Two centuries of combined experience
2015-12-15
This year, Johnson Space Center honored three employees with 50-year service awards and one employee with a 55-year service award. Taken collectively, they have more than two centuries of experience with various aspects of NASA’s space program. In today’s business environment, working one’s entire career with one employer is unusual, but perhaps when you consider that the employer is NASA, that doesn’t sound so unusual anymore.
Over the course of a half-century, a person will experience many difficult challenges, as well as great successes. For these four people, it’s not just a job but a passion that gets them out of bed and brings them to work every day for 50-plus years.
Ed Fein, JSC chief Intellectual Property counsel, said that his enthusiasm is for the people, both in the Legal Office and the clients they serve.
“I love what we have accomplished over my career and eagerly anticipate what the future holds for human spaceflight,” Fein said.
For Fein, the moment that stands out most vividly in his NASA career was witnessing the night launch of Apollo 17, the final mission to the moon, but he’s still looking forward to the next and greater step for NASA.
For Jared Woodfill, Technical Managers’ Representative of the Software, Robotics and Simulation Division, it’s the opportunity to pass along his love of innovation and human spaceflight to the next generation. His career has been full of tumultuous moments, from the tension of solving the excess carbon dioxide problem for Apollo 13 to the solemnity of analyzing the final moments of Challenger. Just as Woodfill was inspired by seeing President John F. Kennedy speak about traveling to the moon at Rice Stadium in 1962, he hopes to inspire adults and children alike about the wonders and benefits of space exploration and NASA’s Journey to Mars.
Woodfill and Fein, along with Elvin Pippert, deputy manager of International Space Station flight software development, were recognized for their 50 years of service to NASA. Jerry Goodman, Aerospace Technologist in Human/Machine Systems, was recognized for his 55 years of service.
JSC is pleased to honor these employees, along with the many others who have contributed so much to the advances of human spaceflight. NASA was recently named the best place to work in the federal government for the fourth year in a row. As NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said, “Everyone who walks through our doors to raise the bar of human achievement does so with a great amount of passion, and that’s truly the only way we can accomplish the huge challenges of exploring space, learning more about our planet and increasing human capabilities.”
Michelle Fraser-Page
NASA Johnson Space Center
Over the course of a half-century, a person will experience many difficult challenges, as well as great successes. For these four people, it’s not just a job but a passion that gets them out of bed and brings them to work every day for 50-plus years.
Ed Fein, JSC chief Intellectual Property counsel, said that his enthusiasm is for the people, both in the Legal Office and the clients they serve.
“I love what we have accomplished over my career and eagerly anticipate what the future holds for human spaceflight,” Fein said.
For Fein, the moment that stands out most vividly in his NASA career was witnessing the night launch of Apollo 17, the final mission to the moon, but he’s still looking forward to the next and greater step for NASA.
For Jared Woodfill, Technical Managers’ Representative of the Software, Robotics and Simulation Division, it’s the opportunity to pass along his love of innovation and human spaceflight to the next generation. His career has been full of tumultuous moments, from the tension of solving the excess carbon dioxide problem for Apollo 13 to the solemnity of analyzing the final moments of Challenger. Just as Woodfill was inspired by seeing President John F. Kennedy speak about traveling to the moon at Rice Stadium in 1962, he hopes to inspire adults and children alike about the wonders and benefits of space exploration and NASA’s Journey to Mars.
Woodfill and Fein, along with Elvin Pippert, deputy manager of International Space Station flight software development, were recognized for their 50 years of service to NASA. Jerry Goodman, Aerospace Technologist in Human/Machine Systems, was recognized for his 55 years of service.
JSC is pleased to honor these employees, along with the many others who have contributed so much to the advances of human spaceflight. NASA was recently named the best place to work in the federal government for the fourth year in a row. As NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said, “Everyone who walks through our doors to raise the bar of human achievement does so with a great amount of passion, and that’s truly the only way we can accomplish the huge challenges of exploring space, learning more about our planet and increasing human capabilities.”
Michelle Fraser-Page
NASA Johnson Space Center
Jerry Goodman, recipient of NASA’s 55-year-service award.
Image Credit: NASA/Bill Stafford
Ed Fein, recipient of NASA’s 50-year-service award.
Image Credit: NASA/Bill Stafford
Elvin Pippert, recipient of NASA’s 50-year-service award.
Image Credit: NASA/Bill Stafford
Jared Woodfill, recipient of NASA’s 50-year-service award.
Image Credit: NASA/Bill Stafford