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Captain Jim Lovell Oral History
Captain Jim Lovell Oral History

Captain Jim Lovell Oral History

Object number2007.001.0003
Date01/17/2007
ClassificationsOral Histories
Oral history interview subject
Oral history interviewer
ObjectOral history
Credit LineOral History Collection/The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza
MediumHi-8 videotape
DimensionsDuration: 26 Minutes
Collections
  • All Online Objects
  • Oral History Collection
DescriptionVideotaped oral history interview with Captain Jim Lovell. Lovell joined NASA in 1962 and became an astronaut for the Gemini and Apollo programs. He served as command module pilot during the Apollo 8 mission in 1968 (the first mission to orbit the moon) and as commander of the Apollo 13 mission in 1970. At the time of the Kennedy assassination, he was with his friend, astronaut Neil Armstrong, who would later become the first man to walk on the moon in July 1969. Interview recorded at the Frontiers of Flight Museum in Dallas on January 17, 2007 by Stephen Fagin. The interview is twenty-six minutes long.
Curatorial Commentary
The year 2007 provided an extraordinary opportunity to record a number of interviews with individuals involved in some way with the U.S. Space Program. In addition to this interview with Gemini and Apollo astronaut Jim Lovell, I had the great honor of interviewing Apollo astronaut Walt Cunningham, Space Shuttle astronaut James F. Reilly, and the legendary test pilot Chuck Yeager, who was commandant of the U.S. Air Force Aerospace Research Pilot School at the time of the Kennedy assassination. In addition, I had the opportunity to interview actor Bill Paxton. While the subject of that interview was primarily his eyewitness account of seeing President Kennedy outside the Hotel Texas in Fort Worth on the morning of the assassination, he also briefly talked about his performance as Apollo astronaut Fred Haise in the movie Apollo 13 (1995), in which actor Tom Hanks portrayed Captain Jim Lovell. - Stephen Fagin, Curator
Captain Lovell passed away on August 7, 2025. - Stephen Fagin, Curator