THYME Magazine: Neil Armstrong Interview II

Citizen Journalism with a Better Flavor


Volume VIII, Issue XV

"We Choose to Go to the Moon..."

Last week we presented a rare Interview with Neil Armstrong [click to view]. If you have not had a chance to watch it in its entirety, please do so. It is a refreshing look at the fulfillment of great human aspiration from the perspective of the very humble man who did it! Alex Malley is refreshing in his open style of interview and he allows Neil Armstrong to be seen as the man he is. There is no drive to sensationalize or twist the story, rather one sees how Armstrong rose from a little boy who was uneasy with the concept of death to a man capable of taking great risks in a well reasoned manner. That was a quality he would need in his journey to the moon.


Alex Malley converses with Commander Neil Armstrong.

Indeed, his story is one to remember, but he is not the first brave man who did not appear so in our first glimpse of him. The morning of my birthday I found myself reading from the Book of Judges in my daily reading. The story was that of Gideon. When we first meet him in Judges chapter 6 he is threshing grain while hiding in a winepress. Normally grain was threshed on a hill in the open so the chaff will blow away, but Gideon fears the Midionites, who raid the land and steal the grain. Hence, he is hiding in the winepress.

An angel of the Lord appears to him saying: "The LORD is with thee, thou mighty man of valour."

Gideon's answer is anything but valorous, he replies: "Oh my Lord, if the LORD be with us, why then is all this befallen us? and where be all his miracles which our fathers told us of, saying, Did not the LORD bring us up from Egypt? but now the LORD hath forsaken us, and delivered us into the hands of the Midianites."

And the LORD looked upon him, and said, Go in this thy might, and thou shalt save Israel from the hand of the Midianites: have not I sent thee?

And he said unto him, Oh my Lord, wherewith shall I save Israel? behold, my family is poor in Manasseh, and I am the least in my father's house.

And the LORD said unto him, Surely I will be with thee, and thou shalt smite the Midianites as one man.

And he said unto him, If now I have found grace in thy sight, then shew me a sign that thou talkest with me.

Gideon might have been the 'least in his father's house.' He indeed asked for a lot of confirmation but then he boldly stepped out and trusted G-d, who did mighty things through him. He went on to win a decisive victory over the Midianites with just 300 men! The time Gideon lived in was one of great despair for the people, as the Midianites had robbed and disheartened them. At times like that (and times like our own),we often find ourselves crying out for extraordinary leaders.We forget that extraordinary things are often done by very ordinary men and women in the face of extraordinary challenges.

Listening to Armstrong, one is struck by his humility and matter-of-fact description of the incredible events he participated in. He does not like to talk about himself and though he is a man of high accomplishment, he is reluctant to take any more of his share of the credit for it. I am incredibly blessed to know young men and women cast in the same mold who live in our times. What will the Divine accomplish through their lives, I ask? I think of President John F. Kennedy's setting the bar: "We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too." [1.] The challenge before us in our times is great indeed!

I step out of the tent and gaze up at the stars. In my lifetime I saw mankind reach for them. My father was an engineer with NASA in its golden age and he developed a device known as the Launch Phase Simulator. [2.] Framed in the trees in the night sky I see the constellation Orion. That was one of the first ones my father taught me to recognize... the mighty hunter with his dagger and his distinctive belt! Generations must have been inspired by the sight before me this night! I think of the young people I have been priviledged to work with. I have seen them grow into people capable of being used to change the world (for the better), and I am humbled to think that I might have somehow been used to influence their lives. And so I plead; we NEED to leave them a country that challenges them as those before us were challenged... to dare and do great things!

Man's First Act on the Moon:

Buzz Aldrin describes, in his own words, the first act of men visiting another world, to honor G-d: “In the radio blackout, I opened the little plastic packages which contained the bread and the wine. I poured the wine into the chalice our church had given me. In the one-sixth gravity of the moon, the wine slowly curled and gracefully came up the side of the cup. Then I read the Scripture, ‘I am the vine, you are the branches. Whosoever abides in me will bring forth much fruit. Apart from me you can do nothing.’ I had intended to read my communion passage back to earth, but at the last minute [they] had requested that I not do this. NASA was already embroiled in a legal battle with Madelyn Murray O’Hare, the celebrated opponent of religion, over the Apollo 8 crew reading from Genesis while orbiting the moon at Christmas. I agreed reluctantly. …I ate the tiny Host and swallowed the wine. I gave thanks for the intelligence and spirit that had brought two young pilots to the Sea of Tranquility. It was interesting for me to think: the very first liquid ever poured on the moon, and the very first food eaten there, were the communion elements.”

Eric Metaxas writes: "And of course, it’s interesting to think that some of the first words spoken on the moon were the words of Jesus Christ, who made the Earth and the moon — and Who, in the immortal words of Dante, is Himself the “Love that moves the Sun and other stars.” [3.]

Next Week in THYME:
A Story in a Painting

Meet Belle, her real life story is the story behind an intriguing Eighteenth Century Painting. It has recently been made into a fascinating movie and tells the story of how her family's love for her compelled them to stand against the beast within; the human depravity that would enslave and destroy her people!

THYME Magazine: Neil Armstrong Interview

Citizen Journalism with a Better Flavor


Volume VIII, Issue XIV

Interview with Neil Armstrong!


The first man to set foot on the moon!

In this rare series of interviews, Neil Armstrong, the first man to set foot on the moon, tells the story of the historic mission from his own perspective. Alex Malley of Australia's EvoTV's The Bottom Line looks at the life and leadership of the lunar mission's commander. Fascinated by aircraft, even at a very early age, Armstrong obtained his pilot's license at the age of fifteen!

He went on to fly combat missions during the Korean War and later became a test pilot. He then became an astronaut as NASA geared up to meet President John F. Kennedy's challenge to put a man on the moon in the decade and return him safely to earth.

The Russians had already orbited the first satellite, Sputnik, on October 4, 1957 and subsequently orbited cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin as the Americans struggled to develop a dependable booster. After Alan Shepard's short suborbital flight in 1961, President Kennedy challenged the fledgeling space agency to go to the moon.

Armstrong is refreshingly honest in his discussion with Malley. The interview is presented in four parts and is worth watching to the very end. Neil Armstrong expresses very real concern that the space agency lacks the vision and sense of purpose it had in those early years. He ends with a challenge that we as a people would do well to heed and pursue in our own time!


