American Frontier Myth and the Flight of Apollo 13

Opt i American Frontier Myth and the Flight of Apollo 13: From News Event to Feature Film Susan K. Opt University of Houston-Victoria

American Frontier Myth and the Flight of Apollo 13: From News Event to Feature Film he historical facts of Apollo 13's flight go something like this; On April 11,1970, at 1:13 p.m. CST. NASA launched its third moon landing mission. Apollo 13. It would go into moon orbit on April 15. .Astronauts Jim Lovell and Kred Haise would fly the lunar ianding module. Aquarius, to an area of the moon called Frau Mauro. There they w o u l d c o l l e c t s o i l s a m p l e s a n d r u n e x p e r i m e n t s

Ongmal crew portrait From left to nght are Astronauts James Lovell, Thomas Mattingly (later replaced by Jack Swigert), and Fred W. Haise in their space suits.

After two days, they would lift off from the moon and rendezvous with the command module, Odyssey, piloted by astronaut Jack Swigert. Then they would return to Earth to splashdown on April 21. However, at 9:07 p.m. on April 13, as the space ship was about 200.000 miles from Earth, oxygen tank number 2, located in the service module, exploded. The explosion caused a quadruple systems failurethe service module lost the other oxygen tank and its three fuel cells which provided the command module's power. Mission Control attempted several procedures to prevent the loss of oxygen and power. When they did not work. Mission Control directed the astronauts to power up Aquarius and shut down Odyssey. At 10:50 p.m. the crew moved into Aquarius, where they lived for the remainder of the trip back to Earth. The moon mission was canceled, and, for the next four days. Mission Control devised and tested procedures to return the astronauts to Earth. The return trip required that the crew conserve resources such as electricity and water When Apollo 13 reached Earth orbit, the astronauts powered up the command module, using re-entry batteries. They ejected the lunar landing module. On April 17. at 12:07 p.m. CST, the crew splashed down in the Pacific Ocean. End of story.

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The American Frontier in Film | Special In-Depth Section

The Story's Variant Forms However, the telling of the story has nol ended. Twentj'-five years later, the 1970 news event has reached renewed popularity in hooks such as Lost Moon, in television specials such as PBS's ApoUo !3: To the Edge and Back, and, most recently, in a major motion picture, Apollo 13. Movie director Ron Howard has remarked that no fiction could equal the real-life drama of the Apollo 13 Ilight (Apollo 13 exhihit). But what is it about this experience that makes it worth re-telling? How could a moon mission that did not accomplish its original goals later become the basis for an academy-awardwinning movie? Examining how an event is reported over time may provide clues to understanding the popularity of it and suggest characteristics of historical stories that make them worthy of later recounting in popular culture forms such as commercial films. This article highlights how the story of Apollo 13 has been told across time, beginning with the popular media coverage of 1970 and leading up to the current-day motion picture success Apollo 13. The historical event of Apollo 13 has become a narrative of mythical and magical properties, of heroic characters, and of the embodiment and promotion of American values—a story, that reinforces the frontier elements of American myth and character.

America's Mythic Frontier and Its Stories Myths create continuity and commonness in a societ)', and offer explanations for the human condition (Robertson 17). They, in essence, tell us who we are, what our place is, and why we are here. As Slotkin notes, "Myths reflect the life of Man, but they also can shape and direct it, for good or ill. They are made of words, concepts, images, and they can kill a man" (51). Robertson writes that American myth, like all cultural myth, is constituted in our stories and experience: America is a memory—a memory of the lives and actions, the beliefs and efforts, of millions of human beings who have lived in American spaces, participated in an American social world, and died Americans .... The memory is contained in the stories Americans tell one another-in poems and histories, in speeches and broadcasts, in shows and pictures, in jokes and obituaries. It is contained in the ways Americans behave and in their expecta-

tions of behavior .... In the American memory are contained many of the truths which are self-evident to Americans, which help them understand their country, and to explain their lives. (3) Our popular media stories are one way we constitute and maintain an understanding of our purpose and place in the world. American myth, in turn, provides a way for us to make sense of specific experiences-especially crisis situations such as the highly publicized Apollo 13 flight. Following the lead of Frederick Jackson Turner, American studies scholars, historians, and others have argued that America's unique frontier experience has been instrumental in forming the American myth that continues to shape our understandings today (Billington 66). Carpenter, Robertson, and others describe dimensions of this frontier-generated myth—such as freedom, change, progress, democracy, equality, individualism, success, and manifest destiny, that have shaped American character and story-telling. Bormann notes our need to promote our myth, not only to ourselves but to others. "The fantasy of America as the model and leader of the world gave to each national cause and crisis a universal significance far beyond its parochial application .... One judged each crisis, each pohcy, each community action against its potential consequences on posterity and on progress toward the perfect society" (236). In the context of American myth, the Apollo !3 flight became a crisis, a significant event, because it challenged expectations created by the myth—such as progress and success. As will be seen, over time, the event has been named and renanned in ways to cope with these apparent contradictions to the myth so that the myth could be maintained. To be considered next, then, are the reports about Apollo 13 before flight, during flight, and after flight, and how these historical recountings created the roots for the present day telling of the story of Apollo 13.

