Word: astronaut
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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Improbable Pioneer. As the smallest (5 ft. 7 in.), most reticent of the seven original astronauts chosen in 1959, Gus Grissom seemed an improbable space pioneer. Yet he was one of the most talented and experienced of some 50 spacemen the U.S. has trained to date. Rejected by the Air Corps during World War II because he was under age, Grissom applied again when he turned 18, spent his wartime service as an aviation cadet. After his discharge, he got a mechanical-engineering degree at Purdue before rejoining the Air Force in 1950 to stay. He flew 100 combat missions...
...splashdown in the Atlantic ended in near-disaster when the capsule hatch inexplicably blew off, swamping Grissom inside. Gus swam from the sinking craft and was rescued by helicopter. Though he was in no way to blame for the mishap, he inevitably became known to the public as the astronaut who lost his capsule. He became more reticent, withdrew even more than usual to the company of his wife Betty and two sons, convinced that he had to prove himself anew...
...White, who came along in the second generation of astronauts in 1962, had the warmth and folksiness that Grissom lacked. In fact, when his celebrated space walk on June 3, 1965 put him in the first rank of astronaut heroes, it was as much for his offhanded casualness as for the feat itself. With the world following his every move, White stepped out of orbiting Gemini 4 at the end of a 24-ft. tether, strolled in space for a spell, then matter-of-factly informed Pilot James Alton McDivitt: "It's fun. I'm not coming...
...being built eight miles away. Not that devotees of Vail were the slightest bit impressed. "Aspen? Oh, yes, that's a tree, isn't it?" they were saying. Be sides, they had a few names of their own: New York's Mayor John Lind say, Mercury Astronaut Scott Carpenter, IBM Chairman Tom Watson - and the whole U.S. Alpine Team...
...antique shops around St. Louis' Gaslight Square. A brace of oxygen tanks perches on the shoulders of the center figure, while a shower nozzle, stainless-steel tubing and a ski cable festoon the fronts of the other two. The apparatus eerily suggests scuba gear, gas masks, or an astronaut's breathing equipment-items necessary, in Trova's view, to habilitate man for "an alien atmosphere...