Posted on 11/21/2002 1:37:48 PM PST by PAR35
MELBOURNE, Fla. -- Gus Grissom's 75-year-old widow and eldest son retrieved the fallen astronaut's personal effects Wednesday from the Astronaut Hall of Fame.
Among the boxed items was the Stetson hat President Lyndon Johnson gave Grissom, the astronaut's logbook and the folded American flag from his funeral at Arlington National Cemetery.
But the artifact his widow and son wanted most -- Grissom's Mercury 7 spacesuit -- was still sealed in a glass case at the Titusville, Fla., museum when the pair headed home to Houston.
Although the Grissoms had the suit for nearly 30 years before loaning it to the museum a decade ago, NASA says it always has belonged to the government.
According to NASA, Gus Grissom borrowed the suit in the early 1960s and never returned it. His family said he took it because he had learned NASA planned to destroy it, a contention the space agency disputes.
"The suit will remain at the Hall of Fame until the ownership issue is resolved," said the Grissom's Melbourne attorney Jim Fallace. "We're hoping to find some way of resolving it other than litigation."
Fallace said NASA has been aware since 1965 that the family had the spacesuit.
"It never was an issue until September of this year when Betty Grissom refused to sign a new loan agreement" with the museum, he said.
That month, the once not-for-profit Hall of Fame was taken over by Delaware North Park Services, which also has a contract with NASA to run the visitor center tourist attraction at Kennedy Space Center.
The Grissoms, who have long blamed NASA for the Apollo 1 launch-pad fire that killed Gus Grissom, 41, and two other astronauts, said they didn't want the space agency making money off his artifacts.
"Betty Grissom also is concerned that the Astronaut Scholarship Fund is not getting sufficient money from the use of her husband's artifacts now," Fallace said.
The Grissoms had planned to confront NASA officials Tuesday outside the museum to demand the silver spacesuit. However, shortly before the planned meeting, Fallace asked that it be rescheduled for Wednesday morning at his office.
During the 1 1/2-hour meeting with NASA's chief counsel Bruce Anderson and a Delaware North representative, the personal items were returned, ownership of the suit was discussed and the family's lingering questions over the fire were heard, Scott Grissom said.
And, although they left town without the spacesuit, the Grissoms took with them something possibly more valuable.
"It was probably the first time since the fire we really had a positive conversation with NASA," he said. "My mom and I are very encouraged."
"Do they still have the spacesuits of the other astronauts that were with him on Mercury 7"
No!
Gov't property or not? Could be argued.
I vaguely recall looking up info on that company once. There's something about it that bothered me, but I'd have to look it up again. Maybe it is a RAT-related company??????? Maybe not.
According to NASA, Gus Grissom borrowed the suit in the early 1960s and never returned it. His family said he took it because he had learned NASA planned to destroy it, a contention the space agency disputes.
Wouldn't the suit he was wearing at his death have been fire damaged? Is this one damaged? I don't mean to appear dense, but I'm not understanding this. How could he have taken it home with him and then died in it at Kennedy? There must have been two suits. A proto-type maybe?
This was his suit from the Mercury flight - a suborbital 15 minute flight in 1961 that traveled only some 300 miles down range.
The Apollo program used an entirely different kind of equipment. The fire was in 1967, 5 and 1/2 years after the suit in question was used.
If anything, the suit would have shown the effects of immersion in water. Grissom's flight was the one where the hatch blew before it was supposed to, the capsule sank, and Grissom almost drowned.
Sorry, I can't add any light to the subject. I probably posted this when I was involved in several (at the time) ongoing discussions about contracting out of government services.
Hah! I did not even see when you posted this story. I probably read this way back when and looked it up at the time.
thanks for the explanation.
Are you sure about that? According to one web site, the Alan Shepard suit is at NASA in Houston. They put the Glenn and Cooper suits at the Air and Space Museum in DC, and Schirra's at the museum in Kansas.
http://aesp.nasa.okstate.edu/fieldguide/pages/spacesuit/
This site also shows the John Glenn suit at the National Air & Space Museum, as well as at least one other Mercury suit.
http://www.nasm.si.edu/collections/space/space.html
The first site also shows NASA with several other astronaut suits from the Mercury program.
IIRC, Liberty Bell 7 was raised from the Atlantic Ocean a couple of years ago, but the hatch could not be located.
ping
Gus Grissom didn’t sink the Liberty Bell 7 Mercury capsule
http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/missions/liberty_bell_000617.html
“Following the splashdown of “Liberty Bell 7”, the hatch, which had explosive bolts, blew off prematurely, letting water into the capsule and into Grissom’s suit. Grissom nearly drowned but was rescued by helicopter, while the spacecraft sank in deep water. Grissom maintained he did nothing to set off the explosives to blow the hatch, and NASA officials agreed. The craft was recovered in 1999 but there was no evidence of how the hatch had been opened. However, later experience showed that the force necessary to trigger the initiator for the explosive egress system would leave a major bruise, and Grissom had no such injury. Guenter Wendt, “Pad Fuhrer” for most of the early American space launches, believes that the cover protecting the external release actuator was accidentally lost, then the T-handle may have been pulled by a parachute shroud line, or have been damaged by the heat of re-entry and fired when it contracted during cooling.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gus_Grissom
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.