The Flight of Apollo 13 Pre-Flight The space program as a whole came into being because of threats to the American self-image as constructed in American myth. When the former U.S.S.R. sent the satellite Sputnik soaring into space in October 1957, it challenged America's view of itself as a world leader in technology.

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Opt I American Frontier Myth and the Flight of Apollo 13: From News Event to Feature Film

"Americans were suddenly jarred out of what the British writer C.P. Snow called their 'technological conceit,' uhich was based in part on the belief that science and totalitarianism were incompatible" (Wilford, We Reach 1-2). In the American myth, democracy and progress go hand in hand. Later, the successful launches and landings of Apollo 11 and 12 reconfirmed the United States' place as leader. As James Reston of The New York Times wrote, "The great achievement of the men on the moon is not only that they made history, but that they expanded man's vision of what history might be. One moon landing doesn't make a new heaven and a new earth, but it has dramatized the possibilities of doing so" (Wilford, We Reach 287). America's selfimage was reinstated, and its beliefs in democracy, progress, and success affirmed. However, by the launch of the third moon landing mission, public attention to the space program was waning. "The complex Apollo launchings have already become almost routine," noted a Time article ("The Dawning" 52). Otber articles attributed the lack of interest to concerns with domestic issues such as the budget and the Vietnam conflict. A U.S. News and World Reports article stated that the enthusiasm and drama of the moon flights had t>

been replaced by "deep gloom" ("After Apollo 13: Lowered" 43). It noted that the space program was facing reductions because of the high costs in Vietnam and because it had achieved its goal of sending men to the moon before the Soviets. Despite the label of "routine" being attributed to this mission, however, the initial reports leading up to the launch of Apollo 13 connected the mission with change, challenge, and progress—all aspects of American myth. The articles named Apollo 13 as unique wben compared to the previous two moon landing missions in terms of what it would do and where it would go. The Apollo 13 space vehicles lifts off from Pad A, Launch Complex Wernher von Braun wrote that the mission 39 at Kennedy Space Center at 2:13 p.m. (EST), Apnl 11,1970.

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would begin tbe earnest exploration of tbe moon's interior and that it would be tbe first Apollo landing site selected because of the scientific paydirt anticipated there (56). The Apollo 13 mission was expected to bring back more definitive answers about the moon (Driscoll 353). This mission would "mark the real beginning of intensive scientific exploration of the moon" ("The Dawning" 52). In fact, the uniform patch designed for this mission reinforced the scientific nature of this flight-"ex luna, scientia" or "from the moon, knowledge" ("Sun Angle" 70), thus distinguishing it from the earlier flights which basically had proved that tbe United States could reach the moon. The articles also focus on how this mission would be more hazardous than the previous two flights-thus. The Apollo 13 mission was considered the riskiest yet because of where the lunar landing module would touchdown. The mission "may prove to be the most challenging test yet of man's skills in space and on the forbidding surface of the moon" ("Tbe Dawning" 52). Aquarius would be tbe first attempt to land in the moon's "badlands" ("What Science" 46), a word choice that invokes images of the Ajnerican frontier. The astronauts would walk farther and conduct more experiments than before. However, the knowledge to be gained from landing in Frau Mauro was viewed as outweighing the riskiness of the landing or tasks ("The Dawning" 52). In general, challenge and risk are connected with progress and success, all aspects of American myth. At the same time, though, the articles pointed out changes made to reduce the riskiness and improve knowledge-gathering—hence, stressing progress. For example, the moon landing procedure had been altered to avoid blowing up a dust cloud, which had created navigation difficulties on the previous two moon landings ("Apollo 13 Weather" 229). Launch rules had also been modified after Apollo 12 was grazed by lightening during its launch ("Sun Angle" 67). On the other hand, the articles created the expectation that the flight between the earth and moon would be uneventful. Tbe routineness of the flight was suggested by tbe fact that four previous Apollos had made it to the moon and back without trouble. The astronauts were expected to sleep in late during the flight (Wilford, "Apollo" 1). Only two "bugs" were mentioned in these early articles— the last-minute replacement of Swigert for command module pilot Ken Mattingly, who had been exposed to the German measles, and the early shut-


down of one of the Saturn V rocket engines during launch. However, these pre-flight articles did not report these events as signs of trouble to come. When launch time was noted, tJie Eastern Standard Time of 2:13 p.m. was given. Only one article mentioned the flight number, "13." Lovell, who was asked about it, replied that the Italians thought it was a lucky number, so he voted with them ("Aquarius and Odyssey" 63). Overall, the pre-flight articles told the Apollo 13 story in a way that emphasized elements of American myth. The Apollo 13 mission would be the first scientific exploration, one in which the astronauts would undertake a risky landing and experiments to bring back valuable knowledge. Being first, taking risks, gathering knowledge to benefit humankind are expected behaviors for those who set out across the frontier. As Robertson notes, "[Americans] are on the cutting edge of history, pathfinding, discovering, and settling the chaotic wilderness which is just beyond-over the next hill, across the next desert, over the next ocean, on the next satellite or planet" (122). In addition, the expected routineness of the mission reinforced the aspect of technological progress. But during the fhght, events would occur that would contradict the expectations created by the pre-flight stories, requiring a shift in focus to other elements of America's frontier myth.

