WEBVTT - TechStuff Classic: Sniffing Out Skunk Works Part One 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:07.800 Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio. 0:00:12.039 --> 0:00:14.520 Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, 0:00:14.640 --> 0:00:17.599 Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with iHeart Radio and 0:00:17.600 --> 0:00:19.640 I love all things tech and it is time for 0:00:19.680 --> 0:00:24.320 a classic episode of tech Stuff. This episode originally aired 0:00:24.320 --> 0:00:29.319 on November two, thousand thirteen. It is titled Sniffing Out 0:00:29.520 --> 0:00:32.800 skunk Works Part One, which I guess is a hint 0:00:32.880 --> 0:00:35.199 of what next week's classic episode is going to be. 0:00:35.600 --> 0:00:39.599 Skunk Works is a fun little catch all phrase these 0:00:39.720 --> 0:00:45.040 days for secret R and D facilities within different companies, 0:00:45.360 --> 0:00:50.159 although it originally had a very specific designation, let's listen 0:00:50.280 --> 0:00:57.840 in it's people given the freedom. This is black ops 0:00:57.920 --> 0:00:59.880 kind of things that like the X Files really and 0:01:00.160 --> 0:01:03.400 was talking about. Yeah, so, but it can be anything, right, 0:01:03.440 --> 0:01:05.920 Like we've got another episode that we just did, the 0:01:06.120 --> 0:01:08.880 Google Loon, which really that's part of Google X, which 0:01:08.959 --> 0:01:10.880 in a way is kind of a skunk works for Google. 0:01:10.920 --> 0:01:14.839 It's top secret, super advanced research. Perhaps less top secret 0:01:14.840 --> 0:01:17.880 than the stuff that Lockheed skunk Works has been working on, 0:01:18.000 --> 0:01:20.480 because they tend to be working on contracts for the 0:01:20.520 --> 0:01:23.840 US government, yes, and specifically the military exactly. So We're 0:01:23.840 --> 0:01:27.440 talking about stuff that is, at least on some level, 0:01:27.520 --> 0:01:32.640 meant to protect people rights, meant to protect real human lives, 0:01:32.680 --> 0:01:36.720 and therefore secrecy is important to maintain that. Before we 0:01:36.760 --> 0:01:38.759 get into skunk works, we really need to just give 0:01:38.800 --> 0:01:43.000 a quick overview of Lockheed Martin. Now, Lockheed Martin as 0:01:43.000 --> 0:01:46.120 an entity is relatively recent the past couple of decades, 0:01:46.160 --> 0:01:49.600 but both Lockheed and Martin have existed since the beginning 0:01:49.760 --> 0:01:54.120 of the century. Yeah, nineteen twelve August sixteen, that's when 0:01:54.120 --> 0:01:57.640 Glenn L. Martin, who was a pilot and someone who 0:01:57.680 --> 0:02:00.880 would who built his own planes, had his first flight 0:02:00.920 --> 0:02:03.320 back in nineteen o nine, but in nineteen twelve, that's 0:02:03.320 --> 0:02:06.520 when he formed the Glenn L. Martin Company in Los 0:02:06.520 --> 0:02:10.080 Angeles and he was building planes there. On December nineteenth, 0:02:10.200 --> 0:02:14.959 nineteen twelve, two brothers Alan and Malcolm Lockheed, who also 0:02:15.160 --> 0:02:17.640 were in the process of building their own aircraft, although 0:02:17.680 --> 0:02:20.799 they wouldn't have their first flight until nineteen thirteen, they 0:02:20.880 --> 0:02:25.600 founded the Alco Hydro Aeroplane Company, which later they decided 0:02:25.600 --> 0:02:28.800 to call the Lockheed Aircraft Company UM. And they were 0:02:29.440 --> 0:02:33.320 really specializing early on in building fast sea planes that 0:02:33.720 --> 0:02:39.359 established many speed and distance records for overwater flights. So, uh, 0:02:39.560 --> 0:02:45.079 these guys all were at the very beginning. We're talking 0:02:45.120 --> 0:02:48.760 like airplanes had barely existed when these companies started making stuff, 0:02:48.760 --> 0:02:52.160 not fall out of the sky, right And uh So 0:02:52.240 --> 0:02:54.520 it's funny. I like, I was reading up on some 0:02:54.600 --> 0:02:56.880 of the engineers, and I kept coming across names that 0:02:56.919 --> 0:03:01.120 I recognized, like Donald Douglas and James McDonald. Anyone who's 0:03:01.120 --> 0:03:03.280 flown a lot