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Colonel John Herschel Glenn Jr. (July 18, 1921 – December 8, 2016) was a United States Marine Corps aviator, engineer, astronaut, and United States Senator from Ohio. In 1962, he became the first American to orbit the Earth, circling it three times.
Before joining NASA, Glenn was a distinguished fighter pilot in World War II, China and Korea. He shot down three MiG-15 aircraft, and was awarded six Distinguished Flying Crosses and eighteen Air Medals. In 1957, he made the first supersonic transcontinental flight across the United States. His on-board camera took the first continuous, panoramic photograph of the United States.
He was one of the Mercury Seven, military test pilots selected in 1959 by NASA as the United States' first astronauts. On February 20, 1962, Glenn flew the Friendship 7 mission, becoming the first American to orbit the Earth, and the fifth person and third American in space. He received the NASA Distinguished Service Medal in 1962 and the Congressional Space Medal of Honor in 1978, was inducted into the U.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame in 1990, and was the last surviving member of the Mercury Seven.
Glenn resigned from NASA in January 1964. He planned to run for a U.S. Senate seat from Ohio, but an injury in February 1964 forced his withdrawal. He retired from the Marine Corps the following year. He lost a close primary election in 1970. A member of the Democratic Party, Glenn first won election to the Senate in 1974 and served for 24 years until January 1999. In 1998, while still a sitting Senator, Glenn became the oldest person to fly in space as a crew member of the Discovery space shuttle and the only person to fly in both the Mercury and Space Shuttle programs. He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2012.
Before joining NASA, Glenn was a distinguished fighter pilot in World War II, China and Korea. He shot down three MiG-15 aircraft, and was awarded six Distinguished Flying Crosses and eighteen Air Medals. In 1957, he made the first supersonic transcontinental flight across the United States. His on-board camera took the first continuous, panoramic photograph of the United States.
He was one of the Mercury Seven, military test pilots selected in 1959 by NASA as the United States' first astronauts. On February 20, 1962, Glenn flew the Friendship 7 mission, becoming the first American to orbit the Earth, and the fifth person and third American in space. He received the NASA Distinguished Service Medal in 1962 and the Congressional Space Medal of Honor in 1978, was inducted into the U.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame in 1990, and was the last surviving member of the Mercury Seven.
Glenn resigned from NASA in January 1964. He planned to run for a U.S. Senate seat from Ohio, but an injury in February 1964 forced his withdrawal. He retired from the Marine Corps the following year. He lost a close primary election in 1970. A member of the Democratic Party, Glenn first won election to the Senate in 1974 and served for 24 years until January 1999. In 1998, while still a sitting Senator, Glenn became the oldest person to fly in space as a crew member of the Discovery space shuttle and the only person to fly in both the Mercury and Space Shuttle programs. He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2012.
John Glenn - Wikipedia
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John Glenn American Hero 1921-2016 PBS Documentary
1998 PBS documentary about the late John Glenn.
Thank you my friend Maj Marty Hogan for making us aware that July 18 is the anniversary of the birth of USNA graduate; WWII and Korean War US Marine combat pilot; NASA Project Mercury Astronaut who was the first American to orbit the Earth; and US Senator John Herschel Glenn Jr.
Rest in peace John Herschel Glenn Jr
Prayers for his widow Annie Margaret [Castor] Glenn son Dave and daughter Lyn and two grandchildren as they grieve his death.
John Glenn American Hero 1921-2016 PBS Documentary
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3bfNjjXycB8
Images;
1. The Original Seven Astronauts. Standing beside a Convair F106-B aircraft in a January 1961 photograph are the nation's Project Mercury astronauts. Left to right, M. Scott Carpenter, L. Gordon Cooper Jr., John H. Glenn Jr., Virgil I. 'Gus' Grissom, Walter M. Schirra Jr., Alan B. Shepard Jr. and Donald K. 'Deke' Slayton.
2. Astronaut John Glenn photographed in space by an automatic sequence motion picture camera during his historic orbital flight on 'Friendship 7' on Feb. 20, 1962
3. Glenn family, taken after John Glenn's 'Project Bullet' transcontinental flight, 1957 wife Annie Margaret Glenn, daughter Lynn and son Dave
4. John Glenn works with an experiment inside the Spacehab module aboard space shuttle Discovery in November 1998
Biographies:
1. obituary from space.com/34958-john-glenn-first-american-in-orbit-dies-at-95.html
2. NASA background from jsc.nasa.gov/Bios/htmlbios/glenn-j.html
1. Obituary from [https://www.space.com/34958-john-glenn-first-american-in-orbit-dies-at-95.html]
"John Glenn, First American to Orbit the Earth, Dies at 95
By Robert Z. Pearlman December 08, 2016
John Glenn, the first American to orbit the Earth, died today (Dec. 8). He was 95.
The former astronaut and U.S. senator was being hospitalized at the Wexner Medical Center at Ohio State University in Columbus when he died. In 2014, Glenn suffered a minor stroke, affecting his vision, after undergoing heart-valve replacement surgery.
"We are saddened by the loss of Sen. John Glenn, the first American to orbit Earth. A true American hero. Godspeed, John Glenn. Ad astra," NASA wrote on Twitter. [John Glenn: An American Hero's Greatest Moments]
The last of NASA's original seven astronauts to die, Glenn circled the world three times on board the Mercury capsule "Friendship 7" before splashing down in the Atlantic Ocean on Feb. 20, 1962.
