Month: September 2007

Dear Members of the Long Gray Line,

I am writing to inform you that the 2007 Annual Meeting of the West Point Association of Graduates will take place on 17 October at 1700 hrs Eastern Time in the Alumni Center at West Point. The business of the meeting will be to elect a Chairman, a Vice Chairman, members of our Board of Directors, and members of our Advisory Council. I hope that a large number of graduates will attend, but if you cannot be on hand, please take the time to submit your proxy via the internet.

In order to do so, go to the West Point AOG home page (http://www.westpointaog.org/) and log in with your Cullum number and password.  Once you are logged in, a box will appear at the top center of the home page enclosing the words, “Vote in the WPAOG Election.”  Clicking on those words will bring up your proxy.

You may assign that proxy to John Calabro ’68, the Secretary of the Association, who will be present at the meeting to register your vote as you have specified it, or you can assign the proxy to another graduate.  One caution, however: if you choose to do the latter, be sure that this person will be attending the meeting, or your vote will not count. Last year, a significant number of votes went uncounted for just this reason; the proxy named a graduate who was not present at the meeting.

The on-line voting site provides you access to a capsule biography and photograph of each candidate by clicking on “BIOS” in the voting instructions or by clicking on any candidate’s name.  When it comes time to fill out the proxy, you may vote for as few or as many of the candidates as you wish.  In addition, with respect to the election of the Chairman and Vice Chairman, our Bylaws give you the option of proposing write-in candidates.  If you wish to do this, please be sure to include each write-in candidate’s first name, middle initial, last name, and class year.  If you wish simply to withhold your vote from the Nominating Committee’s candidate for either Chairman or Vice Chairman while not proposing any write-in alternate, click on the radio button in front of the write-in box, but enter no text in the box itself.

Again, I hope that you will be able to attend the Annual Meeting in person, but if not, I urge you to vote by proxy and participate in these WPAOG elections.

ROBERT L. McCLURE ‘76
Colonel, USA (Retired)
President and CEO

I saw in the paper this morning that the Space and Rocket Center changed the name to the Davidson  Center for Space Exploration.  This means our selection of the wording on the West Point Brick was fortuitous!  “West Point Pioneers of Space Exploration”

Just to give you an update on the brick project.  The total cost of the project now sets at $3250.00.  I do not anticipate it going higher, as I have not gotten any new messages from classes or individuals stating qualifications of individuals.  There are most likely additional West Pointers who could be honored, but they will remain in the shadows.  There are about 300 names on this email listing with WPAOG, so a minimal contribution from each would clearly more than pay the bill.  Any amount collected over the amounted needed will be contributed to the Saturn V project of USSRC.  This means any money spent on the brick project is tax deductible.  We have had contributions from the Class of 52 and from 5 individuals outside our society.  There are two ways to contribute:  Go to our website or you can send a check to me made out to WPSTV.   Either way should only take you a few minutes of your time and it is a great way to support honoring West Point – And it will be an honor that will last.

My Address:

Art Meier
776 Cornelia Dr. SE
Huntsville, AL 35802

There will be a society luncheon on next Tuesday at the ROCC.  I will send out a reminder over the weekend, but if you don’t want to spend the cost of a stamp, bring a check then.

BEAT NAVY!

We had a pretty good turnout last night at the Firehouse Pub.  I am sorry that the ROCC did not follow through on their end of the bargain (the missing hamburgers and hotdogs), but we had a good time any way.  For those of you who missed my short talk, here are some of my notes!

One of the big discussion points was the Admissions work being done by Dick Jackson ’61 and Josh Kennedy ’94 (he is our MALO).  Here is the upcoming schedule of meeting with High Schools so if you can help them out – please contact them.

10 Sep 07 (Mon)
Morning: Grissom HS.  0730 setup, 0810-1010 browse sessions.
Afternoon: Butler HS. 1300 setup, 1315-1500 browse sessions.
Evening: Hartselle HS. 1730 setup, 1800-2000 browse session

11 Sep 07 (Tues)
Morning: Lee HS. 0830 setup, 0900-1100 browse sessions
Afternoon: Johnson HS. 1245 setup, 1330-1500 browse sessions
Evening: System wide Parents Night @ Huntsville HS. 1700-1730 setup, 1800-1930 browse session

12 Sep 07 (Wed)
Morning: Huntsville HS. 0830 setup, 0900-1100 browse sessions
Afternoon: Columbia HS & New Century Tech HS. 1230 setup, 1300-1500 browse sessions
Evening: nada

13 Sep 07 (Thurs) @ UAH Fitness Center
Morning: Madison County high schools (Buckhorn HS, Madison County HS, Hazel Green HS, New Hope HS)
Afternoon: Private schools (Madison Academy, Catholic HS, etc)
Evening: Bob Jones HS, 1800-2000

14 Sep 07 (Fri)
Morning: Athens City and Limestone County @ Athens State University (Phys Ed Center)
* Schools attending are Athens Bible, East Limestone, Ardmore, Clements, Elkmont, Faith Christian Academy, Limestone Area Vocational, Tanner, and West Limestone)

And a reminder:  Major McBride (West Point Admissions Officer for the Southeast) will be here on 25 October.  More on this later.

