The Bucks Underground Railroad

January 30, 2012

For the past decade the Lunar globe that’s rested on the file cabinet in my office may finally gain its rightful place in Our Universe.  Thank you Newt Gingrich for your prophetic announcement that by the end of your “…second term we will have the first permanent base on the moon and it will be American.”  Even more prophetic was your pronouncement that the moon would become “… our 51^st state.”

Great!  I submit for your consideration these Lunar-related names for our 51^st State:  Moonia?  Moonorado?  Moonizonia?  Moonalvania?  Outer Lunar?  Moonida?  Loony?

OK, ‘nuff said.

In the mid 1960’s I lived in Fairfield, California.  At that time when I arrived as a new bride to First Husband Joe–serving in uniform at Travis Air Force Base–Fairfield was a sleepy community sandwiched between San Francisco and Sacramento.  Just loved it out there! California had always been on my bucket list.

Some time after arriving in California I accepted a position with Explosive Technology in its Technical Publications Department (we referred to it as “ET” in our proposals and marketing publications).  ET, sited on the grounds of a dismantled Nike missile base just outside Fairfield, developed its products for the space and defense industries.   A subsidiary of Ducommun, to this day I cannot find any website reference for “Explosive Technology”.  Too bad because ET’s contributions are lost in America’s Right Stuff  history of R&D technology in defense programs and space exploration.

WAY before that dirty word “outsourcing” became part of our vocabulary–ET’s Engineering, QA, and Manufacturing departments produced successful R&D programs that contributed to America’s status as a pioneer in Space.   ET’s separation assemblies pushed our Saturn rockets into space.  ET’s ejection seats saved pilots from burning fighter jets.  Another product ET developed which I don’t believe is now in use was the “Jet Axe”.  The device—packaged in a box about the size of a case of soda or beer—when attached to the roof of a burning structure allowed firefighters to blow a hole in the roof so they could swiftly enter into the building.

Those of you who’ve been around long enough remember the Apollo Space Program when we sat on the edge of our couches glued to our television sets watching the first two American Astronauts on their moon landing.  You probably wondered, How the Eff they gonna get off there?   ET’s brilliant engineers designed a separation assembly in the Lunar Excursion Module (LEM).  With the flick of a switch one of the Lunar landing astronauts fired an explosive guillotine cutter that severed the wires from the spidery LEM.  The capsule blasted off from the moon’s surface to rendezvous with the mother ship circling high above them.

An ET co-worker and friend of mine always joked that we would forever be known as the company that trashed the moon.  Got me thinking that maybe Newt should send the first shuttle to the rocky globe filled with “Really poor children in really poor neighborhoods…” who “…have no habits of working and have nobody around them who works.”   Geez…They could clean up all that abandoned space junk.

Newt’s ”idea” for child labor is just one more statement he’s uttered to vilify minorities, be they Poor and Black, or Brown, or Red or Yellow.

Newt–you’ve talked yourself off the island.  See you on the dark side of the moon.