1. Early life and education

2. Flight experience

3. NASA career
    Skylab 4 Controversy 

4. Post-NASA activities

5. Personal life

6. Death

7. Special honors

8. Bibliography

9. See also

10. References

11. External links

William Reid Pogue (January 23, 1930 – March 3, 2014), (Col, USAF), was an American astronaut, U.S. Air Force fighter pilot, and test pilot who was also an accomplished teacher, public speaker and author.

Born and educated in Oklahoma, Pogue graduated from college and enlisted in the United States Air Force, in which he served for 24 years. He flew combat during the Korean War, and with the elite USAF Thunderbirds. He served as a flight instructor and mathematics professor, and was a versatile test pilot, including two years in an exchange with the RAF (UK).

Colonel Pogue was an Air Force instructor when accepted into NASA in 1966. His astronaut career included one orbital mission, as pilot of the last crew of Skylab. The crew set a duration record (84 days) that was unbroken in NASA for over 20 years, and in orbit they conducted dozens of research experiments. The mission was also noted for a dispute with ground control over schedule management that news media named “The Skylab Mutiny”.

Pogue retired from both the USAF and NASA a few months after he returned from Skylab. Over the next 30 plus years he taught, lectured, consulted, and wrote about aviation and aeronautics, in the US and abroad. He died in 2014, age 84, survived by three children, four stepsons, and his third wife.

Early life and education

Pogue was born on January 23, 1930, in Okemah, Oklahoma to Alex Wallis Pogue and Margaret Frances (McDow) Pogue. He had one older sister, Margaret H., who died in 2012. Pogue was of Choctaw ancestry.^[1] Pogue attended primary and secondary schools in Sand Springs, Oklahoma. He participated in the Boy Scouts, earning the rank of Second Class.^[2]

Pogue received a Bachelor of Science degree in secondary education from Oklahoma Baptist University in Shawnee, Oklahoma in 1951, and a Master of Science degree in mathematics from Oklahoma State University in Stillwater, Oklahoma in 1960.^[3]

Flight experience

Pogue was attracted to flying from an early age, and first flew a plane when in high school.^[4] Pogue enlisted in the U.S. Air Force in 1951 and received his commission in 1952. While serving with the Fifth Air Force during the Korean War, from 1953 to 1954, he completed a combat tour in fighter bombers, flying over 40 combat missions. From 1955 to 1957, he was a member of the USAF Thunderbirds. He was a solo and a slot pilot with them.^[5]

He gained proficiency in more than 50 types and models of American and British aircraft and was qualified as a civilian flight instructor. Pogue served in the mathematics department as an assistant professor at the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colorado, from 1960 to 1963. In September 1965, he completed a two-year tour as test pilot with the British Ministry of Aviation under the USAF/RAF Exchange Program, after graduating from the Empire Test Pilots' School in Farnborough, England.^[5]

An Air Force Colonel, Pogue came to the Manned Spacecraft Center from an assignment at Edwards Air Force Base, California, where he had been an instructor at the Air Force Aerospace Research Pilot School since October 1965.^[5]

He logged 7,200 hours of flight time, including 4,200 hours in jet aircraft and 2,017 hours in space flight.^[8]

NASA career

Pogue was one of nineteen astronauts selected by NASA in group 5 for the Apollo program in April 1966.^[6] He served as a member of the support crews for the Apollo 7,^[7] 11,^[8] and 14 missions. He was CAPCOM for Apollo 7.^[9] No crew members were assigned to the cancelled Apollo missions, but if normal crew rotation were followed, he would have been assigned as command module pilot for the prime crew of the Apollo 19 mission.^[10]

Pogue was the pilot of Skylab 4, the third and final manned visit to the Skylab Orbital Workshop, from November 16, 1973, to February 8, 1974.^[11] This was the longest manned flight (84 days, 1 hour and 15 minutes) to that date.^[12] Pogue was accompanied on the record-setting 34.5-million-mile flight by Commander Gerald P. Carr and Science Pilot Edward G. Gibson.^[11] They successfully completed 56 experiments, 26 science demonstrations, 15 subsystem detailed objectives, and 13 student investigations during their 1,214 revolutions of the Earth.^[13]

They also acquired extensive Earth resources observations data using Skylab's Earth resources experiment package camera and sensor array and logged 338 hours of operations of the Apollo Telescope Mount which made extensive observations of the sun's solar processes. Pogue and Carr viewed a comet transiting the sky during an EVA.^[14] He logged 13 hours and 34 minutes in two EVAs outside the orbital workshop.^[15]

Pogue retired from both the United States Air Force and NASA on September 1, 1975.^[16] He retired to join High Flight Foundation (an inter-denominational evangelical foundation, founded by astronaut James Irwin) as a vice president.^[17]