Forty-five years ago two human beings changed history by walking on the surface of the moon. But what happened before Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong exited the Lunar Module is perhaps even more amazing, if only because so few people know about it.

Retake the Senate!

It is time for action! Many in this country have been discouraged and have been told that their vote didn't matter anymore. Even when the results were close, many Americans rightfully feel they were given lip service but then ignored as the Progressive Liberal faction took over the governance of our land. Are you shocked that you can't keep your health insurance (after you were PROMISED that you could)! Are you troubled by the weakening of our national defense, as we quickly send 3000 troops to 'fight' Ebola but can't seem to muster the resolve to face ISIS? Obamacare is a disaster and many Virginians feel frustrated that their two Senators voted for it. Ed Gillespie is outspoken in his criticism of the legislation that was ramrodded through the legislature despite many reasonable objections. As more and more of "what's in it" is seen, some provisions are being delayed. Even the most optimistic financial projections have the fully implemented program a financial disaster. Kicking the can down the road is suicidal for an economy as fragile as today's.

The media will likely try to paint Mark Warner as the 'moderate' he is not. Let us not forget that he does not even pretend to represent many Virginians' values. When he thought he was alone with his elite buddies he said: "One of the things you are going to see is a coalition that is just about completely taken over the Republican Party in this state and if they have their way it’s going to take over state government. It is made up of the Christian Coalition, but not just them. It is made up of the right-to-lifers, but not just them. It’s made up of the NRA, but not just them. It is made up of the home-schoolers, but not just them. It’s made up of a whole coalition of people that have all sorts of differing views that I think most of us in this room would find threatening to what it means to be an American."[1.] Is there no journalist curious about what being an American means to Senator Warner? Also the media will make much of the fact that Gillespie is the underdog in this race. What you WON'T hear is how he's closed the gap since he announced his candidacy... and he's brought his party to surprise victory before!

The Washington Post says this of him: "Gillespie believes in things, like conservative ideas of lower taxes and less regulation. These may sound bland, but Ed adds a personal perspective. Having grown up in a working-class family, he believes that the key to restored prosperity lies in a renewed middle class, one that relies on its own work ethic and a business-friendly government, not an expansion of a welfare state. He is, I imagine, rather angry with what he sees as liberals' condescension to the middle class and what he views as their assumption that only government can solve their problems." [2.] Unfortunately, the media will probably not underscore the fact that Gillespie can probably relate to us a whole lot better than many privileged politicians. He is wealthy, but he understands how wealth is ultimately created. He is one of the creators of the Contract with America, so instrumental in the 1994 victories by Republican candidates. He is considered a very important strategist and policy writer. Up to now he has remained largely behind the scenes.

Before running for office the first time, Warner said he got BILLIONS from taxpayers: “As Warner –himself a winner [in the FCC lotteries]- says, ‘The government has basically given away tens of billions of dollars of an asset that is yours and mine and everybody’s in the country.’”
-“Winners And Losers In The Great Cellular Giveaway,” Fortune Magazine, November 5, 1990

Running for Governor, Warner changed his story: “‘Nobody gave me anything,’ he said. ‘I’m proud of my business success . . .’”
-R.H. Melton, “Va. GOP Making Issue Of Warner’s Fortune,” The Washington Post, August 5, 2001

Mark Warner’s Former Business Partner Says Warner Is A “Vulture.” Peter Zecola, a Warner partner in a cellular company, described his former partner’s business practices by saying, “At the same time, these people are called by some ‘vulture capitalists,’ rather than venture capitalists. They’re basically in it to make a buck. They’re always there to grab that last crumb off the table.”
-Peter Baker, “Before Politics, A Run For His Money,” The Washington Post, September 2, 1996

The media Won't tell you that thanks to Obamacare implementation, Warner's support has significantly softened. As people "see what's in it," they realize it is going to have a negative effect on them personally. Many potential voters are disheartened now as Northern Virginia has thrown it's weight into the past few elections. Still, if voter percentages in the heartland of Virginia increased by just a small percentage, Northern Virginia would not be able to dominate the process. The statistics are worth repeating:

Time to Awaken a Sleeping Giant

In 2004, Christian voter turnout increased by 93 percent over the 2002 turnout, and 42 percent of voters identified abortion as an important issue. As a result:

• 63 percent of the freshman U.S. congressmen elected were pro-life.
• 77 percent of the freshman U.S. senators were pro-life.

By increasing pro-life representation in Congress in the 2002 and 2004 elections, America witnessed the first four major abortion-restricting bills enacted since Roe v. Wade:

• Infants Born Alive Protection Act
• Unborn Victims of Violence Act
• Partial-Birth Abortion Ban
• Fetal Farming Ban

In addition, those senators helped confirm strict constructionists John Roberts and Samuel Alito to the U.S. Supreme Court. By 2006, Christian voter turnout decreased by 30 percent from the 2004 numbers, and only 30 percent of voters said that abortion was an important issue. As a result:

• Only 31 percent of the freshman U.S. congressmen elected were pro-life.
• Only 10 percent of the freshman U.S. senators elected were pro-life.
• The Baltimore Sun labeled the 2007 Congress as “the most pro-choice Congress in the history of the Republic.”

Your vote does matter, and you have the opportunity to protect life, marriage and family. Will you commit to cast your vote in support of the family this November?

Virginia Voter Information:

State General Election: November 4, 2014
Virginia polling times: 6:00am to 7:00pm
Registration deadline October 14, 2014
Register Online [click to register].

A Call to Action!

Right around you, in your church or place of business, are the discouraged people who likely share your values but won't bother to vote! Elections have consequences and we are losing religious freedom and basic protections found in the Bill of Rights by our apathy. There are Excellent Resources [click to read] to help you get your friends and neighbors registered. There are voter guides to help them make informed decisions.

"And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not." -- Galatians 6:9

Solving an Age Old Problem


At Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport, items left on a plane are returned quickly as Sherlock sniffs out their owners!

Spacecraft Testing in the 1960's

My Father at the Console of the Launch Phase Simulator


In this 1968 NASA Photograph, my Father, Ed Kirchman puts the Launch Phase Simulator through its paces.

