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The Right Stuff
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Chapters 4-6Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 4 Summary: “The Lab Rat”
Chapter 4 describes the intense selection process for the first NASA astronauts: the Mercury Seven.
Wolfe returns to Pete Conrad, still a member of Group 20 at Pax River in 1959, when he and his colleagues receive a secret summons to the Pentagon in Washington. Abe Silverstein and George Low, the two senior engineers at NASA, introduce the test pilots to Project Mercury. The objective is to send a human being into space using an unpiloted capsule controlled from the ground. Though less glamorous than flying, Silverstein and Low stress the importance of the endeavor for the nation. After some deliberation, a majority of the young pilots volunteer for the civilian mission: “[W]ithin the souls of the of the rest of the fighter jocks who came to the Pentagon was triggered a motivation that overrode all strictly logical career considerations: I must not get […] left behind” (66).
Sticking with Conrad’s perspective, Wolfe details the two phases of testing undergone by the volunteers to qualify for one of the seven available positions as an astronaut. The first is physical examination at Lovelace Clinic in Albuquerque, New Mexico (68-74). For Conrad and many of his fellow pilots, the series of tests—sperm analysis, stool samples, self-administered enemas—are a humiliating departure from the exalted status of a hotshot air jock. The second stage of testing is psychological and occurs at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio (74-78). Conrad is similarly unimpressed with the mental assessments administered by the doctors and medical staff at Wright-Patterson, hence the designation “lab rats” for himself and his colleagues (70).
By contrast, another volunteer, Scott Carpenter, excels under the bizarre conditions (79-83). Although Carpenter has avoided chasing the most dangerous feats of test flight throughout his career, he emerges as one of the 30 finalists in the astronaut competition. Conrad does not, though his Pax River compatriots Wally Schirra and Alan Shepard do (83-84).
Chapter 5 Summary: “In Single Combat”
Chapter 5 discusses the unveiling of the first American astronauts, the “Mercury Seven,” in April 1959. The men are Scott Carpenter, Gordon Cooper, John Glenn, Gus Grissom, Wally Schirra, Alan Shepard, and Deke Slayton. The chapter proceeds in three parts.
First, Wolfe inhabits Grissom’s perspective during the press conference that introduces the Mercury Seven to the world (85-94). A traditional, rather taciturn military pilot, Grissom and five of his fellow astronauts are blown away by John Glenn’s performance at the press conference. Instead of providing short, boilerplate answers to the questions of the gathered reporters, Glenn offers charming, articulate thoughts on a variety of weighty subjects. For Grissom, Glenn gives the press “some goddamned amazing picture of the Perfect Pilot wrapped up in a cocoon of Home & Hearth and God & Flag!” (93). This sets off a period of intense publicity for the group.
In the second segment of the chapter, Wolfe reflects on the cultural significance of the Mercury Seven (94-99). He compares the astronauts to participants in the ancient tradition of single combat, in which the bravest and mightiest warriors from two opposing sides in a war would face off against each other prior to (or sometimes in lieu of) a battle. An example given is the story of David and Goliath from the Old Testament of the Bible (96-97).
For Wolfe, the key point is that ancient cultures elevated single combatants to positions of great honor and glory before the fighting occurred; this worked as an incentive for soldiers to volunteer for the high-risk proposition (97). Similarly, the Mercury Seven became instant American heroes without yet accomplishing their stated goal of reaching outer space. The enemy in battle here is the Soviet Union. “The space war was on. They [the astronauts] were risking their lives for their country, for their people” (98).
The third portion of the chapter is a brief anecdote concerning Yeager (99-101). Asked about the astronauts at a press conference promoting the Air Force, Yeager lets slip that he did not volunteer for Project Mercury because it doesn’t involve any flying. After all, the first American “astronauts” will be chimpanzee test subjects, and while some of the Seven are accomplished pilots, none attained the peaks of test flight at Edwards like Yeager. The remark goes largely unnoticed, but it signals a shift in public prestige and perception: Astronauts are becoming more important than test pilots to the American people.
Chapter 6 Summary: “On the Balcony”
Chapter 6 moves the story of the Mercury Seven forward to their training at Langley Air Force Base in Virginia. Wolfe provides more details about the history and personalities of the astronauts while also continuing to reflect on their sudden and intense celebrity.