"Zero-g and I feel fine," Glenn reported to the ground five minutes into the flight. "Oh, that view is tremendous."
Thirty-six years later, at the age of 77, he returned to orbit aboard the space shuttle Discovery, becoming the oldest person, worldwide, to fly into space.
A colonel in the U.S. Marine Corps who flew combat flights during World War II and the Korean War, Glenn served for 25 years as a U.S. senator representing his home state of Ohio. He was honored with the Congressional Gold Medal and the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian honors awarded by the United States.
Glenn was named an astronaut in April 1959, two years after he set a transcontinental speed record flying a jet from California to New York in three hours and 23 minutes. On his historic flight in 1962, Glenn made three revolutions of the Earth on board the Mercury-Atlas 6 orbital mission in just four hours and 55 minutes.
"During my [three-orbit] flight, I was able to perform basic research experiments, which helped contribute to what we know about humans in space," Glenn told me in November 1996. "The primary scientific objective of my [Mercury flight] was to determine the reaction of the body's senses to weightlessness."
The historic mission, which came after orbital missions by two Russian cosmonauts and sub-orbital launches by two of Glenn's fellow Mercury astronauts, also established the United States as a contender for the first time in the space race with the Soviet Union. [In Photos: John Glenn, First American in Orbit]
"There was a strong feeling in this country that we needed to surpass the Soviet's advances and regain our position at the top," Glenn told me. "It is hard to imagine the strength of those convictions today — especially with the collapse of the Soviet Union — but you can bet they were a strong motivator for America."
The successful flight made Glenn an instant hero. Deemed too valuable to the country to risk flying on another rocket, Glenn served as an advisor to NASA until 1964.
"Since I was not going to be on active flight status, I stayed on with NASA for a couple of years to plow my experience back into the program and then went on to other pursuits," Glenn said.
He retired from the Marine Corps the following year to run for the Senate.
Winning his third campaign in 1974, Glenn served for four terms, becoming chief author of the 1978 Nonproliferation Act, chairing the Government Affairs Committee from 1978 until 1995, and sitting on the Foreign Relations and Armed Services committees and the Special Committee on Aging.
In 1984, he ran and lost in the Democratic primary to be a candidate for the President of the United States.
On Feb. 20, 1997, 35 years to the day after he first orbited the Earth, Glenn announced that he would retire from the Senate. Eleven months later, NASA confirmed his return to space to study how microgravity affects aging.
"I'm proud to have been part of the beginning of America's space program, and needless to say I'm excited to be back and I am honored and privileged," said Glenn at a Jan. 16, 1998 press conference announcing his second flight. "The important thing is the opportunity that this gives to take us in some new directions with research. I think that is really what we are kicking off."
For almost nine days, from Oct. 29 through Nov. 7, 1998, Glenn and his six STS-95 crew mates on board Discovery completed 134 orbits, conducting 80 medical and material research experiments, and deploying and retrieving a free-flying science platform.
John Glenn works with an experiment inside the Spacehab module aboard space shuttle Discovery in November 1998. (Image credit: NASA)
On his touch down, Glenn had logged a total of nine days, two hours and 39 minutes off the planet on his two history-making spaceflights.
"I took a little lapel pin that I had on my first flight — took it up again on [the space shuttle] flight — and that has been one of my prized possessions because it has been on both flights along with me," Glenn told me in 1998.
John Herschel Glenn, Jr., was born in Cambridge, Ohio on July 18, 1921. He attended Muskingum College and began flying lessons, earning his pilot's license in 1941. Glenn left college before earning his degree (though he was awarded a Bachelor of Science in engineering from Muskingum in 1962) and enlisted in the Naval Aviation Cadet Program. He was commissioned in the Marine Corps in 1943.
Bestowed with the Distinguished Flying Cross and NASA Distinguished Service Medal, among many other awards, Glenn was inducted into the National Aviation Hall of Fame in 1976, the International Space Hall of Fame in 1977 and the U.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame in 1990.
The NASA John H. Glenn Research Center at Lewis Field in Cleveland, Ohio was renamed in his honor in 1999. Two Ohio roadways bear his name, as do at least eight grade schools located across the country.
In 2014, the U.S. Navy christened the USNS John Glenn, a mobile landing platform, for his service as an aviator and astronaut. In 2006, Ohio State University founded the John Glenn College of Public Affairs. In May 2016, the country's second international airport was renamed for John Glenn in Columbus, Ohio.
Blue Origin, a commercial spaceflight company founded by Amazon's CEO Jeff Bezos, named its orbital-class launch vehicle the "New Glenn" in September 2016.
In 1999, Glenn collaborated with Nick Taylor to author his biography, "John Glenn: A Memoir" (Bantam Books). He was portrayed in the 1983 feature film "The Right Stuff" by actor Ed Harris, in the 2016 ABC limited event series "The Astronaut Wives Club" by Sam Reid, and in the upcoming Fox feature film "Hidden Figures" by Glen Powell.
In March 2001, Glenn took a turn playing himself, making a cameo appearance on the NBC TV sitcom "Frasier."
In 1943, Glenn married the former Annie Margaret Castor of New Concord, Ohio. Together they had a son, Dave and daughter, Lyn and two grandchildren."
