John Glenn: family, wife, photo, duration of flight

John Glenn (photo is placed further in the article) - the first American who flew around the globe, the second time went down in history when at 77 years he became the oldest man who visited space. But before the astronaut was recognized as a national hero, he risked his life for his country more than once.

Biography

John Herschel Glenn Jr. was born on July 18, 1921 in Cambridge, Ohio, in the family of John and Teresa Sprout Glenn. Playing in the school orchestra, he met Anna Margaret Castor, with whom later he linked his fate. After graduation, he studied at Maskingham College, where he received a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering. After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Glenn became a cadet in the Naval Air Force. During the Second World made 59 sorties.

Then Glenn served as an instructor to improve flight qualification in Corpus Christi, Texas. He made 90 sorties in Korea, knocking down three MiGs during the last nine days of fighting.

After that, John Glenn graduated from the Test Pilot School at the US Naval Test Center, and then continued as a Project Officer for a number of aircraft. For two and a half years, he attended classes at the University of Maryland while working in the fighter design department of the US Naval Aeronautics Administration, the predecessor of the Bureau of Naval Weapons.

In July 1957 John set a speed record, flying for 3 hours and 23 minutes from Los Angeles to New York. It was the first flight across the country with an average speed exceeding the speed of sound.

The astronaut John Glenn was rewarded 6 times with the Cross for Flight Merits and a number of other military awards. He and his wife have two children.

Detachment "Mercury 7"

In the spring of 1959, Glenn was selected as a participant in the Mercury 7 project. He became part of the detachment of the first astronauts and was the understudy of the first two Americans who had been in space, Alan Shepard and Virgil "Gus" Griss.

At that time, the United States participated in a space race with the Soviet Union. Yuri Gagarin April 12, 1961 was first brought into outer space, ahead of Alan Shepard less than a month. He was also the first who visited the near-Earth orbit and made a complete revolution around the Earth.

John Glenn: 1962 of a historic flight

February 20, 1962, the United States showed that they have the same character as rivals. In the previous flight into space Shepard and Griss their ship did not make a complete revolution around the Earth - this was done by John Glenn. The flight duration was almost 5 hours. On board the capsule, he flew the Earth three times, traveling at a speed exceeding 27 350 km / h, at a maximum altitude of 260 km.

But his path was not without danger. After the first turn, mechanical problems with the automatic control system required John to manually control the aircraft. The sensors also showed that the thermal shield, which was supposed to protect the astronauts from the deadly temperatures created when entering the atmosphere, was absent. To protect himself when returning to Earth, Glenn kept a package with a brake propulsion system. A second examination of the control system showed that the indicator was defective. The shield was in order, but the sensations were undoubtedly painful.

Political career

John Glenn left the Marine Corps in 1965 in the rank of colonel. For ten years he worked as a business director. In 1974, he was elected to the US Senate. A Democrat from Ohio zealously campaigned for funding science, education and space exploration. In 1984, he made an unsuccessful attempt to nominate the president from the Democratic Party. Glenn was a senator until 1999.

During his time in the Senate, he became the main author of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Act of 1978, was chairman of the government affairs committee from 1987 to 1995, participated in the Foreign Affairs and Armed Services Committees and the ad hoc committee on aging.

The second flight

Despite his advanced age, John Glenn did not finish the space program. October 29, 1998, while still a senator, he once again went down in history, flying on the shuttle Discovery, to become the oldest space traveler. The flight lasted nine days. Glenn worked as a payload specialist and participated in experiments that had to test how his 77-year-old body would cope with weightlessness. The ship also put into orbit the SPARTAN satellite, designed to study the solar wind, and equipment for the forthcoming maintenance of the Hubble telescope. During the flight, the shuttle flew 134 times, having traveled 5.8 million kilometers in 213 hours and 44 minutes.

Glenn's participation in the nine-day mission was criticized by some of the space community as a political service rendered to Glenn by President Clinton. However, the flight of the astronaut gave valuable information in studies of the action of weightlessness and other aspects of space flight on the same person in two moments of his life, separated by 36 years, which today is the longest interval between space flights of the same person. Glenn's participation provided information on the effects of flight and weightlessness on the elderly. Shortly before the start, the researchers found out that he was removed from one of the two main experiments (concerning melatonin), since he did not meet one of the medical conditions. But John took part in two other experiments to monitor sleep and use of protein.

In 2012, Glenn received the Presidential Medal of Freedom. He also participated in the decommissioning of the space shuttle, although he criticized the completion of the program, leading to a delay in research.

Although Glenn's second flight into space was significantly different from the first, both were historic, record missions. However, most Americans will always remember him as the first American to enter the Earth's orbit.

John Glenn: family

Glenn and Annie Castor first met - literally - in the children's arena. In New Concord, Ohio, their parents were friends. When the families came together, the children played.

John - the future pilot-fighter of the Navy, future ass and test pilot, future cosmonaut - from the very beginning was a profitable party. Eventually, during the space race, he became the most desirable man in the US, but what did it mean to be a young John Glenn in New Concord?

Annie Castor was a bright, caring, talented, generous spirit. But she could speak with great difficulty. Her stuttering was so strong that it was defined as an 85 percent disability, since she could not pronounce the word 85 percent of the time.

When she tried to read a poem in an elementary school, she was laughed at. Annie could not talk on the phone. She could not talk to her friends.

And John Glenn loved it.

Wife of a military pilot

As a boy, he realized that people who did not understand her because of stuttering, missed the opportunity to learn a rare and wonderful girl.

They were married on April 6, 1943. As a wife of a military man, she discovered that life in the country can be extremely difficult. In department stores, she wandered through unfamiliar aisles, trying to find the right department, not daring to ask someone for help. In a taxi she had to write to the driver, because she could not pronounce the destination aloud. In restaurants, she just pointed to the items on the menu.

A wonderful musician, Annie in every ward, where she and John moved, played at the church organ to make new friends. She was afraid to use the phone, since it was very difficult for her to say "allo". Annie was horrified to imagine situations where she would need to call a doctor. Will she choose words to report on unhappiness?

For a pack of chewing gum

Glenn, as a naval aviator, going on the performance of the next combat mission during the Second World War and during the war in Korea, each time said goodbye equally. "I'm just behind a pack of gum in the store on the corner," John Glenn said. His wife always answered: "Only not for long."

In February 1962, when the whole world, with bated breath, was waiting for the launch of the Atas rocket with Glenn on board, the couple said goodbye the same way. And in 1998, when at the age of 77 he returned to space aboard the shuttle Discovery. These were tense moments. What if something happens, and their life together ends?

She knew that he would tell her before landing on the shuttle. So he did, and this time gave her a gift - a pack of chewing gum. She wore it in her breast pocket near the heart, until John returned home.

Wonderful cure

Many times in her life, Annie tried to cure stuttering. Nobody could help her. But in 1973 in Virginia, she found a doctor who was carrying out an intensive program, which, as she and John hoped, could help her. Annie went there. The miracle, which the couple had been waiting for all this time, had finally come to pass. At the age of 53, she spoke for the first time in short, jerky, painful queuing, and could clearly express her thoughts.

John, hearing for the first time, as she confidently and clearly says, fell to her knees to offer thanksgiving. Since then, she regularly makes public speeches and always gets up to say a few words at events involving Glenn.

And as soon as she takes the floor, it is worth looking into her husband's eyes.