Legacy of Jim Lovell on The Brett Winterble Show

Tune in here to this Friday edition of the Brett Winterble Show! 

Brett reflects on the passing of Apollo 13 commander Jim Lovell, honoring his legendary leadership and enduring contributions to human spaceflight. At 97, Lovell leaves behind a legacy defined by courage, optimism, and an unwavering commitment to exploration. Brett connects Lovell’s extraordinary life to NASA’s recent discovery of a coral-shaped rock on Mars, billions of years old, using the moment to pose a broader question to listeners: are we still capable of achieving great things as a nation?

The segment takes a poignant turn when caller Rich shares a personal memory from 1994, recalling how Lovell agreed to speak at a trade show for a modest fee—years before his book Lost Moon and the film Apollo 13 brought him global acclaim and far higher speaking rates. Despite his rising profile, Lovell honored the original handshake agreement and even extended his stay at no additional cost, a gesture rooted in his Eagle Scout values. Brett closes by praising Lovell as a truly remarkable American whose humility and integrity matched the scale of his accomplishments.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:17):
News Talk eleven ten, ninety nine three WBT. It's the
Bretwindable Show. It is great to be with you, ladies
and gentlemen today. Seven oh four five seven zero eleven ten.
You can reach out to us on the phone line
if you want, if you're of a mind two, or
you can reach out to us with the WBT text
line driven by Liberty Buick GMC. The telephone number is

(00:38):
the same regardless of the of the two seven oh
four five seven zero eleven ten, text or call. It's
up to you. Famed Apollo thirteen Moon mission commander Jim
Lovell has passed away at the age of ninety At
the age of ninety seven. Can you believe this? Ninety
seven ninety seven. I wonder. I wonder if doing the

(01:03):
sort of things he did made him stronger and got
him to ninety seven. I mean, that's really incredible. The
Apollo thirteen commander was remembered for legendary leadership in pioneering
human space flight. Now, not so long ago, I was
very anti space. I have come around to understand the

(01:27):
importance of space. I'm not going out there, so you
guys can get to go and enjoy it all. You
want Apollo thirteen mission commander astronaut Jim Lovell had died.
He was ninety seven. People are very saddened by this. However,
he had a great life, in a great life. He
passed away in Lake Forest, Illinois. They say that we

(01:48):
are enormously proud of his amazing career and career accomplishments,
highlighted by his legendary leadership in pioneering human space flight.
The family statement continued, But to all of us he
was dad and granddad and the leader of our family.

(02:09):
Most importantly, he was our hero. We will miss him
his unshakable optimism, his sense of humor, and the way
he made each of us feel that we could do
the impossible. He was truly one of a kind. So
let me ask you this directly. Can we still do
great things? Can we still do great things? The idea

(02:34):
of becoming an astronaut, especially when there were you know,
potential issues, potential challenges, potential dangers. What kind of a
person decides to go and do that? What sort of
a person decides to go and to do that thing?

(02:56):
Is it bravery? Is it adventure? Is it I want
to do it because it's really cool? What does that mean,
how do you do this? Why do you go and
and journey in this way? It's interesting because NASA has

(03:23):
apparently found something on Mars that could be billions of
years old. I'm marrying these two stories, so don't hang up.
I will take your call. NASA found a chral shaped

(03:44):
rock on Mars that could be billions of years old.
NASA has captured the image of a choral like rock
on Mars, estimated to be several billion years old. The
Space Agency's Curiosity Rover sent back images of a small,

(04:04):
wind eroded rock that resembles a piece of coral reef
on July twenty fourth, which happens to be the four thousand,
six hundred and ninth Martian Day of the rover's mission.
The rock is about one inch wide. The Curiosity Rover

(04:29):
captured many images and sent them back. When liquid water
still existed on Mars, it carried dissolved minerals into rock cracks.
So it carried dissolved minerals into rock cracks, and here

(04:51):
on Earth you have people who are just looking for crack.
NASA sit, No, they didn't say that. Once the liquid dried,
it left the hardened minerals behind. The unusual shapes left
today were shaped by sand blasting over billions of years.

(05:13):
This is pretty incredible. Would you if you had the ability,
would you sign on to go to Mars to see
Mars in person? Not me, not interested. I don't know
how that would go, but I imagine there are people
who would want to do it. They would say, you
know what, I want to go to Mars. I want

(05:35):
to see what it's like. I want to understand more,
and I want to touch that billion year old rock thing.

Speaker 2 (05:46):
Rich.

Speaker 1 (05:46):
Welcome to the program. What's on your mind?

Speaker 2 (05:48):
Rich? Hey, Bret, I just want to tell you a
short Jim Lovel story. Sure, Jim was a retired Navy
cab and of course, and he was the commander of
Apollo thirteen and back in nineteen ninety four, we were
looking for a keynote speaker for a trade show out
in Las Vegas, which I was chairman of. So somebody

(06:12):
mentioned that Lovell had been on the board of directors
of American Bakeries. So we said, well, there's a tie
in for technology. Let's get him to do a trade
show for us. So he agreed to do it for
seven thousand dollars.

Speaker 1 (06:24):
Wow.

Speaker 2 (06:25):
Well, months later we found out he was writing his
book Lost Moon, which went to the top of the
New York Times bestseller list. So now he's doing a
book tour and he's making like thirty forty thousand dollars
an engagement. But on top of that, they took every
chapter of his book and turned it into a screenplay
for the movie of the thirteen Wow. So by the

(06:47):
time Lovell is doing our business, which was shortly after
the release of the movie, we were trying to figure
out what we were going to do for people the
night before the show opened. So we thought, first off, well,
maybe you'll have a golf outing. Well, there's too many companies,
too many people. That couldn't happen. But we asked Lovell
if he would be willing to come one extra day.

(07:10):
So at this point, we had two thousand dollars left
in our budget, and we're figuring, this guy is on
top of the list making thirty forty thousand dollars a pop,
how are we going to get level. Well, I come
to find out he agrees to do it. So I
asked my contact person, well, will he do it for
two thousand dollars? He says no. I said, we have
no money, says, he agrees to come in one extra night.

(07:33):
Wells we have to do is pick up his room
and his extra night of stay.

Speaker 1 (07:39):
Wow.

Speaker 2 (07:39):
And the reason he did it is because we went
after him when nobody on the planet remembered who Jim
Lovell was. Wow. And as a result, he said he
had a handshake deal with us, and he was an
eagle scout, and because he was an Eagle scout, he
honored the deal.

Speaker 1 (07:56):
God bless him. Wow. That is amazing.

Speaker 2 (08:00):
Yeah, you couldn't have met a nicer man in your
entire life. I had breakfast with that man, and I
was awestruck. He was like your dad. He was like
sitting down and having a breakfast conversation. Really an amazing American.

Speaker 1 (08:14):
That's so awesome. What a great story, What a great story. Rich,
Thank you for sharing that with this audience. I really
appreciate it.

Speaker 2 (08:21):
He was really top match number one guy.

Speaker 1 (08:25):
God God bless him, and thanks so much for sharing.
Absolutely fantastic. This is why I love talk radio. Oh Rich,
great stuff.