136. San Antonio’s Aerospace Past Is Powering Its Future

Bob Rivard [00:00:03]:
All right.

Bob Rivard [00:00:04]:
Welcome to Big City, Small Town, the weekly podcast all about San Antonio and the people who make it go and grow. I'm your host, Bob Rivard. We have a special program today. One week from today on September 12, the D. Howard foundation will celebrate a very special anniversary in San Antonio. That was the announcement in Washington during the Clinton administration by the Base Realignment Enclosure Commission. The Kelly Air Force Base in San Antonio would be closed. So we're joined this morning by Tullis Wells, a San Antonio attorney who's had many leadership roles in the community over the years, who also served, along with a couple of other community leaders in the transition committee that oversaw the base closure.

Bob Rivard [00:00:44]:
We have Christopher Mammon, who is the current executive director of the D. Howard foundation. And we have the program manager, Kathryn Bolish from the Wechs foundation, which promotes aerospace education. And she also happens to be one of the honorees of next week's luncheon, which we'll hear more about. So welcome one and all to Big City Small Town. Tullis, let's let's start with you. And for people that didn't live in San Antonio at the time, in 1996, 1995, excuse me, or who have been born since then, what happened in San Antonio? What was the importance of Kelly Air Force Base to the city, and what was the Base Realignment and Closure Commission?

Tullos Wells [00:01:26]:
Let me take us back to start at 1993, when first Kelly was put on. The Congress had established this commission to look at thinning out the investments the US Military was making in places that built and maintained airplanes as well as other things. In 93, we campaigned to keep Kelly open successfully with the Base Closure Commission. At that time, we knew there would be another 1 in 95, and so we taped our ankles to get ready for that. And it was a big concern because we were aware that the Air Force itself really wanted to close Kelly, having to do more with union issues and other kinds of problems that they saw in the community. So we didn't have a lot of friends at the upper level of the Air Force in the depot side of the business. We taped our ankles again and got ready to put on another campaign for 1995 with K. Bailey Hutchison and others giving us oxygen.

Tullos Wells [00:02:35]:
We worked really hard. I recall all too clearly that when we were sitting in the council chambers when the Base Closure Committee was up on the big screen and they closed McClellan Air Force Base in California, and there was a lot of cheers and applause in San Antonio in the city.

Bob Rivard [00:02:58]:
Council chambers, well, cities were pitted against one another.

Tullos Wells [00:03:01]:
They absolutely were. McClellan was up in Northern California. It was also a big depot. So it was when it was closed, we thought we were off the hook. And I remember I advised everybody, let's not applause, let's not decide. We've got it made yet. They still haven't finished their listings. And so, yeah, then they came back and announced the closure of 1995.

Tullos Wells [00:03:26]:
And what I remember most clearly about that, Bob, Bill Thornton, the first thing he did once it was announced, this was the mayor.

Bob Rivard [00:03:33]:
This was the mayor, oral surgeon, Dr. Bill Thornton.

Tullos Wells [00:03:37]:
Dr. Bill. He got all the city council members to line up, you know, know, around him and with him to say to the community and to the press, okay, we've taken a hit. But you know what? We're going to be fine. We're going to make lemonade out of these lemons.

Bob Rivard [00:03:51]:
While people that are not from San Antonio or weren't here over much of their lives may not know the central role Kelly Air Force Base played in the emergence of a Hispanic middle class with federal wages and benefits, tens of thousands of people were employed there over the decades. It was one of the first military aviation sites in the country, founded in, I think, 1916. So it was central to San Antonio's historic role in the development of aviation and military aviation. And it was a shock that was felt citywide when it was finally announced it was going to close.

Tullos Wells [00:04:26]:
It really was. And even people who had never been to Kelly Field, Kelly Air Force Base in San Antonio, felt it. The entire community really felt it. We knew what it meant whether we worked there or had family there or not. It was a blow, and it could have gone one of two ways. I will say to our friends at McClellan, they never really made lemonade out of their situation. We were pretty ambitious about doing so here. But I remember in 93, when we met with the commission in Corpus Christi, I asked Attorney General Dan Morales to come because his family was from San Antonio, his family worked at Kelly, and he gave a compelling story about how much that facility means to the city generally, but certainly to the Latino population, because it really did help create a robust Latino middle class.

