Not a big deal in my line of work. Lived just outside and worked my entire life at the Navy’s flight test center where the Test Pilot School is located. Probably met a couple dozen future astronauts. But they were just test pilots at the time. So you don’t pay any special attention. Some ended up being real heroes much like you see in the movies. Some were other than that. (Lisa Nowak was assigned to work with/for me. Google her.) BTW: John Glenn and Scott Carpenter were the two that gave me piggy back rides at a friend’s house party.)
I watched Richard Boone working in making an episode of Have Gun Will Travel, over in Central Oregon…and got his autograph. Woo hoo! Maybe an unknown or little known guy to many of you…and he’s already been dead now for 36 years.
No IMDB entry but my 1961 Plymouth Valiant was in two movies: Mel Gibson’s Man Without a Face and Ed Harris’ made-for-HBO miniseries Empire Falls. Both were filmed in Maine in the 1990’s/early 2000’s. My dad drove the car as an extra.
You can see the car in the movies. You can’t see my dad. Although, if you freeze frame on the first scene of Man Without a Face, you can see my mom’s elbow sticking out the window.
So rpegg got piggy-back ride from these guys.
The first and second Americans to orbit the Earth.
Carpenter was also the first astronaut to manually control a re-entry - not by choice. He overshot the landing zone by 250 miles. Easy to do at 17,000 mph.
Thanks for sharing that @rpegg!
Closest I got to astronauts was a furniture delivery.
Didn’t know it until I used her restroom and there was a 10x14 framed picture of an astronaut standing next to a house sized boulder, with a caption that read ‘Daddy collecting rocks on the Moon’.
Her maiden name was Shepard.
What a unique experience it would be, to look up at the Moon, and know you walked on it and left footprints there.
Shepard was also at the Navy base as a test pilot. Almost didn’t become an astronaut. Came close to getting court marshaled for extracurricular acrobatics under the bay bridge and over the base. Yep, it was just like in the movies at that time.
I’ve got a sense of peace that I haven’t had for a long time with my career choices. So many other things I’d love to have done. But getting to know all you forum folks tempers all those yearnings. Well, at least for a little bit until @dwardio says he was co-discoverer of a minor planet.
For some reason , looking at that picture of Dan and the wife. All I can think of is her saying
"You wouldn’t really wear that to the party"
and Dan just saying
"Wooden tie ?!"
It just happened that it was intrepid men like that they needed for the Apollo program.
All of those who had the courage to climb into those ships and ride them into history were a special kind of man.
Woo hoo! Maybe an unknown or little known guy to many of you…and he’s already been dead now for 36 years.
