When Sputnik Hit the Wall

By Dewey Johnson

2010. Three of Dr. Goddard's Commandos – J.D., Nestor, and Jacob – gather to bury Moon. Afterward, they reminisce and contemplate retirement. Their mission has been a success. Compare the U.S. and Russia today to where they were fifty years ago. But how exactly did they pull it off? Jacob, who fears that Putin is still trying to kill them – likely at Starbucks with lattes laced with radioactive polonium – gives an explanation, and the other two agree.

1959. Two years after the U.S.S.R. launches Sputnik 1, Joe Don realizes that it is up to kids like him to save the world from the Red Menace by building better satellites and rockets than the Russians. It's certainly the thing to do in his hometown of Roswell, NM, where Dr. Robert H. Goddard did his pioneering-rocketry work in the 1930s. What he doesn't understand is why he is required to take more math courses. His friend, Jacob, agrees. "Forget Accelerated Algebra! Dr. G. probably left some old rockets in a shed here in town. Let's fix 'em up in shop class, launch a transistor radio, and bombard Russia with songs like 'Battle of New Orleans.' My dad says that'll scare 'em into peace!"

"When Sputnik Hit the Wall" is a humorous, half-century look at the institutions, practices, and prejudices that attempted to shape a group of men and women known as Dr. Robert H. Goddard's Commandos.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dewey Johnson
• Release date: May 26, 2022
• ISBN: 9798201750947

Dewey Johnson

Dewey Johnson is a New Mexico storyteller who grew up in Roswell and lives in Albuquerque. His books include Summer of Champions, Down to Earth in Roswell, The P.I. and the Harvey Girls, The Lord's Prayer: Hope for the Neighborhood, and most recently When Sputnik Hit the Wall.

Book preview

Chapter 1

Camp Lurleensky

1959

Sitting in a booth with red and white rolled and pleated seat covers, I waited for Mom. It was our usual Friday night out at Smiley’s although something unusual had come up.

She phoned me earlier that afternoon from work. I had just walked in the house from mowing Judge Hall’s lawn. I was itchy, twitchy, and needed ice water, but she kept me tethered to the telephone telling me how she and other parents met with the new principal. Scads to talk about over supper.

But with Lurleen Miller there was always yachts to yak about. Did I read anything interesting? No. What did my friends and I talk about? Believe me, Mom, you don’t want to know. And what did I think about this or that? It’s stupid. She even tried to catch me off guard with dumb questions like how was my girlfriend doing? I didn’t have one, at least not in Roswell. I was in love with Shelley Fabares who lived in Hollywood and played Mary Stone on The Donna Reed Show on TV. We were quite the item according to Hedda Hopper, the gossip columnist; still, ninth grade was starting in four days, and by the end of the school year I needed a femme fatale or any gal at all at South Junior High. We’d ride together on the bus during the Ninth Grade Trip to Carlsbad Caverns and glide across the floor at the Ninth Grade Dance. It wasn’t mandatory, but it would be the ginchiest. 

In seventh and eighth grade, I hadn’t been cool. I’d been busier than a pin boy at a bowling tournament, which I hated about myself. I trudged off to school and then, depending on the season, to football, basketball, or track practice, then home to do homework, and then to bed so I could rise and shine and reset my pins. My hope was that in the ninth grade there would be less homework and more time to practice my cool like Daddy-O Moon did his.

Mom came through the door in her glossy-green dress with white polka dots. I liked that dress. It made her look crisp, but it wasn’t like she was wilted lettuce. Sure, she was older than Methuselah, thirty-eight, but Officer Brothers said she had the youngest looking eyes he’d ever seen, bright blue. He also said no bags but not around Mom. And Mom didn’t tire out like she used to. One reason was she stopped taking Geritol and put on a few pounds after Dr. Hoen told her she needed to eat more. Another was money. We were still poor, but when Aunt Elvis one time complimented her on how good she looked, Mom acted surprised. Said it must be because she lucked into a better job. Didn’t worry like she used to about where our next meal was coming from. 

She slid into her side of the booth. Hi, hon. Sit up, you’re slouching again.

I sat up straight. What’s the big deal at school?

