I was the chairman of the 1971 MIT Convention, and that is where I met Harry Stine for the first time. I was an MIT sophomore, not yet fully accustomed to running things and public speaking, and he was a mythic god-like figure to me.

The plan that Harry had developed for the mini-jet rollout involved press coverage at the MITCON launch, which was supposed to be out at a large flying field outside of Boston. We were planning to bus the MITCON participants to the launch, the normal practice for MITCONs.

The year before I arrived at MIT the convention had its cash box stolen and ended up with a big debt to MIT for convention expenses. I had held MIT off from collection when I ran the 1970 MITCON (and paid part of the debt from that event's profits), but shortly before the 1971 MITCON the school demanded full payment for the balance. I had to make a major cut in the MITCON 1971 expenses at the last minute, so I canceled the buses and shifted the launch to be on the MIT athletic field, not a large launch site.

When Harry arrived at MITCON and heard the news, he was absolutely furious at the disruption to his public relations plan. He got right in my face, and used not very pleasant language to express his displeasure. You can imagine how a 19-year-old college student felt about this introduction!

We did the launch on the MIT fields and it went fine.

Harry and I became good friends over the subsequent years of working together on rocketry safety issues and NAR business, and he even dedicated one of his sci-fi books to me due to my career Navy service. But I'll never forget how I met him!

Trip Barber
NAR 4322