2. Background from Nasa in 1999 jsc.nasa.gov/Bios/htmlbios/glenn-j.html
"JOHN HERSCHEL GLENN, JR. (COLONEL, USMC, RET.)
NASA ASTRONAUT (FORMER)
PERSONAL DATA: Born July 18, 1921 in Cambridge, Ohio. Married to the former Anna Margaret Castor of New Concord, Ohio. They have two grown children and two grandchildren.
EDUCATION: Glenn attended primary and secondary schools in New Concord, Ohio. He attended Muskingum College in New Concord and received a Bachelor of Science degree in Engineering. Muskingum College also awarded him an honorary Doctor of Science degree in engineering. He has received honorary doctoral degrees from nine colleges or universities.
SPECIAL HONORS: Glenn has been awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross on six occasions, and holds the Air Medal with 18 Clusters for his service during World War II and Korea. Glenn also holds the Navy Unit Commendation for service in Korea, the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal, the American Campaign Medal, the World War II Victory Medal, the China Service Medal, the National Defense Service Medal, the Korean Service Medal, the United Nations Service Medal, the Korean Presidential Unit Citation, the Navy's Astronaut Wings, the Marine Corps' Astronaut Medal, the NASA Distinguished Service Medal, and the Congressional Space Medal of Honor.
EXPERIENCE: He entered the Naval Aviation Cadet Program in March 1942 and was graduated from this program and commissioned in the Marine Corps in 1943. After advanced training, he joined Marine Fighter Squadron 155 and spent a year flying F-4U fighters in the Marshall Islands.
During his World War II service, he flew 59 combat missions. After the war, he was a member of Marine Fighter Squadron 218 on the North China patrol and served on Guam. From June 1948 to December 1950 Glenn was an instructor in advanced flight training at Corpus Christi, Texas. He then attended Amphibious Warfare Training at Quantico, Virginia. In Korea he flew 63 missions with Marine Fighter Squadron 311. As an exchange pilot with the Air Force Glenn flew 27 missions in the in F-86 Sabrejet. In the last nine days of fighting in Korea Glenn downed three MIG's in combat along the Yalu River.
After Korea, Glenn attended Test Pilot School at the Naval Air Test Center, Patuxent River, Maryland. After graduation, he was project officer on a number of aircraft. He was assigned to the Fighter Design Branch of the Navy Bureau of Aeronautics (now Bureau of Naval Weapons) in Washington from November 1956 to April 1959, during which time he also attended the University of Maryland.
In July 1957, while project officer of the F8U Crusader, he set a transcontinental speed record from Los Angeles to New York, spanning the country in 3 hours and 23 minutes. This was the first transcontinental flight to average supersonic speed. Glenn has nearly 9,000 hours of flying time, with approximately 3,000 hours in jet aircraft.
NASA EXPERIENCE: Glenn was assigned to the NASA Space Task Group at Langley Research Center, Hampton, Virginia, in April 1959 after his selection as a Project Mercury Astronaut. The Space Task Group was moved to Houston and became part of the NASA Manned Spacecraft Center in 1962. Glenn flew on Mercury-6 (February 20, 1962) and STS-95 (October 29 to November 7, 1998), and has logged over 218 hours in space. Prior to his first flight, Glenn had served as backup pilot for Astronauts Shepard and Grissom. When astronauts were given special assignments to ensure pilot input into the design and development of spacecraft, Glenn specialized in cockpit layout and control functioning, including some of the early designs for the Apollo Project. Glenn resigned from the Manned Spacecraft Center on January 16, 1964. He was promoted to the rank of Colonel in October 1964 and retired from the Marine Corps on January 1, 1965. He was a business executive from 1965 until his election to the United States Senate in November 1974. Glenn retired from the U.S. Senate in January 1999.
SPACE FLIGHT EXPERIENCE: On February 20, 1962, Glenn piloted the Mercury-Atlas 6 "Friendship 7" spacecraft on the first manned orbital mission of the United States. Launched from Kennedy Space Center, Florida, he completed a successful three-orbit mission around the earth, reaching a maximum altitude (apogee) of approximately 162 statute miles and an orbital velocity of approximately 17,500 miles per hour. Glenn's "Friendship 7" Mercury spacecraft landed approximately 800 miles southeast of KSC in the vicinity of Grand Turk Island. Mission duration from launch to impact was 4 hours, 55 minutes, and 23 seconds.
STS-95 Discovery (October 29 to November 7, 1998) was a 9-day mission during which the crew supported a variety of research payloads including deployment of the Spartan solar-observing spacecraft, the Hubble Space Telescope Orbital Systems Test Platform, and investigations on space flight and the aging process. The mission was accomplished in 134 Earth orbits, traveling 3.6 million miles in 213 hours and 44 minutes."
2. Obituary background from NASA
"Former astronaut and U.S. Senator John Glenn died Thursday, Dec. 8, 2016, at the Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center in Columbus.
Glenn, who served four terms as a U.S. senator from Ohio, was one of NASA's original seven Mercury astronauts. His flight on Friendship 7 on Feb. 20, 1962, showed the world that America was a serious contender in the space race with the Soviet Union. It also made Glenn an instant hero.
His mission of almost nine days on the space shuttle orbiter Discovery, launched Oct. 29, 1998, when he was 77, made him the oldest human to venture into space. On Discovery he participated in a series of tests on the aging process. The aging population was one focus of his work as a U.S. senator.
