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John Glenn – (1921 – Present) – Astronaut / Statesman
John Glenn is a former astronaut who became the third person and first American to orbit the Earth, and later, United States Senator.
Glenn began his career as a Marine Corps fighter pilot before joining NASA's Mercury program, NASA's original astronaut group.
John Glenn orbited the Earth aboard Friendship 7 in 1962.
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In April 1959, Glenn was assigned to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as one of the original group of Mercury
astronauts for the Mercury Project. During this time, he remained an officer in the Marine Corps. He became the third American in space
and the first to orbit the Earth, aboard Friendship 7 on February 20, 1962, on the "Mercury Atlas 6" mission, circling the globe three
times during a flight lasting 4 hours, 55 minutes, and 23 seconds.
Three decades later, after serving 24 years in the Senate, Glenn lifted off for a second space flight on October 29, 1998, on Space Shuttle
Discovery's STS-95, in order to study the effects of space flight on the elderly. At age 77, Glenn became the oldest person ever to go into
space. Glenn's flight offered valuable research on weightlessness and other aspects of space flight on the same person at two points in life
thirty-six years apart - by far the longest interval between space flights by the same person. Upon the safe return of the STS-95 crew, Glenn
(and his crewmates) received another ticker-tape parade, making him the ninth (and, as of 2007, latest) person to have ever received multiple
ticker-tape parades in his lifetime.
Historical / Biographical information courtesy of Wikipedia.
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