Before she could answer, Amelia, who wore either a red-and-white striped waitress uniform with a black apron or a titty pink one (her words not mine) with a white apron, was standing by our booth, pencil and pad in hand. That night it was red and white, meaning no special occasion. Hi, Lurleen, Joe Don. You need a menu, or do you want the usual?

Bingo, Don Pardo! Give the lady a Sunbeam Mixmaster! Mom could have said the usual and been done with it, but she asked how Amelia’s washing machine was doing, which caused her to rattle on for a wash and a spin cycle. Amelia and her husband Ralph, who had more hair growing out his nose than on his head – Ralphunzel, Ralphunzel, let down your hair! – bought it from Mom at Schwartzman’s. She loved it, and Mom had become one of her favorite people. Amelia also commented on Mom’s hairdo, although neither was sure if it was bouffant or short & curly. It seemed they would never shut up, so I began composing a poem.

I’m Starvin’ Marvin, here in my seat. I’m starvin’ here, got nothin’ to eat. After I’d finished the hundredth stanza, Amelia left. Mom, what’s the deal?  

A great opportunity! You can take an extra year of high school mathematics.     

You mean when I get to high school?

Starting this year. They want seventeen of you ninth graders to take both Algebra 1 and Algebra 2. The course is called Accelerated Algebra. Electives can be waived under special circumstances and will be. You’ll double up. Algebra 1 first semester, Algebra 2 the second. And don’t look at me that way.

Like what? You’ve gone senile?  Double up, Bubble Up, upchuck, I was signed up for Algebra 1, which would already take up WAY too much time.  

Sorry, Mom, I can’t. They’re wrong. I need electives to move on to high school.

No, you don’t. We parents asked.

Yes, I do. Health is first semester. I’ll learn about malaria, rickets, and mouthwash, not to mention watch the syphilis film. Without Health, I could come down with leprosy. You wouldn’t want that, would you? The neighbors would say you did a lousy job of motherhood.

She rolled her eyes.  

And Music Appreciation second semester will teach me what songs Mozart wrote. Otherwise, I might get them mixed up with his brothers’ compositions.

Now you’re officially full of it. His brothers didn’t compose music.

Yes, they did, Joezart and Curlyzart, at least according to Coach Herbert. You don’t want me to grow up and be gauche while making small talk at cocktail parties, do you? ‘Gee, Mrs. Vanderbilt, your chef left the baloney out of these little watercress sandwiches.’

She tried not to smile, but her effort fell short, gauche being such a funny word. What I don’t want is for you to be as silly as the Three Stooges. Music Appreciation and Health are electives, which means both can be waived under special circumstances.

"But then my education won’t be well-rounded. I’ll be a square. Plus, math is my worst subject, along with art and shop and something else. I can’t even remember how many courses I stink at. My eighth-grade history teacher, the beatnik guy Mr. Sands? One time he played the bongos and recited a poem, ‘Algebra, calculus, trigonometry... had no use for me.... Listen, students... to my lecture.... Mathematics... is the Great Rejecter.’"

She rubbed her eyes with her fingertips. If you possess such a lousy memory, how can you even remember such a poem? And what on earth does it mean?  

People are smart enough to go only so far in math. Some this far, some that far. Then it kicks you out. Mr. Sands wanted to be a math professor like his dad at N.M.M.I., but math has its own crossing guard with a sign, ‘All you morons STOP at dumbbell math!’ And that’s me, Mom, the little math moron. They made a mistake even putting me in Algebra 1. WAY over my head. I should be taking General Math.

Mr. Sands is as full of prunes as you are. Remember, ninth grade is different from your schooling so far. It goes on your high school transcript. Five math courses will make you more attractive to colleges, and who knows? You may want to go into it.

Sure, I’d look really cool walking around with a pocket protector and a slide rule case clipped to my belt. Something was stinko in New Mexico. Why more mathematics, and why now, Mr. Wizard? I began backing it up in my mind. Electives can be waived under special circumstances which were sometimes caused by current events. And one current event had been around long enough to smell like sour milksky. Is this about Sputnik?

