#project mercury

Relaxing after the mission. Astronaut John Glenn kicks back following his historic Project Mercury flight to become the 1st American to orbit the globe. His 5 hour flight in Feb ‘62 orbited Earth 3x before splashdown. Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin was both the 1st human in space & to orbit the globe in his Vostok craft in April ‘61. Glenn continued his NASA career to accomplish the formidable feat of being the oldest in space, at that time, at 77 years of age during a Space Shuttle Discovery flight in 1995; a true space pioneer & legend.

60 years ago today, John Glenn became the first American to orbit the Earth: “I got in on this project because it was probably the nearest to heaven I’ll ever get, and I wanted to make the most of it.”