Those of us who grew up in the 1960s will never forget the challenge of President John F. Kennedy to put a man on the moon and return him safely to earth. We lived it. What many tend to forget is the daunting size of the challenge. We were using ICBMs that had been hastily developed in the face of the unfolding "Cold War." They had a pretty poor failure rate and we were just beginning to study the effects of hostile space environments to our hardware. Ed Kirchman had helped build the seaplanes that fought in the Pacific. Now he brought his knowledge to the problems of space flight. His engineer mind took him to explore the combinations of stresses that actually were present in a launch and one of his crowning achievements was designing the Launch Phase Simulator.

He started with a giant centrifuge. It was HUGE! One Summer I worked on the crew that cleaned it. I gained a great respect for the scale of Dad's Magnum Opus. He mounted a vacuum chamber on the end of the centrifuge arm to simulate the change of atmospheric pressure. Then he mounted a "shaker," or a giant vibration machine under the attachment where the spacecraft was bolted. This simulated the merciless vibration present in a launch.

Then Dad put in a cryogenic system to cool the spacecraft and heat lamps to bake it. By testing prototypes this way he was able to find out exactly how stresses occur in spacecraft as they lift out of the atmosphere. Dad wrote a number of reports on spacecraft testing and on the behavior of materials under stress during launch. His work was invaluable in increasing the reliability of spacecraft. But Dad almost did not become an engineer. He struggled in school. His high school guidance counselor even wrote a letter advising that Dad NOT pursue a career in engineering. Dad framed the letter.

He went to a Junior College for his basic courses, then he transferred to Notre Dame in South Bend Indiana. He was always a staunch fan of the 'Fightin' Irish,' even as he was part of the Vanguard of relatively new immigrants from Bavaria and Eastern Europe taking their place in the American experience. His Grandfather had fled Bavaria during Bismark, and muttered curses about the man as he sat on the porch of their home in Bay City. His Grandson would go on to develop new technologies to take us to the stars.

THYME Magazine: Rebuilding the Dream II

Citizen Journalism with a Better Flavor


Volume VII, Issue XXII

Restoration Begins in the Heart

The story is told of a man who sat down on a weekend afternoon to watch a football game. His wife had left him in charge of his small son, who eagerly sought to engage his father in play. Seeking to divert the boy's attention for a bit, the father came up with a game. He found a world map on one page of the newspaper and cut it into an impromptu jigsaw puzzle. "Hey son, put this together and bring it back to me, then we'll play some more!" The father was astounded at how fast the boy returned... map taped together perfectly! "How did you do this?" the amazed father asked. "It was simple," the boy replied, "On the other side of the page there was a picture of a man. I just put the man together and the world was together!" The father hugged his boy, touched by the truth that often comes "from the mouths of babes!"

I set out to write this week about revitalizing American technology. Then tragedy hit our small city as police discovered the body of Julian Parrot in a city park. He was my son's age. He was well known to many Staunton Braves fans as he often helped out at the ballpark. He walked people's dogs for them and though he was mentally disabled, he was known as a kind and friendly person. A sixteen year old juvenile was charged in the apparent murder.

It was time to step away from trying to put the world together.

The technology we used to go to the moon was originally built to blow us up. German scientists at Peenemünde created the ICBM to dominate the world. In a stroke of brilliance, Americans created the civilian space agency with the V2 Rockets they had captured along with their designer, Dr. Wernher von Braun, and reached for new heights. We went to the moon! The inventive Germans created the highways Eisinhower would eventually model the Interstate system after. Clearly the technology for an amazing new world was at hand... and almost led to the domination of the world by the darkest regime in modern history. Was there something in the American character that added discipline to the great march forward?

In the nineteen seventies, journalists from National Geographic went to Leningrad in the Soviet Union. They were not prepared for the welcome that greeted them. Arriving to photograph a dreary Soviet-style factory they were met by the drably-clothed elderly women who worked there. When the women realized that these were Americans, their countenances brightened. They smiled warmly and embraced the startled journalists with many tears. You must remember that after the terrible siege of Leningrad was broken in World War II, the American GIs arrived and were remembered for their kindness to the people. They shared their food and genuinely looked out for their well being. Decades later, the gratitude had not diminished!

So what is it that exists in our national spirit that creates such acts? What might there be to temper the violence of the warrior? The testimony of these Russian women, lectured by their leaders for three decades about the 'evils' of America, who rushed to embrace Americans nonetheless speaks volumes! And have we lost it? A cruel senseless murder and a growing sense that many youths have lost respect for life do not speak well of our national culture today. America's character was formed in the taming of hostile frontiers and adjusting to a new world (as my Bavarian ancestors had to). It was tested on the battlefields of Europe and the Pacific. But now, have we lost it in our luxury? Have we cast off as 'archaic' those values that once guided us to higher deeds on distant shores?

It was time to put the man together.

In the dark turmoil of our Civil War, Evangelist Dwight L. Moody reached out to scores of troops, giving them the hope of the Gospel. Lives were changed, just as lives had been changed in the Great Awakenings prior to this time. Faith gave hope and direction. Faith had a part in the forging of our national character. But Moody almost didn't get a chance to be the agent of the Divine that he surely became.

It is well-known history that in April 1855 Moody embraced Faith when his Sunday school teacher, Edward Kimball, explained how much G-d loved him. He would go on to become a great evangelist, yet it is not so well known that his first application for church membership, in May 1855, was rejected. He was not received as a church member until May 4, 1856. His teacher, Edward Kimball, stated:

"I can truly say, and in saying it I magnify the infinite grace of God as bestowed upon him, that I have seen few persons whose minds were spiritually darker than was his when he came into my Sunday School class; and I think that the committee of the Mount Vernon Church seldom met an applicant for membership more unlikely ever to become a Christian of clear and decided views of Gospel truth, still less to fill any extended sphere of public usefulness."

"The first meeting I ever saw him at was in a little old shanty that had been abandoned by a saloon-keeper. Mr. Moody had got the place to hold the meetings in at night. I went there a little late; and the first thing I saw was a man standing up with a few tallow candles around him, holding a negro boy, and trying to read to him the story of the Prodigal Son and a great many words he could not read out, and had to skip. I thought, 'If the Lord can ever use such an instrument as that for His honor and glory, it will astonish me.' As a result of his tireless labor, within a year the average attendance at his school was 650, while 60 volunteers from various churches served as teachers. It became so well known that the just-elected President Lincoln visited and spoke at a Sunday School meeting on November 25, 1860." [1.]

