Episode Details

Wendy Corr:

Well, hey there, folks, welcome to The Roundup. We're a Cowboy State Daily podcast and we get to feature interesting people from around the Cowboy State. I'm your host, Wendy Corr. Oh my gosh, today our guest is so interesting. We're talking to Tucker Fagan - a lot of you might know Tucker's name. You might know who he is, but I'm willing to bet you don't know all that Tucker has accomplished here in the state of Wyoming. Starting off as a kid on the streets of New York, Mrs. Fagan's little boy has grown up to just make all the difference here in Wyoming. Welcome, Tucker Fagan, to The Roundup. It's so good to have you on the show.

Tucker Fagan:

Thanks, Wendy. You know, I was so fortunate to have a great mom and dad, five brothers and sisters. My dad was a firefighter there, and I learned a firefighter ethic, and they devoted their whole lives to their six kids, to help us, to teach us - it just, I was so thankful for what they did for me. And the fact that I'm in Wyoming, or got here is just, you know, I can't imagine it. But I've had a great life, great things, great people to be around.

Hey, and I admire so much what you're doing. You know, with Dr. Joe McGinley, Rob Wallace, Chuck Box, Candy Moulton. And I know all those people!

Wendy Corr:

That's because you run in the right circles.

Tucker Fagan:

In New York, I never would have met people like that, right? I'd of had a job. I was a Teamster. That's how I got through college.

Wendy Corr:

No kidding?

Tucker Fagan:

I worked at the A&P warehouse, which did all the five boroughs in New York, up to Albany, half of Connecticut, half of New Jersey. So I was a laborer. And that's really what happened to me, is, I get my degree, and here I am four years of college, I go, I move boxes. That's what I do. And my family there, you know, firefighters, cops, people like that. I didn't know what to do. It was 1967.

So I joined the Air Force, it was the height of Vietnam. They sent me to Cheyenne, Wyoming. So my first job in the Air Force was here in Cheyenne, I was a missile launch officer. And I was a kid from New York, from the streets. And you know, and I didn't know about rodeo, I didn't about cowboys, didn't know about any of this. And I was kind of introverted and shy. So I kind of stayed in my room.

And I didn't plan to do this, but I eventually memorized the entire missile system. I could write out the entire circuit breaker protection chart from memory. I could write out every control air line, every hydraulic line, every switch, every light, every piece of equipment. I knew it all.

And what was kind of cool was, then, I got a call from a colonel. And he said he worked at the joint strategic target planning staff in Omaha. They are the war plan builders. And he said, "We heard about you, Fagan, and there's four Air Force and four Navy. And we want you to be one of them. So you're going to come here to Omaha and you're going to build a war plan." And I did that for the next five years.

And, same thing. I went there saying, you're going to pick me, I'm going to do my darndest to know every weapon, where it is, how big, how fast. Could it penetrate enemy defenses? Why would you use a Poseidon weapon on this kind of target or trident? Or a Minuteman II or Minuteman III or B 52? Or FB 111 weapon, as we had at the time. Why would you use that weapon on that target? What's the objective? How do we accomplish that? What's the best mix of target to weapon to accomplish the objectives that we got from the President and the Secretary of Defense?

And eventually I knew just about, I knew every option, and what was inside that option