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Wall of Honor Level:
Air and Space Friend

Honored by:
Mr. Laurence D. Roberts

Laurence D. Roberts, son of Edmund Roberts (another Wall honoree), was born with a love of aviation and can even remember the first time he saw a jet aircraft. He was disappointed at the age of eight, when he needed glasses for near-sightedness and had to give up his first career choice of being an airline pilot. A few years later he came to adopt a new ambition in aeronautical engineering.
Upon college graduation in 1966, Larry was commissioned in the United States Air Force, retiring as a Lt. Colonel in 1989. He held several exciting positions with the Air Force, taking him from one side of the country to the other and then back again. He started with duty at NASA Houston, as a Recovery Engineer for Project Apollo Flight operations, during Apollo missions 7 through 12.
In 1970, Larry was sent to the Air Force Flight Dynamics Laboratory at Wright-Patterson AFB in Dayton, Ohio. He was Project Engineer for the application of Fly-by-Wire control technology to military transport aircraft, demonstrating significant benefits for aircraft controllability using a C-141 test bed. During this period, Larry met his wife, Cathy, whom he married in 1973.
In 1975, Larry was transferred to Ellsworth AFB, near Rapid City, South Dakota. He served in Minuteman ICBM crew operations in Strategic Air Command until 1977. It was here that Larry and Cathy added two sons to their family, Jeff and Brent.
In 1978, Larry and the family moved to sunny southern California, where he worked at Los Angeles AF Station until mid-1985. He worked with spacecraft-launch vehicle integration and mission operations, as well as directing future assessments for DoD payloads on the Space Shuttle. Daughter Julie joined the family early in this period.
In 1985, Larry moved his family back to Dayton for a second assignment at Wright-Patterson. He served in the Aeronautical Systems Division, including stints as Deputy Chief Engineer, Advanced Cruise Missile SPO; Chief Engineer, B-52 Modernization SPO; and Deputy Direction of Engineering, Propulsion SPO.
After Larry retired from the USAF in 1989, he joined ARINC Engineering Solutions. He completes technical quality assurance for system engineering and sustainment projects. AES is the systems management and engineering arm of the former Aeronautical Radio, Inc. a company for which his father had worked many years before.
Larry also contributed to aviation by instilling a love and fascination in his children and grandchildren (currently five). Perhaps his dream of being a pilot will be fulfilled by the next generation of the family.