The rest is history, as they say. But it is more than that. It should serve as a challenge to us. We dare not leave it to our great institutions to identify greatness... we must seek for it around us and nurture it, fully prepared to be astonished!

Redeeming Restoration

Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal spoke last weekend at Liberty University's commencement. He pointed out that those in power now actively stand in the way of the First Amendment's guarantee of freedom to exercise religious faith. He referenced the case of Hobby Lobby and the government's desire to mandate abortificants trumping conscience. The case is going to the Supreme Court. Secularists want to relegate faith to the level of a personal hobby, according to Jindal. Hillary Clinton's carefully crafted statements on "freedom of religion" bear this out. Secularists use the 'Establishment Clause' to exclude as much religious expression as they can from the public square. Jindal remarked:

“It is said that College is an intellectual pursuit, involving reason and logic. I went to Brown University in the Ivy League, a place that prides itself in intellectual reasoning. One of the good things about going to Brown is that I was able to become the President of the College Republicans on campus almost immediately. The other Republican student at Brown was the Vice President.

Some kids go off to college and lose their way, they become convinced that their faith is not an intellectual pursuit.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Reason and logic lead to truth…which means that reason and logic lead to G-d.

There is a general view among many of the elites in America that truly enlightened folks realize that all this faith and religion stuff is just quaint and antiquated thinking from an earlier era. Or that it is a nice restful place for those who are not as bright or as intellectually curious as they are.

Again, nothing could be further from the truth. True intellectual curiosity will inevitably lead to an understanding of the Creator.

I always noticed examples of this elitist view of faith when national political reporters, usually from places like Boston, New York, or Washington, would come down to Baton Rouge to interview me in my first years as Governor.

Inevitably during these interviews they say something like this – “you are a smart guy, we know you went to Brown and were a Rhodes Scholar, so tell me, how is it that you call yourself pro-life, and you say that you oppose gay marriage, and you say that you oppose gun control? You just say that stuff to get elected in the Deep South right?”

So of course, l liked to have a little fun with it, so I would lean over the desk, and in hushed tones, pretending to confide in him or her, I would say – well…just between us, do me a favor, go tell your editors the bad news, tell them that I absolutely believe everything I say. As you can imagine, those interviews ended rather abruptly.” [2.]

I know a university professor of great integrity, who says to his students who are possibly struggling with what they believe, that "someone, somewhere has wrestled with this question before." He points out that scholars like C. S. Lewis and Tolkien have likely struggled with it to the point of writing about it. Professors like him are truly an inspiration to young scholars.

This professor operates within what I would call: The Mapmaker's Ethic. Simply expressed, the Mapmaker's Ethic acknowledges the fact that people must rely on maps to safely navigate and avoid dangers as they proceed to their destination. Known conditions must be clearly and accurately rendered. To do less is to unnecessarily endanger the traveler!

On November 10th, 1975, the Great Lakes Freighter Edmund Fitzgerald sunk in a violent storm on Lake Superior. Captain Ernest M. McSorley decided to hug the Northern shore of the lake, hoping to gain protection from the raging tempest. Normally the 729 foot Fitzgerald would stay in the shipping lanes in the center of the lake. Surprised by the sudden November gale, the captain plotted a new course that would take him very close to Caribou Island. In all likelihood, the large vessel bottomed out on the treacherous Six-fathom Shoal, which jutted out from the island. Examination of the charts of the day showed that Six-fathom shoal was incorrectly placed. It was a half-mile off! We may never know, but it is quite likely that a small error on a map contributed to the deaths of 29 good men!

Those who would assert that reason and logic cannot coexist with faith would to well to pull out the old charts... the ones that provide plenty of evidence for the Divine. The people of old were exhorted to pile up stones and teach their children of the mighty acts of the Divine. We ignore such landmarks at our own... and our childrens' peril.

THYME Magazine: A Case for Vision

Citizen Journalism with a Better Flavor


Volume VII, Issue IV

A Case for Vision

The day was growing long as the evening light outside was fading away. I was installing the model our studio had built of a major resort in the welcome center. At 1" = 500' the physical model showed ski slopes, golf courses and a wonderful water park on a most amazing mountain location. The staff had quietly slipped in and out to look at the artistic rendition of the resort's majesty and many had expressed their admiration. I was hurrying to place the identifying numbers for the map key when I first noticed that I had an audience. Two teenagers had come in to look at the model up close. Their parents were already headed in to the indoor pool area but even the wonders of a world-class resort couldn't stop youth from being intrigued by a statement of vision.

One of the girls gazed at the model with what appeared to be skills of observation beyond her years. There was no need for the admonition: "Don't touch anything!" In fact, I would have considered it an insult. Both sisters displayed incredible respect for the work taking place before them. Though the first girl was quite conversant in literature (how many kids can use the words 'Utopian' and 'Distopian' in their conversation); Homeschoolers? Perhaps, but I didn't ask. Tolkien, Lewis and Rowling were better topics for conversation. The girls had clearly been raised to treasure literature and thought. That they lingered when a really fun moment awaited them through the next doorway spoke volumes to me. Young people (and I have been priviledged to work with the best in our studio) want to see vision and deserve to be shown our best efforts at it.

Most of my life has been spent in the field of visualization. It has involved constructing hundreds of little models of proposed projects, the drawing and painting of innumerable renderings and as the economy recently crumbled, some really interesting publishing projects. Vision is as essential to the soul as food is to the body, so, as S. Truitt Cathy says: "Make it good!" It is in our blood. It is a part of our history.

Michigan at the turn of the Century was poised to become a center of vision and innovation. My own ancestors fled Bavaria in 1870 as Otto von Bismark 'unified' Germany. They came to the American Northwest to settle in that cold land, finding employment on the growing railroad. The men set out first, seeking their fortunes, and saved their money to bring their ladies to the New World. When Oma arrived, she quickly decided she didn't like the boys working on Sunday, so they found work in Bay City's growing sawmill industry. Eventually Bay City would become known for pre-manufactured houses as Aladdin Homes and Lewis Homes would enter the market that Sears Roebuck is most famous for. The companies grew well into the Twentieth Century, but faltered during America's Great Depression.

