[Dialogue] NASA software developer moves on ...

[Tim Wegner]

Yesterday I turned in my badges at the United Space Alliance.

My NASA career started when Susan and I were re-assigned from Egypt 
to Houston. The only thing I knew about the Space Shuttle was what I 
had read in Time magazines bought on the streets in Cairo. 

When we arrived at the Houston House, Susan stayed "in house" and I 
was assigned to work.  Larry Henschen helped me arrange an interview 
with McDonnell Douglas, a NASA contractor.  I had never programmed a 
computer and had no qualification other than a Master's degree in 
mathematics and an "all-but-thesis" not-quite-a-PhD. In retrospect, 
those were great credentials, since the state of computer programming 
when I was in college was using punch cards. When I was working 
programming NASA's first Unix computers, I remember thinking "I wish 
I had studied Unix in college" - then realizing that Unix didn't 
exist when I was in college! But the principles and laws of 
mathematics and physics I learned in the late 60's have stood up very 
well. My career has been spent in the abstract world of mathematical 
models of gravity, drag, solar pressure, and accelerations - space, 
the final frontier. Hard to beat that.

I missed the first four shuttle flights but arrived in time for 
STS-5. My first project was an analysis of the shuttle drag model. My 
supervisors weren't watching closely, so I learned FORTRAN on a 
UNISYS mainframe and implemented my results in a program called HOPE. 
(There was another program called LOVE, but not one called FAITH.) 
Shortly thereafter I was re-assigned as a programmer, and remained a 
software developer (and software project manager) for my whole 
career, which extended more then a year past the last Shuttle flight 
in July 2011. I ended up working for various NASA contractors for a 
bit over 30 years.

Shortly after I started at NASA, Larry Henschen and I were 
instrumental in helping Lynn Oden, another Houston House order 
member, in also getting a job. For a few years Lynn and I commutred 
together. Lynn retired a few years ago, having had a fine  career as 
a Shuttle Navigation Flight Controller.

Susan and I never "left" the Houston House; it melted away around us 
as the Order transitioned away from corporate living. Conna Wilkinson 
was the last one to leave when she moved back to Oklahoma. So Susan 
and I turned out the lights of the Houston House and got an 
apartment, and later bought a house. I am grateful today for all the 
experiences we had assigned to San Franscisco, San Jose, Melbourne, 
Adelaide, Bayad, and finally Houston. Susan and I arrived in Houston 
with no assets but no debts in our mid-thirties, and are now both 
retired. We still have no debts, but now we have a few assets. I 
amazed that that was possible!

I am still working with a small group of your colleagues keeping the 
wedgeblade.net glue connecting our far flung community alive.

Retirement is, of course, just another "assignment" to new 
challenges.

Tim Wegner