starts to recognize these names because we 0:03:03.280 --> 0:03:06.720 have aircraft named after them. Um, and both companies were 0:03:06.760 --> 0:03:13.920 absolutely instrumental in in defining what the early airplane industry was. 0:03:14.040 --> 0:03:17.959 And also they were really instrumental in helping the US 0:03:18.040 --> 0:03:23.160 military get its place in an error combat. Right Without 0:03:23.200 --> 0:03:25.519 Without the engineers who would come out of these companies, 0:03:25.600 --> 0:03:27.800 I don't think that we would have done as well 0:03:27.880 --> 0:03:32.359 in um several of the wars that we've participated in. Yeah, 0:03:32.400 --> 0:03:34.840 not to mention just commercial flight, because a lot of 0:03:34.880 --> 0:03:38.880 the developments that we would have coming to the military 0:03:38.880 --> 0:03:41.800 flights would end up being used in commercial aspects. Now, 0:03:41.880 --> 0:03:44.040 when we talk about skunk works, were mostly talking about 0:03:44.080 --> 0:03:47.280 military because it's really the top secret stuff. Uh, And 0:03:47.360 --> 0:03:50.280 we'll get more into that before we get into get 0:03:50.320 --> 0:03:52.960 that far, we should talk about some other early stuff 0:03:53.000 --> 0:03:57.560 at Lockheed. For example, in nineteen thirty, Lockheed built a 0:03:57.600 --> 0:04:01.720 prototype two seater pursuit air craft fighter called the XP 0:04:02.080 --> 0:04:06.120 nine hundred, and the US military ended up purchasing the 0:04:06.160 --> 0:04:10.520 prototype and redesignated it the y P twenty four, and 0:04:10.560 --> 0:04:14.720 eventually they ordered five why one P twenty four fighters 0:04:15.080 --> 0:04:18.560 and four why one A nine attack aircraft. Now here's 0:04:18.560 --> 0:04:21.400 the fun thing about this podcast. Y'all gonna be lettle 0:04:21.480 --> 0:04:25.120 letters and numbers. It's it's pretty unavoidable. I I think 0:04:25.120 --> 0:04:27.240 that probably what's going to happen is Jonathan is going 0:04:27.279 --> 0:04:29.680 to read those out. I am going to say the 0:04:29.760 --> 0:04:31.680 nice nickname that someone has come up with these things, 0:04:31.720 --> 0:04:33.919 and then we will proceed to call it that nickname 0:04:33.960 --> 0:04:35.880 forever and ever and ever. Right, And I don't have 0:04:35.960 --> 0:04:37.880 a nickname for these, so I'm just calling them Bob. 0:04:38.839 --> 0:04:42.240 Bob was never actually built. Because here's the thing that 0:04:42.560 --> 0:04:46.200 so the U. S Military had ordered aircraft from Lockheed, 0:04:46.480 --> 0:04:48.760 but there was something else that happened right around nineteen 0:04:49.360 --> 0:04:51.680 little thing called the Great Depression, which, by the way, guys, 0:04:51.839 --> 0:04:54.799 wasn't so great, pretty pretty crappy, No it's a pretty 0:04:54.800 --> 0:04:57.760 crappy depression. It was huge F minus would not would 0:04:57.800 --> 0:05:01.920 not buy from again, No, no, yes, do not recommend um. Yeah. 0:05:01.960 --> 0:05:08.760 So great depression obviously was a devastating economic global economic disaster. Yeah. 0:05:08.800 --> 0:05:12.159 And Luckheed itself would go into bankruptcy in ninety two, 0:05:12.160 --> 0:05:14.960 they go into bankruptcy. They were only bankrupt for five 0:05:15.000 --> 0:05:18.040 whole days. After that, a group of investors kind of 0:05:18.040 --> 0:05:19.920 swooped in and safe from, didn't it. Yep, yep. They 0:05:19.960 --> 0:05:23.039 poured enough money to keep the company going. But those 0:05:23.080 --> 0:05:25.000 five days, I mean, the fact that Lockeed had been 0:05:25.000 --> 0:05:27.320 struggling so for so long and then had finally gone 0:05:27.320 --> 0:05:30.520 into bankruptcy had done a lot of damage. And so 0:05:30.720 --> 0:05:33.960 that that plan to build those early aircraft for the 0:05:34.000 --> 0:05:37.359 military fell through. So that would not be the first 0:05:37.480 --> 0:05:42.080 aircraft order that Lockheed would really fulfill for the military. 