Bob Rivard [00:05:20]:
And, Christopher, you can't talk about aviation history in San Antonio without adding the name of D. Howard, which may not be a household name anymore in the city, but it was in the day. Talk a little bit about D. Howard and the foundation and the work that you're doing there.

Christopher Mammen [00:05:35]:
Sure, Bob. Thanks for having me. And thank you for letting me continue to honor these inductees for or some of These inductees for the 2025 San Antonio Aviation and Aerospace hall of Fame luncheon. De Howard was a pioneer and innovator in the aerospace industry in San Antonio. If you drive to the airport, there's a road named after him now. And that's just one small piece of his legacy that leads and shows the impact that he had over time. If you see those orange hangars at the San Antonio airport, almost all of those were orig, Originally D. Howard Co.

Christopher Mammen [00:06:09]:
Hangars. So in 1947, when he was about 27 years old, he decided to become an entrepreneur in the aerospace industry. And over the decades following employed more than 1500 folks within the industry in the San Antonio region. And that was engine overhauls, plane builds. It was over 40 patents, 100 FAA certifications that he helped bring to the industry, but also created here in the San Antonio region. So the impact, we will never know truly the lasting impact that he had. But the industry is here because of the investment that he made in the people and his companies in the San Antonio region. So when he passed, his business partner and longtime friend Wayne Fagan worked with his family to establish the D.

Christopher Mammen [00:06:56]:
Howard Foundation. And the purpose of that was to make sure that students at all levels had access and were inspired by the aerospace industry. So our purpose and our mission is centered around making sure that they know what the industry is, is about where they know what the careers are possible for these students. And we focus on the K12 level because we're looking at that long term investment for these students to get them interested at that middle school level, continue it on to high school and bridge to that post secondary or direct to the workforce. So we do that each year through a number of experiential learning opportunities, project based learning, work based learning opportunities for these students in the community. We focus on the educators too. We do educator externships so that they're aware of what industry is today and into the future for the careers. Because we want to stay beyond next.

Christopher Mammen [00:07:48]:
We don't want to prepare these students for what aerospace is now or next, but what is 10 or 20 years from now? In 20 years we're probably all going to be taking flights without a pilot. What does that mean? What does that mean for technologies? What does that mean for what the students should be learning in middle school now so that they're innovative in the future? And another opportunity that we have to continue the legacy of Dee Howard, but also aerospace and aviation in San Antonio is the annual hall of Fame luncheon where we get to honor Those who have had that lasting impact and continue to have our hope for the industry in the community going forward too as well.

Bob Rivard [00:08:26]:
And I've attended that event a number of times over the years. So what's the origin of the Aviation hall of Fame and when did that get started?

Christopher Mammen [00:08:35]:
So the organization, the D. Howard foundation, started in 2013. In 2016, Wayne Fagan, the then volunteer executive director, Director, but started and continued the organization's mission for a long time, decided that we needed to honor those who had had that impact. So we are military city. There was a lot of military connection with aerospace, but then there was industry and education side too, as well on the investment that he wanted to honor. So from the beginning origins of the hall of Fame, we've honored Air Force wings, we've honored individuals like Ed Swearengen, we've honored the Stinson family and more recently the Latina military pilot Olga Custodio, we've been able to honor too as well, and everybody in between. So what we want to do is make sure that we continue this history on understanding the history in the San Antonio region of what aerospace is. But then each year we also honor somebody who is innovative in the space and building that new generation of folks that are interested in aerospace and the new technology.

Christopher Mammen [00:09:42]:
So we happen to have Kathryn Bullish, who is joining us today, who is our Hope for the Future Future Award, our honoree this year at the hall of Fame luncheon.

Bob Rivard [00:09:50]:
And talk about before we get to Catherine, your other honorees obviously tell us Wells here also is being honored, but who are you honoring and why?

