Texas Extra: Talking with NASA ‘Spacewoman’ Eileen Collins

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Hello, it's Laura Rice joining you with a Texas Extra, extended and special content

tailor-made for our podcast audience. It's not every day I get to talk with someone who has

been to space. Let alone someone who led a mission and broke barriers for women who might want

to do the same. Still, not everyone knows about Eileen Collins and her accomplishments.

A new documentary aims to change that. Here's an extended conversation I had with Collins

and the director of Spacewoman. Enjoy. You've got it tuned to the Texas Standard. I'm Laura Rice.

Little girls all over the country don't get shushed or dismissed anymore when they say they want

to grow up to be astronauts. They can also say they want to pilot a spacecraft or command one.

That's because Eileen Collins did it first decades ago. A new documentary celebrates her

levelhead natural talent and glass shattering determination. It's coming in limited

release to theaters in Texas's biggest cities. It's called Spacewoman. It's directed by Hannah

Berryman. Hannah, welcome to the Texas Standard. Thank you so much. And we're also thrilled to have

Eileen Collins herself with us. Eileen, welcome. Hi, it's great to be with you and talk about her

story. Well, I love it and we love everything Texan. So I got to, I got to mention you were based

Johnson Space Center in Houston for a long time. And am I right that you've made Texas your home?

Oh, that's right. I was at 20 years of Johnson Space Center. In the years I was a space shuttle

astronaut. I married a man from San Antonio and love the city. That's where I live now

in love Texas. It's a great place. You didn't grow up here though. You're from New York. But even

as a young person being not just an astronaut but a spacecraft pilot was a dream. That's right.

So I grew up in upstate New York, a very rural area. People were corn crops. There were cows

and dairy everywhere. So I'm kind of a rural person. I got interested in flying really two ways.

The first was through reading books. And I encourage young people to read books about people that do

things that you would like to do someday. But the other thing is we had the National Soaring Museum

in my hometown of Almira where I was able to watch gliders fly overhead and kind of you know dream

of what it would be like to fly myself. Of course my parents didn't have the money to give me flying

lessons that would have been totally ridiculous to ask them for that. So I ended up joining the

military. The Air Force taught me how to fly and that I think is what led me eventually into the

astronaut program. Well, Hannah, you're from the UK. When do you remember first encountering

Eileen's story? I'm ashamed to say I didn't know Eileen's story and that was one of the reasons

I really wanted to make the film because when I read her book I thought what an absolutely

incredible story. So her quite tough upbringing combined with being the first woman to pilot and

command shuttle which was incredible and then being part of some really jeopardist missions.

It was really obviously going to be a great film and people would know her name if they didn't

already because I'm from London and I just don't think many people do. Well Eileen you mentioned

you really put yourself through the you earned the money yourself to get a pilot's license.

Am I right that you were kind of a natural? How did you discover that? That's a cool talent to have.

That's right. Well I in the film I talk about how I was never good at sports. I tried basketball

and I tried very sports when I was tennis. I was okay but I was never really good at it and so

I was kind of searching my life. I'm a teenager and I'm kind of searching out what I'd be good at.

I was interested in flying so when I was 16 I started these part-time jobs saving money. I

worked minimum wage jobs and in Space Woman they talk about the different jobs I did as a teenager

and by the time I was going on 20 years old I had the money. I had a thousand dollars which at the

time was enough to get a pilot's license so I started flying and I found out that I was good at flying.

I could take off in land I could do the maneuvers, hit the altitudes and air speeds I could talk

in the radio and I mean you're looking down at the beautiful earth and I thought I can do this.

This is something that I can make my career. Unfortunately at the time the Air Force had just

open flight training to women because before let's see they opened in 1976 before that we were

women were not allowed to fly in any one of the military services but the country made the country's

leadership made a decision to start bringing women into flight training. I was actually in a test

program back in 1978 to determine if women could fly military aircraft or not and of course

we know the answer now women fly just like men so it was not today it's not a big deal and young

young girls can dream of being an astronaut yes but they can also dream of the any kind of pilot

that they want to be so I was happy to be part of like maybe breaking that barrier for women.

Absolutely I mean and I'm glad you brought up this this period of your life that was a test pilot

and the Air Force. I don't know that people think about how dangerous that job really is. Why is

it so risky? Yeah so I had spent time as a test pilot also in fact Hannah our film director was

able to get some footage from the Air Force test pilot school from you know past present

in future and we managed to weave that into space woman but I love doing the test flying

that flew 30 different types of aircraft in one year because of my rank I was the class leader

of my test pilot school class there were 25 of us and here I am is a not only is a woman but a cargo

pilot and I'm the class leader for all these fighter pilots and you know tough top gun guys and

it turned out we all made us to work well together and I think the solution to that was we're a team

and we help each other get through these tough schools and these tough missions that we fly in

the military and it really is about being a team and not saying well you're different because you're

a woman but working together but you know frankly so watch space woman you're going to see that

yeah we were different back in the days that women were breaking down these barriers so it's

a good story to have a documentary and just to come in there Eileen obviously to be a test pilot

you're testing the limits of these jets so you're it's by definition you're doing the most dangerous

flying of them because you're testing the limits so that was kind of amazing that hadn't happened

with women before and you know we discovered this old footage this brilliant video that was

for people joining the Air Force and it was all about men and so they did a little skip when they

were test when they were at flight school Pat and Eileen Pat Eileen's husband they did a joke

and they swapped the roles so they did the exact video except it was the other way round and he

was the house husband and she was the pilot and we used that in the film so you know it was a

different era it really was battle of the sexes era and Eileen came through it. It's so delightful

