Comments by "jim oberg" (@jimoberg3326) on "" video.

  1. Well-deserved honors for the inspiration he provided to follow-on applicants who, unlike him, really =DID= measure up to the standards NASA required for astronauts. Dwight had too many too heavy loads to struggle with that had nothing to do with bigotry, since the White House required him to take three day weekends DURING the 'aerospace research pilot' training in 1963 for national speaking engagements promoting Democrat policies, while the other pilots spent full time on classes, books, and flying. In September 1963 the two top rated students in the class [Ted Freeman and Dave Scott] were among the 14 new pilots NASA selected for real astronaut training, but Dwight's expected White House backing failed to persuade NASA to pick him as well on public relations grounds [he admits he did not rate high enough on technical merit but blames this on the impact of his White-House-demanded publicity campaigns -- a plausible explanation]. Kennedy's death the following month obviously had nothing to do with the already-made NASA decision.
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  2. Details addressed to the original on-line article: https://www.9news.com/article/news/community/voices-of-change/ed-dwight-first-black-astronaut/73-ebebf9f3-d98f-4850-b392-1e3f1feedc39 “Ed Dwight never became an astronaut because of racial tensions in 1963.” == The AF nominated Dwight for consideration in NASA’s 1963 class [6 of whom went to the moon] but NASA did not include him in a group of ~30 finalists interviewed in Houston, based on their own standards. Allegations of a campaign to isolate him in training are flimsy, based on a single third-hand hearsay command attributed to school commandant Chuck Yeager that has never been confirmed by any first or second-hand witness, that apparently had zero impact on his studies and social life, and which was denied both by Yeager and by other students in his class. “I got a letter inviting me to join the astronaut corps” – Elsewhere Dwight describes it as a letter inviting him to test pilot school, but the letter has never been shown to biographers. He attended and successfully completed that school and a follow-on ‘Aerospace Research Pilot’ school, but never any NASA ‘astronaut training’., and on graduation got a top test pilot assignment in Ohio. With President John F. Kennedy as his sponsor… == The JFK library apparently has no written record of such sponsorship [or any interest by the President], other sources say Robert Kennedy had pushed to have a black astronaut without naming anyone specifically, and USAF officials found him. But in 1963, when the man behind his mission was assassinated, racism took off instead. .. == NASA had already made its selection two months earlier, passing over Dwight, possibly because of his lower class standing [and other professional reasons] and perhaps also because at 5’03” he was three inches too short to safely fly the Apollo Lunar Module. No white candidate with equivalent credentials was picked, either. Even coming in seventh in a class of 17 test pilots wasn't enough. == Of Dwight’s class, only #1 and #2 were picked by NASA, so of course #7 wouldn’t have been enough for anybody. Hypothetical racist objections seemed to have played no role to Major Robert Lawrence’s selection as a real astronaut only a few years later.
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