July 22, 2019 - I got a letter from my dear High School friend, Jack Fontaine. When we graduated from High School in 1950, he enrolled in Texas A & M and became an Engineer. I enrolled at The Baptist Bible College in Springfield, Missouri and became a Preacher. He has retired in Frankston, Texas now and we are blessed to still communicate after all these years. He is my "blood-brother."
Since we have just celebrated the 50th Anniversary of the Moon Landing of Apollo 11, I am printing his great story in the papers I write for.
Dear friend Henry,
I have read almost all of your stories over the years and I feel like I almost know your life's story. So I thought I would write some of the experiences that made up my life and share them with you. Only the good one's of course!
As the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing approaches, it brings back many memories of the time I spent at NASA'S Manned Spacecraft Center (MSC), now the Johnson Space Center, from 1967 to 1972. I was a member of the Ground Support Group that provided on site services in Occupational Medicine, Environmental and Occupational Health. The contractor was Kelsey-Seybold Clinic in Houston. My job was as an Industrial Hygienist conducting on-site evaluations of employee exposures to noise, toxic chemicals and non-ionizing radiation.
One of the most interesting evaluation that I did was to evaluate exposures to the very toxic chemicals used as attitude control rockets in the Apollo 11 Command Module. This was after it was quarantined in the Lunar Receiving Laboratory (LRL), along with the astronauts. Thankfully, no traces of the chemicals were found. As I finished the survey, a North American engineer (they were the contractor that built the spacecraft), came over and asked if wanted a souvenir. I said "of course," and he ripped of a strip of gold Mylar film that had covered the spacecraft and gave it to me! The edges were all burnt from the heat of re-entry through the earth's atmosphere. I still have the film and the special badges that allowed my entry into the LRL. I consider my time at the MSC as one of the highlights of my professional career.
Your old friend and blood brother, Jack