Glenn was described as "humble, funny, and generous" by Trevor Brown, dean of the John Glenn School of Public Affairs at Ohio State University, in a statement joined by the Glenn family. "Even after leaving public life, he loved to meet with citizens, school children in particular. He thrilled to music and had a weakness for chocolate."
Glenn will always be remembered as the first American to orbit the Earth during those tentative, challenging, daring days when humans were just beginning to venture beyond the atmosphere that had nurtured them since the species began.
While Glenn's flight on Friendship 7 was a glorious national triumph, problems arose that could have spelled disaster. The first was a failure of the automatic control system.
A scheduled 30-minute test to determine whether Glenn could fly the capsule manually became a matter of life and death when the automatic system went out at the end of the first orbit.
"I went to manual control and continued in that mode during the second and third orbits, and during re-entry," Glenn recalled later. He had been confident he could do it.
"The malfunction just forced me to prove very rapidly what had been planned over a longer period of time."
Another problem seemed even more serious -- telemetry indicated the spacecraft's heat shield was loose. It seemed possible that Glenn and the spacecraft would be incinerated on re-entry. Much of the world held its breath.
Glenn left the retrorocket pack in place to steady the heat shield during re-entry. "It made for a very spectacular re-entry from where I was sitting," he said. Big chunks of the burning material came flying by the window.
He wasn't sure whether the flaming debris was the rocket pack or the heat shield breaking up. "Fortunately," he told an interviewer," it was the rocket pack -- or I wouldn't be answering these questions."
From Ohio to Orbit nasa.gov/content/profile-of-john-glenn
"John Herschel Glenn Jr. was born July 18, 1921, in Cambridge, Ohio. He attended primary and secondary schools in New Concord, Ohio. He received a bachelor of science degree in engineering from Muskingum College in New Concord.
Muskingum College is among nine colleges or universities that subsequently awarded him honorary doctoral degrees.
Glenn entered the Naval Aviation Cadet Program in March 1942. He graduated and was commissioned in the Marine Corps in 1943. After advanced training, he joined Marine Fighter Squadron 155 and spent a year flying F-4U fighters in the Marshall Islands. He flew 59 combat missions during World War II.
After the war, he was a member of Marine Fighter Squadron 218 on the North China patrol and served on Guam. From June 1948 to December 1950 he served as an instructor in advanced flight training at Corpus Christi, Texas. He then attended Amphibious Warfare Training at Quantico, Va.
In Korea he flew 63 missions with Marine Fighter Squadron 311. As an exchange pilot with the Air Force Glenn flew 27 missions in the F-86 Sabre. In the last nine days of fighting in Korea, Glenn shot down three MiGs in combat along the Yalu River.
Glenn attended Test Pilot School at the Naval Air Test Center, Patuxent River, Md. After graduation, he was project officer on a number of aircraft. He was assigned to the Fighter Design Branch of the Navy Bureau of Aeronautics (now Bureau of Naval Weapons) in Washington from November 1956 to April 1959. During that time he also attended the University of Maryland.
In July 1957, while he was project officer of the F-8U Crusader, he set a transcontinental speed record from Los Angeles to New York -- 3 hours and 23 minutes. It was the first transcontinental flight to average supersonic speed.
Glenn accumulated nearly 9,000 hours of flying time, about 3,000 of it in jets.
After his selection as a Mercury astronaut, Glenn was assigned to the NASA Space Task Group at Langley, Va., in April 1959. The Space Task Group was moved to Houston and became part of the NASA Manned Spacecraft Center (now Johnson Space Center in Houston) in 1962. Before his 4-hour, 55-minute flight in the Friendship 7 capsule, Glenn had served as backup pilot for astronauts Alan Shepard, the first American in space who flew on May 5, 1961, and to Virgil "Gus" Grissom, who followed Shepard on a suborbital flight of his own.
When astronauts were assigned to provide pilot input for the design and development of spacecraft, Glenn specialized in cockpit layout and control functioning, including some of the early designs for the Apollo Project.
Glenn was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross on six occasions, and holds the Air Medal with 18 Clusters for his service during World War II and Korea. Glenn also received the Navy Unit Commendation for service in Korea, the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal, the American Campaign Medal, the World War II Victory Medal, the China Service Medal, the National Defense Service Medal, the Korean Service Medal, the United Nations Service Medal, the Korean Presidential Unit Citation, the Navy's astronaut Wings, the Marine Corps' Astronaut Medal, the NASA Distinguished Service Medal, and the Congressional Space Medal of Honor.
Glenn resigned as an astronaut on Jan. 16, 1964. He was promoted to colonel in October 1964 and retired from the Marine Corps on Jan. 1, 1965.
He became an executive with Royal Crown International, but took an active part in Ohio politics and environmental protection efforts. He won his Senate seat in 1974, carrying all 88 counties of Ohio. He was re-elected in 1980 with the largest margin in Ohio history.
Ohio returned him to the Senate for a third term in 1986, again with a substantial majority. In 1992 he was elected again, becoming the first popularly elected senator from his state to win four consecutive terms.
During his last term he was the ranking member of both the Governmental Affairs Committee and the Subcommittee on Air/Land Forces in the Senate Armed Services Committee. He also served on the Select Committee on Intelligence and the Special Committee on Aging.
He was considered one of the Senate's leading experts on technical and scientific matters, and won wide respect for his work to prevent the spread of weapons of mass destruction. He took pride in using his position on the Governmental Affairs Committee to root out waste in government and to clean up the nation's nuclear materials production plants.
