I wrote this short piece on 12/9/16 after I learned of the death of this wonderful man, Astronaut John Glenn.
Godspeed, John Glenn.
When I was a kid, I faked sore throats to stay home and watch the Project Mercury launches on TV from start to finish. There was a book called "We Seven" that provided profiles of each of the Mercury astronauts, and I devoured it. Being the chubby nerd who didn't have a concept of context, I persuaded our Sister Mary Joan to have seven students in fourth grade each portray one of the Mercury heroes.
All the grades piled into the basement auditorium where Mass was held each Sunday. The seven of us stood on the altar steps, looking out at the American Martyrs Roman Catholic Grammar School student body. Sister explained that this was a very special day for everyone to learn about the brave men of NASA’a Mercury Program. When my turn came, I stood straight, took a deep breath, and proudly said, "I am John Glenn."
The assembled students burst out in laughter based on the contrast between my rotund self and the crewcut, blonde god of Ohio. That didn't stop me, and I proudly told the tale of the man who was a jet pilot ace and so innately decent and a symbol of the hopefulness of America in the early sixties. After his amazing orbital flight, the first for NASA’s manned space program, New York threw him a ticker-tape parade, and President Kennedy welcomed him to the White House. His flight had not been without problems, with two of the three orbits manually flown by Glenn due to the malfunction of the automatic control systems. To add to his challenges, NASA controllers received a reading that the heat shield on the rear of his spacecraft was loose and, if true, he would burn up in the atmosphere during his return to earth. Thankfully, that proved to be a false reading.
My love of space exploration followed the two-man Gemini flights and the Apollo trips to the moon. I thought that everyone shared my interest in NASA until Gemini VIII, back in 1966, when, in attempting to practice docking maneuvers, a thruster on the capsule was stuck open, and the craft started spinning out of control - at one revolution per second! The commander of the flight managed to correct the spin with some quick thinking and saved the mission. His name was Neil Armstrong. This was all covered during evening TV prime time. While NASA and the astronauts were desperately trying to slow the tumbling Gemini capsule, ABC-TV’s switchboard was flooded by calls from viewers complaining that this news bulletin had interrupted their Batman episode. We are lucky that space explorers are not your average human beings.
I remember hearing a newscast a few years after his Mercury flight that said Colonel Glenn would be grounded due to an inner ear problem that caused balance issues. I was devastated. But this was no ordinary human that would just pass quietly into history. After a second career serving twenty-four years as a U.S. senator, at the age of 77, Senator Glenn returned to space in the Space Shuttle, the only astronaut to have been in both the Project Mercury and Shuttle programs. Now he has made that last great flight to heaven. It was spectacular to have had him amongst us.
Jordan, I love reading your stories by the morning fire.
Nice piece, Jordan!
I note this is from 2016. Are you quite good at keeping hold of your previous work? I do not have that much written work to speak of, but it is interesting to understand the habits of others (those, who chuck things out with ease, and those, who safe guard).
In other aspects of my life, I am quite the keeper (not a hoarder necessarily but I attach sentimental value to mementos, etc.). In that respect, I think I will be one to keep scraps of paper or non-sensical word files for years to come...