NASA MOD Email regarding Henry Allen’s Passing

From: KNIGHT, JACK (JSC-DV) (NASA)

Sent: Friday, April 23, 2004 09:53

To: DL MOD DV Division Personnel

Subject:  Henry Allen’s Passing
 

I have been informed that Henry Allen passed away a few hours ago. As
all
of you probably know, he was diagnosed with inoperable cancer a couple
of
weeks ago and it has now taken him from us. Henry had been involved
with
JSC for over 18 years and in the network business for many years before
that.

The times that he and our colleagues shared in the 20th century appear
now
to have been truly among the best of times. We were battling Mother
Nature and her laws of physics and chemistry. Competence was what
counted. We worked and made decisions and built things that carried
out
their design goals, at least well enough to get us to the Moon before
the
decade was out. And not once, but six times to the surface.

The first real space station, Skylab, was built, launched and we
operated
it for 9 months. The science return was wildly in excess of
expectations.
We learned about data compression and large data-set management.

The Space Shuttle was built on the dreams of Henry and others who
longed
for mass access to space. It was, and is, a marvelous vehicle, though
fragile in many ways.

Henry jumped in when the X-38 team needed an innovative ground team to
make it happen, he  helped make the Space Station happen, and was
instrumental in our efforts to understand the Switched Ethernet
technologies and others.

His contributions to the Operations team have been un-paralleled and he
was always on the leading edge of new technologies. That kind of
leadership and mentoring will continue to benefit us all far into the
future. The threads he added to the fabric of our culture continue to
bind us together and strengthen us. My poor words cannot express how
much I respect and appreciate it.

Henry will be missed.