Christopher Mammen [00:09:58]:
Yeah, So I mentioned Mr. Wayne Fagan. So we're we're able to honor him this year with the Chairman's Award. And this is his legacy literally stretches decades of being the business partner of D. Howard and close friend, but also and more recently in the nonprofit side through the D. Howard foundation and making sure that the future generations are prepared for aerospace. So we're getting to honor him in the 30th anniversary of the closing of Kelly Air Force Base. We're also honoring through the Legacy Award, Mr.

Christopher Mammen [00:10:29]:
Joseph Crier, who happened to be the CEO of the Greater San Antonio Chamber at the time and brought together the business partnership and awareness of what it meant to close Kelly Air Force Base. Then we have the tri chairs who were appointed by Mayor Thornton, and that includes Mr. Tolus Wells, Mr. Juan Solis and Mr. Jose Villarreal, who led the charge of bringing the community together and understanding what it meant when it was announced that Kelly Air Force Base was closed. But what we needed to do in the next steps to make sure that we kept industry in San Antonio into what is now Port San Antonio and a thriving area for commerce and industry. And then mentioned already, but our Hope for the Future award is Kathryn Bullish, and she is engaged with youth in our community, mostly related to space industry and technologies. So showing what we're getting into in the San Antonio region.

Christopher Mammen [00:11:25]:
Everybody knows Houston, West Texas, South Texas as hubs for the space industry, but San Antonio has a growing portion and hold, whether it's the education side or the research and development too, as well.

Bob Rivard [00:11:38]:
Well, we're going to want to hear about that. And we should mention that once Elise was a District 5 councilman at the time of the closure announcement. And Jose Villarreal, San Antonio attorney with close ties to the Clinton administration. So they're also being honored. Catherine, welcome again to big city, small town. Tell us about the WEX foundation and its origins and your work there.

Kathryn Bolish [00:12:01]:
Yeah, absolutely. Thank you so much for having me. And before I start, I do want to say I'm just honored to be sharing the stage at this luncheon in these next couple weeks here with some amazing people that have made some amazing impacts. And so I'm honored to be ready to make those same impacts. The WEX Foundation. I am the program manager for the Wex Foundation. It was founded by Sam Jimenez, space architect. Sam was actually one of the first space architects to ever graduate with that title out of the University of Houston, first ever cohort.

Kathryn Bolish [00:12:29]:
He was one of eight in his time. And from his graduation to now, Sam has not only in San Antonio, but around nationally and internationally, kind of made an impact in how we view space advancements in space technologies. When he decided to open WEX here in San Antonio, which was early 2010, we went to the Port area and we just used the connections that he had to start building this community of students and this passionate space mindset here in San Antonio, in the Port area. So the WEX foundation is great because we have a lot of programs and a lot of curriculum that specifically is space, STEM education. And. And so as a nonprofit, the WEX foundation has the honor of being able to reach all kinds of students in all kinds of areas. We focus on students directly around the Port. We're trying to get that underserved reach.

Kathryn Bolish [00:13:22]:
But we are in many, many regions, including Eastern New Mexico, Midland, Odessa, and we have subsidiary companies even in places like Australia and Luxembourg. And so here in San Antonio, I get the pleasure of working with the Wechs foundation to Teach what we call space stem educ. It's everything that you would imagine for aerospace STEM development, workforce. But then we throw in the extra layer of space and getting humanity into an extreme environment that we have very little experience in. We have a couple programs, and the LCATS program, as you can see here, is one of our namesake programs. LCATS was funded by NASA originally in 2017.

Bob Rivard [00:14:04]:
Let's pause and break down these acronyms. So there's WEX, related to Jimenez, since Sam's last name starts with an X. What does WEX stand for?

Kathryn Bolish [00:14:13]:
Yeah, it is actually. The WEX foundation is Waldo E. Jimenez, Sam's father.

Bob Rivard [00:14:18]:
Okay.

Kathryn Bolish [00:14:18]:
And if you were to look him up, you'd see that he is a judge, or was a judge here in San Antonio for a long time, advocating for diversity rights and really serving the underserved student population.

Bob Rivard [00:14:29]:
He knew Judge Jimenez.