Yes. Because of Sputnik, eighth graders in Roswell can take Algebra 1 for the first time ever. There was an act passed in Washington. You’re a year too late to accelerate, but the new principal asked Mrs. Albright to include ninth graders who show promise. The superintendent thinks it’s the thing to do since Dr. Goddard did his rocket research here. Algebra 1 first semester two periods. Algebra 2 the same two periods second semester.

My jaw hit the table hard enough to launch a molar. Two periods a day? Why did Dr. Goddard have to do his rocket research in Roswell? If only Disneyland had opened years earlier, he could have done it there. What mad scientist wouldn’t want the address Tomorrowland, Disneyland?

Amelia returned with our orders. After inhaling my burger, fries, and most of my malt, I came up for air. Mom, two math courses in one year is ‘Murder, I tell you, murder!’ You know how late I stay up doing regular homework. Dad wouldn’t hear of it.   

As I helped myself to the last of her fries, her voice softened. Yes, he would have. I know you work hard, and you make me proud, but it won’t take much more time. I signed you up, and Mrs. Albright handed out review sheets for us parents to bring home. Due Tuesday morning. She says they’ll help you get back in the saddle again.

More like knock me out of the saddle into a pile of shift... ing sand. I couldn’t believe it! Not that Mom signed me up without asking my permission. It was what she did in her role as Mingette the Merciless, Ruler of My World. But it’s Labor Day weekend! School hasn’t even started, and she assigned review sheets?

Twenty mimeographed pages. Maybe we should hurry home.

Maybe I should become a juvenile delinquent instead. Keep a pack of Lucky Strikes rolled up in my T-shirt sleeve. Clean my fingernails with a switchblade. Go on a date with a high-school girl in a low-cut blouse whose bra straps show. Steal a car and be sentenced to reform school at Springer. Juvenile delinquents didn’t take Accelerated Algebra. That’d show her who’s boss.

As we finished our malts, she asked, How was work today at the Judge’s? Did his maid give you some more of those strange cookies?

Biscuit cheaters. She’s nice. Unlike a mom who turns her son’s life into a Russian concentration camp.

Chapter 2

Dr. Robert H. Goddard’s Commandos

2011

Can butterflies winging applause for a celebrated biscochito baker in Baja generate a dirt devil in Washington, D.C.?  Maybe so. The Russians certainly kicked up a shit storm by sending Sputnik 1 into orbit October 4, 1957.

I was in the seventh grade. Premier Nikita Khrushchev phoned President Eisenhower, Say, Ike, what’s up?

Not much, Red. What’s up with you?

I have a sputnik that goes 18,000 miles per hour. Is that faster or slower than American satellites? But wait a minute. You haven’t put one into space yet! What was that you Americans just launched? An Edsel?

The anxiety level in D.C. hit the terrorsphere. Sputnik 1 orbited the earth every ninety-six minutes, flying over the United States seven times a day, giving the American Eagle the Soviet bird. In its attack on notions of national insecurity, its radio signal, which was easily detected by amateur radio operators worldwide, played a role like Paul Revere, "Les Russes arrivent! ¡Los rusos vienen! The Russians are coming!"

Alfred E. Neuman wasn’t worried, of course, and on January 31, 1958, America launched Explorer 1. Take that, Khrushchev, you kreep! Still, there wasn’t just one sputnik. They were going off like Romanov Candles. Three within one year! What could we do to defend against the communist menace? Dennis the Menace wasn’t enough.

The National Aeronautics and Space Act was passed on July 29, 1958, creating NASA, followed by the National Defense Education Act, an attempt to bring America’s schools up to speed, which, of course, was 18,000 mph. Adults had won World War II and fought a police action in Korea, but too few could solve the equation D = RT, and certainly not R = D/T. Warfare was changing. It was up to a group of young men and women carrying on the tradition of Dr. Robert H. Goddard, the rocket pioneer who did his work in Roswell in the 1930s, to keep America safe. At least that’s how I understood it, and I was one of the commandos who accepted the challenge.

Barry Sadler soon enough wrote a song in honor of our courage, The Ballad of the Math Berets. Unfortunately, the title wasn’t sexy enough for record company executives and was changed prior to release.