Ironically it was during this same Depression, South of Bay City in Detroit, that Henry Ford's assembly line was creating an American version of the 'Industrial Revolution.' For a good portion of the Twentieth Century, Detroit was the automobile production center of the world. Across the 'glove,' in Benton Harbor, the Heath Company [click to read] began manufacturing a 'build it yourself' airplane kit. Expanding into consumer electronics, Heath offered a whole range of kits for enthusiasts who wanted to build their own radios and electronic devices. Heathkit became a legend as scores of people assembled and enjoyed these products. My father and I must have assembled dozens of them in my youth. My two brothers went on to become NASA engineers!

As Detroit diminished and Asian and European auto makers grew, one of my uncles worked for John Portman creating the great towers of Detroit's Renaissance Center. Today those gleaming towers preside over a city in decline. As Japanese and Korean companies remade the assembly line, Detroit's 'Big Three' were hobbled by antiquated methodology and union work rules. They had operated without fear of competition for so long that they came too late to the world of robotics and subcompact cars.

Great minds like that of Lee Iococca might have remade her, but Detroit was stubborn about resisting change and forgot about the deep well of her inventive past. It was not so much that they were 'stuck in the past' but that they were 'stuck in their own Century!' Had they looked to the past, they might have seen the transformation wrought in previous times by men like I. K. Brunel [click to read]. If some day we find ourselves gliding rapidly between cities in pneumatic tube transit systems, we will do well to remember that Brunel was there first. He used a pneumatic tube and piston to propel trains on one of his innovative railways in the Nineteenth Century!

The time was growing late. I asked my young observers a loaded question: "Why are there no books on how to teach your baby to walk?" They looked at me with a serious rumination I had often seen in the countenance of my studio assistant when I'd pose such a problem. "You don't need them!" one of the girls thoughtfully answered. She went on to explain that babies naturally want to stand and reach out to their full potential. "Why do we lose that?" I pondered. "Does it get 'taught out of us' as we move on to more formal instruction?"

And yet, it can be rekindled! It can be nurtured! As a boy I spent hours in the woods observing the wonders of the natural world. In 1964 the New York Worlds Fair inspired me to draw impossible built environments. Men walked on the Moon. My grandfather designed and built his own machinery for his mill. My grandmother was a great painter and designer. My mother loved mathematics and designing sweater patterns. My father wrote the procedures for testing spacecraft in the 1960's. Once Mom took me to visit a friend of hers who sculpted in white marble. Her friend encouraged me to work in Ivory Soap!

I do not consider my childhood to be all that out of the ordinary. This world is FULL of beautiful creative souls, most of whom LOVE to share their vision with young people. If it IS at all out of the ordinary, then I believe we are to blame for not allowing our children to come alongside and be infected by our brightest and best. History offers us even more. Consider the Wright Brothers [click to read]. Too often we've turned history class into: "What's Wrong with America" and neglected the stories of inspiration and greatness. That is not to say we should ignore the dark parts, but we must never create a picture of hopelessness and despair. There is too much evidence to the contrary!

My wife is an educator of young children. She once shared with me some research about early childhood development that focused on infants in an orphanage in Tehran. The staff was spread so thin that the children were merely fed and changed. There was no time to hold and cuddle the infants. Far too many of these precious souls never rose to crawl. They never pulled upright to walk. They simply died. The study affirmed the importance of nurture in young lives, and begs us to ask: "As we push our children to conformity and 'productivity,' do we unwittingly cease to nourish some essential part of the soul?" Could Vision be the essential food for human aspiration?

As much of the media has been all too ready to report the demise of the American experiment, THYME looks at these fine young people and looks to offer them far more. We'd like to present a vision that is rooted in history and faith, that dares them to dream big dreams. The world needs them to do so, We can offer them no less!

Dreams from MY Father...

"That's One Small Step for [a] Man..."


The first step on the Moon. NASA Image.

"...One Giant Leap for Mankind." -- Neil Armstrong

Neil Armstrong is gone. The first man to step onto another heavenly body has stepped into Eternity. I remember that July in 1969, gathering with the family around the television to watch the first blurry images as Armstrong and Buzz Aldren walked on the lunar surface.

I grew up in a NASA family. Dad had met Mom at Glenn L. Martin's Middle River Plant in Baltimore building and testing seaplanes for the war. Dad married his chief number cruncher and went on to start his own structural testing lab. In the early 'Sixties, he joined the space agency, doing work that greatly increased the reliability of spacecraft. His partner in much of this work was a hansome Turkish engineer named Ali.

NASA, in its wisdom, sent Dad and Ali to advise the European space agencies... landing them in Paris during the push for Algerian separation. As tanks rolled through the Parisian streets, Dad made his way through the city with a man many suspected was an Algerian! Those were interesting times.

Dad and Ali were good friends. We entertained Ali at our house, Mom carefully avoiding the foods that would be offensive to his Muslim culture. Indeed, NASA brought together great minds from a host of diverse backgrounds. A cast of thousands developed the technology that put the man from Wapakoneta, Ohio on the Moon. Here was the true brilliance of NASA; the terrible technology of Peenemünde was turned on its head as Wernher von Braun now led its mission to take human aspirations to the stars.

From the national anxiety created by Sputnik, the designers of NASA brilliantly shifted the technology advances necessary for our defense from the Army Missle Agency to a civilian agency. John F. Kennedy raised humanities collective aspirations with his charge to: "put a man on the Moon in this decade, and return him safely to Earth."

When Neil Armstrong stepped onto the Moon, the world watched. That moment seemed to welcome a new era of human progress.


Neil Armstrong's official NASA portrait. Nasa Image.

49 NASA Scientists Dispute 'Climate Change'

Taking the Agency to Task for Activist Stance


January 7th, 2010 NASA photo shows Great Britian covered with a blanket of snow.

In a letter to Nasa administrator Charles Bolden, 49 former NASA scientists and asronauts, including Charlie Duke, Al Worden, Richard Gordon and Walter Cunningham question the agency's activist stance on 'global warming:'

"We, the undersigned, respectfully request that NASA and the Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) refrain from including unproven remarks in public releases and websites. We believe the claims by NASA and GISS, that man-made carbon dioxide is having a catastrophic impact on global climate change are not substantiated, especially when considering thousands of years of empirical data. With hundreds of well-known climate scientists and tens of thousands of other scientists publicly declaring their disbelief in the catastrophic forecasts, coming particularly from the GISS leadership, it is clear that the science is NOT settled."

