The Week in SpaceApril 6-12, 2009
American Idols It was five decades ago this week at a news conference in Washington, D.C., that NASA’s Administrator, T. Keith Glennan, introduced to the public the seven men chosen to be America’s nominees for the first human voyagers into space. These Project Mercury astronauts were the cream of the crop, survivors of the most stringent and grueling astronaut selection processes ever conducted. With varying degrees of reluctance, the astronauts soon became celebrities and idols to the American public, answering the nation’s need for a new breed of hero. Arguably the most famous of the seven was John Glenn, who in 1962 became the first American to orbit Earth. In 1998, at age seventy-seven, Glenn flew on the space shuttle STS-95 mission, becoming the oldest person ever to fly in space. Image credit: NASA
Weekly CalendarApril 6-12, 2009 Holidays - Sky Events - Space History
1965: Early Bird (Intelsat 1) launched |
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