Talking Space

In this special edition of Talking Space, we observe the anniversary of Apollo 1 allowing the crew to tell their own story and talk to us through courtesy of the NASA Internet Audio Archive.  While launch preparations for Apollo 1 were underway, NASA had held a press conference with the prime crew of what was then called Apollo-Saturn 204 Command Pilot: Virgil I. Grissom Senior Pilot: Edward H. White II and Pilot: Roger B. Chaffee The newly announced back-up crew was also in attendance:  Back-up Command Pilot: Walter M. Schirra, Back-up Senior Pilot: Donn F. Eisele Back-up Pilot: R. Walter Cunningham,   Chief of the US Astronaut Corps Donald K. "Deke" Slayton was also made available to the press for this conference.  The purpose of the press event was to introduce the new back-up crew for the flight and to highlight training for the upcoming mission of the then new 3 person spacecraft that would be the lynchpin to get the United States to the Moon.   Rather than recount the doleful events from January 27, 196