Remembering Apollo Astronaut Al Worden
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Al Worden in Huntsville in 2019: perfectly captured by Mark Usciak.
Only twenty-four people ever journeyed to the moon, in a tiny sliver of time in the late 1960s and early 1970s. All of them made valuable science, engineering, and aerospace contributions. Some also shared startling personal stories of what that journey was like. Al Worden was among the best in every one of those categories.
He was proud to have flown on Apollo 15, which many consider the high point of human exploration. I tend to agree. Al believed he had the best seat on that mission too. Orbiting the moon alone for three days, he looked out at the universe in a way no human had been able to do before. What he experienced in those hours is a glimpse into a wider universe we have only just begun to explore. It will be centuries until most of humanity can even begin to understand in person what he felt.
I only knew Al in the last twenty years of his life, and shared a number of adventures with him that will remain forever personal and special. At first, I figured I might be meeting someone whose glory days were behind him. I couldn’t have been more wrong. Al used every minute of his long, rich life to the fullest.
You know the saying – never meet your heroes. How many of us have ever approached a favorite music or movie idol only to find the experience underwhelming? Al, on the other hand, was everything you could ever hope for in a spacefarer. In his Sid Caesar, “lemme-tell-ya” cadence, he’d make people feel like they had journeyed to the moon with him. Each person he encountered felt like they had made a close friend. Most at home in a loud bar with a corral of companions, Al made everyone feel welcome and included. And I mean everyone. Those socially awkward folks who generally get marginalized? Al remembered their names, and gave them a cheery greeting the next time he saw them. He made people feel special. He was the perfect astronaut for everyone to meet.
There was a perennial question Apollo astronauts were asked – “what do you do after you’ve been to the moon?” Al was a shining example of always having new goals and new ventures ahead.
As those of you familiar with his story know well, Al was beaten down after his moon mission: exiled from Houston, miserable, defeated. But someone with his spirit does not stay down long. He spent the rest of his life contributing. Any one of the things he did next would have been the capstone of any career. He chaired the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation, assisting hundreds of students in their quest to be the engineering leaders of the future. With Kallman Worldwide, he was leading a similar scholarship effort around the world, helping aerospace students globally. He had so much more he wanted to do: more scholarships, more books to publish, more enjoying his friends and family.
He wasn’t going to slow down. At one point, he bought a home in Michigan, on a golf course: he could have relaxed and just played golf every day. Not Al. He was much too restless. He sold the house, moved back to Houston to be near his family, and started traveling the world again. People like him don’t retire.
That’s what makes this extra tough. Despite being almost 90, he had the energy of a guy in his 20s and decades more of projects that he wanted to accomplish. Today feels very unfair. He needed more time. We needed him for longer.
I’ve never met someone with such a burning desire to write a book. He felt wronged by his exit from NASA, and he wanted to tell his story. I felt honored to assist him in this, and in many other endeavors he believed in. And there is more to come – we have co-authored another two books which are not yet released. There are new Al stories you have yet to hear. He’s still with us.
When his wife, Jill, passed away some years ago, I have never seen such inner strength. I don’t mean stoic endurance. Al wasn’t afraid to open up and cry when he needed to. I mean the strength to share how he felt, to assist his life partner in her last days, her last hours, to get her every possible medical assistance, to protect her dignity – it was one hell of a life lesson for me to witness. I hope we can all do as much for others, and I hope we can all have as caring a partner as Al by our side when we go.
Today, I feel like I am at the bottom of a deep well, looking up at a faraway sky. It’s tough. For his family it’s immeasurably tougher, and my love is with them.
But I can hear Al’s throaty laugh, his kick at my heel and a chortled “C’mon, let’s go” – and I know there is work ahead, to keep his legacy moving forward. I hear you, Al. Be like you. Keep going.
Test pilots, famously, don’t think about death – at least, not their own. In our many years of interviewing, I only once asked Al what he’d choose as an epitaph. I’d found an article where many Apollo astronauts were asked how they would like to be remembered. At first, he responded “Have to think about that. Not sure I am qualified to write my own epitaph.” But after some time went by, he replied, “What an honor to represent the people from Earth.”
When you write a book with someone later in their life, like Al, you’re aware that their memoir may also one day serve as a kind of epitaph. The last words of the last chapter of “Falling To Earth” were chosen knowing this day would come. And now, here we are.
“Of all the places I have traveled, it is still hard to beat a Michigan summer. I like to walk in the woods and fields, just like I did as a kid back on the farm. Except now, I’m not alone. On a warm evening I’ll be with my children, and their children. Sitting on the grass, I can feel the living soil as I rest my hands on it. There’s new life there, new potential, waiting to grow. It’s comforting.
Sometimes, while I sit and enjoy the company of my family, the moon will slowly rise above the trees. I generally don’t pay it much thought. But occasionally I am reminded of my brief glimpse into infinity while alone on the moon’s far side. I still have lingering questions about what I experienced. The answers won’t come in my lifetime. That will be your job.
Try it, sometime. Some day all of us who journeyed to the moon will be gone. Take a walk on a summer night, look up at the moon, and think of us. A part of us is still there and always will be.”