Awestruck! Personal Encounters with Legends

By John Gordon

If you can answer the following fourteen questions, you need NOT buy Awestruck. Otherwise…spend a buck and have some fun.

Whose record-setting endeavor was officially deemed by the U.S. government to be "manifestly unsafe," yet he persevered? What was Neil Armstrong's version of a high-profile life after he walked on the moon? Who said "I don't even hear them" when asked about doing his job in front of 40,000 raucous people? What presidential candidate appeared to have thugs beat up a heckler seated just behind me?

Who said that stepping onto the moon "was almost anticlimactic"? What message did the man who dropped the A-bomb on Hiroshima have for those who, in hindsight, view that act as one of racism? Who landed a small plane on a treacherous, sloped mountainside to rescue Italian dictator Benito Mussolini? What did I do to warrant public embarrassment by mega-author Stephen King?

Who flew a prototype German Kamakazi-type aircraft during World War II, and why did Hitler cancel the project? How accurate was Tom Hanks' portrayal of astronaut Jim Lovell in the film Apollo 13? What famous aviator said, "No, it is much too dangerous" when asked if he flew recreationally? What astronaut's famous words from the moon were, to prove a point, predetermined at a cocktail party? Why did a Secret Service agent insist on taking my photo?

• Language: English
• Publisher: John Gordon
• Release date: May 15, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393376330

Book preview

To all veterans: thank you for your service.

Forward

I have always been fascinated with people who accomplished the extraordinary. I want to know what factors caused them to be the ones to move boundaries. Was it genetics? Fate? Superior intellect or training? Courage? Luck? All of the above or none of the above?

But let me be clear: I am not curious about just anyone whose face appears in a newspaper, a magazine, on television, or in films. Not everyone who is famous is important. Some people who are cultural icons today will be forgotten next year. Their accomplishments, in a historical context, are not unique; they are only temporarily entertaining, at best. Similarly, not everyone who is important is famous.

As you will read, I found many ways to place myself in the midst of greatness. I started by collecting autographs, visiting gravesites, and hearing speeches by notables. I refer very briefly to those experiences in the first couple short chapters of this book.

Best, of course, was experiencing and savoring one-on-one chats with historical figures...rare opportunities to hear from the legends themselves. My motivation was not born of hero worship. I hoped to learn what set those folks apart. Essentially, I was trying to put my own definition to the right stuff—a term made popular by Tom Wolfe’s blockbuster book bearing that name.

I am also interested in unheralded people who accomplished extraordinary things. Later in this book, you will meet people you don’t know, although their accomplishments are unique and impressive...even record-breaking or history-changing. Put another way, without knowing it you may have passed a genuine hero today while running errands.

What follows are interactions with important people you have heard of–Neil Armstrong, Stephen King, Chuck Yeager, Bill Clinton, and more–and some you have not. I am sure you don’t know, say, Hugo Vihlen or Paul Tibbits, but I expect you will be surprised and impressed by their accomplishments. I hope so. They are remarkable people.

Autographs: A Link to Fame

Forty years ago and to sort of touch, these historical figures, I started collecting autographs. I bought verified signatures of deceased notables from dealers, and I found ways to contact and request autographs from those still living.

Astronauts became of special interest, because I was a kid of the space age. When I was eleven, I remember watching Sputnik 1 move swiftly across the crisp October night sky over Nebraska.

In my collection of two hundred historical signatures, the largest groups are flyers and astronauts. Some of my favorites include Amelia Earhart, Orville Wright, Charles Lindbergh (the best), Chuck Yeager (Mach 1), Scott Crossfield (Mach 2), First-Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, Valentina Tereshkova (first woman in space), Sally Ride (first American woman in space), all seven original Mercury astronauts, and numerous Gemini and Apollo astronauts, including Neil Armstrong. I also have a signed photo from John Young, commander of the first shuttle mission.

Being a baseball nut, I also had to acquire a Babe Ruth signature...and Mickey Mantle...and Joe DiMaggio.

I started sending books–autobiographies of famous people–to their authors. I included a stamped, self-addressed return envelope. When the recipient was outside the country, I sent cash for their cost of return postage. I now have about a library of thirty signed books.

I received some extraordinary responses including one from Mikhail Gorbachev, then General Secretary of the Soviet Union. He signed and returned a Time magazine Man of the Year cover bearing his picture. It arrived at our house in an envelope from the Soviet Embassy in Washington, DC. The cover letter verified that the signature was legitimate. My skeptical wife Julie saw that signature and decided to take my autograph hobby seriously.

Mother Teresa of Calcutta, now a saint, signed and wrote a personal blessing in a new prayer book I sent her. That is now in the hands of relative...a devout Catholic who’s local bishop claims the book qualifies as a Second Degree Religious Artifact. He said it should be donated to the church. Not happening.

At a garage sale I found a copy of Donald Trump’s 1987 book Trump: The Art of the Deal. I sent it to him and he autographed and returned it. Who knew that thirty years later, he would be the brash and controversial President of the United States? I am not taking a political stand here; I am just saying that Life is like a box of... well, you know.

I also have signed books from Maria von Trapp, Margaret Thatcher, Bishop Desmond Tutu, Chuck Yeager, Bob Hope, Nelson Mandela, Yogi Berra, Kirk Douglas, Betty Ford, Lee Iacocca, Nancy Reagan and Jimmy Carter.