a future of peace and harmony."
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Will this generation of students coming up get similar awards?
Talk it up.

"/Failure Is Not an Option/."
- LRK -

Thanks for looking up with me.

Larry Kellogg

Web Site: http://lkellogg.vttoth.com/LarryRussellKellogg/
BlogSpot: http://kelloggserialreports.blogspot.com/
RSS link: http://kelloggserialreports.blogspot.com/atom.xml
Newsletter: https://news.altair.com/mailman/listinfo/lunar-update
==============================================================

Nov. 30, 2007

David E. Steitz
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1730
david.steitz@nasa.gov

Michele Jurek
Central Catholic High School, Toledo, Ohio
419-255-2306, ext. 148
mjurek@centralcatholic.org

MEDIA ADVISORY: M07-170

NASA HONORS LEGENDARY FLIGHT DIRECTOR GENE KRANZ

TOLEDO, Ohio - NASA will honor Eugene Francis "Gene" Kranz with the
presentation of an Ambassador of Exploration Award for his
involvement in the U.S. space program. Kranz will receive the award
during a ceremony at 2 p.m. CST on Dec. 6 at the Central Catholic
High School. Kranz is a 1951 graduate of Central Catholic. The award
will remain at the Toledo school for display. Reporters who would
like to attend the ceremony should contact Michele Jurek
(mjurek@centralcatholic.org) at 419-255-2306, ext. 148, by 3 p.m. on
Dec. 5.

The award is a moon rock encased in Lucite and mounted for public
display as inspiration to a new generation of explorers who will help
return humans to the moon and eventually travel on to Mars and
beyond. The rock is part of the 842 pounds of samples collected
during the six Apollo lunar expeditions from 1969 to 1972.

NASA is giving the Ambassador of Exploration Award to the first
generation of explorers in the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo space
programs for realizing America's vision of going to the moon. NASA
also is recognizing several key individuals who played significant
roles in the early space programs.

Kranz worked on NASA's Mercury, Gemini and Apollo space missions.
Kranz was the lead flight director during the Apollo 13 mission. An
explosion aboard the spacecraft during Apollo 13 required Kranz and
other team members to help resolve the crisis and safely bring the
astronauts back to Earth. Kranz was a co-recipient of the
Presidential Medal of Freedom for the Apollo 13 Mission. For
information about Central Catholic High School, visit:

http://www.centralcatholic.org/

For more images of the award, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/imagegallery/AofEphotos.html

-end-

To subscribe to the list, send a message to:
hqnews-subscribe@mediaservices.nasa.gov

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http://www.amazon.com/Failure-Is-Not-an-Option/dp/B000FC0O7M/
*Failure Is Not an Option (Kindle Edition)*
by Gene Kranz

*Amazon.com*
In 1957, the Russians launched /Sputnik/ and the ensuing space race.
Three years later, Gene Kranz left his aircraft testing job to join NASA
and champion the American cause. What he found was an embryonic
department run by whiz kids (such as himself), sharp engineers and
technicians who had to create the Mercury mission rules and procedure
from the ground up. As he says, "Since there were no books written on
the actual methodology of space flight, we had to write them as we went
along."

Kranz was part of the mission control team that, in January 1961,
launched a chimpanzee into space and successfully retrieved him, and
made Alan Shepard the first American in space in May 1961. Just two
months later they launched Gus Grissom for a space orbit, John Glenn
orbited Earth three times in February 1962, and in May of 1963 Gordon
Cooper completed the final Project Mercury launch with 22 Earth orbits.
And through them all, and the many Apollo missions that followed, Gene
Kranz was one of the integral inside men--one of those who bore the
responsibility for the /Apollo 1/ tragedy, and the leader of the "tiger
team" that saved the /Apollo 13/ astronauts.

Moviegoers know Gene Kranz through Ed Harris's Oscar-nominated portrayal
of him in /Apollo 13/, but Kranz provides a more detailed insider's
perspective in his book /Failure Is Not an Option/. You see NASA through
his eyes, from its primitive days when he first joined up, through the
1993 shuttle mission to repair the Hubble Space Telescope, his last
mission control project. His memoir, however, is not high literature.
Kranz has many accomplishments and honors to his credit, including the
Presidential Medal of Freedom, but this is his first book, and he's not
a polished author. There are, perhaps, more behind-the-scenes details
and more paragraphs devoted to what Cape Canaveral looked like than the
general public demands. If, however, you have a long-standing
fascination with aeronautics, if you watched /Apollo 13/ and wanted
more, /Failure Is Not an Option/ will fill the bill. /--Stephanie Gold/

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gene_Kranz
Eugene Francis "Gene" Kranz (born 17 August 1933) is a retired NASA
flight director and manager. Kranz served as a flight director during
the Gemini and Apollo programs, and is best known for his role in saving
the crew of Apollo 13. He is also famous for his trademark flattop
hairstyle, and the wearing of vests (waistcoats) of different styles and
materials during missions for which he acted as flight director. Kranz
has received the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

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http://history.nasa.gov/SP-4223/sp4223.htm
Edited by
Glen E. Swanson

The NASA History Series
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
NASA History Office
Office of Policy and Plans
Washington, D.C., 1999

*http://history.nasa.gov/SP-4223/contents.htm
SP-4223 "Before This Decade Is Out..."

Chapter 6. Eugene F. Kranz.
*http://history.nasa.gov/SP-4223/ch6.htm

[118]
Eugene F. Kranz, flight director, is shown at his console on May 30,
1965, in the Mission Operations Control Room in the Mission Control
Center at Houston during a Gemini-Titan IV simulation to prepare for the
four-day, 62-orbit flight. (NASA Photo S-65-22203.)

[119]
From a very young age, Eugene F. Kranz developed a unique interest in
space flight. Born in Toledo, Ohio, on August 17, 1933, Kranz formerly
declared his interest in the subject by writing a high school thesis
which explored the possibilities of flying a single-stage rocket to the
Moon. However, after graduating from Parks College of St. Louis,
Missouri, with a BS in Aeronautical Engineering, Kranz's interests
became more down to earth as he shifted from space travel to aviation.

[131]
Gene Kranz working at his flight director's console in the Mission
Operations Control Room at Houston circa 1965. (NASA Photo S-65-60057.)

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WHAT THE MIND CAN CONCEIVE, AND BELIEVE, IT WILL ACHIEVE - LRK

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