In 1998, Glenn flew on the STS-95 Discovery shuttle flight, a 9-day mission during which the crew supported a variety of research payloads including deployment of the Spartan solar-observing spacecraft, the Hubble Space Telescope Orbital Systems Test Platform, and Glenn's investigations on space flight and the aging process."
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Rest in peace John Herschel Glenn Jr
Prayers for his widow Annie Margaret [Castor] Glenn son Dave and daughter Lyn and two grandchildren as they grieve his death.
John Glenn American Hero 1921-2016 PBS Documentary
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3bfNjjXycB8
Images;
1. The Original Seven Astronauts. Standing beside a Convair F106-B aircraft in a January 1961 photograph are the nation's Project Mercury astronauts. Left to right, M. Scott Carpenter, L. Gordon Cooper Jr., John H. Glenn Jr., Virgil I. 'Gus' Grissom, Walter M. Schirra Jr., Alan B. Shepard Jr. and Donald K. 'Deke' Slayton.
2. Astronaut John Glenn photographed in space by an automatic sequence motion picture camera during his historic orbital flight on 'Friendship 7' on Feb. 20, 1962
3. Glenn family, taken after John Glenn's 'Project Bullet' transcontinental flight, 1957 wife Annie Margaret Glenn, daughter Lynn and son Dave
4. John Glenn works with an experiment inside the Spacehab module aboard space shuttle Discovery in November 1998
Biographies:
1. obituary from space.com/34958-john-glenn-first-american-in-orbit-dies-at-95.html
2. NASA background from jsc.nasa.gov/Bios/htmlbios/glenn-j.html
1. Obituary from [https://www.space.com/34958-john-glenn-first-american-in-orbit-dies-at-95.html]
"John Glenn, First American to Orbit the Earth, Dies at 95
By Robert Z. Pearlman December 08, 2016
John Glenn, the first American to orbit the Earth, died today (Dec. 8). He was 95.
The former astronaut and U.S. senator was being hospitalized at the Wexner Medical Center at Ohio State University in Columbus when he died. In 2014, Glenn suffered a minor stroke, affecting his vision, after undergoing heart-valve replacement surgery.
"We are saddened by the loss of Sen. John Glenn, the first American to orbit Earth. A true American hero. Godspeed, John Glenn. Ad astra," NASA wrote on Twitter. [John Glenn: An American Hero's Greatest Moments]
The last of NASA's original seven astronauts to die, Glenn circled the world three times on board the Mercury capsule "Friendship 7" before splashing down in the Atlantic Ocean on Feb. 20, 1962.
"Zero-g and I feel fine," Glenn reported to the ground five minutes into the flight. "Oh, that view is tremendous."
Thirty-six years later, at the age of 77, he returned to orbit aboard the space shuttle Discovery, becoming the oldest person, worldwide, to fly into space.
A colonel in the U.S. Marine Corps who flew combat flights during World War II and the Korean War, Glenn served for 25 years as a U.S. senator representing his home state of Ohio. He was honored with the Congressional Gold Medal and the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian honors awarded by the United States.
Glenn was named an astronaut in April 1959, two years after he set a transcontinental speed record flying a jet from California to New York in three hours and 23 minutes. On his historic flight in 1962, Glenn made three revolutions of the Earth on board the Mercury-Atlas 6 orbital mission in just four hours and 55 minutes.
"During my [three-orbit] flight, I was able to perform basic research experiments, which helped contribute to what we know about humans in space," Glenn told me in November 1996. "The primary scientific objective of my [Mercury flight] was to determine the reaction of the body's senses to weightlessness."
The historic mission, which came after orbital missions by two Russian cosmonauts and sub-orbital launches by two of Glenn's fellow Mercury astronauts, also established the United States as a contender for the first time in the space race with the Soviet Union. [In Photos: John Glenn, First American in Orbit]
"There was a strong feeling in this country that we needed to surpass the Soviet's advances and regain our position at the top," Glenn told me. "It is hard to imagine the strength of those convictions today — especially with the collapse of the Soviet Union — but you can bet they were a strong motivator for America."
The successful flight made Glenn an instant hero. Deemed too valuable to the country to risk flying on another rocket, Glenn served as an advisor to NASA until 1964.
"Since I was not going to be on active flight status, I stayed on with NASA for a couple of years to plow my experience back into the program and then went on to other pursuits," Glenn said.
He retired from the Marine Corps the following year to run for the Senate.
Winning his third campaign in 1974, Glenn served for four terms, becoming chief author of the 1978 Nonproliferation Act, chairing the Government Affairs Committee from 1978 until 1995, and sitting on the Foreign Relations and Armed Services committees and the Special Committee on Aging.
In 1984, he ran and lost in the Democratic primary to be a candidate for the President of the United States.
On Feb. 20, 1997, 35 years to the day after he first orbited the Earth, Glenn announced that he would retire from the Senate. Eleven months later, NASA confirmed his return to space to study how microgravity affects aging.
"I'm proud to have been part of the beginning of America's space program, and needless to say I'm excited to be back and I am honored and privileged," said Glenn at a Jan. 16, 1998 press conference announcing his second flight. "The important thing is the opportunity that this gives to take us in some new directions with research. I think that is really what we are kicking off."
