I don’t know if I came off as a prat but I was most certainly embarrassed.
When I was working as a Field Rep on the Atlas missile our pads were to be going on EWO (Emergency War Orders) where our birds would be fitted with Hydrogen bombs. In order to get EWO status all personnel had to undergo an interrogation much like the verbal dissertations made by a PHD candidate. Many of the guys that went before me didn’t fair too well. I was afraid I would meet the same end.
I was brought into the room and sat down in a chair facing an empty table. However, sitting behind me were the President of Convair, the director of product support, the director of field service and my immediate supervisor and several other individuals. Then a door opened and in walked a group of senior officers (Colonels, Lt. Colonels and Majors including one Senior Master Sergeant. As one, they all shouted “hey, it’s Lu Zuckerman. I had previously been an instructor in San Diego and all of these people had been my students. At that time It was around Christmas and my wife had made a slew of Bourbon balls. They were packed full in two shoeboxes and I split them between my morning and afternoon classes. There was a lot of humor injected between technical points so all went well while the students were quietly getting loaded.
The officers and the sergeant harkened back to those days and the senior Colonel stated “ Hell, Lu knows his systems”. “Lu if you can tell three jokes that we have never heard we will pass you”.
So I sat there checking my memory banks and came up with the required three jokes and all of this with the people behind me wondering what the hell was going on. The military personnel all laughed but there wasn’t a murmur from the group behind me. I was certificated but needless to say I did a lot of bookwork to fully understand the systems I was responsible for.
