Launch angle: Smokies usher has NASA past 

KODAK, Tennessee -- In his current occupation, Stephen Eason helps people get to their seats. In his former occupation, he helped people get to outer space. It just goes to show, you never know who you might meet at a Minor League Baseball game.

Eason, a self-described "good old country boy from Arkansas," enjoyed a long and improbable NASA career and is now a proud member of the U.S. Space Worker Hall of Honor. His time with the agency was a dream come true, one achieved through the timeless combination of hard work and perseverance.

"I went to work for NASA in 1987. My main office was in Cape Canaveral. Worked in Houston a lot, worked in Denver," he said at Smokies Stadium earlier this month. "My first launch I worked was 'Return to Flight' in 1988 after the Challenger accident. I got the opportunity to work on 91 launches. I was what they called a systems auditor. I’d go out on the floor and watch the technicians, whatever they were doing, and I’d follow the paperwork trail back up to the government contract. Just to make sure our technicians were providing what the government said [they were going to provide]."

So how does a "good old country boy" make it to NASA?

"Went to Florida in 1981, on vacation," said Eason. "Did the [Kennedy] Space Center tour and rode the tour bus and I told my wife, I said, 'One day I’m gonna work here.' I just fell in love with the place."

Eason was a machinist at the time. He'd go to work at 7 in the morning, take classes at night and spend whatever time that remained trying to land a job with NASA.

"This was before the internet. I was researching magazines, sending letters with the stamp and the whole nine yards," he said. "I wanted it so bad. I would contact somebody once a month just about. Every time I found a job description, I'd send them a letter. And that's how I got it, through perseverance. It took me five years to even get an interview down there."

Throughout Eason's space odyssey, he said it never felt like a job because he got to "get up every day and do something I really enjoy doing." That's not to say there weren't stressful moments.

"Ninety-one launches, never got used to it. You get just as excited at 91 as you do at 1," he said. "You figure everyone is in the same boat hoping they've done their job right. Because you've got from five to nine bodies depending on that. So you make a mistake there, you've got a guilty conscience. Make sure the i's are dotted and the t's crossed, cross your fingers and hope for the best."

The Smokies, the Double-A affiliate of the Cubs, are located in Kodak, Tennessee. Eason, who left NASA in 2007 because the shuttle program was coming to an end, moved to the area in 2015. He got a job with the Smokies grounds crew shortly thereafter, eventually shifting to an usher role because groundskeeping is "a young man's game."

"I get to talk with people and just enjoy it, you know?" said Eason on his current role with the Smokies. "I like the atmosphere. You meet unique people, people from all over the southeast who came up here to watch some baseball."

Despite having a job that allows for a lot of small talk, Eason said he doesn't tell many people about his unique career path. Nonetheless, he calls it "something I'm pretty proud of."

"I had a great career," he said. "There's not a whole lot of country boys that got an opportunity to sit in a [space shuttle] captain's chair at launch position on launch pad. I think that's one of my biggest memories from down there."

Despite all those years at NASA and his passion for aeronautics, Eason never did have aspirations to go to space himself.

"I got close enough," he said with a smile. "I got close enough."