I remember one really impressive moment with David and Mike at the school. They were up flying together in a two-seat version of the Starfighter, running low-lift drag ratio landings, meaning they came in at a very steep angle and needed to flare the airplane, give it power, and go around and shoot another steep landing. On one of these runs, they lost their engine. The airplane hit the ground with a bash. Mike Adams in the back seat ejected just before that thing hit, but David Scott didn't. It was amazing to me: both guys made a split second decision that was absolutely correct. And both were opposite courses of action. The rear cockpit crunched, and if Mike had staved he would have been killed. If David had punched he would have been killed because when he hit, his seat was cocked sideways. To me, that incident indicated their capability and future.
NASA's Mercury astronauts had been chosen before our school geared up. But over the next six years, the space agency recruited thirty-eight of our graduates to their corps of astronauts. Because we had the most advanced experimental test pilot school going, NASA relied heavily on our recommendations. But some of our guys turned them down flat. They came back from their interviews in Houston and told me, "Colonel, we're overqualified for their program. All we get to do is take a ride like one of those damned chimps they sent up. We don't want to get involved because everything is controlled from the ground and there is nothing to fly." I said, "Hell, I don't blame you. I wouldn't want to have to sweep off monkey shit before I sat down in that capsule."
But as time went on, NASA made its program damned attractive to recruits. They were in a tough spot, needing outstanding pilots who were little more than Spam in the can, throwing the right switches on instructions from the ground. Even then, they had trouble landing precisely and it sometimes took half the Navy to locate a capsule bobbing in the Pacific miles from where it should've been. Also, they had many more astronauts than available rides, and a lot of guys never flew or had to wait for years to get their opportunity. So, they sold their program like one of those fly-by-night land developers selling tracts in the desert. For signing up, a guy got a free expensive house, donated by a local realtor in Houston and a cut of a lucrative contract with Time-Life. The glamour, splash, and money made it attractive to some pilots. The guys came back from their interviews and told me, "All the talk in Houston is about how much money we are going to make."
My attitude was they shouldn't get a dime for being selected for the space program, especially when the risks involved weren't half as great as some of the research flying done at Edwards over the years. It rubbed me wrong and I said so: "Forget that crap. Don't ever make a decision whether to be an astronaut based on damned perks. Either the program is right for you or it isn't. And if it isn't, stay the hell out of it.
After a couple of years, the Navy and Marines began sending us pilots to train, as did several NATO countries. By then we had room for twenty-six students, and NASA, feeling the political heat for picking too many blue suiters, was relieved that we were teaching pilots from other branches. But I had my own political problems. From the moment we picked our first class, I was caught in a buzz saw of controversy involving a black student. The White House, Congress, and civil rights groups came at me with meat cleavers, and the only way I could save my head was to prove I wasn't a damned bigot.
In late 1961, we were ready to start screening applicants for our first class at the space school, and because they would be the first bunch, the screening process was particularly thorough. We wanted only the very best pilots, and our first couple of classes consisted of experienced military test pilots, who had graduated from Edwards's test pilot school, and whose abilities and academic background were demonstrably outstanding. Our space course was six months of intensive classroom work and flight training. My staff at Edwards culled the applications, pulled out the most promising student candidates, conducted preliminary checks of their records, and forwarded their recommendations to a selection committee at the Pentagon, which carefully reviewed the background of each applicant, conducted personal interviews sought evaluations from their superiors, and further winnowed the list.
I was a member of the final selection committee, and after several months of interviewing and tough deciding, we published our list of the first eleven students. Actually, we had twenty-six names in order of preference, but we didn't publish our list that way: we just named eleven guys alphabetically as the members of our first class, and listed the first three or four alternates, in case any of them dropped out.
The quality of those selected was such that they added tremendously to the prestige of our new school which was our intention all along. I was thrilled with the choices. But when our list was published I received a phone call from the Chief of Staff's office asking whether any of the first eleven were black pilots. I said, no. Only one black pilot had applied for the course and he was number twenty-six on the list. I was informed that the White House wanted a black pilot in the space course.
The Chief of Staff was Gen. Curtis LeMay, probably the most controversial personality in the Air Force since his days as the tough, cigar-chewing head of SAC. I knew him pretty well. I remember briefing him at SAC headquarters after I had tested the MiG 15 on Okinawa, and he was very interested in the MiG's directional instability while climbing. "Yeager, how bad is that snaking motion?" he asked. I told him, "Well, sir, just about right to hit a B-36 wingtip to wingtip if you were shooting at him." My answer really tickled him, and he told it all around. And during my tour in Germany, he sent for me while he was in Spain, to show me off a little during a hunting trip with Franco. General LeMay wasn't what I would call a smoothie. He was blunt: you didn't have to read between the lines dealing with him.
He got on the phone and said, "Bobby Kennedy wants a colored in space. Get one into your course." I said, "Well, General, it's gonna be difficult. We have one applicant, a captain named Dwight, who came out number twenty-six. We already published our list with the fifteen who made it, and it's going to be embarrassing to republish the list with Dwight's name on it because now everyone knows who the first fifteen are." He said: "Okay, I'll just tell them they're too late for this first class." But a 150-millimeter shell came ripping in from the White House, and LeMay was told: "By God, you will have a black pilot in that program-now!" He called me back: "Do what you have to do, Yeager, but get that colored guy in." I said, "Okay, General, but what I think we ought to do is take at least fifteen students in the first class, instead of eleven, and make him number fifteen. Give me a little more money and I can handle this many in the school."
He agreed, and we brought Dwight in. Ed Dwight was an average pilot with an average academic background. He wasn't a bad pilot, but he wasn't exceptionally talented, either. Flying with a good bunch in a squadron, he would probably get by. But he just couldn't compete in the space course against the best of the crop of experienced military test pilots. In those days, there were still comparatively few black pilots in the Air Force, but Dwight sure as hell didn't represent the top of the talent pool. I had flown with outstanding pilots like Emmett Hatch and Eddie Lavelle; but unfortunately, guys of their quality didn't apply for the course. Dwight did. So we brought him in, set up a special tutoring program to get him through the academics because, as I recall, he lacked the engineering academics that all the other students had.