Page "Lunar orbit rendezvous" Paragraph 14

Dr. John Houbolt would not let the advantages of LOR be ignored.

As a member of Lunar Mission Steering Group, Houbolt had been studying various technical aspects of space rendezvous since 1959 and was convinced, like several others at Langley Research Center, that LOR was not only the most feasible way to make it to the Moon before the decade was out, it was the only way.

He had reported his findings to NASA on various occasions but felt strongly that the internal task forces ( to which he made presentations ) were following arbitrarily established " ground rules.

" According to Houbolt, these ground rules were constraining NASA's thinking about the lunar mission — and causing LOR to be ruled out before it was fairly considered.