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THE DAILY ASTORIAN • FRIDAY, DECEMBER 9, 2016
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AP Photo/File
Astronaut John Glenn sits next to the Friendship 7 space capsule atop an Atlas rocket
at Cape Canaveral, Fla., in February 1962, during preparations for his flight which made
him the first American to orbit the Earth. Glenn, who later spent 24 years representing
Ohio in the Senate, has died at 95.
Glenn, first American to
orbit Earth, has died at 95
Love of flight, politics
John Herschel Glenn Jr. had
two major career paths that
often intersected: flying and
politics, and he soared in both
of them.
Before he gained fame
orbiting the world, he was a
fighter pilot in two wars, and as
a test pilot, he set a transconti-
nental speed record. He later
served 24 years in the Senate
from Ohio. A rare setback was
a failed 1984 run for the Demo-
cratic presidential nomination.
His long political career
enabled him to return to space
in the shuttle Discovery at age
77 in 1998, a cosmic victory
lap that he relished and turned
into a teachable moment about
growing old. He holds the
record for the oldest person in
space.
Space hero
More than anything, Glenn
was the ultimate and uniquely
American space hero: a com-
bat veteran with an easy smile,
a strong marriage of 70 years
and nerves of steel. Schools, a
space center and the Columbus
airport were named after him.
So were children.
The Soviet Union leaped
ahead in space exploration by
putting the Sputnik 1 satel-
lite in orbit in 1957, and then
launched the first man in space,
cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, in a
108-minute orbital flight on
April 12, 1961. After two sub-
orbital flights by Alan Shepard
Jr. and Gus Grissom, it was up
to Glenn to be the first Ameri-
can to orbit the Earth.
“Godspeed, John Glenn,”
fellow astronaut Scott Car-
penter radioed just before
Glenn thundered off a Cape
Canaveral launch pad, now
a National Historic Land-
mark, to a place America had
never been. At the time of that
Feb. 20, 1962, flight, Glenn
was 40 years old.
During the four-hour,
55-minute flight, Glenn uttered
a phrase that he would repeat
frequently throughout life:
“Zero G, and I feel fine.”
“It still seems so vivid to
me,” Glenn said in a 2012
interview with The Associated
Press on the 50th anniversary
of the flight. “I still can sort
of pseudo feel some of those
same sensations I had back in
those days during launch and
all.”
Friendship 7
Glenn’s ride in the cramped
Friendship 7 capsule had
its scary moments. Sensors
showed his heat shield was
loose after three orbits, and
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By SETH BORENSTEIN
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — John
Glenn, whose 1962 flight as the
first U.S. astronaut to orbit the
Earth made him an all-Ameri-
can hero and propelled him to a
long career in the U.S. Senate,
died Thursday. The last survi-
vor of the original Mercury 7
astronauts was 95.
Glenn died at the James
Cancer Hospital in Columbus,
Ohio, where he was hospital-
ized for more than a week, said
Hank Wilson, communications
director for the John Glenn
School of Public Affairs.
CAR
AP Photo/Paul Vernon
Former astronaut and U.S. Sen. John Glenn speaks
during an exclusive interview with The Associated Press
at the Ohio Statehouse, in Columbus, Ohio, in 2015.
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AP Photo/Vincent P. Connolly
Astronaut John Glenn and President John F. Kennedy in-
spect the Friendship 7 in 1962, the Mercury capsule, in
which Glenn became the first American to orbit the Earth.
Kennedy presented Distinguished Service medal to Glenn
at Cape Canaveral, Fla. At right is Vice President Lyndon
Johnson. Glenn, who later spent 24 years representing
Ohio in the Senate, has died at 95.
Mission Control worried he
might burn up during re-en-
try when temperatures reached
3,000 degrees. But the heat
shield held.
Glenn was born July 18,
1921, in Cambridge, Ohio,
and grew up in New Concord,
Ohio. His love of flight was
lifelong; John Glenn Sr. spoke
of the many summer evenings
he arrived home to find his son
running around the yard with
outstretched arms, pretending
he was piloting a plane.
Glenn’s goal of becom-
ing a commercial pilot was
changed by World War II. He
left Muskingum College to
join the Naval Air Corps and
soon after, the Marines.
He became a successful
fighter pilot who ran 59 hazard-
ous missions, often as a volun-
teer or as the requested backup
of assigned pilots. A war later,
in Korea, he earned the nick-
name “MiG-Mad Marine.”
Glenn’s public life began
when he broke the transconti-
nental airspeed record, bursting
from Los Angeles to New York
City in three hours, 23 minutes
and eight seconds. With his
Crusader averaging 725 mph,
the 1957 flight proved the jet
could endure stress when
pushed to maximum speeds
over long distances.
In New York, he got a hero’s
welcome — his first tickertape
parade. He got another after his
flight on Friendship 7.
In Congress
He first ran for the U.S.
Senate in 1964 but left the race
when he suffered a concussion
after slipping in the bathroom
and hitting his head on the tub.
He tried again in 1970 but was
defeated in the primary.
For the next four years,
Glenn devoted his attention to
business and investments that
made him a multimillionaire.
In 1974, Glenn ran for the Sen-
ate again and won.
Glenn represented Ohio
in the Senate longer than any
other senator in the state’s his-
tory. He became an expert on
nuclear weaponry and was the
Senate’s most dogged advo-
cate of nonproliferation. He
was the leading supporter of
the B-1 bomber when many
in Congress doubted the need
for it.
Glenn said the lowest point
of his life was 1990, when he
and four other senators came
under scrutiny for their con-
nections to Charles Keating,
the notorious financier who
eventually served prison time
for his role in the costly sav-
ings and loan failure of the
1980s. The Senate Ethics
Committee cleared Glenn of
serious wrongdoing but said he
“exercised poor judgment.”
He announced his impend-
ing retirement in 1997, 35 years
to the day after he became the
first American in orbit, saying,
“There is still no cure for the
common birthday.”
Glenn returned to space in
a long-awaited second flight
in 1998 aboard the space shut-
tle Discovery. He got to move
around aboard the shuttle for
far longer — nine days, com-
pared with just under five hours
in 1962 — as well as sleep and
experiment with bubbles in
weightlessness.
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