For almost nine days, from Oct. 29 through Nov. 7, 1998, Glenn and his six STS-95 crew mates on board Discovery completed 134 orbits, conducting 80 medical and material research experiments, and deploying and retrieving a free-flying science platform.
John Glenn works with an experiment inside the Spacehab module aboard space shuttle Discovery in November 1998. (Image credit: NASA)
On his touch down, Glenn had logged a total of nine days, two hours and 39 minutes off the planet on his two history-making spaceflights.
"I took a little lapel pin that I had on my first flight — took it up again on [the space shuttle] flight — and that has been one of my prized possessions because it has been on both flights along with me," Glenn told me in 1998.
John Herschel Glenn, Jr., was born in Cambridge, Ohio on July 18, 1921. He attended Muskingum College and began flying lessons, earning his pilot's license in 1941. Glenn left college before earning his degree (though he was awarded a Bachelor of Science in engineering from Muskingum in 1962) and enlisted in the Naval Aviation Cadet Program. He was commissioned in the Marine Corps in 1943.
Bestowed with the Distinguished Flying Cross and NASA Distinguished Service Medal, among many other awards, Glenn was inducted into the National Aviation Hall of Fame in 1976, the International Space Hall of Fame in 1977 and the U.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame in 1990.
The NASA John H. Glenn Research Center at Lewis Field in Cleveland, Ohio was renamed in his honor in 1999. Two Ohio roadways bear his name, as do at least eight grade schools located across the country.
In 2014, the U.S. Navy christened the USNS John Glenn, a mobile landing platform, for his service as an aviator and astronaut. In 2006, Ohio State University founded the John Glenn College of Public Affairs. In May 2016, the country's second international airport was renamed for John Glenn in Columbus, Ohio.
Blue Origin, a commercial spaceflight company founded by Amazon's CEO Jeff Bezos, named its orbital-class launch vehicle the "New Glenn" in September 2016.
In 1999, Glenn collaborated with Nick Taylor to author his biography, "John Glenn: A Memoir" (Bantam Books). He was portrayed in the 1983 feature film "The Right Stuff" by actor Ed Harris, in the 2016 ABC limited event series "The Astronaut Wives Club" by Sam Reid, and in the upcoming Fox feature film "Hidden Figures" by Glen Powell.
In March 2001, Glenn took a turn playing himself, making a cameo appearance on the NBC TV sitcom "Frasier."
In 1943, Glenn married the former Annie Margaret Castor of New Concord, Ohio. Together they had a son, Dave and daughter, Lyn and two grandchildren."
2. Background from Nasa in 1999 jsc.nasa.gov/Bios/htmlbios/glenn-j.html
"JOHN HERSCHEL GLENN, JR. (COLONEL, USMC, RET.)
NASA ASTRONAUT (FORMER)
PERSONAL DATA: Born July 18, 1921 in Cambridge, Ohio. Married to the former Anna Margaret Castor of New Concord, Ohio. They have two grown children and two grandchildren.
EDUCATION: Glenn attended primary and secondary schools in New Concord, Ohio. He attended Muskingum College in New Concord and received a Bachelor of Science degree in Engineering. Muskingum College also awarded him an honorary Doctor of Science degree in engineering. He has received honorary doctoral degrees from nine colleges or universities.
SPECIAL HONORS: Glenn has been awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross on six occasions, and holds the Air Medal with 18 Clusters for his service during World War II and Korea. Glenn also holds the Navy Unit Commendation for service in Korea, the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal, the American Campaign Medal, the World War II Victory Medal, the China Service Medal, the National Defense Service Medal, the Korean Service Medal, the United Nations Service Medal, the Korean Presidential Unit Citation, the Navy's Astronaut Wings, the Marine Corps' Astronaut Medal, the NASA Distinguished Service Medal, and the Congressional Space Medal of Honor.
EXPERIENCE: He entered the Naval Aviation Cadet Program in March 1942 and was graduated from this program and commissioned in the Marine Corps in 1943. After advanced training, he joined Marine Fighter Squadron 155 and spent a year flying F-4U fighters in the Marshall Islands.
During his World War II service, he flew 59 combat missions. After the war, he was a member of Marine Fighter Squadron 218 on the North China patrol and served on Guam. From June 1948 to December 1950 Glenn was an instructor in advanced flight training at Corpus Christi, Texas. He then attended Amphibious Warfare Training at Quantico, Virginia. In Korea he flew 63 missions with Marine Fighter Squadron 311. As an exchange pilot with the Air Force Glenn flew 27 missions in the in F-86 Sabrejet. In the last nine days of fighting in Korea Glenn downed three MIG's in combat along the Yalu River.
After Korea, Glenn attended Test Pilot School at the Naval Air Test Center, Patuxent River, Maryland. After graduation, he was project officer on a number of aircraft. He was assigned to the Fighter Design Branch of the Navy Bureau of Aeronautics (now Bureau of Naval Weapons) in Washington from November 1956 to April 1959, during which time he also attended the University of Maryland.
In July 1957, while project officer of the F8U Crusader, he set a transcontinental speed record from Los Angeles to New York, spanning the country in 3 hours and 23 minutes. This was the first transcontinental flight to average supersonic speed. Glenn has nearly 9,000 hours of flying time, with approximately 3,000 hours in jet aircraft.
