Bob Lindstrom

Bob Lindstrom

Bob was raised in Illinois, attending the University of Illinois for a bachelor's in ceramic engineering. He was drafted into the Korean War, and was sent to Redstone in Spring of 1951, being assigned to the material laboratory. After his service, he continued work at Redstone in the same category of re-entry protection. In 1956, a large booster project began, utilizing Jupiter hardware, which would eventually develop into the Saturn system. Bob would serve as a project engineer on the Saturn 1/1B booster, and on Jupiter C, also serving as a liaison to JPL. He remained with ABMA as it converted to NASA, but would leave in 1963 to work for the Spacecraft company (alongside Olin King and others). He would stay with Spacecraft for approximately 4 years, then worked for Northrop. Bob discusses the company's time working on the MARS study contract, after which he would return to MSFC (around 1971) at the behest of Dr. Eberhard Rees, working in the Propulsion Vehicle Engineering Lab. He would move to the Shuttle office, and remain with the project through several launches. Bob discusses the various personnel he interacted with in this role. After his shuttle work, Bob would retire and do consulting work (spending some time at Thiokol and Rockwell, forming a firm with several other former coworkers). He would take over Thiokol's space operations group following the Challenger disaster, running into concerns against the Advanced Solid Rocket Motor project, but ultimately bringing the company into relative success. He concludes by emphasizing the importance of strengthening engineering.

University of Alabama in Huntsville Archives and Special Collections, Huntsville, Alabama

2006-5

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Interviews

Video

Bob Lindstrom (Space History Interviews).mp4

Lundquist, Charles

Lindstrom, Bob

1:15:58