The Record of Ignoring Empirical Evidence [click to read] is explained further in Business Insider. The full text of the letter is included as well. NASA has long held the reputation of supporting open investigation and avoiding promoting extreme positions but the letter warns:

"As former NASA employees, we feel that NASA’s advocacy of an extreme position, prior to a thorough study of the possible overwhelming impact of natural climate drivers is inappropriate. We request that NASA refrain from including unproven and unsupported remarks in its future releases and websites on this subject. At risk is damage to the exemplary reputation of NASA, NASA’s current or former scientists and employees, and even the reputation of science itself."

David Coppedge, a former computer specialist with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, was terminated by the agency. A wrongful termination lawsuit now being argued asserts that Coppeddge was terminated for his interest in, and advocacy of the theory of intelligent design.

This Article [click to read] in the San Jose Mercury News raises further speculation as to whether the agency actually adheres to a rather strict narrative rather than encourage open inquiry. The Journey [click to read] has inquired before into the bias against intelligent design in the academy.

Remembering Columbia and Challenger

Memorial to the Astronauts in Arlington Cemetary


Plaque honoring Mission Specialist David Brown, Commander Rick Husband, MissionSpecialist Laurel Clark, Mission Specialist Kalpana Chawla,Mission Specialist Michael Anderson, Pilot William McCool, and Israeli Payload Specialist Ilan Ramon.


Michael J. Smith, Dick Scobee, Ronald McNair, Ellison Onizuka, Christa McAuliffe, Gregory Jarvis, Judith Resnik are remembered.

"It's Only a Model" NASA Data Says

New Data Challenges 'Global Warming' Theory


February 2010 saw this record snow in Staunton on Beverley Street.

Data from NASA's Terra satellite challenges previous models that 'prove' global warming. Hypothesis based on the satellite's findings show that planet Earth actually releases heat into space, more than it retains it. The higher efficiency of releasing energy outside of Earth contradicts former forecasts of climate change.

Read more here:
Earth Releasing Heat into Space [click to read] in International Business Times.
Global Warming Theories Wrong [click to read] in International Business Times.
Investigation Leads to Global Warming Doubt [click to read].

'The Day after Yesterday'
Global Warming Isn't About Observation Anyway

In 2007 we visited Alaska. Just outside Juneau we saw a glacier that was shrinking "due to global warming." Later we sailed past the mighty Hubbard Glacier, which is "growing due to global warming." How can both be true?

Easy! In the world of climate 'science' the observed phenomena simply are added to the narritive for the desired result. The 'coming ice age' was recast as 'global warming,' remember.

Back in the early sixties, my brothers and I went to see the movie Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea. It's been a while but here's the plot synopsis:

A new research submarine takes to the seas [conveniently fitted with Polaris missles, more on that later] and embarks on her maiden voyage. It was a cool submarine too. There was a shark tank somewhere in her midsection. The sub's most interesting feature was a gigantic bay window in the prow for observing giant squid and other Jules Verne inspired monsters that will attack it during the course of the film.

Life in the research sub is humming along when suddenly the Van Allen belt, a radiation field around the Earth, catches fire. My father, a NASA engineer, chuckled at this one. It is impossible for a radiation field in space to catch fire. Still it made for a pretty good Earth-threatening disaster film.

The plucky scientists on the Seaview devise a means to put out the fire in the Van Allen belt but they have to argue their case before the United Nations. The fire is really heating up now and all the scenes in New York are shot through a red lens. To a ten year old it was pretty ominous. Their plan involves shooting a Polaris into the belt and exploding it.

True to form the United Nations debate ends in a denial of permission for the mission and the sub is now stuck in New York Harbor with blue helmets guarding every inch of her. Now the brave captain makes the decision to do it anyway. He submerges the sub and leaves the blue helmets swimming as he makes his escape.

Now he must evade the navies of the world. He must submerge to depths unimagined and face the perils of giant squid and other such creatures. Finally he is able to fire the missle and the Van Allen Belt fire is blown out! Hooray for American ingenuity and spirit!

They knew how to make good movies back then!

Fast forward to a few years ago. The kids brought home a movie called "The Day After Tomorrow." It too is a junk science disaster film but this time global warming causes super-sized hurricanes that somehow create a major chill down of whatever part of the Earth they cover... global warming causing freezing!

The movie is an odd juxtaposition of climate penance and self actualization as scientist Dad rescues his kid and his kid's girlfriend who are on a field trip to New York when this happens. Plucky son saves everybody from freezing by burning books in the New York Public Library. Young love blossoms as the world goes to hell. Inwardly I'm shouting "where's your Polaris missle?" There is no heroic effort to blow out the monster storms that I can see. The movie ends with a scene guaranteed to warm any leftist's heart. The United States is covered with Ice and the survivors are all refugees to Mexico "if they'll let us in." Of course, that is the real point of the movie anyway.

In my mind I rewrite the ending. In my version the scientist must choose between saving his son and saving the people of the United States. He makes the heroic choice.

Scientist goes against the United Nations and launches storm busting missles out of our Midwest silos. Storm is knocked out but scientist sacrifices rescuing son and stupid girlfriend who freeze in the New York Public Library because the librarian will not allow the defacing of books.

My ending would have been better.


Hubbard Glacier.


Mendenhal Glacier near Juneau.

The Heavens are the Lord's

Thoughts on Creation and the Creator...


Paintbrush Dasies.

The Heavens are the Lord's [click to read] by Rabbi Avi Shafran in Jewish World Review

I was in high school when men landed on the Moon in July of 1969. I remember the wonder of seeing a world that had previously been visualized only in the minds of artists. I was amazed by the human accomplishment, to be sure, but Rabbi Shafran captures well the awe that I felt on another level.