The chapter title comes from Wolfe’s allusions to “Pope’s balcony,” that is, the image of the Pontiff overlooking throngs of adoring believers at the Vatican (103, 117, 124). Though confined to Langley for long periods for training, the Mercury Seven regularly tour the country for engagements with a rapt, almost worshipful public.
As first indicated in the previous chapter, the star of these appearances is John Glenn, who has established the image of the group as “seven patriotic God-fearing small-town Protestant family men with excellent backing on the home front” (111). The Mercury Seven are given permission to hire a lawyer and promoter, Leo DeOrsey, to handle their publicity (109-11). He secures the astronauts a lucrative deal with Life magazine for an exclusive piece on each of the Seven and their wives. This an especially welcome development since many of the astronauts have taken a pay cut to participate in Project Mercury; their low military salary is no longer supplemented by additional “flight pay” earned every month by spending a certain number of hours in the air (79, 110-11, 119-20).
Wolfe notes that not all of the astronauts are as comfortable as public figures as Glenn. Gordon Cooper, Deke Slayton, and Gus Grissom each have a background in the Air Force and tend to speak, as Wolfe puts it, “Army Creole, a language in which there were about ten nouns, five verbs, and one adjective” (112). By contrast, the Navy men—Alan Shepard, Wally Schirra, and Scott Carpenter—are each charming and articulate, if not quite to Glenn’s level (117). Despite his relative inexperience as a test pilot, Cooper especially misses the thrill of actual flight; he even makes the gaffe of mentioning this to the press (118-21).
The chapter closes with a shift to the perspective of the astronauts’ wives through the viewpoint of Betty Grissom (121-26). Wolfe describes an “unofficial Military Wife’s Compact” by which pilots’ wives make certain sacrifices—a low salary for their husbands, the possibility of their early deaths—in exchange for the stability, community, and prestige of military life (122). In this context, Betty is happy with the remunerative Life deal, especially since the wives and the astronauts get to censor the reports in order to be presented to the American public in the best possible light, including heavily touched-up photos.
Chapters 4-6 Analysis
In this section, the narrative pivots from Wolfe’s opening account of military test flight culture—embodied above all by Chuck Yeager—to the selection, training, and publicization of the first American astronauts, the so-called Mercury Seven. Two central themes emerge: (1) the contrast between the expectations of the astronaut program and test flight, and (2) the instant national celebrity of the Seven.
The objective of Project Mercury is to send a human being into suborbital space using an unpiloted capsule. This does not involve any actual piloting in the traditional sense. Though unrecognized by the public, this key difference between the roles of test pilot and astronaut is readily acknowledged by the military community: “anybody in Project Mercury was more of a test subject than a pilot” (100). It is for this reason that none of the Seven are top-tier test pilots like Yeager; five of the astronauts have good flight credentials (Glenn, Slayton, Grissom, Shepard, and Schirra), but Cooper and Carpenter have relatively little flight experience (81-82, 101). The divorce between the ideals of a pilot and an astronaut becomes evident in the series of physical and psychological tests used to select the Seven. Some seasoned test pilots, such as Pete Conrad and Jim Lovell, fail to excel under these circumstances (83-84).
Despite the absence of true flying in Project Mercury, the seven astronauts chosen by NASA are treated as immediate heroes and celebrities by the American public upon their introduction in April 1959. From the outset, John Glenn distinguishes himself as the most charming and media-friendly of the Seven; his “light shone brightest” (112). Glenn’s outsized personality also defines the collective narrative surrounding the astronauts; they are straight-laced, patriotic, and God-fearing family men prepared to make any sacrifice in the space race against the Soviets. Even those of the Seven whose lives do not match this model—such as Gordon Cooper, who ensures a speedy reconciliation with his estranged wife during the astronaut selection process—understand the importance of “the American dream” to their mission (115).
This is made all the more evident with the Life magazine profile of the astronauts and their wives that appears in September 1959. Personal details that undercut the portrait of the Seven and their spouses as ideal Americans—for instance, the previous marriage of Marge Slayton, the heavy speech impediment of Annie Glenn—are scrubbed from the record (126). As Wolfe puts it, the most crucial function of the American media, “the great colonial animal […] made up of countless clustered organisms responding to a single nervous system,” is to ensure that “in all matters of national importance the proper emotion, the seemly sentiment, the fitting moral tone should be established and should prevail” (95).
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By Tom Wolfe