Kathryn Bolish [00:14:30]:
Yeah.

Bob Rivard [00:14:31]:
I didn't know that connection.

Kathryn Bolish [00:14:32]:
Yeah. Jimenez Garage at utsa, that's. That's after Sam's dad. Yep.

Bob Rivard [00:14:37]:
And Jimenez Drive out there.

Kathryn Bolish [00:14:38]:
And Jimenez Drive as well. Yeah. So they've had a big impact. LCAT is ZAM's namesake program that we've kind of taken on as our own, and we've grown so much. It started in 2017. It stands for lunar caves, analog test sites. Two to four billion years ago, the center of the moon was a magma core, and it was constantly erupting. And so the surface of the moon was covered in molten lava that dried out.

Kathryn Bolish [00:15:04]:
And once everything collapsed and all the skylights collapsed in it revealed to us that there's an extremely intricate series of cave systems within the lunar surface that's been confirmed by NASA. The first Artemis missions were focused on getting images of those caves. They've been identified in the South Pole region and the Mare regions. So that's what we focus on in LCATs, those caves. Those caves are big enough to house entire cities. They're within the surface, so they're pressure. We can pressurize them and we can control the temperature in there. I mean, the moon gets from negative 200 to positive 200C.

Kathryn Bolish [00:15:36]:
That's not something the human body can sustain. So if we're talking about actual lunar habitation and humanity going back there to stay for multiple days, then the lava tubes are where we're going. And so LCATs, lunar caves, analog Test sites focuses on helping these students for three years. We take these students into this program and we teach them everything they would need to know to get to the moon, habitate it, and survive within these lava tubes. Year One of Elcats, we take them to caves around Texas. So the one we've been going to a lot is Whirlpool Cave in South Austin, Travis County. Shout out to the TCMA for always being so great with guiding our students down there. I mean, taking 30 students to a cave that's only belly and knee crawling, it's a big experience.

Kathryn Bolish [00:16:18]:
And so these students go down there. Yeah. And surprisingly, I've only ever had one student be a little bit too scared to keep going after she got in there. But they take a 20 foot drop on a ladder, one at a time down into a hole in the middle of nowhere. You literally walk under a bridge. Travis County. And they bring devices that they have built, things like lidar scanners and all kinds of sensor devices into these caves with them. They splunk, they get super dirty, they have the whole gear all dressed up.

Kathryn Bolish [00:16:45]:
When we get to the center cave, then they actually do scientific experiments in the caves. They use the lidar kits to take 3D scans of the walls. Things that we have confirmed with our NASA partner that this is what we're going to need to do when we get to the lunar surface. We don't want to throw humans in there. We want to throw robotics that have the LIDAR systems to tell us what it looks like, create a map for us, come back out and we're safe, give us some rock samples, that kind of thing. So throughout the three years of lcats, every year the students go to the cave and they do a different thing. They collect samples, they do the lidar. And the confidence that they get from being terrified to go in a cave where you can't stand to coming out with smiles on their faces is just.

Kathryn Bolish [00:17:23]:
It's incredible to see their confidence really shine because people are scared of aerospace, you know, and I was always told that, that it's hard to get into the aerospace community. And now that WEX is a company, that I get to say that we are the center of space in San Antonio is, is a really big award.

Bob Rivard [00:17:38]:
Catherine, your profile.

Kathryn Bolish [00:17:41]:
Thank you.

Bob Rivard [00:17:42]:
Your profile describes you as a mathematician and an entrepreneur. Where are you from and how did you get into this, this line of work?

Kathryn Bolish [00:17:51]:
Born and raised San Antonio. Actually went to UT Austin and I majored in mathematics. Covid hit 2020. It was my first year of college. They were like, get out. Came back home to San Antonio, was online at UT for a year. And then I came to utsa. And when I switched to utsa, I was lucky enough to meet people who were involved with geekdom and geekdom threw me into the small business environment of San Antonio.

