my dad was usaf and one the first 1000 to break the sound barrier so he had a ton of fun stories. I knew the full back story but what fun would that be. HaInteresting factoid- NASA looked at using mechanical pencils from the beginning of the space program but the problem is that it creates little flakes of floating graphite which can interact with sensitive electronics. They had especially low risk tolerance after a fire linked to a short circuit killed 3 astronauts. Soviets had a far higher risk tolerance as their ethos was “we can always get another cosmonaut.”
Also nasa didn’t engineer the pen, it was made by a private company (cost them millions to develop) and sold to NASA but I’m sure it wasn’t cheap to buy!
Sorta like China right now. They will do anything to win including taking our ideas then failing on implementing. Ha