NASA EXPERIENCE: Glenn was assigned to the NASA Space Task Group at Langley Research Center, Hampton, Virginia, in April 1959 after his selection as a Project Mercury Astronaut. The Space Task Group was moved to Houston and became part of the NASA Manned Spacecraft Center in 1962. Glenn flew on Mercury-6 (February 20, 1962) and STS-95 (October 29 to November 7, 1998), and has logged over 218 hours in space. Prior to his first flight, Glenn had served as backup pilot for Astronauts Shepard and Grissom. When astronauts were given special assignments to ensure pilot input into the design and development of spacecraft, Glenn specialized in cockpit layout and control functioning, including some of the early designs for the Apollo Project. Glenn resigned from the Manned Spacecraft Center on January 16, 1964. He was promoted to the rank of Colonel in October 1964 and retired from the Marine Corps on January 1, 1965. He was a business executive from 1965 until his election to the United States Senate in November 1974. Glenn retired from the U.S. Senate in January 1999.
SPACE FLIGHT EXPERIENCE: On February 20, 1962, Glenn piloted the Mercury-Atlas 6 "Friendship 7" spacecraft on the first manned orbital mission of the United States. Launched from Kennedy Space Center, Florida, he completed a successful three-orbit mission around the earth, reaching a maximum altitude (apogee) of approximately 162 statute miles and an orbital velocity of approximately 17,500 miles per hour. Glenn's "Friendship 7" Mercury spacecraft landed approximately 800 miles southeast of KSC in the vicinity of Grand Turk Island. Mission duration from launch to impact was 4 hours, 55 minutes, and 23 seconds.
STS-95 Discovery (October 29 to November 7, 1998) was a 9-day mission during which the crew supported a variety of research payloads including deployment of the Spartan solar-observing spacecraft, the Hubble Space Telescope Orbital Systems Test Platform, and investigations on space flight and the aging process. The mission was accomplished in 134 Earth orbits, traveling 3.6 million miles in 213 hours and 44 minutes."
2. Obituary background from NASA
"Former astronaut and U.S. Senator John Glenn died Thursday, Dec. 8, 2016, at the Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center in Columbus.
Glenn, who served four terms as a U.S. senator from Ohio, was one of NASA's original seven Mercury astronauts. His flight on Friendship 7 on Feb. 20, 1962, showed the world that America was a serious contender in the space race with the Soviet Union. It also made Glenn an instant hero.
His mission of almost nine days on the space shuttle orbiter Discovery, launched Oct. 29, 1998, when he was 77, made him the oldest human to venture into space. On Discovery he participated in a series of tests on the aging process. The aging population was one focus of his work as a U.S. senator.
Glenn was described as "humble, funny, and generous" by Trevor Brown, dean of the John Glenn School of Public Affairs at Ohio State University, in a statement joined by the Glenn family. "Even after leaving public life, he loved to meet with citizens, school children in particular. He thrilled to music and had a weakness for chocolate."
Glenn will always be remembered as the first American to orbit the Earth during those tentative, challenging, daring days when humans were just beginning to venture beyond the atmosphere that had nurtured them since the species began.
While Glenn's flight on Friendship 7 was a glorious national triumph, problems arose that could have spelled disaster. The first was a failure of the automatic control system.
A scheduled 30-minute test to determine whether Glenn could fly the capsule manually became a matter of life and death when the automatic system went out at the end of the first orbit.
"I went to manual control and continued in that mode during the second and third orbits, and during re-entry," Glenn recalled later. He had been confident he could do it.
"The malfunction just forced me to prove very rapidly what had been planned over a longer period of time."
Another problem seemed even more serious -- telemetry indicated the spacecraft's heat shield was loose. It seemed possible that Glenn and the spacecraft would be incinerated on re-entry. Much of the world held its breath.
Glenn left the retrorocket pack in place to steady the heat shield during re-entry. "It made for a very spectacular re-entry from where I was sitting," he said. Big chunks of the burning material came flying by the window.
He wasn't sure whether the flaming debris was the rocket pack or the heat shield breaking up. "Fortunately," he told an interviewer," it was the rocket pack -- or I wouldn't be answering these questions."
From Ohio to Orbit nasa.gov/content/profile-of-john-glenn
"John Herschel Glenn Jr. was born July 18, 1921, in Cambridge, Ohio. He attended primary and secondary schools in New Concord, Ohio. He received a bachelor of science degree in engineering from Muskingum College in New Concord.
Muskingum College is among nine colleges or universities that subsequently awarded him honorary doctoral degrees.
Glenn entered the Naval Aviation Cadet Program in March 1942. He graduated and was commissioned in the Marine Corps in 1943. After advanced training, he joined Marine Fighter Squadron 155 and spent a year flying F-4U fighters in the Marshall Islands. He flew 59 combat missions during World War II.
After the war, he was a member of Marine Fighter Squadron 218 on the North China patrol and served on Guam. From June 1948 to December 1950 he served as an instructor in advanced flight training at Corpus Christi, Texas. He then attended Amphibious Warfare Training at Quantico, Va.
In Korea he flew 63 missions with Marine Fighter Squadron 311. As an exchange pilot with the Air Force Glenn flew 27 missions in the F-86 Sabre. In the last nine days of fighting in Korea, Glenn shot down three MiGs in combat along the Yalu River.
Glenn attended Test Pilot School at the Naval Air Test Center, Patuxent River, Md. After graduation, he was project officer on a number of aircraft. He was assigned to the Fighter Design Branch of the Navy Bureau of Aeronautics (now Bureau of Naval Weapons) in Washington from November 1956 to April 1959. During that time he also attended the University of Maryland.