Kathryn Bolish [00:18:14]:
An environment that many people, including my family, who are locals in the city for generations, had no idea that downtown San Antonio has an environment dedicated to building the small businesses in San Antonio. And not only building them, but then keeping them here to develop our economy and our workforce. So I fell in love with the community here. I started to meet people. Sam was the first one that I met. And when he told me what he was doing as a mathematician, as someone who was actively studying math and physics, Astroport really stood out to me. But also as a mathematician and someone who likes math education teaching also stood out to me. So then to come home to transfer colleges and to be in a whole new world meeting people like Sam, who told me, yes, your ideas are big and we're a company where you can focus them, teaching and the research and development portion together just felt unreal.

Kathryn Bolish [00:19:05]:
And to have watched that grown at the port over the last four years, that's where my life has been. I had the choice to go back to UT and get my graduate degree. I decided to get my graduate degree at UTSA so I could stay here and continue to work with Astroport. I get to use math at Astroport all the time. I mean, calculations for how many rovers does it take to make a lunar brick to make a lunar landing pad? Technology that is currently being developed here that not many people know about.

Bob Rivard [00:19:30]:
I think that's, that's something we should talk about a little bit about in this program, which is what's happening out in Port San Antonio in, in that space. Because it's pretty exciting that we have a role that we're playing.

Kathryn Bolish [00:19:41]:
Yes, San Antonio has a huge role. And to get to see that role just. It blows my mind every day. We have a lab space in the port and there's a lot of labs and other aerospace companies around us that have always supported us. We've grown within the port. So now what we have there is a giant for space lab with the WEX foundation connected to it. Astroport and WEX work together a lot. Astroport is a NASA and government contracted research and development company.

Kathryn Bolish [00:20:08]:
So most of our contracts come from NASA. We also have other contracts with the Air Force. We've had darpa, dod, many different funders, people interested in getting us back to the moon and beyond. Astroport sole focus is the moon. We are a lunar development based company, which is great because it means we get to work with all the Mars companies too to continue our advancement. And so every Part of this space industry is all connected. And all of the partners, everyone in Houston, everyone in Australia and Luxembourg, they all work with our company here in San Antonio to make things happen. And we make things happen to help their advancements.

Bob Rivard [00:20:39]:
And you're employed there as well as at the Wechs Foundation. You kind of divide your time.

Kathryn Bolish [00:20:43]:
I divide my time pretty equally down the middle. So with wex, I get to run our education programs and help with some curriculum development. That curriculum development comes from what I do at Astroport. So I'm actually a contract manager at Astroport. I get to run one of our NASA contracts. It's a phase two sbir for people who know that proposal phase verbiage, we don't. Okay. SBIRs are small business innovative research contracts.

Kathryn Bolish [00:21:09]:
There's two you can get from NASA, SBIRs or STTRS, which is small technology transfer research. It just depends on. One is partnered with a research university and one is partnered with research institutions. So, for example, Southwest Research and then utsa. And so those are partners that we have on many of our contracts. But we have many other partners. KBR, AstroLAB, Boeing. I mean, we have a lot of partners because what we do with NASA specifically, there's a lot of lunar development involved with the regolith.

Kathryn Bolish [00:21:37]:
Does anyone know what regolith is getting us on every Nancy Moon?

Tullos Wells [00:21:41]:
Dirt.

Kathryn Bolish [00:21:41]:
So there's a very fluffy layer of powder on the lunar surface. Because of the low gravity, it hangs maybe 10 meters up in the air. And it's dirt. It's just like dirt we have here. But if you were to look at the regolith particles under a microscope, it would look like spinas stickers, like the stickers you get in your shoes when you walk through a field because there's no water on the moon, right? There's no erosion, and so there's nothing to really flatten out those particles. There's also no atmosphere. So the cosmic and solar rays are constantly being absorbed by the regolith. And there's also constant meteorite impacts.

Kathryn Bolish [00:22:15]:
And so it's always being bombarded with more and more friction and force and fire. And that creates a very toxic, dangerous dirt on the lunar surface. The astronaut suits, their EVA suits actually switched from zippers to velcro in 2019 because the regolith was getting in the zippers. And, you know, it just, it messes everything up, especially rovers. That's why rovers have a shelf life, right? And they die. Either the regolith covers their solar panels to the point where they cannot charge anymore, or just Grinds up into their gear so much that they can't move. Astroport's biggest goal and focus and vision is how do we take the lunar regolith and turn it into something usable instead of it being the whole problem, how do we take it and make a solution out of it? And we do a lot of different work in that arena. One of the biggest things is that we melt the lunar bricks using a process called induction heating, basically turn it back into that lava form, and then we can mold it into different shapes and sizes to make moon dirt.

