atlasbooster

Some of these gentlemen are Mercury astronauts. From left, (unknown), Alan Shepard, (unknown), Gus Grissom, John Glenn (with the bowtie), Gordon Cooper, and Wally Schirra.

Mercury astronauts Gordon Cooper (left) and Alan Shepard (center) at Kearney Mesa tour circa 1959.

That's Mercury astronaut Deke Slayton in the center. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deke_Slayton

This picture is a bit of a mystery to me. This is one of a series of photos in this Flckr set of a visit to Convair by Mercury astronauts. According to the company newsletter Convairiety (Vol. 12, No. 20, Sept. 30, 1959, Astronautics Edition), six of the astronauts - all but Slayton - visited during September, 1959, along with NASA public affairs officer "Shorty" Powers. But here is a picture of Slayton in the same photoset, with a Negative Number (38211A) that is sequential within the others in the set. Moreover, the visit in September of 1959 was the one in which Gus Grissom gave his famous 3-word speech - "Do good work." - a speech which Slayton, in his autobiography, seems to have been present for (see below). How do you explain the contradictory evidence? Perhaps this photo is out of sequence and was taken during a different visit. Slayton was the astronaut assigned to monitor the progress of the Atlas Booster, so he already knew Convair quite well - perhaps he only showed up on the day the Astronauts toured the floor of the plant, the day Grissom spoke. (If anyone has any further thoughts on this question please post them here thanks!)

"It helped that we were the guys whose butts were on the line. When we visited Convair, the plant that was building the Atlas, they asked Gus Grissom to give some sort of pep talk. Gus wasn't any more comfortable with this stuff than I was, but he came up with the perfect words. 'Do good work," he said. They fell all over themselves applauding, and had signs made up: DO GOOD WORK. Because it's our butts." - Deke Slayton, in Deke! (1994), Chapter 10, page 79. ISBN 0-312-85918-X. Co-authored by Michael Cassutt.

grace!