The Flight During the flight, the routineness theme continued in reports that the three television networks did not interrupt their regular programming to carry the first live color television broadcasts from a space mission. But, on the third day into the mission, events occurred that threatened the assumptions underlying aspects of American myth, thus creating a "crisis" situation. Almost 56 hours into the mission and just after the astronauts had finished their unwatched broadcast, an explosion rattled the ship. It would be unclear until a few weeks after splashdown what happened. During the flight, all that Mission Control knew (and consequently the popular media reported) was that the "event," as NASA would name it (Witkin 22), resulted in a loss of power and oxygen to Odyssey and forced the crew to move into Aquarius to survive the journey back to Earth. To direct attention away from the anomaly of the explosion, the popular media began to focus on different dimensions of American frontier myth. The

Apollo 13 flight was recategorized from being a routine mission to being "the most critical situation" in the history of the American space program (Wilford, "Crew" 1). No longer were challenge and progress stressed; rather the story of Apollo 13 became a tale ol rugged individualism and Yankee ingenuity. Such a shift enabled Americans to background contradictions in the myth. As Robertson notes, experience named as "technology" has been viewed as promoting "freedom, independence, and happiness," (276) all aspects of American myth. The fact that NASA could construct a spacecraft and send it free of the Earth to the moon reinforced the myth. However, as Robertson also points out, technology can fail as it did, for example, during the East Coast blackout in 1965 and later in 1979 at Three Mile Island and as it would during the Apollo 13 mission. Such failures potentially remind Americans that technology makes them "dependent" (Robertson 277), contradicting tbe myth. But rather than telling a story that focused on this challenge to assumptions about technology and that would possibly lead to an attention shift, the popular media altered their storytelling focus. For example, articles began stressing the dimension of rugged individualism in their descriptions of the Apollo 13 crew. They were no longer named as scientists on a routine mission but "three courageous men in a crippled craft" ("Emergency" 46); men whose "lives are hanging in balance" (Wilford, "Crew" 1); men who "have already written an epic of heroism and skill that assures them immortality in the annals of space exploration" ("As the World" 36); men who exhibited courage and skill "in the great spirit of exploration and bravery" (Wilford, "Astronauts" 1). The media tales highlighted the frontiersman-like qualities exhibited by the men—such as the calmness and coolness in their voices (Wilford, "Crew" 1) expected by space-age Leatherstockings. "The Frontiersman is the discoverer, the pathfinder, who adapts to whatever he finds.... The Frontiersman is the survivor, skilled in natural life, who knows the wilderness and its ways ...." (Robertson, 135-136). The Apollo 13 crew, then, once seen as astronauts undertaking a routine mission to the moon, began to assume archetypal characteristics. This theme became even more pronounced in the after-fUght storytelling. But the astronauts were not the only ones exhibiting the calm, cool behavior expected from American heroes under stress. So, too, were the

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Opt I American Frontier Myth and the Flight of Apollo 13: From News Event to Feature Film

Mission Control t light controllers who had the task of bringing the crew back to Earth. "There will be great risks and little margin for error," Wilford ("Power" 1) noted when writing about the work at Mission Control. Schmeck described the flight controllers as calm and professional, and, although a bit tense, expressing no outward signs of haste or alarm ("At Mission" 32). Despite the unknown factors of the event, the articles constructed a picture of Mission Control, in which it, like the archetypal frontiersman, had everything under control and was keeping the situation stable. The media reinforced the perspective by detailing the specific barriers the flight controllers faced and showing their ability to adapt. In particular, the construction of a filter to solve the Aquarius's carbon dioxide problem received much attention as a sign of "Yankee Ingenuity" (Wilford, "Astronauts" 30). The articles explained upcoming procedures, such as burns, the lunar lander separation, and splashdown, reinforcing a story line that stressed control and stability. The articles indicated that many of these procedures had been simulated on previous missions or in the simulators and were assumed to work in real life. Attention to flexibihty and preparedness constructed the story that these frontiersmen, both in space and on Earth, were using their skills to overcome the obstacles of nature. Overall, then, the articles during the flight promoted the story that the crew, like the frontiersmen of old, would confront the challenges of the frontier and return triumphant. As the New York Times reported on the day of splashdown, it was anticipated that "the most perilous journey human beings have ever undertaken will end safely in the Pacific today" ("As ihe World," 36). After all, heroes enacting the American myth were expected to face and conquer the trials of the wilderness (Nimmo and Combs 231). Rather than telling a story that focused on the chaotic aspects of the event and on the technological failure, the popular media focused on the individualism, adaptabiUty, and innovative aspects of American myth—a pattern that would continue after-flight. After Flight After splashdown on April 17, President Richard Nixon flew to the Houston Space Center where he presented the flight directors with the Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian award. He continued on to Hawaii where he awarded the Apollo 13 astronauts the medal. Not only did