0:05:42.080 --> 0:05:44.800 But it wasn't too much longer after that that they 0:05:44.839 --> 0:05:49.080 would manage to do it. Seven. Uh. There was an 0:05:49.080 --> 0:05:52.920 important team led by how Hibberd and assisted by someone 0:05:52.960 --> 0:05:56.080 who will become incredibly important in this podcast one, Clarence 0:05:56.279 --> 0:05:59.960 Kelly Johnson. Yeah, and they were designing a new type 0:06:00.000 --> 0:06:03.240 a fighter using twin engines. Called the XP thirty eight, 0:06:03.640 --> 0:06:06.359 which eventually would be called the P thirty eight Lightning, 0:06:06.760 --> 0:06:09.920 and it is awesome. It's been called the most maneuverable 0:06:10.000 --> 0:06:13.200 and furthermore, the most beautiful plane in the Allied Forces 0:06:13.400 --> 0:06:15.560 and in what would become the Allied Forces in World 0:06:15.560 --> 0:06:17.839 War Two. It was if you've never seen a picture 0:06:17.839 --> 0:06:20.360 of this, you need to look for the the P 0:06:20.560 --> 0:06:25.480 thirty eight Lightning. Uh. It is is a particularly striking design. 0:06:25.560 --> 0:06:28.240 It's it's these kind of jets for kids who are 0:06:28.320 --> 0:06:31.040 my age. I'm gonna show my age here in second, 0:06:31.279 --> 0:06:34.000 the kids my age who grew up in the realm 0:06:34.040 --> 0:06:36.200 of G. I. Joe. And that was a big cartoon 0:06:36.279 --> 0:06:38.120 on television. If you look at the law of the 0:06:38.200 --> 0:06:40.520 vehicle designs from G. I. Joe you can see a 0:06:40.560 --> 0:06:44.560 lot of it has has drawn inspiration from these early aircraft, 0:06:44.560 --> 0:06:47.800 these very classic things, right. Um. Furthermore, it was an 0:06:47.839 --> 0:06:50.280 impressive feed for the time, capable of speeds of four 0:06:50.680 --> 0:06:53.920 miles per hour, which is about six per hour. Yeah, 0:06:53.920 --> 0:06:57.279 it's pretty fast for the for it's time. Obviously, aircraft 0:06:57.360 --> 0:07:00.680 today leave that in the dust. But right we're still 0:07:00.720 --> 0:07:04.360 talking about engines that use moving parts and not turbines. 0:07:04.400 --> 0:07:07.479 We're talking propellers. Yeah, yeah, this this is before the 0:07:07.560 --> 0:07:12.600 jet era. So eight, Lockheed had the Model fourteen Super Electra, 0:07:13.040 --> 0:07:15.360 which was a plane that ended up breaking the speed 0:07:15.400 --> 0:07:18.679 record for circling the globe. It only took three days, 0:07:18.760 --> 0:07:20.920 nineteen hours and fourteen minutes to get all the way 0:07:20.960 --> 0:07:23.840 around the Earth. And uh yeah, and of course it 0:07:23.880 --> 0:07:27.880 was piloted by a famous crazy guy, right, Howard Hughes. 0:07:28.000 --> 0:07:31.320 Howard Hughes. It's got to be difficult piloting and electra 0:07:31.480 --> 0:07:33.920 when you've got boxes on your hands and feet the 0:07:33.920 --> 0:07:36.240 whole time, and you know, especially if you don't want 0:07:36.240 --> 0:07:38.040 to upset the jars of urine that you have in 0:07:38.080 --> 0:07:42.360 the back. Howard Hughes was crazy, y'all. I imagine he 0:07:42.400 --> 0:07:44.840 did not bring the jars. But I actually think this 0:07:44.920 --> 0:07:47.280 was I don't imagine that that was actually the same. 0:07:47.360 --> 0:07:50.360 I'm pretty sure that by he he wasn't quite uh 0:07:50.760 --> 0:07:55.120 showing the the real symptoms of his later kind of 0:07:55.160 --> 0:07:59.000 disturbing behavior. You know, he became a hermit, a recluse, 0:07:59.480 --> 0:08:03.120 but that was later on. I think he was still, 0:08:03.160 --> 0:08:05.360 you know, pretty much had it together at that point. 0:08:05.600 --> 0:08:09.120 At any rate. In three um, that's that's when we're 0:08:09.120 --> 0:08:13.000 going to really get started on these big military contracts. Right. Yeah, 0:08:13.040 --> 0:08:15.680 that's when the US Army Air Corps, which was the 0:08:15.720 --> 0:08:20.720 predecessor for the United States Air Force, decided to ask 0:08:20.800 --> 0:08:22.880 for a new jet fighter and they kind of put 0:08:22.880 --> 0:08:25.480 out the word a jet fighter period. I mean, okay, 0:08:25.520 --> 0:08:27.760 that the thing is is that previously the Army had 0:08:27.840 --> 0:08:32.000 kind of rejected development of these propellerless jet engines in 