Epilogue 



Fuqua and mi 1 r rURE 



On January 23. 1979, the caucus of all Democratic Members of the 

 House of Representatives decided by a secret ballot vote of 235 to 10 

 that Florida's Representative Don Fuqua would become the fourth 

 chairman of the Science Committee. There were only three committee 

 chairmen given a higher number of votes (the most being 238) at the 

 start of the 96th Congress. The House made it official January 24. 



At age 45, Fuqua was the first of the four Science Committee chair- 

 men to be born after World War I, as well as the first to become chair- 

 man before the age of 60. Teague had already finished at Texas A. & M. 

 before Fuqua was born. The following table gives a comparison of the 

 relative ages of the four committee chairmen: 



Chairman 



Brooks 

 Miller 

 Teague 

 Fuqua 



AN ACTIVE APPRENTICESHIP 



Fuqua had served an active apprenticeship on the committee, 

 chairing the following subcommittees since his fifth term starting in 

 1971: International Cooperation in Science and Space, Manned Space 

 Flight, Oversight, and Space Science and Applications. Although 

 both Brooks and Miller had taken brief flings at handling minor sub- 

 committees at the same time they chaired the full committee, Fuqua 

 was the first chairman to choose to head up a major subcommittee at 

 the same time he piloted the full committee. He decided in 1979 to 

 retain his chairmanship of the Subcommittee on Space Science and 

 Applications (handling all of NASA's activities except aeronautics), 

 a post he had held since 1975- 



The circumstances of Teague's severe illness in 1977, when he 

 was confined to the Naval Hospital in Bethesda for major surgery, 

 gave Fuqua the experience of presiding at full commirtee sessions 

 during Teague's absence for several months. 



1005 



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