In 1959 NASA ordered the first piloted spacecraft. The objective of the first phase, the Mercury Program, was to place astronauts in space, test their reactions and return them safely to earth. This was not a small objective -- getting a successful rocket launch and being able to return the spacecraft safely to earth faced large obstacles.
The original seven Mercury astronauts were selected from an elite group of military pilots. After undergoing rigorous physical and psychological testing, the following seven astronauts were chosen: Scott Carpenter, Gordon Cooper, John Glenn, Virgil (Gus) Grissom, Walter Schirra, Alan Shephard and Donald (Deke) Slayton.
There were 25 missions in the Mercury Program. First came a number of unmanned suborbital test flights, five of which were successful, and then four orbital test flights, two of which were successful. Then, before a flight with a human was risked, Ham the chimpanzee was sent up in a suborbital flight. The flight landed successfully and Ham survived. It was time to attempt manned missions.
Each space capsule held only one astronaut. Each capsule bore the number 7 and was named by the astronaut manning it. It was launched on top of a Redstone or Atlas rocket. The astronauts manually controlled thrusters which directed the craft out of orbit and oriented the spacecraft for re-entry. The capsule was designed to enter the atmosphere with the blunt end first, which was protected by a heat shield to protect the craft and the astronaut from the tremendous heat generated during re-entry. A parachute would be deployed to slow the entry of the spacecraft into the ocean, where the capsule would be picked up by a ship.
Freedom 7 on May 5, 1961. Alan Shephard became the first American in space with a suborbital flight 116 miles above earth. His craft parachuted safely into the Atlantic after a flight of 15 minutes 22 seconds.
Liberty Bell 7 on July 1961. Virgil (Gus) Grissom flew a mission similar to the Freedom 7 mission. While waiting in the water for the recovery team, bolts securing the hatch were triggered and water flooded in, forcing Grissom to abandon capsule. He was safely retrieved from the water.
Friendship 7 on February 20, 1962. John Glenn orbited the earth for 4 hours 55 minutes. There were some tense moments during reentry as they feared that the landing bag and heat shield might have come loose. However, the heat shield remained in place and he landed safely.
Aurora 7 in May 1962. Scott Carpenter flew a three orbit flight, carrying out experiments and practicing significant maneuvering.
Sigma 7 in October 1962. Wally Shirra beamed the first telecast from space back to earth.
Faith 7 in May 1963. Gordon Cooper completed 22 orbits, setting a new space flight record of 34 ours and 19 minutes, during which he deployed a satellite.
Liberty Bell 7 was the only capsule not recovered in any of the manned space missions.
John Glenn was the first American to eat in space, where he ate a tube of applesauce on Friendship 7, and the first to experience zero gravity in space.
The first astronauts got to meet the President and were honored by ticker tape parades down Broadway in New York.
Deke Slayton was the only one of the original seven astronauts not to pilot a Mercury mission due to the discovery that he had an irregular hearth rhythm. He was later cleared to be the docking pilot of the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project in 1975, becoming oldest person in space up to that time.
The Mercury astronauts became popular celebrities of the time and were featured with their families in Life magazine.
Web page created as class assignment on November 10, 2014, last updated November 17, 2014.
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