Kathryn Bolish [00:23:09]:
Make moon brick instead of Earth dirt. Make or earth brick. Right. Even though bricks aren't made out of dirt on Earth. If we wanted to take Earth bricks up to the moon, I think the Last estimate was 1 1/2 million dollars is what it takes cost to take a pound up there. So obviously we can't do that. And so if we want to build habitats, if we want construction and we need construction material, it has to be with what's already there. That's what we teach LCATs and all of our other programs at WEX.

Kathryn Bolish [00:23:35]:
So the greatest thing about all of this is there's a team of engineers in Port San Antonio who have rovers in house, this melting technology in house, lunar simulants in house here in San Antonio. And we use it constantly to do the testing. Astroport's actually one of the biggest companies right now in understanding how the regolith material behaves. And so while SAM is a space architecture, the biggest people on our team at this phase of this project, which we've been working on for the past four years, are material scientists, planetary geologists, people who understand the chemistry and composition of a material and how to manipulate it. We take our students at the WEX foundation and we put them in the Astroport lab, and they work directly with these engineers on solving these problems. Since you heard me say four years, it's a problem that's ongoing. Many people are trying to solve it. And as a company that's been trying to solve it, we need the brains of everyone who cares about space and has that passion in them, right? To travel the stars.

Kathryn Bolish [00:24:34]:
They come to our lab and all of these students get to put in their ideas, if they have really good ones. We've had students whose names go into our proposals and their ideas and they get credited. They get to publish papers with us as sophomores in high school and go to conferences with the work they've done on the lunar regolith. I actually have two students right now trying to solve A problem of extracting the oxygen from the regolith. And they were like, oh, can Astroport help us with that? And we were like, no, you can help Astroport with that. It's something that's very hard to do and if you want to sit and study it, we'll support you through it. And that's why I love the connection that the port gives us. Because not only Astroport is one of those partners for the WEX foundation, but we take the students to First Robotics, we take them to the Boeing center.

Kathryn Bolish [00:25:18]:
And so Sam sat and they see all of these other companies and they get to hear that their ideas are things that they can chase and follow because there's a support system here.

Bob Rivard [00:25:27]:
I can see why you're being honored.

Kathryn Bolish [00:25:30]:
Thank you.

Christopher Mammen [00:25:31]:
Kathryn embodies hope for the future for sure.

Kathryn Bolish [00:25:34]:
Oh, I can't wait. We're in the future. That's the thing.

Bob Rivard [00:25:37]:
Well, the future is exciting out there. But you know, tell us, let's talk a little bit about the present for those of us that were. We're here for the before and, and we should bear in mind that Brooks Air Force Base closed at approximately the same time. And so, I don't know. There was another city in the United States that faced two military facility closures simultaneously. But not only did San Antonio find itself in that situation, but we now have two thriving enterprises and communities at Port San Antonio. The former Kelly Air Force Base and then at Brook Air, you know, now what we call Brook City Base and we just call Brooks now. But what's happening out of Port San Antonio? By last count, I think it was 18,000 smart jobs.

Bob Rivard [00:26:20]:
It's just amazing what's going on out there.

Tullos Wells [00:26:23]:
It is amazing and it didn't happen by accident. One of the most interesting things about the port is most communities just would had knee buckling responses to the BRACS and the other changes in the Department of Defense. One of the things I think we did enormously well here in San Antonio is literally pull the entire community together. Interestingly. Obviously we wanted to support the resurrection and the continuation of the aerospace industry and the DoD work here in San Antonio. When we had our first job fair with the Boeings and the other big aviation companies came to it and our message was, you come continue your work here or bring your work here and we're going to give you a deal you can't refuse. So we were pretty much in a sales mode when first we started Brooks closed, frankly, because we all wanted it to close because we wanted the scientists and everyone else out there to be able to do a broad range of things other than just what they were doing in terms of space medicine at the time. So losing Brooks wasn't.