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Nixon symbolically designate the crew and controllers as heroes with the awarding of medals, his presentations began the process of renaming the failed mission as a success. As Thomas Paine, then administrator of NASA, pointed out, technically Apollo 13 must be counted as a failure because it did not accomplish its prime objective (Schmeck, "NASA" 1). But this part of the tale was backgrounded in the media stories which carried President Nixon's version of the Apollo 13 story. Nixon named Apollo 13 a tribute to human courage and a success because it had reached the hearts of milhons (Semple I A). He categorized the mission as successful because it had served the cause of the space program-future missions would be safer-and of international understanding and goodwill. "Finally, your mission served your country. It served to remind us all of our proud heritage of a nation, to remind us that, in this age of technicians and scientific marvels, the individual still counts," Nixon concluded ("Text" 53). He also remarked that greatness came also in adversity, not just in triumph, and that their safe return was a triumph of the human spirit that built America ("Text" 53). In drawing these upbeat conclusions, Nixon, then, backgrounded attention to Apollo 13's inability to complete its original mission and redefined the attributes of "success" so that the mission reflected those characteristics, consistent with the American frontier perspective. Other articles, besides following President Nixon's construction, stressed signs of successsuch as the unity and concern expressed by people around the world for the astronauts' safe return. "Perhaps in the long run this ability to raise man's concerns above his petty earthly aggrandizements may be the most important contribution of space exploration to the history of the human race" (Hotz 9). Paine named the safe return as a triumph of dedication and teamwork (Schmeck, "NASA" I). Such statements reflected and reinforced America's image of itself as a significant player in world events. In all, the popular media redefined the elements of success so that the mission could be considered successful and the mythic contradictions masked. Also in these initial articles after splashdown, the dramatic aspects of the event began to surface in the storytelling. During the flight, the reports focused on the stability of events. But after flight, the articles began to stress the "man versus nature" theme, an integral tenet of American frontier expe-


rience, thereby renaming the essence of the Apollo 13 experience. For example, the Apollo 13 mission was viewed as different from previous epic voyages of survival because it was "a struggle in which human courage, endurance and ingenuity were pitted not against wave and wind and hunger but the perils of suffocating, burning up or freezing to death in space or crashing onto the moon, or having the spacecraft miss the earth to become an eternal wanderer in the solar system" (Sullivan I). It became the drama of man struggling against the total hostility of space (Hotz 9). The articles after splashdown continued a chronological recounting of all the hurdles tbat had to be overcome during flight to conquer nature to return the crew to Earth. As Lovell noted, "The triumph was in proving our ability to cope with these problems and solve them" ("I Was" 24). While the articles during the flight named the obstacles as serious (but controllable), they now became major dramatic life-and-death concerns for the Apollo 13 story. In addition, even more heroic, frontiermen-like characteristics were attributed to the astronauts and flight controllers. Anthony Lewis compared the astronauts to Magellan and the Wright Brothers — "opening new ways for all mankind"—and to mountain climbers whose "purpose is to face a challenge at the outer limit of human imagination and strength" (38). Hotz noted that the astronauts taught the world new lessons about both tbe U.S. space program and man himself (9). The astronauts were not simply scientists, "but also humanity's envoys to the future" ("Apollo's Return" 12). The skills and abilities of all involved continued to be much stressed in the after-flight articles. "It was tbe calm and confident courage of the Apollo trio and skill of their ground crews that overcame near tragedy in space and coaxed the patched up spacecraft back to earth" ("After Apollo" 20). In all, by overcoming the hurdles and returning successfully, the astronauts matched the achievements of tbe frontier heroes of old. Only one article suggested an alternative narrative not supportive of the frontier aspects of American myth. Lplyveld, writing for The New York Times, challenged the heroic story. "It was their [astronauts'] training and technical expertise—more than their courage or the perils they faced—that made the astronauts a unique fraternity. Everything that could happen in space had been foreseen and rehearsed. Or so we were told" (13). Technology and skill, not heroism, was what got the crew back to Earth.

However, Lelvveld was also the first to refer to Apollo 13 as "unlucky" and to describe it as a mission that "from its inception was marked by mishap and improvisation" {13). His story reflected a trend of stressing ominous signs that would appear in later accounts of tbe flight. For example, a Science News article reported that the substitution of Swigert for Mattingly was "prophetic ior the ill-fated flight" ("Untimely End," 387). An article a few days after splashdown made reference to the flight designation " 13" and the ominous moment of the launch, 13:13 military time (Strickland, "Crew" 14). By the end of April 1970, the popular media began offering interpretations of what this event would mean for the program's future and explanations of what had happened and why. In general, the articles agreed that the Apollo 13 "failure" would not halt the space program. "Despite ' I Apollo's close brush with disaster, NASA officials seem more determined than ever to continue exploration of the moon" ("Post-Mortem" 82). However, the articles stressed recategorizing the missions from routine to risky. "The hard fact is, there are almost unlimited possibilities for equipment failure aboard spacecraft far from Earth" ("Post Mortem," 82). "If we intend to push ahead with manned spaceship voyages, we must resolve to accept the possibility of accident, suffering, maiming, and death" (Lear 56). Another article noted that all Apollo flights have had anomalies, just none as severe as that of Apollo 13 ("Shorts"45S). Thus, renaming the missions from routine to risky would account for any future anomalies, while accounting for the one that did, and thereby resolve mythic contradictions. To answer the question of what happened, NASA appointed a review board. It found that three events—the dropping of oxygen tank number 2, which knocked a tube out of place in the tank; the failure to replace some 28-volt circuit breakers in the tank with 65-volt breakers; and an unusual detanking procedure a few weeks before the flight-

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Opt I American Frontier Myth and the Flight of Apollo 13: From News Event to Feature Film eventually resulted in conditions that caused the tank to explode during the flight. From the findings emerged a narrative that human error and oversight, rather than technology, caused the failure. One article noted that such a finding "restores faith in the engineered system" ("13's Glitches" 571). Strickland wrote that the board "said the mishap was not the result of a chance failure but 'resulted from an unusual combination ol mistakes, coupled with a somewhat deficient and unforgiving design'" ("Review" 256). Stressing human error rather than than tbe iailure of technology, then, backgrounded possible challenges LO the science and progress tenets of the American myth. In all, after splashdown, the popular media directed attention away from the mission's failure and highlighted signs of success. Tbe articles continued developing the heroic and dramatic aspects of the event. After the oversight that led to the explosion was uncovered, the space program could move on.