Chapter 3

Two Half-Naked White Women

1959

Mom let me drive us in to work Saturday morning. It was the second time I’d done so, but again too early in the morning for anyone who knew me to see me.

I looked cool with my left arm hanging out the window of our stick-shift, white-over-turquoise ’57 Chevy Bel Air. I’d ordered a bigger bicep from the Charles Atlas Course, but it hadn’t come in yet. When it did, I’d look bitchin’. A week earlier, on my fifteenth birthday, I paid a visit to the New Mexico Motor Vehicle Division. In Texas it was called the Department of Motor Vehicles, DMV, but in New Mexico it was the MVD. Curty said the difference was because New Mexico was home to More Venereal Disease. New Mexicans could drive when we turned fifteen so long as we passed Driver’s Education, which I aced the second term of summer school.

I parked behind Schwartzman’s Furniture & Appliance, where Mom was a saleslady, and walked four blocks to my Saturday job at Whitman’s Auto Store. In addition to automotive supplies, we sold furniture, appliances, bicycles, lawnmowers, and toys. Earl, the delivery man, was standing by the water fountain when I walked in the back door. He was wearing a white short-sleeved work shirt with Earl stitched in green thread on the pocket and a pair of gray khaki pants. His clipboard was clasped in hand, which meant he was ready to load up.

Miller, I need ya all day on the truck. Lotsa deliveries.  

Mr. Rodman, the manager, grew up with my dad in West Texas. After Dad was killed with the other Marines along the Yalu River in Korea, he took pity on Mom and me in our penury. He kept Mom’s old Ford running for years and gave me a Saturday job beginning in fifth grade, paying me in cash since I wasn’t old enough to be on the payroll. I did whatever needed doing, mostly uncrating merchandise and putting together bikes and mowers, but lately he’d been sending me with Earl on his deliveries, which was fun. Furniture delivery was Whitman’s version of the Charles Atlas Course.

Earl was the first black man I’d ever known. He went to school through only eighth grade, but he was smart, lots smarter than Manny, a floor salesman who bragged about being a ladies’ man. He told me that blondes had black pubic hair. No way! Cars were two-toned, not humans. Humans were like gorillas, the same color hair all over, just not as much of it.

We loaded the red delivery truck with a sofa, double bed, mattress, box springs, dresser, and two nightstands, all for a stop at Walker Air Force Base. After we turned onto Main Street, Earl said, Miller, you’re startin’ to look skinny again.

I shot up another half-inch over the summer, six feet even. But I’m eating plenty. Mom made me three sandwiches for lunch. Plus, we’re going to stop and buy snacks, right?

I’ll stop at Hoggly Woggly comin’ back and let you buy the place out. How much you weigh?

One sixty in my underwear. I knew because Dr. Hoen gave me a physical so I could play football.

You know Moon, right?

Yeah. We’re in the same grade.

How much does he weigh? He looks heavier.

I don’t know, but you’re right. He’s a little shorter than I am but weighs more. Earl went to the same church with Moon’s family.

That’s ‘cause his family eats like I do. A job like this, you need some meat on your ribs. Red beans and cornbread keeps ole Earl goin’. Don’t need no steak like rich folk.

Mom and I eat cornbread and red beans.

And turnip greens. Turnip greens is good for ya.

I made a face. Turnip greens are disgusting! They taste bad and cooking ‘em makes the house smell worse than a lady’s home permanent.

Earl grinned. Did you watch the fights last night?

No, I had to do math review sheets. And school hasn’t even begun.

Ever since I started having trouble with other kids, Earl had been teaching me how to box. On Friday nights, he watched the Gillette Cavalcade of Sports on TV, which was boring unless the boxers were going for a championship. In fifth grade I listened to the Rocky Marciano-Archie Moore fight on the radio. It was exciting! Rocky was knocked down early in the match but rallied to win by a knockout, ending his career undefeated, forty-nine wins and no losses.

You didn’t miss much. Showboats dancin’ round the ring with they gloves held waist high. One halfway good boxer could’a beat ‘em all. You halfway good? What have I taught ya?

Don’t be a showboat. Pride goeth before a fall.

Right. What else?

Jab with one hand to his face, and then put my weight into a body blow with the other.