In July 1957, while he was project officer of the F-8U Crusader, he set a transcontinental speed record from Los Angeles to New York -- 3 hours and 23 minutes. It was the first transcontinental flight to average supersonic speed.
Glenn accumulated nearly 9,000 hours of flying time, about 3,000 of it in jets.
After his selection as a Mercury astronaut, Glenn was assigned to the NASA Space Task Group at Langley, Va., in April 1959. The Space Task Group was moved to Houston and became part of the NASA Manned Spacecraft Center (now Johnson Space Center in Houston) in 1962. Before his 4-hour, 55-minute flight in the Friendship 7 capsule, Glenn had served as backup pilot for astronauts Alan Shepard, the first American in space who flew on May 5, 1961, and to Virgil "Gus" Grissom, who followed Shepard on a suborbital flight of his own.
When astronauts were assigned to provide pilot input for the design and development of spacecraft, Glenn specialized in cockpit layout and control functioning, including some of the early designs for the Apollo Project.
Glenn was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross on six occasions, and holds the Air Medal with 18 Clusters for his service during World War II and Korea. Glenn also received the Navy Unit Commendation for service in Korea, the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal, the American Campaign Medal, the World War II Victory Medal, the China Service Medal, the National Defense Service Medal, the Korean Service Medal, the United Nations Service Medal, the Korean Presidential Unit Citation, the Navy's astronaut Wings, the Marine Corps' Astronaut Medal, the NASA Distinguished Service Medal, and the Congressional Space Medal of Honor.
Glenn resigned as an astronaut on Jan. 16, 1964. He was promoted to colonel in October 1964 and retired from the Marine Corps on Jan. 1, 1965.
He became an executive with Royal Crown International, but took an active part in Ohio politics and environmental protection efforts. He won his Senate seat in 1974, carrying all 88 counties of Ohio. He was re-elected in 1980 with the largest margin in Ohio history.
Ohio returned him to the Senate for a third term in 1986, again with a substantial majority. In 1992 he was elected again, becoming the first popularly elected senator from his state to win four consecutive terms.
During his last term he was the ranking member of both the Governmental Affairs Committee and the Subcommittee on Air/Land Forces in the Senate Armed Services Committee. He also served on the Select Committee on Intelligence and the Special Committee on Aging.
He was considered one of the Senate's leading experts on technical and scientific matters, and won wide respect for his work to prevent the spread of weapons of mass destruction. He took pride in using his position on the Governmental Affairs Committee to root out waste in government and to clean up the nation's nuclear materials production plants.
In 1998, Glenn flew on the STS-95 Discovery shuttle flight, a 9-day mission during which the crew supported a variety of research payloads including deployment of the Spartan solar-observing spacecraft, the Hubble Space Telescope Orbital Systems Test Platform, and Glenn's investigations on space flight and the aging process."
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Images:
1. 1998, John Glenn is with his son David, his daughter Lyn, and his wife Annie at the Kennedy Space Center.
2. February 23, 1962, President John F. Kennedy gives a speech honoring John Glenn for his 1962 Friendship 7 flight, John Glenn's family -daughter Lynn, wife Annie and son Dave [age 16]
3. February 23, 1962 President John F. Kennedy (left), John Glenn and General Leighton I. Davis ride together during a parade in Cocoa Beach, Florida
FYI LTC Jeff Shearer Maj Robert Thornton SGT Philip RoncariCWO3 Dennis M. SFC William Farrell
FYI SGT (Join to see)PO3 Bob McCord [~655611:spc-douglas-bolton Cynthia Croft SSG Donald H "Don" BatesSP5 Jesse EngelSPC Matthew LambSSG Robert "Rob" WentworthCapt Rich BuckleyCW4 G.L. SmithSPC Russ BoltonSFC Terry WilcoxPO2 Roger LafarletteSPC Nancy GreeneSSG Franklin Briant
1. 1998, John Glenn is with his son David, his daughter Lyn, and his wife Annie at the Kennedy Space Center.
2. February 23, 1962, President John F. Kennedy gives a speech honoring John Glenn for his 1962 Friendship 7 flight, John Glenn's family -daughter Lynn, wife Annie and son Dave [age 16]
3. February 23, 1962 President John F. Kennedy (left), John Glenn and General Leighton I. Davis ride together during a parade in Cocoa Beach, Florida
FYI LTC Jeff Shearer Maj Robert Thornton SGT Philip RoncariCWO3 Dennis M. SFC William Farrell
FYI SGT (Join to see)PO3 Bob McCord [~655611:spc-douglas-bolton Cynthia Croft SSG Donald H "Don" BatesSP5 Jesse EngelSPC Matthew LambSSG Robert "Rob" WentworthCapt Rich BuckleyCW4 G.L. SmithSPC Russ BoltonSFC Terry WilcoxPO2 Roger LafarletteSPC Nancy GreeneSSG Franklin Briant
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ASTRONAUT JOHN GLENN: WHAT AN INSPIRATION YOU ARE/WERE! I MISS YOU LIKE CRAZY, SIR; AND I LOVE YOU EVEN MORE. Maj Marty Hogan
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Born and raised in Ohio he was one of my heroes growing up along with Neil Armstrong. I got to meet then Senator Glenn once, very nice man, very personal.
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