Friday, Elbert (Joe) W., 2003-07-25

Oral history interview with Elbert W. "Joe" Friday, Jr., 2003. Interviewed by Kristine Harper. 2 sound cassettes (ca. 3 hrs.) : analog, mono + transcript (53 pgs.). AMS 17-18; three physical versions (one master, two copies). Forms part of American Meteorological Society Oral History Project. Harper begins by asking about Friday’s early life. Friday talks about his parents, his father’s military service and his childhood moving around the country. Friday comments on his influences, church life, and interest in math and science. From there they move on to his military career and Friday talks about how he joined the military and studied weather at the University of Oklahoma. Friday outlines specific courses he took and then describes his experience in the Air Force as a staff weather officer. Friday discusses computer modeling, forecasting technology and aircrafts. Harper then questions more about Friday’s education and Friday talks about graduate school and the destruction of his first dissertation. Friday also comments on his advisers, his dissertation topic, and other Air Force officers with him in the program. Friday then moves on to his Air Force career after graduation and his assignment to the Compatriot project in Vietnam. He goes into detail on the failure of the project, his clean-up, the cease-fire in Vietnam and his time at Nakhon Phanom Air Base. Friday dictates how he was almost fired and then talks about his year at the Air War College, his promotions to Colonel and his job as the military assistant for environmental research with the DOD and ultimately the director. He talks about how he questioned the military weather systems and how his inquiries led to major improvements in the systems. Friday then moves on to talk about his retirement from the Air Force and subsequent directorship of the National Weather Service.