Chapter 4: To venture alone
Theme: November 1958. To begin planning the selection program we had to draw upon our knowledge of the nature of those individuals who had been successful explorers in the past.
From the beginning of time, some men have been driven to leave the safety of family, tribe or country and to dare the wilderness and the hostile stranger, seeking new lands, new goods to trade, or new information. What is the nature of these individuals? Do they have common traits? Is there an explorer “type”, a pioneering character, which sets these men apart? Are their achievements purely a matter of chance or special circumstance? And if the pioneers of the past bear certain traits in common, do our present-day explorers come from the same mold? Studies of the chronicles of exploration and of the records of those who have survived long periods of isolation in small boats or the Arctic wastes give some clues to these questions.
The nature of exploration is changing. Travel has always involved some technical planning, and frequently great expense which only governments could afford. Columbus’ discoveries cost Isabella her crown jewels. Prince Henry the Navigator had a large program of government-sponsored exploration, while the first circumnavigation of Africa was authorized by the Pharaoh Necho II. Nevertheless, as long as the explorations were within our earth’s atmosphere, many have been privately sponsored and on individual initiative. Thus, the senior Polo brothers made their first trip to the court of the Great Khan for commercial reasons, while Leif Erikson was looking for new farm lands for his family and friends. Stanley was sponsored by a newspaper, while Livingston was sponsored only by himself and his God.
In space flight, sch opportunities for private initiative or small business profit are non-existent. The cost of putting a satellite into orbit is so high that only a government or the largest companies can consider financing the venture. While the exploration of space will require human skills and courage of the highest order, it will not be accomplished by the intrepid individual who succeeds in interesting a university or scientific society in his work, and takes off for the wilderness. It will not even be accomplished by a well-organized business venture such as that which financed Lindbergh’s flight. Only the government will have the resources to produce the immense rockets, the complex spacecraft, and the vast operations required to place a man on the moon or on the planets. When exploration becomes technically complex and requires the marshalling of such large resources, what role can the individual play? How does the astronaut vary from the argonaut, the Viking, or the western trailblazer?
All of these men share certain characteristics: intelligence, the ability to live alone and make their own decisions, and most important, ability to think clearly and act effectively when danger threatens -- a trait the psychologist calls “stress-tolerance”, but which is known to most people as bravery.