From Success to Embarrassment After the review board's findings were published in the summer of 1970, reports about Apollo 13 dropped out of the popular media for almost 25 years. HoUandsworth attributed this silence to NASA. "[I]t was not long before NASA went into a defensive mode about the mission. Officials didn't like talking about the flight... The spine-tingling rescue of the astronauts had suddenly become an embarrassment" (124). Indeed. Odyssey ended up in an aviation museum in France. The articles in 1970 about Apollo 13 did not indicate why this shift from "success" to "embarrassment" occurred. However, Cooper, writing in 1972, offered a new thread to the ApoUo 13 story that provided a clue to NASA's silence. Cooper wrote a two-part series about Apollo 13 for the New Yorker, which would be published a year later in book form: Thirteen: The Flight That Failed. Unlike the popular media which had portrayed the fhght controllers as competent problem solvers, Cooper stressed the inabihty of the flight controllers to believe that there was a problem in the early stages. "The first disaster in space had occurred, and no one knew what had happened. On the ground, the flight controllers were not even sure that iuiything had" (Cooper, Nov. 11 62). He noted that the explosion, later called a "tank failure" by NASA engineers, challenged NASA's selfimage; it believed it had created a space craft that was the nation's greatest technological develop-

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ment and that system redundancy would handle any failure (62). As a result of this mindset, the flight controllers spent at least an hour after the explosion attempting to label the event as an "instrumentation failure." Cooper remarked, "The chief reason the flight controllers didn't tumble to the seriousness of the oxygen problem was that the correct answer was also the unthinkable one" (80). This aspect of the event—the determinal behef in an instrumentation glitch—recurred later in the books Moonshot and A Man on the Moon in their references to Apollo 13. From 1974 until the publication of Lovell's book Lost Moon in 1994, Apollo 13 was discussed only in a chapter or two in books about the Apollo space program, like the popular media in 1970, these writings stressed the public's indifference to the Apollo 13 launch and to the problem-solving methods used to return the astronauts to Earth. In addition, however, these reports continued developing the tale of ominous pre-launch events that foreshadowed the impending crisis in space. For example, Richard Lewis wrote, "The launch appeared smooth enough to observers .... However, all was not quite well. A sequence of nninor flaws appeared .... They were all precursors of, although not connected with, the disaster to come two days later ..." (156). Bond carried these "precursors" even further. "Only five days before the launch date, the 'jinx' spread to the crew," he wrote, referring to the replacement of Mattingly by Swigert (226). After the explosion. Bond noted, "It began to look increasingly likely that the crew of'unlucky' 13 would die from suffocation in a dark, cold spacecraft drifting out of control in the vast emptiness of space" (231). Thus the news event of Apollo 13 continued to acquire literary and dramatic elements, both mythical and magical properties, that would eventually find realization in Ron Howard's commercially successful film Apollo 13.

From Embarrassment to (Box Office) Success In 1994 and 1995, the ApoUo 13 story re-entered the popular media with Lovell's book Lost Moon (upon which the movie ApoUo 13 would be based) and with several television specials commemorating the 2Sth anniversary of the flight. The motion picture release spurred numerous magazine articles that typically briefly summarized the mission and then focussed on how the movie was filmed or on the actors involved. In these renderings of the

The American Frontier in Film | Special In-Depth Section Apollo 13 mission, the event took on grand scale proportions, being named as one of the greatest stories of human adventure. In addition, besides enhancing the superstitious signs and critical nature of Apollo 13, the present constructions introduced a new storyline—the fear of not returning. These themes became most evident in the well known popular incarnation of the news event—the motion picture Apollo 13. Bv naming the Apollo 13 flight as one of humanity's greatest adventures, the popular media created the expectation that this was a story worth retelling, and, by extension, made Apollo 13 a movie worth seeing. It was, as film critic Richard Corliss wrote, the story about real, ordinary people who do extraordinary things. "!n an anxious four days, they would learn how to pilot a wounded, runaway craft; they would assemble an air purifier usinp homelv artifacts found in anv space module; and they would hope againsi hope that the guys back in Houston knew how to improvise against chaos" (51). This ordinariness was emphasized in Apollo 13, in scenes in which Lovell gets drunk at the Apollo 11 moonwalk party, or Swigert forgets to iile his income taxes, or Haise vomits just after launch. Such elements of the movie tied into the common man aspect of American myth and helped create audience identification with the characters and story. Like a great dramatic narrative, the events portrayed in both tbe current-day popular media and the movie foreshadowed the crisis that was to come. An Apollo 13 film press kit stressed that the flight was the 13th Apollo mission; it lifted off at 13:13 Houston time; and on the 13th it had a problem (Apollo 13 Exhibit). In the movie itself, when Lovell told his wife Marilyn about his upcoming flight, she replied, "Naturally, it's 13, why 13?" In another scene, during a photo opportunity four days before launch, a reporter asked the crew about the flight number, launch time, and the ship's entering the moon's gravity on April 13. It could be argued tbat tbe film played up the "unlucky 13" bit to increase tbe dramatic aspects of the narrative. However, this trend of foreshadowing had already begun in the historical reports; the movie simply reinforced it. It did, however, add a few scenes, such as Lovell discussing the Apollo I accident with his son, or Marilyn dreaming about an accident later losing her wedding ring in the shower, and that strengthened the ominous nature of this event. A particularly striking sequence in Apollo 13 was the rocket