0:08:32.040 --> 0:08:33.840 the thirties because they didn't think it could be done 0:08:34.200 --> 0:08:36.360 until the Germans went and did it, right, and then 0:08:36.400 --> 0:08:38.600 they said, well, you know what, we need some of 0:08:38.960 --> 0:08:41.200 let's do some of those things. So they kind of 0:08:41.240 --> 0:08:44.920 put out the request for a proposal, asking various companies 0:08:44.960 --> 0:08:49.360 to put forth their their proposed solution to this, and 0:08:49.440 --> 0:08:51.840 Lockeed wanted to throw its hat in the ring, and 0:08:51.880 --> 0:08:55.720 they decided that the best way to to innovate quickly 0:08:56.160 --> 0:08:59.760 would be to create a special division within Lockheed that 0:09:00.160 --> 0:09:02.640 was not going to have to answer to the corporate 0:09:02.720 --> 0:09:06.880 level at the same kind of bureaucratic process that everyone 0:09:06.920 --> 0:09:08.840 else had to write and that would wind up being 0:09:09.280 --> 0:09:14.959 the basis of the skunk Works ideology for forever until now. Right. So, 0:09:15.080 --> 0:09:18.160 originally it was called, you know, the official official name 0:09:18.280 --> 0:09:21.240 is the Lockheed Advanced Development Projects and then later it 0:09:21.320 --> 0:09:25.319 was renamed officially to Advanced Development Programs a d P. 0:09:25.880 --> 0:09:30.680 But it's official nickname, which like we said, it's it's trademarked. 0:09:31.080 --> 0:09:33.880 It's got a logo is of course, skunk Works. And 0:09:33.920 --> 0:09:36.120 the logo, by the way, is a skunk. It's it's 0:09:36.120 --> 0:09:39.280 the cutest little skunk that has ever adorned machines war 0:09:39.720 --> 0:09:42.960 It's just about almost as cute as flour from Bambi, 0:09:43.160 --> 0:09:46.600 but not quite but close. And so you might wonder, 0:09:46.720 --> 0:09:50.120 why the heck would they be called skunk Works? Where's 0:09:50.160 --> 0:09:52.600 that name come from? Okay, So the story goes that 0:09:52.679 --> 0:09:55.320 when when this division was first started up, they you know, 0:09:55.320 --> 0:09:58.160 it was wartime, Lockheed did not have any room on 0:09:58.200 --> 0:10:01.280 their main floors for this new division. So they started up, 0:10:01.760 --> 0:10:06.000 uh Mr Clarence Kelly Johnson UM bought a circus tent 0:10:06.640 --> 0:10:08.960 and set it up somewhere like I imagine, in a 0:10:09.000 --> 0:10:12.280 parking lot on the property of this facility and UM 0:10:12.480 --> 0:10:15.040 and it happened to be next to a plastics manufacturing 0:10:15.080 --> 0:10:17.839 plant which was really quite stinky yep. And so that 0:10:17.960 --> 0:10:23.800 stinky odor ended up completely saturating that circus tent, making 0:10:23.800 --> 0:10:26.920 it a very smelly place. And you know, but but 0:10:27.040 --> 0:10:28.840 it was all very secretive. You know. All the projects 0:10:28.880 --> 0:10:30.840 that they were working on are really the one project, 0:10:30.920 --> 0:10:33.120 this jet engine project that they were working on. It 0:10:33.200 --> 0:10:35.400 couldn't be talked about. And so they were told when 0:10:35.440 --> 0:10:38.319 they answered phones to to not say what they were 0:10:38.360 --> 0:10:41.440 doing or give any kind of indication. And supposedly when 0:10:41.480 --> 0:10:45.440 one engineer answered a phone, he he made this joke. 0:10:45.600 --> 0:10:48.160 And and this joke is a little bit out of 0:10:48.200 --> 0:10:51.800 my reach personally, having never read the comic strip Little Abner, 0:10:52.320 --> 0:10:55.040 Um this this is one of those newspaper comics from 0:10:55.080 --> 0:10:58.400 the time. Um. But apparently in in this comic strip 0:10:58.440 --> 0:11:01.240 there was something called the skunk Work. Yes s k 0:11:01.520 --> 0:11:05.120 o in k. It was a kind of a playful 0:11:05.200 --> 0:11:08.240 misspelling of skunk because it's it was a couple of 0:11:08.280 --> 0:11:12.839 country bumpkins who ran this um this this uh still 0:11:13.280 --> 0:11:15.240 well it's not even a still really, because it wasn't 0:11:15.280 --> 0:11:18.320 moonshine they were making. They were making Kickapoo juice, and 0:11:18.760 --> 0:11:21.880 Kickapoo juice was made out of pretty much anything they 0:11:21.920 --> 0:11:23.520 could get their hands on, and it was supposed to 0:11:23.520 --> 0:11:26.600 be the most including skunks up doing, including skunks moose. 