‘Cause a guy can’t fight back when his wind is knocked out. And when you see his big fist comin’ at your face, what do you do?

He’d never asked me that one before. I don’t know, what?

Duck! He laughed and patted his knee with his big right hand, biggest hands I’d ever seen on a man. I grinned and then he asked why I was doing homework when school wasn’t in session yet.

There used to be a man who lived here named Dr. Robert H. Goddard. He built rockets and now they want us kids to learn how. Also, satellites.

Why’s that?

In case a war starts with Russia.

Math has to do with rockets and satellites?

I guess. We rode on in silence until we came to the airbase gate. An M.P. in a white helmet and white crossing-guard gear waved us onto the base where Earl carefully observed the 10mph speed limit. I was glad he was driving. I couldn’t drive so slowly for more than a few seconds, and if arrested, the punishment was spending the next Saturday jumping out of planes testing for defective parachutes. Jay Bob’s brother Gerald said that when a kid went missing from high school, the other kids knew why. A chute didn’t open, always the last one they gave him to test.

Without looking at the map, Earl found the house. The driveway was two parallel strips of concrete with a scraggly stand of Bermuda grass growing in between. I bailed out to guide him in, standing so he could see me in the sideview mirror as he backed up. After he cut the motor, I walked to the front door and knocked.

Hi, can I help you?

I was expecting an old married woman to answer the door, not a cute teenage girl with blonde hair, a white sleeveless blouse, and yellow.... I stood there not saying anything.  

Are you alright?

Sure. It was just that she brought to mind the song, Short Shorts. Hers shorted out the connection from my brain to my tongue. But from deep down inside, the same place where Rocky reached for strength to get up off the mat, I pulled up the cool to say, We’re from furniture, auto.

Mom! The furniture’s here! She unlatched the screen door. Y’all come on in.

I followed Earl as the lady of the house showed us to the near empty master bedroom. The bedroom suite was to go there, the sofa in the living room. The girl made a distraction of herself watching us carry in the furniture. I loved it – she was prettier in person than through the screen door – but I knew Earl hated it when white women bared arms and legs. They could accuse a black man of looking and cost him his job. While I held the mirror so that he could screw the brackets into the backside of the dresser, the girl asked me what grade I was in.

Ninth.  

Me too! We moved here this summer from San Antonio. All us junior high kids at Walker are gonna to be bused to South. Where do you go?

South. I tried not to appear excited, but here was a girl who could be my date for the Carlsbad Caverns and the Ninth Grade Dance!

Really! My name is Amy Jackson. What’s yours? 

Joe Don Miller.

I can’t believe we’ll be at the same school! She yelled down the hallway, Mom, this is Joe Don! He goes to South too.

I didn’t hear what her mom said, but I heard lots more from Amy while Earl and I were setting up the bed. Her favorite subjects were chorus and art, she cried all day after she heard Buddy Holly was killed, and she didn’t like the food in her old school’s cafeteria. Hoped that South’s was better. I didn’t say one way or the other. Mom brought me up to be thankful for whatever was set before me, and to help me be thankful, she always gave me a choice. Take it or leave it.  

After Earl and I brought in the sofa and everything was squared away, he went into the kitchen so Mrs. Jackson could sign for the furniture.

Amy asked if South had elected cheerleaders yet. I said last May. She was disappointed. I was going to be head cheerleader at my old junior high, but then we were transferred.

Miller, we’re finished here.

Need me to drive? Turning to Amy as Earl gaped, I also drive a ’57 Chevy. 

She was impressed. Cool!

As we walked out, she said, I’ll look for you Tuesday. Look for me. I’ll be riding the bus.

Not only did she say I was cool, but I felt cool! I’d met a cute girl, a head cheerleader, a yellow-shorts shorter, and handled myself well. But inside the cab Earl said, Miller, you cain’t talk so much to people on the job. They could think you’re gettin’ outta line, and Mr. Rodman don’t want us wastin’ time. Plus, you’re still underage. He don’t need anyone findin’ that out.

I’m sorry, but she kept asking questions. What should I have done?

