Posted
on July 18, 2013
Today
is International Mandela Day, a day to celebrate the life and wisdom
of Nelson Mandela, who once said, “We can change the world and make
it a better place. It is in your hands to make a difference.” (See
the link below for more on Mandela.)
It's
Mandela's day because it is his birthday, but it is also the birthday
of one of the most famous astronauts in U.S. history, John Glenn.
Here's
what John Glenn once said: “It was quite a day. I don't know what
you could say about a day in which you have seen four beautiful
sunsets.”
FOUR
sunsets in one day? I bet you can tell that Glenn said that after
being in outer space!
John
Glenn followed a career in the military as a fighter pilot by being a
test pilot and one of the first American astronauts. He was THE first
American to orbit the Earth, circling the globe three times in almost
five hours. Here are some interesting facts about this historic
flight:
The
people in the town of Perth, Australia, turned on all their
lights—house lights, car headlights, and of course
streetlights—while Glenn was passing overhead. He said that he
could clearly see the city from space, and Perth became known as the
“City of Light”!
- Glenn's spacecraft was called Friendship 7. He carried with him a note that read in several different languages, “I am a stranger. I come in peace. Take me to your leader and there will be a massive reward for you in eternity.” This note was to be used if the capsule splashed down in the remote South Pacific Ocean. (I'm not sure why the note had to clarify that Glenn was a stranger! Don't you think any people he encountered in the remote South Pacific would know that?)
An
indicator said that Glenn's heat shield had come loose. There wasn't
much that anyone could do—if the heat shield failed, the capsule
would burn up—but the flight controllers had Glenn keep his
retrorocket pack over the shield to try to keep it in place. Of
course, the capsule splashed down safely. It turned out that the
shield was fine, and the indicator was faulty!
When
Glenn retired from NASA, he became a U.S. Senator for the state of
Ohio for 25 years. At age 77, in 1998, Glenn went back into space—the
oldest human ever to do so! He was part of a 9-day Space Shuttle
program designed to measure effects of space travel on the elderly.
Of course, the program was also perfect for research on the effects
of space travel on the same person at two different points of life
(his flights being 36 years apart!).
By the way, the City of Light, Perth, Australia, lived up to its name with all its lights turned on again for Glenn during that Shuttle mission! How nice!
Also
on this date:
Plan
ahead:
Check
out my Pinterest pages on July
holidays, historical
anniversaries in July,
and July
birthdays.
And
here are my Pinterest pages on August
holidays, historical
anniversaries in August,
and August
birthdays.
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