Skylab 4 Controversy

While on the Skylab 4 mission, Pogue was involved in the Skylab controversy, a dispute and mini-strike over management of the crew schedule.^[18][19]

Post-NASA activities

After he retired, he was self-employed as a consultant to aerospace and a producer of general interest videos on space flight.^[8]

In 1985, Pogue authored the book How Do You Go to the Bathroom in Space?, answering 187 common questions he received.^[20] In 1992, he co-authored The Trikon Deception, a science fiction novel, with Ben Bova.^[1]

Personal life

Pogue married three times. He married Helen Juanita Dittmar in 1952 and with her they had three children: William R. (born September 5, 1953), Layna S. (born June 9, 1955), and Thomas R. (born September 12, 1957).^[5] They later divorced. He married Jean Ann Baird in 1979, until her death in 2009;^[21] with her he had five stepchildren. His most recent wife Tina he wed in 2012.^[18]

Death

Pogue died at his Cocoa Beach, Florida home during the night of March 3, 2014 from natural causes at the age of 84.^[22][23] He is survived by his third wife Tina, three children from his first marriage and four stepsons from his second marriage.^[24] According to Tina Pogue, his ashes would be sent into space using Celestis, a memorial rocket service.^[18]

Special honors

• JSC Superior Achievement Award (1970)^[25]
• Air Medal, Air Force Commendation Medal, the National Defense Service Medal, and an Air Force Outstanding Unit Award (while a member of the USAF Thunderbirds)^[26]
• Air Force Distinguished Service Medal and Command Pilot Astronaut Wings (1974)^[26]
• City of Chicago Gold Medal (1974)^[25]
• City of New York Gold Medal (1974)^[25]

The three Skylab astronaut crews were awarded the 1973 Robert J. Collier Trophy "For proving beyond question the value of man in future explorations of space and the production of data of benefit to all the people on Earth."^[27][28] In 1974, President Nixon presented the Skylab 4 crew with the NASA Distinguished Service Medal.^[29] Federation Aeronautique Internationale awarded the Skylab 4 crew the De La Vaulx Medal and V. M. Komarov Diploma for 1974.^[30] The American Astronautical Society's 1975 Flight Achievement Award was awarded to the Skylab 4 crew.^[3][31] Gerald Carr accepted the 1975 Dr. Robert H. Goddard Memorial Trophy from President Ford, awarded to the Skylab astronauts.^[32] The Skylab 4 crew won the AIAA Haley Astronautics Award in 1975 "For demonstrated outstanding courage and skill during their record-breaking 84-day Skylab mission".^[33]

The William R. Pogue Municipal Airport (FAA Code: OWP; ICAO Code: KOWP) in Sand Springs, Oklahoma was named in Pogue's honor in 1974.^[34] The Oklahoma Aviation and Space Museum awarded Pogue the Clarence E. Page Memorial Trophy for "making significant and ongoing contributions to the U.S. aviation industry" in February 1989. Page died ten days before the award was presented and Pogue used most of his speech to memorialize Page's life.^[35]

He was awarded an honorary Doctorate of Science from Oklahoma Baptist University in 1974.^[36] Pogue received the General Thomas D. White USAF Space Trophy for 1974.^[37] Pogue was inducted into the Five Civilized Tribes Hall of Fame in 1975.^[38] He was one of five Oklahoman astronauts inducted into the Oklahoma Aviation and Space Hall of Fame in 1980.^[39] Pogue was one of 24 Apollo astronauts who were inducted into the U.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame in 1997.^[40]

Bibliography

• {{cite book|title=How Do You Go To The Bathroom In Space?: All the Answers to All the Questions You Have About Living in Space|author=William Reid Pogue |publisher=New York : Tom Doherty Associates |year=1991| ISBN= 0812517288}}
• {{cite book|title=Astronaut primer|author=William Reid Pogue |publisher=Tucson, Ariz. : Libration Press |year=1985| ISBN= 0935291008 }}
• {{cite book|title=The Trikon Deception|author=Ben Bova and William Reid Pogue |publisher= |year=

• {{cite book|title=Space trivia|author=William Reid Pogue |publisher=Ontario : Apogee Books |year=2003

• {{cite book|title=But for the Grace of God: An Autobiography of an Aviator and Astronaut by William Reid Pogue|author=William Reid Pogue |publisher= Soar with Eagles; First Edition edition (March 21, 2011)| ISBN=0981475655 }}

See also

• List of spaceflight records

References

External links

• Official website of William R. Pogue
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20140725213446/http://www.astronautix.com/astros/pogue.htm Astronautix biography of William R. Pogue]
• Spacefacts biography of William R. Pogue
• {{IMDb name|0999048}}
• Pogue at Spaceacts
• Pogue at Encyclopedia of Science
• {{Find a Grave|125887085}}

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