Happy Birthday to Wally Schirra, one of the Original Seven Astronauts!

[edbermac]

82 years young today...

From L to R: Scott Carpenter, Gordo Cooper, John Glenn, Gus Grissom, Wally Schirra, Al Shepard, Deke Slayton.

A group of guys who fough tooth and nail to be first to sit on top of a rocket in order to lead their country into the future, when rockets were blowing up left and right in the early days of the space program...the Right Stuff indeed!




And here's a picure of somebody with The Wrong Stuff...God, what a contrast!!

[Octafish]

1. Happy Birthday, Wally!

IIRC, Schirra is the only astronaut to fly aboard Mercury, Gemini and Apollo.

http://www.astronautix.com/

[havocmom]

2. And, I believe, the only one to smuggle a sandwhich into orbit.

Guess the Tang wasn't that good?

[edbermac]

3. That was John Young and Gus Grissom on the first Gemini flight...

Gus loved corned beef so Young smuggled one on board, and they caught hell for it...

[havocmom]

6. Thanks for the correction.

Who was the first golfer on the moon? Can't remember that one. My memory sucks these days.

[edbermac]

8. Al Shepard on Apollo 14; he smuggled a few golf balls to the moon...

A very avid golfer on earth, he swung one-handed using a metal rod with a scoop on it that was used for collecting soil...as far as I know he never revealed the brand name; he would have made a fortune!

[GreenPartyVoter]

4. Cool! One of my cheerleaders is going to space camp this summer. Who

knows, maybe she will get to Mars like she wants to. :)

[Bake]

5. Back when the country GAVE A DAMN about the future ...

I miss those days.

Happy Birthday, Wally!

Bake

[Bake]

7. Back when you were PROUD to be an American.

Back when we did great things (well, except for that whole Vietnam thing ...). But we DID some great things.

I miss Camelot.

Bake

[qnr]

9. Happy Birthday Wally - Thanks for all the positive memories n/t

[Zuni]

10. America has so much potential

just looking at the astronauts and what they accomplished is amazing. Too bad we are held back by a reactionary President and American-Taliban leadership in Congress. If we had the right leaders and could get back on the right track, there is no telling the miracles we could produce for the benefit of mankind.

[Aristus]

11. Happy Birthday, Wally!

I've become fascinated with the early manned space program. I've read nearly every biography and autobiography on the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo astronauts that is available. Does Wally Schirra have a book? Anyone know?

I recently read Scott Carpenter's autobio "For Spacious Skies", where he makes clear that the Aurora 7 malfunctions and overshoot were instumentation problems and not a result of him fooling around. Carpenter also hinted around that he was a general supporter of the Dems. Unlike John Glenn, who is a proud and open Democrat. It's nice to know.

So many of those guys came from a background that would steer them more towards the Repukes politically, even if they had no political ambitions of their own.

I also just finished reading "One Giant Leap", a bio about, of course, Neil Armstrong. Armstrong actually sounds like he might be more at home with the repugs, except that his biographer mentions a number of times that Armstrong is resolutely apolitical.

That's fine with me. I'd hate to think a hero of mine had feet of clay. :-)