0:11:26.720 --> 0:11:29.320 The moose were very popular because they would say lacks body, 0:11:29.480 --> 0:11:31.560 so they would go knock a body unconscious to throw 0:11:31.559 --> 0:11:34.640 it into the mix. And uh yeah, kickapoo juice was 0:11:34.640 --> 0:11:38.520 supposed to be the most powerful alcohol. And dog Patch. 0:11:39.360 --> 0:11:41.640 Dog Patch, by the way, is the location where Little 0:11:41.679 --> 0:11:44.640 Abner takes place. Okay, alright, but but so so this 0:11:44.800 --> 0:11:47.360 engineer answered the phone like like, hello, this is Skunk 0:11:47.360 --> 0:11:50.400 Works because it was stucky and and it's stuck and 0:11:50.400 --> 0:11:54.440 and eventually, um, I believe after the Little Abner lawyers 0:11:54.520 --> 0:11:58.240 gave them a call, they changed it officially to Skunk Works. Yeah, 0:11:58.280 --> 0:12:01.960 so that would happen later. That was happened later. They 0:12:02.000 --> 0:12:06.000 so they started trying to develop a jet plane based 0:12:06.120 --> 0:12:09.240 around a jet engine that had was not developed at Lockheed. 0:12:09.280 --> 0:12:11.120 In fact, it was it was developed by the British. 0:12:11.120 --> 0:12:16.280 It's called the Goblin. And before they really got down 0:12:16.320 --> 0:12:20.040 to designing this, Kelly came out. Kelly Johnson came out 0:12:20.080 --> 0:12:22.360 and kind of laid down the law. He sort of 0:12:22.400 --> 0:12:25.360 came up with a philosophy. He was thirty three years 0:12:25.360 --> 0:12:27.400 old at the time, which is just incredible to me. Yeah, 0:12:27.440 --> 0:12:32.040 it's a young man who comes up with fourteen guiding principles, rules, 0:12:32.040 --> 0:12:34.880 and practices are what they're called. And we're not gonna 0:12:35.000 --> 0:12:37.280 read out all fourteen, but I've got six of them 0:12:37.360 --> 0:12:41.120 I would like to. Yeah. Yeah, So they're this pretty 0:12:41.200 --> 0:12:43.520 much is just kind of the overview of how skunk 0:12:43.520 --> 0:12:45.760 Works business gets done in order for them to do 0:12:45.800 --> 0:12:49.600 it expediently at the quality they wanted. So number one 0:12:50.040 --> 0:12:53.160 was the skunk Works manager must be delegated practically complete 0:12:53.160 --> 0:12:55.920 control of his program in all aspects. He should report 0:12:55.920 --> 0:13:00.200 to a division president or higher, meaning that Kelly wanted 0:13:00.240 --> 0:13:02.000 to make sure that he had the authority to make 0:13:02.000 --> 0:13:04.160 the decisions he needed to make in order to deliver 0:13:04.320 --> 0:13:08.760 upon these incredibly lucrative contracts and uh. And he felt 0:13:08.760 --> 0:13:11.680 that if he had to dance around all these corporate levels, 0:13:11.720 --> 0:13:14.560 it would slow things down and they would lose. So 0:13:14.640 --> 0:13:17.520 he said, we can't have that. So that's rule number one. Uh, 0:13:17.679 --> 0:13:19.600 we'll skip over a couple of the rule number three. 0:13:20.160 --> 0:13:22.080 He's the number of people having any connection with the 0:13:22.080 --> 0:13:25.520 project must be restricted in an almost vicious manner. Use 0:13:25.600 --> 0:13:28.960 a small number of good people ten to twenty compared 0:13:29.000 --> 0:13:32.640 to the so called normal systems. So these are really small, 0:13:32.720 --> 0:13:36.079 nimble teams, and that was important for multiple reasons. One again, 0:13:36.120 --> 0:13:37.960 he wanted to be able to move quickly, and the 0:13:38.000 --> 0:13:40.480 more voices you have than you know you might have, 0:13:42.559 --> 0:13:45.800 and it just slows everything down. And also because these 0:13:45.880 --> 0:13:48.280 projects were top secret, it's a lot easier to keep 0:13:48.280 --> 0:13:50.319 a secret if you keep the number of people who 0:13:50.320 --> 0:13:53.480 know it to a small minimum. Yeah, i'll tell you. You 0:13:53.320 --> 0:13:56.480 You tell like