Actually been in space and that is astronaut Leland Melvin and, mr. Melvin, you write that your book is called chasing space and you write that it had all begun with a dropped pass. Yeah, exactly. A dropped path, i pass. I block a lot and we were at a homecoming game. The ball was perfectly thrown in the game and i dropped a touchdown pass in my hands and the thing is a scout was there from the university of richmond looking to see if i could play football for the team. He walked out of the stadium, my coach green believed in me, this time i caught the ball, that one catch resulted in 180,000dollar scholarship to the university of richmond because the coach said he didnt give up, he kept going. That was the grits and the first and the second chance. How did you get from playing from the university of richmond spiders to Space Shuttle missions . I think the turning of season from 010 around to 38 in playoffs brought the College Scout and then all of the hard work and dedication and disc
Fire, john young who is not a liar is a friend of mine who interviewed me to become an astronaut, walked on the moon. I believe in this man, he is an honest honorable person. I believe in the Space Program and i know we have walked on the moon because of the efforts to help advance our civilizations and listen to these conspiracy theorists. Some who dont believe the earth is round. I have seen the earth from space, the earth is round. You cant buy into this stuff on you youto be. Any more scientists with analytical minds that can discern these Different Things and understand these things are real. Host you talk about the twang . Guest when you are sitting in the shuttle for three main engines come on and are off from the stack, the entire shuttle rotates forward and we come back, the main engines light, there are eight bolts with explosive charges that are ignited and they blow away and we are off and it is amazing because when you come back up, but weighing on a screen door you open,
I retired from nasa. But i help out in certain aspects when there are launches and missions and things. T im still an advocate and supporter of helping our space program. How is your 90acre Serenity Farm in lynchburg . The farm got sold. Im doing other things involved in kids getting outdoors and believing themselves. In here is the cover of the book. Called, chasing space, an astronaut story of grit, grace and second chances. T the author and our guest is leland melvin. Booktv live coverage of the is 7th annual book festival now continues. Well hear from bestselling author, michael lewis. His most recent book, the undoing project. A friendship that changed our mind. This is booktvs live coverage. Can you hear me . Im hearing an echo. Its all good . We just found out michael is supposed to do a power point presentation. That will take us half an houred to find the power point presentation he forgot to bring. Thank you for being here. Thank you to the library of congress. Thank you to d
And that is astronaut Leland Melvin. And, mr. Melvin, you write that your book is called chasing space, and you write that it had all begun with a dropped pass. Guest exactly. A dropped pass. So i was a wide receiver on a running team, and that means that i block a lot versus catching passes. We were at a homecoming game, i was running down the sideline, the ball was perfectly thrown io my hand, and i drop a touchdown pass in my hands. And the thing is, a scout wasro there from the university of richmond looking to see if i could play football for the team. He walked out of the stadium. My coach, jimmy green, believed in me. Get back out there, run the same play. That one catch resulted in a 180,000 scholarship to the university of richmond becauseep the coach said he didnt give up, he kept going. So that was the grit and the perseverance and the second chance. Host how did you get from playing for the university of retch monday spiders to richmond spiders to two Space Shuttle missions