JS: My old friend Bob Button, of Jersey City, NJ, is a retired journalist and former public affairs officer for such outfits as NASA, TRW and Grumman. An active pilot, he flies his airplane mostly for his own amazement, but also as part of the Coast Guard Auxiliary. Bob keeps in frequent touch by email and some of his 'memories and musings' about things he and I shared are so interesting that I thought they deserved to be read by others. Working in Public Affairs (corporate and govenment PR), he had the kind of inside access to some of the 20th century's most fantastic events that the best of us in the writing and broadcast media would have given our eyeteeth for. As you will see, Bob usually had a real good time getting the job done. That's why I hope we'll see a lot of his memoirs in this these.."Letters from New Jersey."

A lot of people forget that Neil Armstrong was one of those guys who flew the X-15 rocketship before hiking off to the moon. Bob remembers; he was there:

Bob Button: First off, I was the new guy at NASA (in 1962). I talked the NASA Headquarters guys into letting me be the PAO (Public Affairs Officer) at the '62 world's fair 'cause I needed the per diem -- I had just left Convair and taken a helluva cut in salary 'cause I wanted to get close to the excitement of man in space. As a result of bein' the new guy, I trampled on their precious red tape and got rockets (nasty memos or calls) from HQ nearly every day. I (just) called North American direct (hell, I knew all those guys) and got them to send us the X-15 display. (Editor's note: this was and still is not the prescribed NASA way..)

Then, horror of horrors, I called Joe Walker at NASA Dryden (EAFB) direct also 'cause I knew Joe. He was NASA's chief test pilot at Dryden. I asked him if he could come up with a few X-15 pilots and give me a press conference.

From left: Bob Button, Joe Walker, Neil Armstrong, Milt Thompson and Bill Dana.

I had already talked to the president of Boeing (then headquartered in Seattle) and got him to lay on some dinners and entertainment for the pilots. I lured Joe with dinners, good company and booze. He said 'Hell yes..." (I never bothered to tell NASA Hq, of course).

Then, even more horrible, Joe and a few of the X-15 guys -- Neil Armstrong, Bill Dana, and Milt Thompson, as I recall -- all jumped into the ancient NASA C-47 at Edwards and flew up to Seattle. You don't think there was some screamin' about puttin' all those X-15 guys on one decrepit old airplane? But hell, that was Joe's idea! Send him the rocket!

Right: A smiling Neil Armstrong, X-15 Pilot, and "rogue" NASA PAO, Bob Button.

I had the exhibit set up so you could walk around it, see it from all sides. Then I got creative and fixed it so's we'd have a "Press Conference in the Round," with the pilots seated at the exhibit with lapel mikes, the reporters seated just in front of them, and the great American unwashed milling all over the place. Lousy idea; ambient noise from those onlookers, other exhibits, air-conditioning, etc. nearly did us in -- thank God for those little lapel mikes. It was an experiment gone wrong, but the press conference turned out real well in spite of my "creativity." And the pilots were wonderful -- friendly to the press and a zillion kids and mamas...got great press (and, of course, I got one helluva rocket from Dr. Manov, NASA's head of exhibits, not to mention (PAO Chief) Paul Haney et al.

"It Happened at the World's Fair.."

In case nobody remembers, that's the title of a 1963 Elvis Presley movie. Elvis played a crop duster who wanted to be an astronaut, and he headquartered himself at the NASA exhibit during the 1962 World's Fair in Seattle while making that film. Our exhibits became his props, and he was enthralled by all that man-in-space stuff -- remember, this was 1962, and Project Mercury was in full swing: Scott Carpenter had flown in May, and Wally Schirra was on deck.

I gave up my office so Elvis could use it as a hideout and dressing room. We were in pretty tight quarters there for awhile, sorta got to know each other a little.

(That's Joan O'Brien and Gary Lockwood with Elvis in that "studio" shot...the little girl is Ginny Tiu.)

Elvis was a nice kid, but his entourage of duck-tailed Memphis boys were a pain in the butt, followed him everywhere -- I mean, how many guys can you cram into one little office? We had 21 college students as exhibit guides, and I think those six big-haired boys worked their way through all the females that first day. The guides' reward was they got to march right there alongside Elvis during the movie's finale, a big parade down past the Space Needle and all through the fairgrounds.

Elvis, who always called me 'sir' (I was 33), was grateful for all that hospitality and gave me his copy of the script, autographed by him and his co-star Joan O'Brien. I sold it via Sotheby's about ten years ago.

Some movie trivia: Kurt Russell had a minor role in that Elvis movie, played a little kid who kicked Elvis in the shins. Russell later played Elvis in a biographical film about the King of Rock 'N Roll.

Another bit of movie trivia: Ted Richmond, producer of ³It Happened at the World's Fair,² was best buddies and partners with the movie idol Tyrone Power, who had died in Ted's arms on the set of "Solomon and Sheba" in 1958. He choked up when he told me about it.

Back to space..

Someday ask me how I got Convair to send us an Atlas missile to set up outside the exhibit -- drew folks like a magnet. Or about the day I hijacked John Glenn's "Friendship 7" Mercury spacecraft as it was on its way from a world tour to the Smithsonian, tore down a wall and put it into our exhibit...or how I talked Werner von Braun into comin' to Seattle by telling him D. Brainerd Holmes (his boss at Hq) was coming. Then I called Holmes and told him von Braun was coming and got him too. I became infamous at NASA headquarters and had one helluva good time for my six months or so on TDY. God, I loved doin' that stuff.

Oh yeah, ask me someday about how I took Carpenter's Mercury space suit off the display manequin, put it on one of our college kid guides and sent him around the fairgrounds like the pied piper... streams of people followed him to our exhibit.

Maybe over a drink someday, Jim.

I love tellin' those stories...gotta hold myself back from embellishing 'em.

Footnote to this history:

In keeping with the joint nature of the X-15 project, its pilots came from the four different organizations that were cooperating to design, build, and fly the airplane.

X-15 Pilots in Order by Dates of First Flight:

A. Scott Crossfield, North American Aviation-14 flights.
Joseph A. Walker, NASA-25 flights.
Robert M. White, United States Air Force (USAF)-16 flights.
Forrest S. Petersen, United States Navy-5 flights.
John B. McKay, NASA-29 flights.
Robert A. Rushworth, USAF-34 flights.
Neil A. Armstrong, NASA-7 flights.
Joe H. Engle, USAF-16 flights.
Milton O. Thompson, NASA-14 flights.
William J. Knight, USAF-16 flights.
William H. Dana, NASA -16 flights.
Michael J. Adams, USAF-7 flights.

Total number of flights-199.

Looks like Rushworth had the most flights (34) and Neil had the fewest (7). Walker, bein' the boss, took the flights that established speed and altitude records, but I don't even know the numbers anymore.

That's alright, Bob, just keep the great stories coming