List of Illustrations
Foreword by Francis French
1. Launch Morning
2. Beginnings
3. Astronaut Selection
4. Going Back to Houston
5. After the Fire
6. Liftoff
7. Rendezvous
8. The Grandeur of Earth
9. Return to Earth
10. Splashdown
11. Home
12. After the Flight
Afterword by Susie Eisele Black
Historical Overview by Amy Shira Teitel
Acknowledgments
Index
Donn Eisele (1930–87) flew the Apollo 7 spacecraft in
1968 and served as backup command module pilot for the Apollo 10
moon mission. After retiring from the air force and the space
program, he became director of the U.S. Peace Corps in Thailand.
Francis French is the director of education at the San
Diego Air and Space Museum and the coauthor of Into That Silent
Sea: Trailblazers of the Space Era, 1961–1965 (Nebraska,
2007). Susie Eisele Black (1939–2014) was the widow of
astronaut Donn Eisele.
"A posthumous memoir gives an unsung astronaut his due."-Kirkus
“[Donn Eisele was] a sharp-eyed witness to space history, to the
darker side of Apollo, and we are lucky to have his
memories.”-Michael Cassutt, coauthor of Deke! and We Have
Capture
“Raw, unvarnished, and edgy, this is Eisele, unplugged. His
highly personal account is both sweet and sour but,
ultimately, one hell of a unique and fascinating read.”-Richard
Jurek, coauthor of Marketing the Moon: The Selling of the Apollo
Lunar Program “At long last, the enigmatic Donn Eisele tells his
story. Eisele holds nothing back in his memoirs discussing
1960s-era NASA and his historic Apollo 7 mission. His blunt
reminiscences make other Apollo astronaut autobiographies look like
kids’ books. His memoirs illuminate his frustrations with astronaut
life, his unique, often quirky sense of humor, and his thrill at
the view from Earth's orbit. Like it or not, Eisele tells it like
it is-his long-silenced voice is finally brought to vivid
life.”-Emily Carney, space historian
“Apollo Pilot is a lost treasure of the golden age of
space exploration, a critical and controversial time that people
talk about, but that no one has ever heard like this. This
first-person account of Apollo 7’s Donn Eisele is a vital missing
piece of the history of NASA’s journey to the moon.”-David Hitt,
coauthor of Homesteading Space: The Skylab Story “I came away
astounded, frankly, by [Donn Eisele’s] brutally honest depiction of
life in the heyday of NASA. I felt like I was there with Eisele,
only a step or two behind him during the colorful phases of
selection, training, and flight operations that marked his time as
an Apollo 7 crewmember.”-Jay Gallentine, space historian and
award-winning author of Infinity Beckoned: Adventuring Through the
Inner Solar System, 1969–1989
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