| Harrison Schmitt | |
|---|---|
| United States Senator from New Mexico |
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| In office January 3, 1977 – January 3, 1983 |
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| Preceded by | Joseph Montoya |
| Succeeded by | Jeff Bingaman |
| Personal details | |
| Born | July 3, 1935 Santa Rita, New Mexico |
| Political party | Republican |
Harrison Hagan "Jack" Schmitt (born July 3, 1935) is an American geologist, a retired NASA astronaut, university professor, and a former U.S. senator from New Mexico.
He is the twelfth and last of the Apollo astronauts to arrive and set foot on the Moon, as Apollo 17 crewmate Eugene Cernan exited the Apollo Lunar Module first. However, as Schmitt re-entered the module first, Cernan became the last astronaut to walk on and depart the moon. Schmitt is also the only geologist as well as the only person to have walked on the Moon who was never a member of the United States Armed Forces, although he is not the first civilian; since Neil Armstrong left military service prior to his landing in 1969.[1]
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Born in Santa Rita, New Mexico, Schmitt grew up in nearby Silver City.[2] He received a B.S. degree in geology from the California Institute of Technology in 1957 and then spent a year for graduate studying geology at the University of Oslo in Norway.[2][3][4] He received a Ph.D. in geology from Harvard University in 1964, based on his geological field studies in Norway.[2]
| Harrison Hagan "Jack" Schmitt | |
|---|---|
| NASA Astronaut | |
| Nationality | American |
| Status | Retired |
| Born | July 3, 1935 Santa Rita, New Mexico |
| Other occupation | Geologist |
| Time in space | 12d 13h 52 m |
| Selection | 1965 Scientist group |
| Missions | Apollo 17 |
| Mission insignia | |
Before joining NASA as a member of the first group of scientist-astronauts in June 1965, he worked at the U.S. Geological Survey's Astrogeology Center at Flagstaff, Arizona, developing geological field techniques that would be used by the Apollo crews. Following his selection, Schmitt spent his first year at Air Force UPT learning to become a jet pilot. Upon his return to the astronaut corps in Houston, he played a key role in training Apollo crews to be geologic observers when they were in lunar orbit and competent geologic field workers when they were on the lunar surface. After each of the landing missions, he participated in the examination and evaluation of the returned lunar samples and helped the crews with the scientific aspects of their mission reports.
Schmitt spent considerable time becoming proficient in the CSM and LM systems. In March 1970 he became the first of the scientist-astronauts to receive an assignment to either a backup or primary crew. He joined Richard F. Gordon, Jr. (Commander) and Vance Brand (Command Module Pilot) on the backup crew for Apollo 15 and was clearly in line to fly as Lunar Module Pilot on Apollo 18. After the cancellation of the Apollo 18 moon mission in September 1970, it was widely expected that he would be assigned to fly on Apollo 17, the last lunar mission. That assignment was announced in August 1971. (Schmitt effectively replaced Joe Engle who had been in training with commander Gene Cernan as his Lunar Module Pilot.)
During Apollo 17's flight to the Moon in December 1972, Schmitt is believed to have taken the photograph of the Earth known as The Blue Marble, one of the most widely distributed photographic images in existence. (NASA officially credits the image to the entire Apollo 17 crew; Schmitt claims that he personally took the image.)
While on the Moon's surface, Schmitt — the only geologist in the astronaut corps — collected the rock sample designated Troctolite 76535, which has been called "without doubt the most interesting sample returned from the Moon".[5] Among other distinctions, it is the central piece of evidence suggesting that the Moon once possessed an active magnetic field.[6]
As he returned to the Lunar Module before his crewmate Gene Cernan, Schmitt is the next-to-last person to have set foot on the moon's surface.
After the completion of Apollo 17, Schmitt played an active role in documenting the Apollo geologic results and also took on the task of organizing NASA's Energy Program Office.
In August 1975, Schmitt resigned from NASA to seek election as a Republican to the United States Senate representing New Mexico. Schmitt faced two-term Democratic incumbent, Joseph Montoya, whom he defeated 57% to 42%. He served one term and, notably, was the ranking Republican member of the Science, Technology, and Space Subcommittee. He sought a second term in 1982, but due to a deep recession and concerns that he wasn't paying attention to local matters, he was defeated in a re-election bid by the state Attorney General Jeff Bingaman by a 54% to 46% margin. Bingaman's campaign slogan asked, "What on Earth has he done for you lately?".[7] Following his Senate term, Schmitt has been a consultant in business, geology, space, and public policy.
During his term in the Senate, Schmitt sat at the chamber's Candy desk.
Schmitt is an adjunct professor of engineering physics at the University of Wisconsin–Madison,[8] and has long been a proponent of lunar resource utilization.[9][10] In 1997 he proposed the Interlune InterMars Initiative, listing among its goals the advancement of private sector acquisition and use of lunar resources, particularly lunar helium-3 as a fuel for notional nuclear fusion reactors.[11]
The idea of generating significant power from helium 3 obtained from the moon is regarded as wildly impractical.[12]
Schmitt was chair of the NASA Advisory Council, whose mandate is to provide technical advice to the NASA Administrator, from November 2005 until his abrupt resignation on October 16, 2008.[13] In November 2008, he quit the Planetary Society over policy advocacy differences, citing the organization's statements on "focusing on Mars as the driving goal of human spaceflight" (Schmitt said that going back to the Moon would speed progress toward a manned Mars mission), on "accelerating research into global climate change through more comprehensive Earth observations" (Schmitt voiced objections to the notion of a present "scientific consensus" on climate change as any policy guide), and on international cooperation (which he felt would retard rather than accelerate progress), among other points of divergence.[14]
Regarding the international scientific consensus on anthropogenic climate change, Schmitt has said that "[t]he CO2 scare is a red herring",[15] that the "global warming scare is being used as a political tool to increase government control over American lives, incomes and decision-making," and that scientists who might otherwise challenge prevailing views on climate change dare not do so for fear of losing funding.[16]
Likewise, in a 2009 interview with conservative talk-radio host Alex Jones, Schmitt asserted a link between Soviet Communism and the American environmental movement: "I think the whole trend really began with the fall of the Soviet Union. Because the great champion of the opponents of liberty, namely communism, had to find some other place to go and they basically went into the environmental movement."[17]
In January, 2011, he was appointed as Secretary of the New Mexico Department of Energy, Minerals, and Natural Resources in the cabinet of Governor Susana Martinez.[18]
Harrison Schmitt wrote a book entitled "Return to the Moon: Exploration, Enterprise, and Energy in the Human Settlement of Space" in 2006.[19]
He lives in Silver City, New Mexico, and spends some of his summer at his northern Minnesota lake cabin.
Schmitt is one of the astronauts featured in the documentary In the Shadow of the Moon. He also contributed to the book NASA's Scientist-Astronauts by David Shayler and Colin Burgess.
| United States Senate | ||
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| Preceded by Joseph Montoya |
United States Senator (Class 1) from New Mexico 1977–1983 Served alongside: Pete Domenici |
Succeeded by Jeff Bingaman |
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