"all began with a telephone call from the White House to the Department of Defense. There was no arrogance in the callers voice; only a simple question:

"Does the Air Force have any Negroes in the new aerospace research pilots' course being set up at Edwards Air Force Baser in California?"

After what was probably an extended pause came the answer: "No, there aren't any."

It was an ordinary enough question, but the call came from an extraordinary source.

Had it come from an ordinary White House, the reaction might have been mild, nothing more than grist for a workday tale some government employee could tell at a weekend gathering. But this call came from the Kennedy White House, that place called "Camelot," which had seen the beginning of civil rights"sit-ins" and had sent troops to get a black man into a university in the Deep South. it was a White House that had used its influence to gain Martin Luther King's release from jail. perhaps the recipient of the call knew all of this and felt a bit like a person in a closed garage slowly filling with carbon monoxide. In any event, the reaction was predictable: something had better be done- and rather quickly. The innocuous-sounding call thus became something of an edict.

The air force swiftly launched a search for a black pilot with the right amount of flying time, the "right academic background, and one would could meet all the other stringent requirements." Fortunately, air force personnel officers didn't have to look too far, for it was about that time that Capt. Ed Dwight's application reached them."

Meanwhile, Colonel Yeager's dim view of Dwight's abilities grew. Yeager later maintained that Dwight's abilities were so lacking "we set up a special tutoring program to get him through the academics, as I recall, he lacked the engineering [background] that the other students had."

Yeager further observes that Dwight worked hard, as did his tutors, but adds that "Dwight just couldn't hack it... didn't keep up in flying." Yeager claims to have worked with Dwight on his flying, but he noted that "our students were flying at levels really beyond his experience. The only prejudice against Dwight," Yeager recalls, wagging a literary finger," was the conviction that he was not qualified to be in the school" in the first place. (p. 20)

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3841191&forum_id=2#35032731)

commander: we are gonna die!

black astronauts: laughing loud as fuck, cracking jokes, slapping each other on the back

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3841191&forum_id=2#35024931)

"Con-rad lemme tell ya space is a cold dark place ya know, feel me? So I says to the guys buildin the ship, ain't no WAY a colored man goin into subzero degrees without some mutha fuckin heat in this bitch. I got that shit on 82 just like at home and nigga we is ROASTIN in here ain't a thing!"

"Well, that's actually what I wanted to tell you"

"An' ma boy Jamal got his soul music playin loud & clear"

"Dem power circuits iz past they limi-"

"Con-rad lemme just tell you get off that damn radio and chill we alright don't get all uncle tom on a nigga with all dem rules & reg-u-lations"

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3841191&forum_id=2#35024981)

Cmdr. N'Kwantay Jones-Miller: "Oh so we gonna die cuz it's BLACK outside, is that it?!"

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3841191&forum_id=2#35025295)

Just flip it and let it do what it do

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3841191&forum_id=2#39323937)