Space dreams lead to military career

Retired Lt. Col. John Heaton of Custer spent more than three decades serving his country in the United States Air Force. During that time he worked on nuclear missiles, flew B-52s during the Cold War and helped shore up NATO air defense systems in southern Europe, but what drew him into the U.S. military in the first place was a boyhood dream of becoming an astronaut and someday walking on the moon.
Although he was only four years old when Alan Shepard became only the second human and the first American to be launched into space in 1961, Heaton says he remembers watching as the Mercury spacecraft made its historic mission. Growing up in Salt Lake City, Utah, Heaton was glued to the TV every time Americans went into space over the next decade. He was watching in 1968 when Bill Anders and two other astronauts became the first men to circle the moon in Apollo 8. (As an Air Force officer he would later get the opportunity to meet and speak with Anders who was by then a general.)
Heaton was there by his set the next year when Neil Armstrong became the first man to walk on the moon and he remembers in 1972 when Eugene Cernan left the moon for the last time as the Apollo program ended.
As the world speculated when humans would return to the lunar surface, Heaton, who by this time had decided to become an astronaut, wondered if it might be him.
“I noticed a lot of the astronauts were military—either Air Force or Navy—and they were all aviators,” said Heaton.
So, after graduating from high school in 1976, Heaton immediately enlisted in the U.S. Air Force and prepared to start his journey into space. His first assignment was to F.E. Warren Air Force Base in Cheyenne, Wyo. where he spent the next six years at least working on rockets.
However, these rockets were intercontinental ballistic missiles carrying nuclear weapons. Rising to the rank of tech sergeant, Heaton says he did about every job there and learned how propulsion and guidance systems worked. Working on missile electronics during the day and studying electronics at night, Heaton earned an electrical engineering degree at nearby Colorado State University at Ft. Collins.
Still holding on to his dream of going into space, Heaton went back to his native Utah where he studied logic and pursued a second degree at Utah State University. He also joined ROTC and, after graduation in 1984, he received his commission and was sent to flight school at Mather Air Force Base in California. He was later assigned as an electronic warfare officer.
“I wanted to pursue that area because I knew that electronics was really where the future was going,” said Heaton.
He knew cyber and electronic warfare were fast growing fields in both the military and in space operations. After completing his flight training, Heaton was assigned to fly B-52s and was stationed at a now-closed air base at Blytheville, Ark. There he sat on nuclear alert one week out of three for six years during the Cold War. While there he served as wing executive officer and deputy wing inspector under the inspector general’s office as a captain.
When Operation Desert Storm occurred in 1991, Heaton was deployed to the Middle East with the B-52s. Flying bombing missions into Iraq, he remembers being shot at by surface to air missiles.
“That tests your skills and your faith in God and all kinds of things,” he recalls.
Heaton’s South Dakota experience began after Desert Storm when he was assigned to Ellsworth Air Force Base where he served three years flying both B-52s and B-1s. He also earned his master’s degree in aeronautical engineering.
While there he wrote an exercise called “Operation Warfighter”—now “Dakota Thunder”—which is still in use. He also met up with a young South Dakota native named Sheri who was working there as a software engineer with a program that dealt with flight simulators and bomb practice ranges. After both of them were transferred to Nellis Air Force Base at Las Vegas, Nev. they started dating and were married in 1997.
While at Nellis, Heaton became director of flight operations for Red Flag (a fighter jet program started, coincidentally, by another Custer resident, retired Col. Marty Mahrt who flew combat missions in Vietnam.)
Heaton says one of the exciting things he got to do there was to act as director of flight operations for the Air Force’s 50th Anniversary Air Show in 1997. It was the largest air show the world had seen at that point. and aircraft were brought in from all over the world. He got to fly with the Snowbirds of the Royal Canadian Air Force and got to meet some of his aviation and space heroes like Chuck Yeager and men who had walked on the moon.
The next year the Heatons were off to an assignment in Germany and then to Albania where he coordinated air missions into Kosovo during the crisis of 1999.
The early 2000s found them assigned to New Mexico and then to Greece where Heaton had
command of all southern NATO air defense systems. That deployment gave the Heatons and their growing family the opportunity to tour much of Europe.
For most of the time he was soaring around the globe with the Air Force, Heaton was continuing to dream about going into space and kept applying for the astronaut program, however, after the Challenger disaster of 1986 he says the opportunities began to dry up rapidly. He also had been in an accident while serving in Nevada that ended in a hip replacement. That, and the fact that he was no longer in his 30s, ended his hopes of entering the highly competitive space program.
In 2007 Heaton retired from the Air Force but immediately put his skills and education into practice in the defense industry. For the past 10 years he has worked as an engineer with
General Atomics Aeronautical where he designs new military drones and payloads. General Atomics is the company that sells the Reaper and Predator drones that have a 60-80 foot wingspan and carry up to 3,000 pounds of ordnance. Even though the company is headquartered in San Diego, Calif., Heaton is able to work part time from his home near Custer.
The Heatons have four grown and married children who they consider their greatest accomplishments. They also have several grandchildren. They have lived in the home they built west of Custer since 2008.
Heaton says he can’t imagine a more patriotic town to live in, especially on Veterans Day. He said he will be there in uniform on Friday when the Custer Schools put on their program at the Armory, but not because he’s seeking any recognition for his military service.
“I go there because I see how much work those kids put into that program,” he said, adding that he’s there for the students because he doesn’t want them to think their work and patriotism are not appreciated. “I would hate to think they would do all that work and no one showed up.”
Heaton says his three decades of military service were hard and competitive but he has no regrets.
“I do miss my time in the service,” he said. “I miss the camaraderie with the people who were dedicated toward the goals of keeping our country free and weren’t caught up in either politics or shaping society or anything like that...We were focused on how to fight the next war and win it.”