"Others in 1969, though, while they were duly impressed by what human minds and hands had built and accomplished, felt an awe of a deeper sort. It was essentially the same astonishment born of looking — truly looking — at any part of what the world calls nature, of seeing — truly seeing — the night sky even from here on earth, or the sun, or clouds shifting shape. It was the awe of watching a baby explore his own new world, or begin to talk or walk; of leaves turning in the fall; of a spider spinning a web; of a wound, miraculously, healing. To be sure, the awe that summer day in 1969 was newly writ large, in images of an alien landscape, of bootprints in ancient dust, of a brilliant blue earthrise. But the shiver it inspired was, to sensitive people, the same yir'as harome'mus — awe before creation's Creator — accessible everywhere. To those observers, the space program's subsequent deceleration was but a reminder of the limits placed upon us mortal creations." -- Rabbi Avi Shafran

THYME Magazine

Citizen Journalism with a Better Flavor


Volume III, Issue XXVIII

The "other" weekly news magazine this week writes about "the Future of Fish" as an era ends. The last American manned space flight lifted off Friday. As of the time it lands there will be, for the first time in decades, no American manned space capablility.

For the first time since the early 'sixties,' Russia will have manned flight capability and we will not. Some feel that private enterprise will rise to fill the vacuum. I hope it does. Steven Andrew writes:

"Earlier this year, President Obama announced that NASA will continue its core mission of manned and unmanned space exploration, but that private companies will manufacture a growing share of its spacecraft. The NASA authorization bill, S. 3729, officially clears NASA to support the development of commercial spacecraft. Obama's space plan tasks NASA to draw on commercial space vehicles to ferry astronauts to and from the International Space Station.

The decision is expected to spawn a new industry, much like the early days of aviation, which now adds billions of dollars to the U.S. economy every year. This marriage between NASA and private enterprise -- which insiders refer to as "NewSpace" -- will put more people and payloads into orbit in the next ten years than in the last half century. Synthesizing the latest literature on space exploration and drawing on interviews with the new industry's key players, NewSpace offers a complete portrait of this partnership between private enterprise and visionary government policy."

My impression, however was that the President was cutting the next generation of space vehicle development entirely. NASA seem poised in all actuallity to become mostly a 'global warming' advocacy group and an 'outreach to Muslims.'

NASA's mission began in the wake of a string of Soviet space successes, Sputnik and the launch of Yuri Gagarin among them. President Kennedy's call to put a man on the Moon and return him safely to earth was a clear message that America would not be left behind.

The brilliance of NASA, in my thinking, is that it took space exploration away from a strictly military program and made it a civilian agency. The lofty ideal of peaceful exploration was in the forefront, while the military necessity was never forgotten.

Ironically, when the current shuttle mission lands, we will have no manned launch capability and will have to buy space on Soviet spacecraft.

The high costs of space missions and the relatively modest prospects of financial return have pretty much discouraged the large scale privatization of space. Commerce, you may remember, is what drove much of the exploration of the new world. Still, plans to harvest solar energy from orbital platforms and other projects might yet drive private initiative. There are a few extremely wealthy individuals who are willing to pay for a ride into orbit. The gold of the New World just doesn't seem to be within reach to drive regular and economical access to space yet.

In the distant future, colonization of Mars might be a possibility, but it seems the environmental manipulation necessary for such a move might prove prohibitive. Converting our own planet from a carbon fuel driven economy to a hydrogen driven one might be more economical in the long run.

The First Celebration of Commmunion...

...on the Moon! Apollo Astonaut Remembers


Forty years ago two human beings changed history by walking on the surface of the moon. But what happened before Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong exited the Lunar Module is perhaps even more amazing, if only because so few people know about it.


Apollo 11 Lifts off on its way to the moon.




Armstrong after the famous first steps on the moon.

These photos are from The Apollo Archive, one of the best collections of NASA photos I have ever seen. Click Here to enjoy many more fine photos taken by our astronauts.

Remembering Challenger

Still a Vivid Memory Twenty-five Years Later


The crew of Challenger who perished 25 years ago today. Nasa Photo.

Today Lynn Remembers the Astronauts [click to read] of the Challenger. My father was an engineer at Goddard Space Flight Center and the whole family followed launches. We had cheered Armstrong's first step on the Moon, still remembering the fire that claimed the lives of Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee on January 27, 1967.

We cheered the landing of Fred Haise, Jack Swigert and Jim Lovell of Apollo 13 after their crippled ship circled the Moon, using the Lunar Excursion Module as a 'lifeboat.'

25 years ago today we mourned the loss of Mission specialist Ellison S. Onizuka, Teacher in Space Participant Sharon Christa McAuliffe, Payload Specialist Greg Jarvis, Mission specialist Judy Resnik, Pilot Mike Smith, Commander Dick Scobee, and Mission specialist Ron McNair.

David Brown, Laurel Clark, Michael Anderson, Ilan Ramon, Rick Husband, Kalpana Chawla and William McCool Died in the reentry of STS-107, the final mission of shuttle Columbia on February 1, 2003. Space flight has always been about a journey into extremely hostile conditions. These brave men and women gave their lives in our quest to explore the final frontier.


Liftoff of STS-107, the final mission of shuttle Columbia.
NASA photo.

The Brooklyn Space Program Takes Wing!

Father and Son Team Explore the Final Frontier


"Dangerous" [1.] Homeschoolers take note! While NASA busies itself with 'outreach' to the Muslims, a father and son in Brooklyn are staying on mission for you! ht/Frank F.

More on the Brooklyn Space Program [click to read].

Meet Luke Geissbühler and Max Geissbühler, the father/son team who launched the spacecraft. Homer Hickam and Miss Riley would be proud to know that their mission lives on!

NASA's New Mission to the Dark Side?

White House Denies Ordering 'Muslim Outreach'


Bridge detail and Moon, Washington DC.

It all started when NASA chief Charles Bolden started granting interviews to Al Jazeera, stating that the President had charged NASA with a new mission: to make make Muslims feel better about their culture and history.

"Before I became the NASA administrator, he charged me with three things," Bolden said. "One was he wanted me to help re-inspire children to want to get into science and math, he wanted me to expand our international relationships, and third, and perhaps foremost, he wanted me to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with dominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science and math and engineering."

Now Robert Gibbs is out there denying the whole thing. Still, it sounds just like the kind of thing you would expect from this White House... and the two interviews with Al Jazeera seem so... premeditated. Michelle Malkin launched a contest to redesign the NASA logo to better represent the space agency's new mission and the entrys were really funny. I don't think you can backpedal out of this, Mr. Gibbs, it is too much in character with your boss' way of doing things.

