MOMENTS IN SPACE HISTORY
STORY MUSGRAVE is a Marine, a
physician and astronaut. He served NASA for 30 years with
expertise garnered from earning six academic degrees
in math, science and medicine. He started work at NASA
in 1967, helping design spacesuits, life support systems,
airlocks and manned maneuvering units that were used for
spacewalks. He and astronaut Jeff Hoffman performed one
of the longest spacewalks in history in a nearly eight-hour
stint to repair the Hubble Space Telescope while aboard the
shuttle Endeavour in December 1993. He later consulted
with Disney’s Imagineers. Musgrave was awarded NASA’s
Distinguished Service Medal, its highest honor.
“ Hubble touches people. When you’re
looking that far out, you’re giving people their
place in the universe, it touches people. Science
is often visual, so it doesn’t need translation. It’s
like poetry, it touches you.” — From an interview with the Academy of Achievement,
May 22, 1997
SALLY RIDE was the first American woman
astronaut to go into space on the shuttle Challenger on
June 18, 1983. She flew on two shuttle missions prior to
the Challenger disaster in 1986 and was the first woman to
operate the shuttle’s robotic arm. She earned a doctorate
in physics from Stanford University and served as a physics
professor at the University of California following her NASA
stint. She advocated for science education. She helped
create NASA’s EarthKAM that let students take photos of
the Earth remotely from the International Space Station.
President Barack Obama awarded her the Presidential Medal
of Honor posthumously.
“ Studying whether there’s life on Mars
or studying how the universe began, there’s
something magical about pushing back the
frontiers of knowledge. ” — From an interview with NPR in 2003
28: SPACE COAST LIVING | SPACECOASTLIVING.COM
Story Musgrave made advances in space medicine during his NASA career.
Sally Ride prepares for her first mission in June 1983
on the flight deck of the shuttle Challenger.
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