Tullos Wells [00:27:35]:
It was not as hard for this community as the thought of losing Kelly. You look at where we are today because there have been really smart people like Jim Pirschbach, Kathryn, who seems to know exactly what's going on.

Bob Rivard [00:27:50]:
Jim's the current CEO out there.

Tullos Wells [00:27:51]:
Jim's the current CEO.

Bob Rivard [00:27:52]:
Quite a visionary in his own right.

Tullos Wells [00:27:54]:
It absolutely is. What Jim and his board have done out at the port is remarkable. And as Jim would tell you, you ain't seen nothing yet. So you back up to where we were, and we look at the communities across the country that just had knee buckling responses to changes in their DoD investments in their communities. We've done as well as, and probably much better than anyone else. The Hill Air Force Base Depot, the one in Georgia, is still working. They're still doing lots of work for dod. None of them are thriving at the level that we are here in San Antonio.

Bob Rivard [00:28:32]:
Well, you mentioned something tell us that I think is important for people that weren't here at the time and for those of us that were to recall, there was enormous community anger and hurt and defensiveness over this. We looked at the Wright brothers landing their biplane here. We looked at the role In World War I, the development of the Army Air Force before the Air Force. There was just disbelief that you could possibly close this. There was lots of mutterings about the labor unions and whether it was targeting Mexican Americans in the community from Washington. So it took a lot of work to get people over the psychological, I would say, mountain that we all faced over seeing something just ripped out of the heart of San Antonio. And we weren't really in a. In a place to imagine the future that we're now experiencing today.

Tullos Wells [00:29:24]:
It is as scalding an event as we had had in San Antonio since the Alamo. And you're correct, a lot of people were very scared of what's next because if the DoD work goes away, what's left? As we discovered, if you give us the time we need, we could resurrect lots of things. When we went to the White House built Mayor Thornton and me and some of the other folks, they asked us, what do you guys want? And we said, give us time, give us resources and give us support. And the administration really did. The conversation we had with President Clinton that evening before we flew home was just remarkable because the President was keenly aware of every particular detail about what was going on at Kelly in San Antonio. And he was obviously clearly miffed, would be a charitable way to put it, unhappy with the fact that this facility with such a huge Latino base and what such a great reputation for the kinds of things it does. The fact it was on the closure list was just aggravating to him. And we had a chance to talk with him a couple of times after that.

Tullos Wells [00:30:45]:
And so Kelly remained a really sore point and ambition point for the president and his administration, which I think redounded greatly to our benefit as we were putting together how to put a big Air Force base together and keep it going without the DOD money that we had over the years.

Bob Rivard [00:31:06]:
Christopher, I know that you are, you're going to have Dr. Bill Thornton, former Mayor Thornton, at the, at the luncheon and, and I would say one of the keys to the success of this transition was that Dr. Thornton, Tullis Wells and the rest of the, the people that went to visit with the President convinced him to what I would say was slow walking the closure. So it was announced in 95, but Kelly didn't finally close until 2001. And those six years were critical in terms of a transition where we were able to absorb the civilian jobs that were being lost out there into the more diversified economy. And actually it wasn't that long after 2001 that Toyota announced they were coming. And we saw the birth of the advanced manufacturing economy in San Antonio, which, you know, the port is key to today.

Christopher Mammen [00:31:56]:
Yes. You know, Mayor Thornton acted fast, but then he figured out how we could all act slower too as well and be intentional about how we would keep industry in San Antonio and how we would keep that workforce and innovation in our region. So along with the other honorees, Mr. Joseph Cryer and the tri chairs, they took their time and they listened to the community and evaluated what we really needed and what our skill sets were, but what our skill sets could become too, as well as a workforce, but as an industry and staying ahead of what aerospace or aviation or the technologies that are tangential to the industry could be and how port could be the center of that. And Port San Antonio remains that 30 years later. We've had announcements of the vertiport that's coming into that area I mentioned earlier. Pilotless planes are coming. It's one of the things that the D.