NASA, you may recall, was begun as an 'outreach' to the former Soviet Union. After Sputnik, the United States knew that being left behind in space exploration was not an option. The Russians got the first satellite in orbit in 1957 and followed with the first man, Yuri Gagarin. Taking the high ground in space exploration was clearly in our national interest and President Kennedy laid down the famous challenge to put a man on the Moon in a decade. The rest is history. The Apollo program, accomplished not by the military, but by a civilian agency, inspired the world. It told the world that America was here and strong without rattling a single sabre.

In fact, the brilliance of NASA was that it created an invitation for the nations of the world to come together and explore space peacefully. The International Space Station is the fruit of this 'outreach.'

Now it could be suggested that Nasa should craft its 'outreach' to the star and crescent in the same way that it crafted its 'outreach' to the hammer and sickle... with a clear statement that America intends to hold the high ground.

Please, Mr. Space Man...

NASA's 'Left Stuff,' The End of an Era!

Michelle Malkin [click to read] has this depressing report. I grew up watching John Glenn orbit the Earth and men walk on the Moon. It was a time when American ingenuity was pushed to the far frontiers of space. Mona Charen [click to read] has more on this.

Now, NASA is reduced to pandering to the Muslim world and shilling for 'global warming?' How sad!


Apollo 11 Lifts off on its way to the moon.




Armstrong after the famous first steps on the moon.

These photos are from The Apollo Archive, one of the best collections of NASA photos I have ever seen. Click Here to enjoy many more fine photos taken by our astronauts.


"And G-D saw that it was good..." Earthrise from Apollo 8.

Evidence of Divine Design, Great and Small

"The Heavens Declare the Glory of G-d;
The Skies Proclaim the Work of His Hands." -- Psalm 19:1


Moth wing pattern.

I saw this little creature outside my studio yesterday morning. It got me reflecting on the creative wonder, both large and small, that surround us.


M 51 Spiral Galaxy, NASA photo from the Hubble Space Telescope.


Detail of the 'X Structure' in M 51, NASA photo from the Hubble Space Telescope.

The Earth From Space

A Newly Released Photo from NASA


NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Image by Reto Stöckli (land surface, shallow water, clouds). Enhancements by Robert Simmon (ocean color, compositing, 3D globes, animation). Data and technical support: MODIS Land Group; MODIS Science Data Support Team; MODIS Atmosphere Group; MODIS Ocean Group Additional data: USGS EROS Data Center (topography); USGS Terrestrial Remote Sensing Flagstaff Field Center (Antarctica); Defense Meteorological Satellite Program (city lights).

"No Rockets on Company Property"

Obama Budget Kills NASA's Constellation Program


I remember the thrill of watching the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo Astronauts fly their missions. It is a sad day when America takes a back seat in space exploration.

Augusta Conservative Has More [click to read].

Six Reasons to Explore the Moon [click to read] by Homer Hickam.

Nasa's Misdirected Mission

The Moon was a Significant Goal, Global Warming is Not


Last evening I saw this sight as I went back to the studio.

As a child the space program enthralled me. When John Glenn orbited the Earth it was a milestone. We were always a few steps behind the Russians and they always seemed to get the jump on the next advance... until the Moon! When Jim Lovell's Apollo 8 orbited the Moon we listened and watched as the astronauts read from the Creation account. We were properly at awe. Next came the landing itself. The culmination of a decade's work spurred by John Kennedy's challenge. Then there was a problem.

We'd made it to the Moon, but settling the Moon was impractical. There was no economic gain or strategic advantage worth the costs that would be involved. Nasa's attention turned Earthward as the shuttle program and the International Space Station geared up. In a move that was more diplomatic than scientific, an Apollo and Soyuz [Russian] spacecraft docked in orbit.

The early days of the space program are remembered in the movie The Right Stuff. In one scene a press liason guy sitting in Pancho's bar with some test pilots asks: "you wanna know what makes your ship go up?" As one of the pilots begins to wax eloquent on aerodynamic theory the guy continues: "I'll tell you what makes your ship go up... Funding! No Bucks, No Buck Rodgers!"

As more elements of Climategate come to light, NASA is now coming under scrutiny. Of course NASA is the home base of some of Global Warming's most stalwart supporters. In the seventies NASA turned from the Moon to environmental studies of Earth. Is it any wonder that Global Warming would be the 'major crisis' most likely to guarantee the agency perpetual funding?

Watching the movie Apollo 13 you see constant references to NASA's funding dilemma after they succeeded in doing what Kennedy asked for. NASA had originally planned nine or more missions but there was pressure to stop the program to save money. The program might not have been continued to Apollo 17 had it not been for the harrowing Apollo 13 near-disaster.

As it happened, Jim Lovell's last mission in space was a brutal reminder of the scope of Kennedy's challenge. The program was continued with Apollo 17 being the last Lunar mission. The reasoning now was that the hardware was already built and that except for the operations the missions were essentially 'bought and paid for.'

The reusable shuttle was a program that was shared with the military. The defense implications guaranteed it's continuation but NASA needed a reason for the civilian component to continue. Climate science was made to order for the job.

NASA data was crunched first into 'the coming ice age' and more recently 'global warming.' The layman assumed that peer reviewed research guaranteed that the science was good. The problem was that there were always larger samplings around that did not support the notion that the sky was falling. Historic data supports a more cyclical pattern of warming and cooling.

In fact the Earth would seem to have a remarkably engineered dampening system as it has renewed it's atmosphere on a global scale for thousands of years. Man made pollution tends to be a problem more in instances like acid rain, urban development in valleys where pollution can hang in place and not disburse and in overuse of pesticides. The problem is that these do not have the selling power of a 'disaster that will destroy us in fifty years' as some have described global warming.

No doubt there are some who see global warming as convenient way to keep money going into solving these real problems but they have sold out Western Civilization to those Marxists who would level it. Just imagine if they succeed in destroying the American economy through Cap and Trade and overregulation. They will have minimal impact if any... but here is what will likely happen. The remnant of American society will resort to burning wood out of our great forests and will create more pollution than the logical step of building more nuclear and natural gas sourced power plants. NASA would seem to be securing it's funding in a way likely to destroy its host.