I also thought I might mention (again) the Apollo Brick program:  As you know we are honoring the astronauts from West Point and also those West Pointers who were involved in the very early Space programs – up to the Apollo Program.  The complete is on our website. (You can also contribute to this effort at our website  http://www.west-point.org/society/wps-tenn-valley/  For the non-astronauts, here is some of what they did.

Holger N. Toftoy ‘26 supervisor of development for the stage 1 missile that launched the first satellite.

August Schomburg ‘31 CG MICOM  59 -62

John A. Barclay ‘31 DCG Army Ordnance Missile Command 60-61, Northrop Space Labs 62- 77

Francis J. McMorrow ‘33 DCG & CG Army Ordnance Missile Command (AOMC) 61-63

John G. Zierdt ‘37 Chief of Staff, ABMDA at the time of the Explorer I launching.

Edward P. Mohlere ‘36 Chief of Staff, MICOM 64-66, ATech Dir Marshall Space Flt Center 66-77.

John C. Nickerson ‘38 Explorer Program Office

Robert M. Pearce ‘44 Explorer Program Office

Rocco Petrone ‘46 Director of the NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center from 1973 to 1974. Before that he was Director of Launch Operations at NASA's Kennedy Space Center from July 1966 until September 1969 and then Apollo Program Director.

John P. Jones ‘53 Left the AF late 1963 to join IBM Federal Systems Division, Space Center for involvement with the Air Force's Manned Orbiting Laboratory (MOL), NASA's Large Orbiting Research Laboratory (LORL), Medium Orbiting Research Laboratory (MORL), Gemini and Apollo Command Computers and the Saturn V Instrumentation Unit.

Jay W Gould  ‘54 Program Engineer in various capacities on the following Programs:

Martin Co:              Titan I, Titan II, Titan III and Gemini 1957-1963
Honeywell:              Apollo 1963-1966
3M       :              Apollo & Space Lab 1966-1980

Edward Olivares ‘57 worked on the Hughes Aircraft Company's Surveyor unmanned Lunar Lander that preceded the Apollo to scout out the potential landing sites (and determine whether there would be fifty feet or more of dust that Apollo's lander would sink into). As well, I worked on the Apollo Program for North American Aviation-Rockwell's S&ID Division, developing the Apollo Command Module.

George Kannapel ‘56 A design engineer on what were Black projects called the Bear Projects. For Momma and Pappa Bear I was first a Project Engineer and later a site Project Engineer.  The Program was under the Secret activities of the Air Force and Air Products used the company name of APIX Fertilizer to help conceal the real purpose of the plant directly across from Pratt & Whitney's plant in West Palm.  The secret was coded under the name of SF-1  (Secret Fuel One) which we designers knew had to be Liquid Hydrogen because we were designing heat exzcangers for use down to -430 degrees F (liquid hydrogen temps.)  Only H and He are liquid at those temps.  We got involved in a big way with the new space programs from Mercury and Gemini to really invloved with Von Braun and Dr. Tessman in the early vehicle fuels programs and eventually Apollo program and Saturn support.

Jim Castle ‘58 In 1961 I was an Engineer responsible for various Telemetry Systems for the Army's ADVENT Communications Satellite. I was employed by GE's Spacecraft Dept at the time.
2. From 1962 through 1964 I was an Engineer/Systems Engineer/and Project Leader on the SAMOS Satellite System. I was employed by GE's Advanced Space Projects Dept at the time.
3. From 1964 through 1968 I was a Supervising Engineer and Manager-System Software Development for the Manned Orbiting Laboratory. I was employed by GE's MOL Dept at the time.
4. From 1978 through 1980 I was General Manager of the Apollo Support Dept located in Daytona Beach Fla. I was responsible for all Dept activities.

BEAT AKRON!
BEAT NAVY!

Dear Society Leaders,

Our Information Systems department has set up on-line classes for those of you interested in content management instruction for the new WPAOG society web pages.  You or a representative may be interested in attending one of these sessions, particularly if you were not able to attend the recent Leaders’ Conference.  The sessions will be offered on 19 Sep (1400-1600) and 26 Sep (1400-1600).  To register, go to www.westpointaog.org; click on the “Get Involved” tab across the top; scroll down to “Upcoming Events.”

Leaders’ Conference materials are also posted on our website now.  You must log in to access them.  Go to www.westpointaog.org and log in with your Cullum number and password.  On the homepage, click on “read more” under the Vice Chief/Leaders’ Conference news.  There you will find links to all conference materials.

Best regards,

Maryellen
 

Maryellen Picciuto '86
Director, Organizational Support
West Point Association of Graduates
698 Mills Road    West Point, NY  10996
845-446-1569  or  800-BE-A-GRAD x1569
Fax:  845-446-1695
maryellen.picciuto@usma.edu
www.westpointaog.org