Eileen speaks really matter-of-factly about all of these barriers that she just barrelled down

to her horn for her here I mean this was really shortly after the first women like Sally ride

were accepted at NASA how how huge was it when when Eileen made that move to NASA and then

was on this path to being a pilot. Yeah so if they hadn't allowed women to fly the jets in in the

Air Force then you wouldn't have been able to make it through to the shuttle program so as a pilot

so Sally ride obviously it was a great achievement to go to space but she didn't fly the spaceship

so that's why it was so huge when Eileen came along and you see her in a room full of these male

pilots and it's really that kind of right stuff world still at that stage and it's tough

and she had to prove herself so yeah she doesn't talk about it in that way but it must have been

a real feat to do that. Eileen you became the first woman not just to pilot a spacecraft but

also to command one why would you want the weight of a mission on your shoulders? Well you know I

I love a challenge I have found that once I really learned as much as I could about the

space shuttle of course I was always continuing learning and learning getting to know the people

the other astronauts the flight directors the engineers the technicians the people that worked

in the shuttle program I loved the mission so much and I think that I feel confident in myself

as far as being a decision-maker being a person who likes to encourage communication I like to

be good listener I'd like to ask people questions I want to encourage creativity so I think in that

respect that was the type of leader that I was not really a yelling orders at people but being a

collaborative type of leader and when you're in a I would say a mission like flying in space where

everyone is very educated and already dedicated to the mission they love the mission I would say

you need a different type of leader for that so I was kind of a collaborative leader and especially

at the time when we had the terrible accident and this will come out in the film when we lost the

space shuttle Columbia in 2003 people needed someone to talk to people felt horrible about the accident

and I found myself in a leadership role of going around and being a listener and trying to bring

people together so I think for me it was more of being a natural type of leader in the sense that

I want to listen and I want to help people and I want them to be better in their job and

the most important of all is keeping everyone focused on the mission so I felt like I was very well

prepared I wanted to be the commander of the flight after the accident and I was happy that Nessa

had the confidence in me to keep me on and fly that mission that was called return to flight it

was a huge challenge but you know what an honor I was so well prepared you know I'm not going to

say you know I was better than anybody else I think it was just that I hit the places I had been

made me very well prepared yeah you know there's a moment in the film that highlights some advice

you gave to another female astronaut what in general is your lesson for women in leadership or

women who want to be in leadership yeah so there's so much I could say about that my first thing is

you need to know as much as possible about your job be as good as you can in your job but also

learn about your industry so read the history of your industry read case studies of where people

made mistakes what was done to correct for those and then secondly be a good communicator which

means being a good listener and I find that some people tend to intimidate I didn't want to be that

kind of person so I I think it's the way we approach people and looking them in the eye and

saying hey I I value you and I want to know what you're thinking so don't ever be afraid to speak

up and then the last thing I'd say is it falls on integrity you know being being honest with people

and having that trust factor that you can trust people to be honest in the future and so I always

try to come back to those three things knowing your job communicating and maintaining a sense of

integrity so that's the same type of advice I'd give there to women but also to men and you always

stay focused on the mission well Hannah this film Spacewoman has made the rounds in film festivals

and now you're taking it to different parts of the US do you just have to be passionate to make

this kind of of independent film and and really want to bring it to audiences definitely I mean

independent documentary making is not an easy business anymore um but we knew we had a great

story with islands and it's emotional and it's involving and it's jeopardists and people should

come and see it we're doing lots of Q&A so just look up on spacewoman.film and you can find

all the information about whether there's a cinemasque reading it near you well of course we didn't

touch on all the aspects of the film there's there's your relationship with your daughter Eileen

there's there's so much of the sort of the pressure of of people just asking about your role as a

mother and and as a woman Hannah what do you hope that people take away from this film?

I hope that if they see this pioneering women they take away that it wasn't easy you can't do

everything brilliantly at every single point and that's fine it's worth it do it follow your passions

follow your dreams women and men and take you know sometimes you have to take risks as well that's

the other thing about live modern life it's lots all quite safety but it's also to be human is to

take those risks and especially risks when you have endeavor and so that's kind of the messages

of the film Eileen what would you add? Well you know the the film is actually two things

it the first of all it's the missions I flew my time in the Air Force and then the four missions

I flew on the space shuttle but what Hannah really brought in that I thought she did such a great

job on that I hadn't really thought about as much was my family you know of course I think about

my family but what role would that be in the space woman film? Well Hannah has brought out

what did my husband feel during all the missions I flew what especially my daughter who was seven

years old when the accident happened and then nine years old when I flew the return to flight

mission after the accident and kind of revolves around her story also and you know how do

family members feel when their loved one goes off into something dangerous or risky and that part

really was kind of new to me seeing you know my daughter being interviewed and her her feelings

up there on the screen and I think that's what really touches people is they watch the film it's

not just about cool space missions but it's also about humans and how we relate to each other.

Eileen Collins was the first woman to pilot and command a spacecraft the film space woman is

based on her book through the glass ceiling to the stars and is directed by Hannah Berryman

it's coming to theaters in Texas in April Eileen Hannah thank you both again thanks so much for

having us thanks enjoyed it thanks so much for listening to the Texas standard KUT in the

Texas standard our members of the NPR network it's an independent coalition of public media

podcasters you can find more shows in the network wherever you get your podcasts I'm David Brown

we'll see you tomorrow.

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allowing users to send spend and receive an up to 40 currencies with a few simple tabs

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