twenty five people a secret, that secret 0:13:56.559 --> 0:13:58.040 is going to get out eventually. But if you tell 0:13:58.080 --> 0:14:00.440 two thousand, five hundred people that secret, that secret, they 0:14:00.600 --> 0:14:01.920 might as well not even make the secret in the 0:14:01.960 --> 0:14:04.320 first place. That's why I don't tell anyone my secrets, 0:14:04.480 --> 0:14:07.920 especially podcasts. He can't trust us. Yeah, i'll tell you 0:14:07.920 --> 0:14:10.720 as a secret. Number five is there must be a 0:14:10.720 --> 0:14:13.320 minimum number of reports required, but important work must be 0:14:13.360 --> 0:14:16.320 recorded thoroughly. Again, this was to cut down the bureaucratic 0:14:16.320 --> 0:14:19.400 approach that I didn't have to keep on making reports 0:14:19.400 --> 0:14:21.720 over and over, taking time away from actually doing the work. 0:14:22.200 --> 0:14:25.800 But he did say that it's important that we record 0:14:25.880 --> 0:14:28.920 what we do because accountability still has to be maintained. 0:14:28.960 --> 0:14:32.080 You can't just have no accountability whatsoever. That would be 0:14:32.120 --> 0:14:36.320 a disaster as well. Number twelve, there must be mutual 0:14:36.360 --> 0:14:39.720 trust between the military project organization and the contractor, the 0:14:39.840 --> 0:14:42.240 very close cooperation in liaison on a day to day 0:14:42.240 --> 0:14:45.360 basis that this cuts down misunderstanding and correspondence to an 0:14:45.400 --> 0:14:50.560 absolute minimum, again cutting out all that interference. Number thirteen. 0:14:51.000 --> 0:14:53.840 Access by outsiders to the project and its personnel must 0:14:53.840 --> 0:14:57.440 be strictly controlled by appropriate security measures. This would actually 0:14:57.440 --> 0:15:00.360 come into a really important story later are on in 0:15:00.400 --> 0:15:04.120 skunk works where people who genuinely wanted to help we're 0:15:04.160 --> 0:15:07.400 not allowed on the premises and it ended up destroying 0:15:07.480 --> 0:15:11.800 a project in the process. Number four team is because 0:15:11.880 --> 0:15:13.840 only a few people will be used in engineering and 0:15:13.960 --> 0:15:16.800 most other areas, ways must be provided to reward good 0:15:16.800 --> 0:15:20.080 performances by pay, not based on the number of personnel supervised. 0:15:20.200 --> 0:15:22.120 I think this was Kelly's way of saying, I wants 0:15:22.160 --> 0:15:25.200 to get my money, y'all, and Shakespeare got to get paid. Yeah, 0:15:25.240 --> 0:15:28.600 Because you know, this is essentially saying I might have 0:15:28.720 --> 0:15:31.360 these really small teams that I've asked for, but don't 0:15:31.400 --> 0:15:33.800 base my pay on how many people I oversee. Based 0:15:33.880 --> 0:15:36.560 my pay on the results that we get, which which 0:15:36.560 --> 0:15:38.800 we mostly include. Because we were a little bit entertained 0:15:38.840 --> 0:15:41.000 by by all of these like really imported. I mean 0:15:41.120 --> 0:15:44.960 these these kind of business structures have been used throughout 0:15:45.240 --> 0:15:49.160 corporate America and the world exactly since the inception of 0:15:49.520 --> 0:15:55.000 skunk Works, but tacked onto the end like get dudes paycheck, yes, 0:15:55.160 --> 0:15:57.560 which you know, until again makes sense because it's not 0:15:57.640 --> 0:16:00.440 just it's not just Kelly here, we're poking at Kelly, 0:16:00.480 --> 0:16:03.600 but honestly referred to anyone who was a project leader, 0:16:03.680 --> 0:16:07.200 right because again, if your project is incredibly important but 0:16:07.280 --> 0:16:09.440 it has fewer people on it then say a typical 0:16:09.480 --> 0:16:12.720 project in the main branch of Lockheed, you don't want 0:16:12.760 --> 0:16:14.440 that to count against you. So that was he was 0:16:14.480 --> 0:16:16.960 really looking out for his people. So even though we're 0:16:17.000 --> 0:16:19.400 making light of it, he was he was actually he 0:16:19.480 --> 0:16:23.360 was being very thoughtful exactly. Yeah, yeah, but yeah, I mean, 0:16:23.440 --> 0:16:27.360 practicality was overall the