launch, in which the explosive rocket engine ignition was shown from numerous camera angles along with debris falling from the Saturn V, foreshadowing the explosion to come. The camera angles on the rocket also emphasized the colossal size of it and, by extension, the largeness of the experience and story. This feeling of enormousness repeats in other scenes, such as an early shot that approaches the Vehicle Assembly Building in a way that emphasizes its immense size and a later shot that shows Loveil looking down on a huge Earth. This was a tale of epic proportions. But like all great stories, the Apollo 13 cbaracters triumphed over adversity and all ended well. The "human drama" became "the most amazing rescue operation of all time" (Kroll 55). As one reviewer o( Apollo 13 noted, the film "pays tribute to the endangered American virtues of individual ingenuity and team spirit" (Corliss SI). The film Apollo 13 closely followed the chronological problem-solution storyline stressed in the historical accounts, reinforcing the adaptability and inventiveness elements of America's selfimage. Almost every scene in the movie presented an adversity to be overcome—loss of oxygen/move to lunar landing module; loss of power/shut down landing module; carbon dioxide increase/create filter; no computer/manually correct the course. And then there are possible obstacles: Will the weather interfere with splashdown? Will the command module restart? Is tbe heat shield still attached? Will the parachutes deploy? Overall, the current day renderings stressed that the crew and Mission Control found ways to conquer nature to return the men home. This focus, however, downplays the possible contractions inherent in American myth, such as what if the heat shield bad blown off or the parachutes hadn't deployed?

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Opt I American Frontier Myth and the Flight of Apollo 13: From News Event to Feature Film At the same time, though, the current-day reports featured attention to an aspect of the event avoided in the early articles—the fear of not returning to Earth. The explosion "threatened to create an orbiting mausoleum occupied by three lifeless forms frozen forever in a metallic casket of thwarted technology" (Gregory 17). Loveil's view that it was "better to burn up in the atmosphere ... than to become the first human beings never to return to their home planet" (Chaikin 502) was often repeated in the current-day media. Lovell, who began his book by describing death in space, noted the consequences if the crew had not returned home: "With Lovell and his crewmates sealed inside, the zipping ship would remain visible to humans for millennia, enduring indefinitely as a twinkling, mocking monument to the technology of the twentieth century" (3). This possibility of not returning was suggested in the movie, which opened with the death of the Apollo I astronauts, setting the stage that death lingered in the background of the Apollo 13 event. In one scene, Swigert messes up a reentry simulation, which in real life would have resulted in a fiery death for the crew. Later in the film, flight controllers debate the odds of the crew safely returning. In addition, several scenes showed the astronauts shivering in the cold of a ship that could become their tomb. This focus on the possibility of not returning helped create a sense of dramatic tension in an audience that has faith in American myth. Not returning to Earth would symbolize the failure of the frontiersmen and of the technology and hence a failure to achieve the expectations of the frontier myth. The possible never-ending flight of Apollo 13 would have been a continual reminder of an anomaly in our myth and might have forced a re-

4 8 I Film & History

thinking of that myth. This storyline, then, helped reinforce the epic nature of the voyage—these men faced the ultimate challenge, overcoming death to get home. In Apollo 13, the flight of Apollo 13 became, as director Ron Howard said in a promotional release, the story of "coming home" (Apollo 13 exhibit). Overall, in today's re-telling, the flight of Apollo 13 has been symbolically recategorized from an everyday success story to a tale of great epic proportions. Like the heroes of old, these modern day heroes faced adversity with calmness and coolness; they overcame unthinkable obstacles with ingenuity and inventiveness; they used technology to defeat bad luck. And, in the end, they returned home, bringing with them a glimpse of the frontier.

Conclusion During the days of the Apollo moon shots, a perspective rarely expressed in the historical discourse said that the space program was a waste of money and resources. In the storytelling about Apollo 13, the event could have been categorized as tbe program's greatest failure and offered as support for this point of view. The mission did not achieve its objectives, the much-vaunted technology did not work, and men almost lost their lives—all elements of failure. Such an view would have stressed contradictions in American myth and would have created unease in America's understanding of itself and its place in the world. Such an emphasis across time would have backgrounded the mythological and heroic aspects of the event, and it is unlikely a major motion picture would have been made or been successful. However, as Brown points out, as long as we find ways to account for or mask the contradictions, then the myth can be maintained ("Attention" 24-27). As the case of Apollo 13 has shown, by stressing different elements of American myth across time, the overall myth went unchallenged. Such communicative processes, then, enabled the mission to be renamed from failure to success to the present day "NASA's finest hour" ("Crisis in Space" 8). By shifting the elements of the myth emphasized in the historical accounts, the basis of a story that would become tbe film Apollo 13 was created. The film's success can be attributed to its ability to tie into a familiar interpretation of experience shared by many Americans, tan interpretation linked to our frontier origins.

