Finding Aid for the Robert M. Kelso Papers (HSF-59)

The Robert M. Kelso Papers is composed of flight manuals, handbooks, checklists, press kits, memorandums, telephone directories, and miscellaneous materials, used and kept by Robert M. Kelso while he worked as flight controller and later lead flight director in Flight Operations in Mission Control Center at NASA Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas. The bulk of the materials are handbooks, flight manuals, and console binders used by Kelso during the first three Space Shuttle Orbiter missions STS-1, STS-2, and STS-3, while working as a flight controller for the Shuttle between 1981 and 1982. There are also operational manuals, binders, and other records from the Space Shuttle missions STS-5, STS-8, STS-12, and STS-13. One of the more unique items in the collection is Kelso’s original National Space Transportation System reference press kit binder from 1988, providing information shared with the public regarding the Space Shuttle STS program.