Apollo Moon Missions: The Unsung Heroes by Billy Watkins

As this book’s title suggests, Mississippi journalist Billy Watkins has attempted to give credit to some of the lesser-known figures among the more than 400,000 people who contributed to Project Apollo. Each of the 14 chapters focuses on one individual. They range from astronaut Bruce McCandless, who served as the capsule communicator on Apollo 11, to Joseph Laitin, the journalist and assistant White House press secretary who came up with the idea of having the Apollo 8 astronauts read from the Book of Genesis while orbiting the Moon. Some figures, such as Navy frogman and command module recovery specialist Clancy Hatleberg, are already familiar to those who have read other Apollo books (in Hatleberg’s case, the excellent Moon Men Return).

Watkins also does a wonderful job of introducing the reader to much more obscure figures. Two especially interesting perspectives come from Black electronics expert Hugh Brown, who helped relay data from the launches, and JoAnn Morgan, an instrumentation controller at the launch site. Relatively few Black people or women worked on Project Apollo, and both Brown and Morgan have stories involving struggles to overcome discrimination. Their voices are valuable additions to the Apollo literature.

I suspect it is Watkins’ journalistic background that helps makes these and other stories so compelling. The chief source for each chapter is a recent, detailed interview with its subject. As a result, many tidbits of information here are brand new, even on well-covered Apollo topics. Thirty to forty years after the program, most of the subjects seem ready to talk openly about the events. In one of the funniest anecdotes, flight director Gerry Griffin discloses that during Apollo 11, following the landing, one Mission Control team member projected “THE RUSSIANS SUCK” on one of the large screens at the front of the room. Griffin: “We all got a good laugh out of that, but I finally said, ‘Guys, we probably need to get that down before the press sees it.’” This lighter side of events is always a welcome addition to books on Apollo.

Additionally, Watkins largely gets out of the way of his interviewees; a large portion of each chapter consists of direct quotes from the subject. The author’s text is limited mostly to historical background and context for each person’s particular role. The result is that the book often feels like an intimate conversation with its subjects.

My only issue with the book: about once per chapter, I would notice an unfortunate copy editing or fact checking error. Some were simple typos, but others were more significant. In the Introduction, the author calls the Apollo 7 launch vehicle a Saturn IVB (the IVB actually served as the third stage of the Saturn V and the second stage of the Apollo 7 rocket, the Saturn IB). This might seem like a minor error to a reader unfamiliar with the Apollo program, but for someone well-versed in Apollo it stuck out harshly against the well-executed, entertaining, and informative interviews and anecdotes. What’s more, this was in the paperback edition; it is unfortunate that it wasn’t fixed following the hardcover printing.

Despite some editing issues, I highly recommend Apollo Moon Missions: The Unsung Heroes. It includes what Apollo enthusiasts crave: new anecdotes, new perspectives, and new knowledge on the program. With veterans of Apollo growing older, Watkins has done readers (and history) an important service by recording and relaying some of their stories.