JoAnn Morgan Saw It All And Broke A Few Gender Barriers Along The Way

What's it like being one of the very first women ever to join NASA? JoAnn Morgan, who retires from the space agency soon, has a unique perspective on that issue. She joined the space program in 1958, before NASA was even created, as an 18-year old student from the University of Florida. She loved the work, the people and the missions. In Part One, Ms. Morgan was kind enough to remember some of the milestones and distinct personalities she witnessed as a 45-year NASA veteran. She continues that rememberance in this second part of the story. But she also recalls her personal mission to be fully accepted as a space-flight team member:

"I guess I mark time in two ways," said JoAnn Morgan, who'll soon retire from NASA after 45 years on the job. "I look at my own career progression, often near the top. I got there by working hard and doing jobs others wouldn't. I also mark time in terms of the missions we've completed, in terms of our accomplishments."

She knows first hand about progress. From a college intern who was "part of the team" just four days after she arrived at Cape Canaveral in 1958, she's risen through the ranks of NASA to become one of its senior leaders.

Morgan's career spans 45 years and includes a list of firsts at KSC, including her appointment as the first woman senior executive at the space center. She has been in leadership roles at KSC for the past 20 years.

Her list of firsts also includes first woman in the Launch Control Center Firing Room during the Apollo program; first woman division chief; first woman to win a NASA medal; first woman senior executive at KSC; first woman associate director for KSC and first woman to act as deputy director of KSC. Additionally, Morgan was the first woman in NASA to win the coveted Sloan Fellowship. The Sloan Fellowship is one of the NASA fellowship programs and grants fellowships to MIT in Massachusetts and Stanford University (CA), for graduate study. The program is international and includes students from government and industry in the United States and abroad.

"JoAnn's career is a model of success," said KSC Director Roy Bridges Jr. "She is the pioneer for all the female engineers at NASA. She is my hero, too. She has a passion for excellence that is rarely exceeded. She thinks 'out of the box' and makes things happen. What a joy to work with her!"

It's not hard to feel JoAnn's level of commitment and energy, even on the telephone from 2000 miles away. That's fairly remarkable, given the fact she ran into a lot of roadblocks along the way.

"Logistics were hard," she said without a trace of bitterness in her voice. "For instance, there were no women's rest rooms at the launchpad. I had to get a security guard to clear out the restroom." That's what she had to do from the moment she joined the space program in 1958, until NASA built a new launch facility for the Apollo missions in the 1960s.

Convincing her fellow NASA workers to treat her as a part of the team wasn't any easier. "I buried myself in the job," she said. "If I found a man who didn't want me there, I ignored him." That happened a lot, she said. For instance, when she joined the Apollo project, she encountered one supervisor in the launch facility who told her flat out that women weren't allowed in the blockhouse. JoAnn had been given a procedural task to complete. At a loss, she called her own supervisor, who told her without hesitation to complete the task. Only later, said Ms. Morgan, did she find out that her supervisor had called all over the space agency and asked, "What gives?" until the harrassment stopped. While JoAnn said that went a long way to quelling the testosterone rebellion against her, it didn't stop. Not long after Apollo Pad 39 was constructed, she said a launch director "poo-poohed" her presence there. The very next day, she said, the Apollo launch manager made it a point to pat her on the back and give her a rather elaborate welcome. Point taken.

The Slump

As the Apollo program came to an end, JoAnn, like a lot of people at NASA, found herself looking for something to do. "We went from four launches in a year to two in a decade," she said. But Ms. Morgan remained committed to the space program and that commitment led her to work on the Skylab and Apollo-Soyuz missions, paving the way for the creation of an International Space Station.

She also took time to better her education, attending Stanford University and assuring her continued rise through the ranks. She then became one of the KSC team developing the Space Shuttle launch processing system central data subsystem, which was initially used for the first launch of the orbiter Columbia. Following that, she served in managerial positions including division chief and deputy director, Expendable Launch Vehicles; director of Payload Projects and Ground Operations; and director for Safety and Mission Assurance with overall responsibilities for the KSC safety, reliability, maintainability, quality and mission assurance programs.

Challenger

On that cold February morning in 1986 (you know the one), Many members of the Challenger launch team were iced in, according to Ms. Morgan. "We had all been working so hard, we were all very tired," she remembers. "I got up that morning and saw a white something. I didn't know what it was at first. It was an icicle hanging off the boat motor. So I didn't go in that day. I felt like it wasn't the right day to launch. When I saw the launch and what happened, I was just frustrated. It didn't need to happen!"

At the time, she said, NASA was leaderless, a factor she believes contributed to the demise of Challenger. "We're not an agency that copes well without quality leadership. We need leaders who understand procedures, but who also know how to listen. Our people are "can-do" people. They respond to leaders." She offered a critical glimpse into NASA culture, the very subject of the CAIB investigation and the Return To Flight Task Force.

"The little clues (leading to the Challenger disaster) were there," she said wistfully. "But there weren't enough people in the program who knew to pick them up. The program is the king. So people circled the wagons. They got into a group think. We had a number of outside groups, but maybe we had too many. They didn't have the clout they should have."

Columbia: "We're Having A Bad Day, JoAnn."

"I was there at KSC for the landing," JoAnn said, referring to the Columbia disaster, almost 17 years after Challenger exploded shortly after launch. "I was babysitting the press. At some point, a reporter from USA Today realized we hadn't heard the sonic booms (characteristic of shuttle landings). I ran inside and was told, 'We're having a bad day, JoAnn.'"

That simple, stark statement came after controllers lost touch with Columbia, just about 30 minutes before touchdown. "We had lost all communications systems. I know those systems are so robust that if they all go out, something really bad has happened." She recalls that NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe was there with her and the families. "He just did an incredible job," said Ms. Morgan. "We got out our contingency plans. He called the president and explained what happened. Then he told the families." It's clear in those words the admiration Ms. Morgan holds for the NASA chief.

The Day After Tomorrow

Remembering the past, JoAnn turned to the future. "I believe in the commercialization of space," she said, "but tehre's not enough money in it right now to make the commercialization of space viable."

That could change, she admitted, if the United States is spurred to action by, of all countries, The People's Republic of China. Seeing the ambitious plans China has for space exploration and the development of a lunar mining colony, JoAnn thinks we might just enter a new space race. She hopes that could mean a better budget for NASA. "We need to get people inspired. I think I can help with that."

Perhaps so. Florida Governor Jeb Bush has appointed Ms. Morgan to the University of Florida system Board of Trustees, where she'll help develop programs that honor astronauts and foster a growth in science education.

That quest, she said, is greatly facilitated by one of the projects she holds dearest, the Hubble Space Telescope. "I worked on Hubble for ten years. All I studied before then has been outdated by Hubble. It's rewritted the same astronomy books I learned from. I'm so proud to have been a part of that -- rewriting history."

FMI: www.nasa.gov