In the &quot;The Right Stuff&quot; by Tom Wolfe, he mentions quite a few situations where the Mercury astronauts would visit factories and facilities in charge with building various components, and in all of these cases there was the same gist of &quot;be really careful with your work or these nice young boys could die.&quot; So this practice existed from the very beginning of the American space program.<p>I wonder if any of that still happens these days. Probably way less now when American astronauts hitch a ride on the Soyuz.