The American Frontier in Film | Special In-Depth Section Across time, then, the microcosmic experience of the flight of Apollo 13 has come to reflect and symbolize the macrocosmic experience of America. k has become a significant event in American memory and a story worth re-telling because it highlights the frontier aspects of the American

myth and copes with contradictions in the myth. It is more dramatic than fiction because these real-life people and events enact that which we Americans believe to be most true about ourselves and our lives, allowing us to "return home" to our mythic roots as a pioneering people.

Data and Methodology To follow the historical development of the Apollo 13 story, popular media were analyzed beginning with news reports in March 1970, one month before the Apollo 13 launch, and ending with the 199S Apollo 13 film. Magazine articles and New York Times coverage about the event, along with books on the Apollo space program with at least one chapter devoted to Apollo 13, were read. In addition, video presentations, primarily occurring in 1994 and 1995, were viewed. In all, 80 magazine and newspaper articles, along with eight books, five videos, an Apollo 13 movie exhibit at the Houston Space Center, and the motion picture Apollo 13 were examined. The accounts were analyzed via Brown's rhetorical model of social intervention ("Ideology" 123-140), which provides a method to study how cultural myths are maintained or changed over time. Brown argues that we adhere to a myth as long as it appears to explain and make predictable our Uved experiences. For example, the myth that the Apollo space program was "America's greatest technological triumph" (Hollandsworth 92) created anticipations and predictions about everyday experience. But when unexpected events or anomalies occur that the myth is unable to explain or resolve, we potentially face what Brown calls an "attention switch," or a symbolic recategorization of experience-experience does not alter, but the interpretation we give or story we tell about it changes ("Attention" 17-19). For example, Apollo 13, a crippled spacecraft, contradicted the myth "the greatest technological triumph," creating conditions for an attention switch. Attention shifts occur, then^ when we create new myths to make sense of and predict experience, such as renaming Apollo 13 as a "technological failure." Turner suggests, for example, that Americans experienced attention shifts as they accommodated their European myths to the "New World" environment, thus evolving a uniquely American myth (e.g., discarding beliefs in heredity in tavor of skill as a way to determine social rank) (Billington 68). Such shifts. Brown would agree, bring about reorganizations of a society's perceptions of needs, relationships, and worldview ("Ideology" 125-139). In general, though, as Nachbar, Weiser, and Wright point out, "The purpose of myth is not to debate beliefs within a culture but to re-affirm them" (31). BrowTi argues that we typically attempt to avoid attention shifts and the corresponding cultural change by finding ways to downplay the significance of unaccountable events, such as the Apollo 13 explosion.

Works Cited "After Apollo B ,..." U.S. News & World Reports 27 April 1970: 19-21. "Alter Apolto 13; Lowered Sights in Space." U.S. News & World Reports 13 April 1970: 46-47. Apollo 13. Dir. Ron Howard. Pro. B. Grazer. Universal City Studios, 1995. Apollo 13 Exhibit. Houston, TX: Houston Space Center, 199S. "Apollo 13 Weather Rules Altered." Aviation Week & Space Technology 9 Mia A 1970: 229. "Apollo's Return: Triumph Over Failure." Time 27 April 1970; 12-14. "Aquarius 8t Odyssey." Newsweek 13 April 1970: 62-63. "As the World Watches." New York Times 17 April 1970: 56. Billington, Ray A, "The Frontier and the American Character." Historical Viewpoints: Volume One to 1877, ed. John Garraty. New York: American Heritage Press. 1970. 66-77. Bond, Peter. Heroes in Space: From Gagarin to Challenger. New York: Basil Blackwell, Inc, 1987. Bormann, Ernest. The Force of Fantasy. Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, I98S. Eraun, Wemher von. "How ApoUo 13 Will Probe the Moon's Interior." Popular Science March 1970; 56-58+, Brown, William R. "Attention and the Rhetoric of Social Intervention." The Quarterly Journal of Speech 68 (1982): 17-27. —. "Ideology as Communication Process." The Quarterly Journal of Speech 64 (1978): 123-140.