thing of this that the mantra 0:16:27.400 --> 0:16:30.760 of the entire operation is is quick, quiet, and quality. Yep, 0:16:30.960 --> 0:16:33.000 he wants all three of those things. That has to 0:16:33.000 --> 0:16:35.760 be secret, it has to be done on schedule, and 0:16:35.800 --> 0:16:38.240 it has to be uh you know, has to meet 0:16:38.280 --> 0:16:41.080 the qualifications that the military laid out. In fact, that 0:16:41.160 --> 0:16:43.320 was another one of his rules was that let's be 0:16:43.360 --> 0:16:45.520 really clear about what the expectations are so that we 0:16:45.560 --> 0:16:47.800 can meet them and not waste time on things that 0:16:47.840 --> 0:16:51.800 are not important to whatever the expectations are. So yeah, 0:16:51.920 --> 0:16:55.000 top secret operation. In fact, employees were not allowed to 0:16:55.000 --> 0:16:57.840 talk about what they were working on with anyone who 0:16:57.920 --> 0:17:00.160 wasn't on their project team. So even other people who 0:17:00.160 --> 0:17:02.760 are working in skunk Works at the time, you were 0:17:02.760 --> 0:17:04.880 not allowed to talk about what it was you were 0:17:04.880 --> 0:17:07.600 working on if that person wasn't also on that project. 0:17:08.119 --> 0:17:10.719 So um, this one carry over to one of the 0:17:10.880 --> 0:17:14.280 great testing facilities that would come into existence about a 0:17:14.320 --> 0:17:16.879 decade later. We'll mention it a couple of times, but 0:17:16.920 --> 0:17:18.840 it's one of my favorite subjects that I still I'm 0:17:18.880 --> 0:17:23.879 determined to do an episode on sometime in the future. Anyway, Uh, 0:17:23.920 --> 0:17:27.040 it's almost as though we continually get prevented from doing it. 0:17:27.080 --> 0:17:29.600 I know, it's some kind of shadowy forces, almost like 0:17:29.680 --> 0:17:33.240 some gentlemen wearing black suits will occasionally show up outside 0:17:33.240 --> 0:17:34.800 of the offices of How Stuff Works and say you 0:17:34.800 --> 0:17:37.639 really don't want to talk about that, namely Alex Trebec 0:17:37.680 --> 0:17:41.320 and Jesse Ventura sometimes sometimes been Bowlen, and you think, 0:17:41.400 --> 0:17:43.119 like I thought he was on our side, but no, 0:17:43.240 --> 0:17:46.760 he's working for the man anyway. So another thing that 0:17:46.800 --> 0:17:50.080 we can mention is that the secrecy went beyond just 0:17:50.480 --> 0:17:52.719 you know, don't talk about it, right. They went so 0:17:52.760 --> 0:17:57.320 far as to start to disguise the buildings themselves. Right, Um, Yeah, 0:17:57.359 --> 0:17:59.800 they had decoy buildings and they would cover some of 0:17:59.800 --> 0:18:02.280 them or all of them in camouflage and netting and 0:18:02.280 --> 0:18:05.760 stuff like that. Yeah, because you know, Pearl Harbor demonstrated 0:18:05.800 --> 0:18:10.440 the value of being able to hide potential high value targets, 0:18:10.440 --> 0:18:12.760 and now they were going to be working on super 0:18:12.800 --> 0:18:15.919 secret projects for the military, so they considered themselves a 0:18:15.960 --> 0:18:18.720 potential target. So this was really kind of a practical 0:18:18.720 --> 0:18:22.159 approach to trying to minimize that the chance that they 0:18:22.200 --> 0:18:26.320 would be hit by some enemy aircraft carrying bombs. So 0:18:26.960 --> 0:18:31.400 they actually went to great pains to to disguise their campus. Now, 0:18:31.440 --> 0:18:34.479 the very first jet that they started working on, the 0:18:34.480 --> 0:18:37.400 one that had that Goblin jet engine from the British, 0:18:37.840 --> 0:18:41.879 was designated the XP eight e jet fighter. So the 0:18:41.880 --> 0:18:45.240 team started work on that in nineteen forty three, four 0:18:45.320 --> 0:18:50.280 months before they were officially awarded the contract for the project. 