Fast Fprward: Neil Armstrong's Long Island Connection

By James Bernstein | Staff Writer

It would seem any company would boast if Neil A. Armstrong, the first human to step foot on the moon, had been named its chairman.

Not AIL Systems Inc., the Deer Park defense electroncs company.

Armstrong, who landed on the moon July 20, 1969, was named AIL's chairman in January, 1989, long after he left the U.S. space program for civilian life. But neither AIL nor its parent at the time, Eaton Corp. of Cleveland, made any public announcement of Armstrong's appointment. It came out during an interview an AIL executive had with a Newsday reporter on an unrelated matter.

AIL and Eaton said there was nothing secret about the appointment. It had, they said, more to do with Armstrong's long-held, deeply rooted desire for personal privacy. After his historic moon landing, watched by the entire world, Armstrong retreated to the anonymity of the business world, shunning most interviews.

Armstrong, an Ohio native, had been a board member of Eaton, a company that makes auto parts and other machinery, and which owned AIL. In the late 1980s, AIL was struggling to build defense electronics equipment for the Air Force's B-1B nuclear bomber. The company's work had been sharply criticized by the Air Force and some members of Congress. Eaton asked Armstrong to take rein of the company and help it wade through its B-1B work, as well as through the company's problems with the Air Force and Congress.

AIL's day-to-day business is run by James Smith, the company's president and chief executive officer, who reports to Armstrong. Armstrong, 67, does not spend much time on the Island, appearing about once a month at AIL for board meetings. He maintains a residence in Ohio.