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Opt I American Frontier Myth and the Flight of Apollo 13: From News Event to Feature Film Carpenter, Frederick I. American Utenture and the Dream. New York: Philosophical Library, Inc, 1968. Chaikin, Andrew. A Man on the Moon. New York: Viking Press, 1994. Cooper, Henry S.F. "Annuals of Space Exploration." New Yorker 11 Nov. 1972; 48-52*. —, "Annuals ot'Space Exploration." New Yorker 18 Nov. 1972; 75-76+. —, ThirLeen: The Flight that Failed. New York: The Dial Press, 1973. Corliss, Richard. "Hell of a Ride." Time 3 July 1995: 50-53. "Crisis in Space: The Heroic Flight of Apollo 13." Popular Science ]vly 1995: 50-56. "The Dawning of Aquarius." Time 13 April 1970: S2+. Driscoll, Everiy. "Apollo 13 to the Highlands." Sdence News 4 April 1970: 353-355. "Emergency in space." New York Times 14 April 1970: 46. Gregory, J. C. (Ed.) Apollo 13: A Story of American Heroism. Ft. Worth, TX: Magnolia Media Group, 1995. Hollandsworth, Skip. "Shooting the Moon." Texas Monthfy.july 1995: 92-95+. Hotz, Robert. "Apollo B." Avfatjon Weet & Space Tecino7o£)'20 April 1970:9. Kroll, Jack. "Found in the Stars." Newsweek S July 1995: 55. Lear, John. "Decision Time." Saturday Review 9 May 1970: 56. Lelyveld, Joseph. "Apollo 13; Moment of Exaltation." New lori: Times 18 April 1970: 13. Lewis, Anthony. "The Poetry and Politics of Space." New York Times 20 April 1970: 38. Lewis, Richard. The Voyages of Apollo. New York: New York Times Book Co, 1974. Lovell, James. I was a good target for the law of averages. Life 1 May 1970; 24-28. —, Lost Moon: Tbe Perilous Voyage of Apollo 13. New York: Houghton Mifflin Co, 1994. Naciibar, Jack, Deborah Weiser, and John L. Wright (eds.) The Popular Culture Reader. Bowling Green, OH: Bowling Green University Press, 1978. Nimmo, Dan & Comhs, James. Subliminal Politics. Englewood Qiffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc, 1980. "Post-mortem on Apollo 13." T/me 4 May 1970:82. Robertson, James O. American Myth. American Reality. New York: Hill & Wang, 1980. Schmeck Jr., Harold. "At Mission Control, the Scene is Quiet and Professional and Tense. New York Times 14 April 1970; 32. —, "NASA to Review Space Accident." New York Times IS April 1970: 1,13 Semple, Robert. "Nixon in Hawaii, Joins Astronauts and Honors Them." New York Times 19 April 1970: lA. Shepard, Alan, and Deke Slayton. Moonshot. Atlanta, GA: Turner Publications, 1994. "Shorts in the System." Science News9 May 1970; 455. Slotkin, Rjchard. "Dreams and Genocide: The American Myth of Restoration Through Violence." 77ie Popular Culture Reader, eds. Jack Nachbar, Deborah Weiser, and John L. Wright. Bowling Green, OH; Bowling Green University Press, 1978. 51-63. Strickland, Zack. "Crew Brings Apollo 13 Mission to Safe Ending." Aviation WeeJir & Space Technology 20 April 1970: 14-19, —. "Review Board Urges Re-examination ol Apollo Eouipment." Ai'Jafion Week & Space Technology 22 June 1970: 254-257. Sullivan. Walter. "Three Came Back as the World Held its Breath." New York Times 19 April 1970. sec. 4: 1. "Sun Angle Held Vital to Apollo 13 Landing." Avjatio/i Week & Space Technology 6 April 1970: 67-70. "Text of President's Welcome and Lovell's Response at Honolulu." New York Times 19 April 1970: 53. "13's glitches, 14's delay." Science Ncw5 13 June 1970:571. "UnUmely End of Apollo 13." Sdence News 18 April 1970:387-388. "What Science Seeks from Apollo 13." U.S News & World Reports 20 April 1970:46-47. Wilford, John N. "Apollo Coasts Toward the Moon." New York Times 13 April 1970: 1. —, "Astronauts Fire Rocket and Correct Aim as TTiey Prepare for Landing." New York Times 16 April 1970: 1, 30. —, "Crew of Crippled Apollo Starts Back After Rounding Moon and Firing Rocket." New York Times 15 April 1970: 1, 28. —, "Power Failure Imperils Astronauts." New York Times 14 April 1970: I, 32. —, We Reach the Moon. New York: Bantam Books, 1969. Witkin, Richard. "Last Leg of Apollo Crew's Return Simulated on the Ground by Fellow Astronauts." New York Times 17 April 1970:22.

50 I Films History


Susan Opt is an assistant professor of communication at the University of Houston-Victoria. A draft of this paper was presented at the 1996 Popular Culture/American Culture national convention; a revised version vsas selected as the top division paper in American Studies at the 1996 Speech Communication Association Convention. The author gratefully acknowledges the comments and support of the convention participants, reviewers, and Ron Wukeson.

U.i. Navy underwater demolition team assists the astronauts in egressing then Lommand Module and entering life rafts, which splashed down at 12:07:44 p.m. (EST), April 17,1970.

May 28-30,1997 The Monument to Robert Could Shaw and the Fifty-fourth Massachusetts Regiment: History and Meaning A public symposium, "The Monument to Robert Gould Shaw and the Fifty-fourth Masachusetts Regiment: History and Meaning," will be held May 28-30, 1997, in Boston, Massachusetts. The symposium will include a session entitled "History on Film: G/or> and The Fifty-fourth Massachusetts Regiment" featuring William Gwaltney of the National Park Service, technical advisor to Glory; Patricia Turner of the University of California, Davis, one of the featured commentators in Marlon Riggs' "Ethnic Notions"; and others. Contact; Erin Beatty Boston National Historical Park Charlestown Navy Yard Boston, MA 02129 (617) 242-5668 FAX (617) 241-8650 [email protected]

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