He looked at me like I had a point. I don’t know, but a black man like me and two half-naked white women like that, I’m glad you were with me. He was quiet for a moment and then started the truck.

What I do know is when you said, ‘We’re from furniture, auto,’ I almost burst out laughin’. Grinning, he slapped me on the shoulder. And then you go to showboatin’. Lord, help me! When do I need you to drive this truck? Two loads after hell freezes over.

Chapter 4

Number Three Wife

2010

Judging by tire sizes and vanity plates in the parking lot, it appeared to be a rowdy bunch. The bean curd crowd was mixing its message, ILVTOFU, whereas the bigots were rather clear, NO ZOG. Still, there appeared to be more average American customers, IMRIGHT, than any other faction. I pulled into an open space and cut my engine.

Nine of us had been invited to the seafood restaurant in Webster, Texas, a Houston suburb, to celebrate Fred & Judy. We had also been with them as vows and rings were exchanged earlier that evening in the chapel at Westminster Presbyterian Church. It was July and hotter than Sheena, Queen of the Jungle’s steam room, which made me think about flying to Albuquerque the next week. People there, especially transplants, talked about the weather being hot, then added, But thank God, no humidity!

Being on the groom’s side of the aisle, it was my first time to meet Judy. I’d worked with Fred off and on over the years, arguing about one thing or another since the 1970s. Tu ne sais pas de la merde, Fred. He believed it was unpatriotic to drive anything other than an American-made car – a criterion he was forced to change over the years to Mostly American-made – and that the best Americans drove Cadillacs. I once told him his obsession with Cadillacs was going to get him buried head-first in the ground, feet in the air, like the cars at Cadillac Ranch outside Amarillo. He liked the idea until someone told him rigor mortis lasts only a day or two. Then you go limp. Impersonate an ostrich.

Like some in our profession, Fred liked to gamble. As a young man, risk-taking led to his asking Helen’s parents and his parents for permission to marry, which was quickly granted given that Helen was four months gone. The two were seventeen. Helen died forty-four years later, and not only was I a pallbearer, but Fred asked me to speak at her funeral service. I said she was funny, well-read, and the best thing that ever happened to Fred, who was dull, humorless, and always waited for the movie to come out.

All three remarks about fair Helen were true. Fred was so lost without her that he could do no better than roll the dice once again three months later, this time coming up with Goldie. No one knew for sure how they met, although I assumed introductions were made by way of an escort service. She was half his age, and if it was tight fitting and tacky, Goldie (whose mother named her after actress Goldie Hawn) wore it or tried to squeeze into it. After their wedding in Las Vegas – the hotel with the Egyptian dude out front – she refused to sign the postnup, same as she had with the prenup, turning it into a screwup on Fred’s part. 

Goldie went through Fred’s money like a marlin through a school of mackerel. What she didn’t lose gambling, she spent on sportscars, clothes, booze, boyfriends, drugs, travel, nights out on the town, and a new ranch house with a swimming pool. She didn’t know about the self-storage unit filled with Fred’s collection of vintage mopeds. The whole lot appraised for less than he hoped; still, after I reassured him that Goldie was also short for Gold Digger, he sold them, retained a divorce lawyer, and resigned himself to life without retirement. He’d be working in the coal mine until his canary keeled over.  

Judy, number three wife, looked younger than Fred by a few years, but she hadn’t turned any cartwheels since George Washington made company clerk. All of us at the wedding and the dinner afterward hoped the knot would hold as well as the first one had with Helen. For the sake of everyone who worked with him, Fred needed to regain some guidance, balance, and structure to his life. Otherwise, several of us were going shark fishing off a pier in Galveston using him as bait.

We were sitting at a long table formed by three smaller plank-top tables being pushed together in a row, six on one side, five on the other. The dining room was large and loud, and even though it was a seafood restaurant, the A.C. coming out the vent above could have frozen a side of beef. I was leaning in from my position at right end trying to keep warm, as well as hear what Fred and Judy were saying about their plans, when I heard a fight start behind me. Since our table was positioned along the back wall, I figured we were out of harm’s way unless bullets started flying.

Wrong. As I turned to observe the action, a big fellow in a light-blue polo shirt and dark-blue slacks came reeling into our