0:18:50.680 --> 0:18:55.240 And it would turn out that this apparently was sort of. Yeah. 0:18:55.440 --> 0:18:57.399 That was essentially the military would say, hey, you know what, 0:18:58.320 --> 0:19:01.840 we sure could use a an aircraft that does this, 0:19:01.920 --> 0:19:05.719 this and this, and the skunk Works would say, we 0:19:05.760 --> 0:19:07.639 could do that for you. Yeah, you know, we might 0:19:07.640 --> 0:19:10.200 whip something up. They shake hands, and then skunk Works 0:19:10.400 --> 0:19:12.679 goes out and pours a lot of time, money, and 0:19:12.720 --> 0:19:15.480 effort into developing it. And then months later the contract 0:19:15.480 --> 0:19:17.680 comes through. Oh yeah, yeah with it with the understanding 0:19:17.680 --> 0:19:19.959 that eventually the money would come. And you know, this 0:19:20.000 --> 0:19:22.440 was partially due to the or largely I think due 0:19:22.440 --> 0:19:25.880 to the cleverness and machinations of Kelly Johnson because he 0:19:26.680 --> 0:19:29.960 uh he also stated himself as the only person who 0:19:30.000 --> 0:19:32.920 would get to talk to Air Force officers and CIA agents. 0:19:33.480 --> 0:19:37.040 Um yeah, there's a great everything comes through him, which 0:19:37.240 --> 0:19:41.840 you know, which really streamlines the process exactly. Yeah. Yeah, 0:19:41.920 --> 0:19:43.480 you had that and put him up as a as 0:19:43.520 --> 0:19:46.879 a reliable He was the central voice. I mean, it 0:19:46.920 --> 0:19:49.479 meant that you weren't going to get mixed messages because 0:19:49.560 --> 0:19:52.119 everything was going through one source. I also have a 0:19:52.160 --> 0:19:54.240 fun little thing I can talk about and a little 0:19:54.240 --> 0:19:57.240 bit about about what it was like to go along 0:19:57.280 --> 0:19:59.680 with Kelly on one of these meetings with the CIA. 0:20:00.520 --> 0:20:03.080 I've heard him referred to as like W. C. Fields 0:20:03.119 --> 0:20:05.320 without the sense of humor. Yeah, in this case, it 0:20:05.359 --> 0:20:08.119 was more about the links they went to to try 0:20:08.160 --> 0:20:12.440 and prevent being overheard, which I thought was amusing. Jonathan 0:20:12.440 --> 0:20:15.159 from here breaking in to say, we're going to be 0:20:15.200 --> 0:20:17.240 back at skunk Works in just a second, but first 0:20:17.280 --> 0:20:29.080 let's take a quick break alright. Soe they got that contract, 0:20:30.600 --> 0:20:35.959 they delivered the XP eight Lulu Bell prototype jet fighter. Uh. 0:20:36.240 --> 0:20:38.879 This was only a hundred and forty three days after 0:20:39.200 --> 0:20:42.320 that kind of handshake deal had occurred. It was just 0:20:42.440 --> 0:20:45.280 under five months and a little bit earlier than planned. 0:20:45.359 --> 0:20:48.000 Yea by a full week. They delivered it a week 0:20:48.040 --> 0:20:50.960 ahead of schedule. Uh. And the jet fighter would eventually 0:20:50.960 --> 0:20:55.119 become known as the Lockheed P eighty Shooting Star. And 0:20:55.160 --> 0:20:57.399 that was the very first jet fighter used by the U. S. 0:20:57.520 --> 0:21:00.200 Army Air Forces. So some of the bombers that were 0:21:00.200 --> 0:21:03.040 operating in Europe during the tail end of World War 0:21:03.040 --> 0:21:05.960 Two absolutely um where we're helped out by the creation 0:21:06.000 --> 0:21:08.720 of this vehicle. Right, It's just that they weren't designed 0:21:08.720 --> 0:21:11.960 to do actual military work yet, Like they couldn't fly 0:21:12.440 --> 0:21:15.200 a combat mission. They weren't outfitted for that, and it 0:21:15.240 --> 0:21:18.160 wouldn't happen until after the conclusion of World War Two. 0:21:18.400 --> 0:21:20.640 They would be used later in the Korean War. Yes, 0:21:21.119 --> 0:21:22.720 so you might wonder what it looks like. Well, it's 0:21:22.720 --> 0:21:25.720 a single theater, single theater jet. It's pretty simple, like 0:21:25.760 --> 0:21:28.480 a basic jet design that if you can imagine what 0:21:28.520 --> 0:21:30.840 a fighter jet looks like, it looks like a small 0:21:30.920 --> 0:21:34.960 version of that. That's why it was by so A 0:21:35.000 --> 0:21:38.280 little four years later they developed the T thirty three 0:21:38.440 --> 0:21:40.760 T Bird, which is also known as the T thirty 0:21:40.800 --> 0:21:44.040 three Shooting Star, which is mostly used at least in 0:21:44.080 --> 0:21:46.840 the United States, was mostly used as a training aircraft. 0:21:46.840 --> 0:21:50.520