Some light moments:

The groundbreaking, while serious, did have a succession of light moments. Opening the meeting, which took place
in a tent in the heat of midday, master of ceremonies Sherman McCorkle sternly informed the row of formally dressed dignitaries behind him that “the official Sandia groundbreaking August dress is: no tie.” They wore ties. McCorkle
did not.

McCorkle is chairman of the Science and Technology Park Development Corporation. Domenici described how the paper copy of a speech he was expected to deliver when President Bush visited Sandia the day before had been given by Domenici’s aide to a Secret Service agent to bring through security to the senator. The agent, acquainted with neither New Mexico senator promptly delivered the speech to Senator Bingaman, who looked at it casually, decided it was a copy of the President’s speech, and put it in his pocket. When Domenici stepped to the lectern no speech was there to read from. “The President even looked for it,” he said. Senator Bingaman, realizing what might have happened, took out the speech and passed it to Senator Domenici. The Republican senator jokingly held up the speech’s unexpected arrival as an example of true bipartisanship. More seriously, he told the CSRI audience that he’d like to have Tom Hunter’s speech similarly arrive on Pete’s lectern for him to deliver it. He praised Tom’s speech for its clarity and simplicity.