Christopher Mammen [00:32:47]:
Howard foundation is engaged with. Nine school districts in the San Antonio region is on drone technologies. That's not necessarily to create drone operators every year to go into the industry, but it's to understand those technologies and Innovations so that we're staying ahead of things like the Vertiport that's coming into Port San Antonio, cybersecurity that.

Bob Rivard [00:33:07]:
Can you stop right there on Vertiport? Because we've had Jim Hirsch back here in the studio talking about that. As I understand it, the shared vision out there is that we're going to have what I would call pilotless air taxis flying in and out of the port to downtown and the airport and all over the metro area. And within the space of maybe certainly.

Christopher Mammen [00:33:30]:
The next decade, if not sooner. It is already scouted out on the, on the grounds of Port San Antonio and testing will happen. You know, in the coming years. I think there will be, there will be a bigger delay on us accepting it as a transportation option versus the technology ready to be able to do that.

Bob Rivard [00:33:50]:
Put me in that car.

Christopher Mammen [00:33:53]:
But it's, you know, there are already pilotless cargo planes, pilotless 18 wheelers or driverless 18 wheelers and so forth on the roads and in the air. So the technology is there and it's ready for us. We have to figure out how it molds into our normal transportation opportunity. So the scaling of that is going to be slow and intentional. But it is, it is coming and it's something that we're going to be doing and stepping into in the next decade or two.

Bob Rivard [00:34:23]:
The future possibilities out there are both endless and exciting, but we're running out of time. If anyone listening to the program didn't know about your hall of Fame luncheon coming up next week but would like to attend, is it too late to get a ticket or.

Christopher Mammen [00:34:36]:
It's not. We still have a few tickets available, so if you go to D Howard.org, dash E-E H O W A R D.org, you'll be able to access more information on our great honorees, future inductees, but also be able to buy a ticket for the luncheon too, as well. If you can't make the event, there's still opportunity to support the D. Howard Foundation. So all proceeds from the 2025 hall of Fame go directly back to the D. Howard foundation and support those education pathways and educator externships through middle high school and post secondary in our community and you can offer donations or support in any way that you can would be much appreciated. We need to stay ahead of the technologies we've we know that aerospace is important for our region, but we know how important it is for the future of our region too. As technologies advance and the industry goes.

Bob Rivard [00:35:27]:
To new heights and Kathryn, if people are hearing for the first time about the WEX foundation and all this exciting space education that you're doing in our public schools, how do they support the foundation if they want to come on board?

Kathryn Bolish [00:35:40]:
Yeah, absolutely. If you just go to wexfoundation.org, you'll be able to access all of our programs. We actually have open applications right now for the LCATS program. So all of our programs, thanks to the Kelly Heritage foundation, are tuition free. So any student in any school district in San Antonio is welcome to apply. And there's always opportunities on wexfoundation.org for free space camps and free after school clubs, anything that they could be interested in. So just check us out online.

Bob Rivard [00:36:06]:
All right. So parents with school age children can also find out if there's opportunities there for their families in the programming.

Kathryn Bolish [00:36:13]:
K12 free programs for space STEM education. Yes sir.

Bob Rivard [00:36:17]:
Wexfoundation.org Congratulations to all three of you.

Kathryn Bolish [00:36:20]:
Thank you.

Bob Rivard [00:36:20]:
We'll see you next week. And thanks for coming on to Big City Small Town.

Christopher Mammen [00:36:24]:
Great. Thank you, Bob.

Kathryn Bolish [00:36:25]:
Thank you, Bob.

Bob Rivard [00:36:29]:
Thanks for joining us for this episode of Big City Small Town. Please share this episode with friends and colleagues and if you haven't already, sign up for Monday Musings, my weekly newsletter. Just go to bigcitysmalltown.com and add your email. Big City Small Town is brought to you by Western Urban Building, a city our children want to call home, and by Geekdom, where startups are born and smart ideas become businesses. Thanks to Corey Ames of Ensemble, Texas for the production of this show. We will see you next week.