Cheryl Haley

We went down to visit him just before his second surgery.

In fact, we stopped along the way, and we cut fronds from the palm trees growing along the highway, for which the police stopped us, but we ended up being able to make off with the fronds.

And so we were sitting on either side of his bed fanning him, and the nurse walked in and said, oh my goodness, you look like a god with your goddesses.

And he enjoyed that.

We met his daughter Michelle and his wife, and they were interacting with him before he went into surgery.

And it was interesting because there was a marked contrast between the way Barb and I were relating to him, which was very playful and very entertaining and lighthearted.

I really appreciate the sense of respect that he showed to me and to us.

I mean, he never came on to us sexually.

I really trusted his character, his intention, and his integrity.

And I thought that was a really beautiful thing.

I lived in California.

I went to New York to visit a friend and I had just arrived.

My friend was in the bathroom.

Phone rang and I picked it up and it was Richard Feynman.

He was going on this journey where they were going to investigate what happened to the Challenger.

He did share in great detail with me how, step by step, he investigated the process that came up with that little cheap O-ring that ended up not being replaced when it should have and was responsible for blowing up the Challenger.

He was surprised that there was so much resistance.

However, he was vindicated in the end because he did discover the reason, and he even went before Congress and demonstrated why it was the case that that little O-ring was responsible for the whole explosion.

It was also amazing that we got to watch on television together

Because I just happened to be down here at that time and everything was live on television when he dropped the O-ring in front of Congress into the glass of water.