Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8 by Robert Zimmerman Read Free Book Online Page A

During most of the dance the husband-to-be kept her ring in his pocket, while she wore his on a blue and gold ribbon around her neck.
At the center of the dance floor a short ramp led to a giant replica of the class ring, big enough for a couple to stand under. As the young couples danced, one-by-one they picked the moment to exchange rings. The couples dipped their engagement rings in a large bowl containing water from the seven seas, then walked together up the ramp and under the ring. There they placed the rings on each other's fingers, kissed, and thus became officially engaged.
By June of Jim's sophomore year he needed to pick out the style of ring he wanted. One weekend, Marilyn and Jim went to a jewelry store to
     

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look over the selection. As they both eyed the many styles, which included both the men's full size and the women's corresponding miniature, Jim Lovell nonchalantly indicated the miniature rack and said, "Well, which one would you like?"
Marilyn looked at him, a bit bewildered. "You mean you want me to have one of these?"
"Well, yes," he said. "Which style do you like?"
Rather than commenting on his unorthodox proposal of marriage, Marilyn merely looked at the selection, and made her choice.
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Then came the night in 1955, when Marilyn was back in California with their first two children, and Jim was sitting in the cockpit of his fighter jet, desperately trying to find his way back to the aircraft carrier.
After graduation and marriage, he had been assigned to a Pacific aircraft carrier group, training to fly jets at night. Though they never saw any MIGs, he and his squadron flew patrols and practiced night flying and night landings on their aircraft carrier. They also developed flying techniques for releasing their nuclear bombs and getting away as fast as possible.
And above all, they stayed prepared, ready to drop atomic weapons on their assigned targets in China and the Soviet Union should a nuclear attack be attempted against the United States.
The original plan this night had been for Lovell and three other planes to take off, fly at 30,000 feet for ninety minutes, lock onto a radio signal beamed from the carrier, and use this to rendezvous at 1,500 feet above the carrier deck. They'd then bring their planes home, one by one.
Lovell took off without problems, but after that nothing went right. First, the clouds rolled in, the fourth plane's take-off was aborted, and the ship told the pilots already in the air to forego flying at 30,000 feet and to return to formation at 1,500 feet. Locking onto the radio signal, Lovell began flying in the direction indicated. What he didn't know was that his instruments had locked onto a radio signal transmitted on the same frequency from an air base in Japan seventy miles away. As the other two pilots linked
     

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up over the carrier, Lovell found himself alone, gliding over the choppy waves of the Pacific ocean. And nowhere below him could he see the carrier.
Well, he thought, things could be worse. He swung his plane around and backtracked, scanning the ocean for any telltale sign of the aircraft carrier.
At this moment things got worse. In his youthful enthusiasm to improve his country's flying equipment, Lovell had improvised a small additional light for reading the tiny numbers printed on a reference card strapped to his lower leg. He now decided to turn this light on, and as planned, he plugged it into the instrument panel and flipped the switch.
Instantly he shorted out every light in his instrument panel. Now the inside of Lovell's cockpit was as dark as the outside.
Desperately he felt for a small penlight. Sticking it in his mouth, this was now all he had to illuminate his instruments. He could get his readings, one dial at a time, but it involved using one hand when he needed both to fly.
He turned the penlight off, having no idea what to do. As his eyes became accustomed to the darkness, however, he suddenly realized