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Mercury Seven

Ch. 1 of 8
— CH. 1 · INTRODUCTION —

Contents

Mercury Seven

8 sections

  • On the 9th of April, 1959, the Mercury Seven were introduced to the public at a press conference in Washington, DC, that neither NASA nor the seven men had expected. Two hundred reporters overflowed the room. The astronauts wore civilian clothes, and observers described them as "mature, middle-class Americans, average in height and visage, family men all." Time magazine compared the group to "Columbus, Magellan, Daniel Boone, and the Wright brothers."

    None of the reporters asked about engineering or technical details. John Glenn responded to a question about his family's support by saying he "didn't think that any of us could really go on with something like this if we didn't have pretty good backing at home. My wife's attitude towards this has been the same as it has been all along through my flying. If it is what I want to do, she is behind it, and the kids are too, one hundred percent." The room applauded. Scott Carpenter drew even louder applause when he mentioned that he had been at sea when NASA called, and that his wife Rene had accepted on his behalf.

    During Glenn's three years as a Navy test pilot before his selection, twelve colleagues had died. Privately, several of the seven calculated that at least one of them would not survive Project Mercury. One was already managing a failing marriage. One carried a heart condition no doctor had yet detected.

  • On the 4th of October, 1957, the Soviet Union launched a satellite called Sputnik 1. The demonstration of American technological inferiority came as a profound shock to the public. The Soviets followed with Sputnik 2, which carried a dog named Laika. American intelligence analysts assessed that the Soviets planned to put a man into orbit, which moved both the United States Air Force and the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics to strengthen their own efforts.

    The Air Force launched a project called Man in Space Soonest, known as MISS, and requested $133 million in funding. MISS ran into difficulty almost immediately. Its core problem was an inability to articulate a clear military purpose for human spaceflight, which created conflict with the agencies that should have supported it.

    President Dwight D. Eisenhower chose a different path. He created the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, a civilian agency that absorbed NACA and took charge of the American space program. NASA was established on the 1st of October, 1958. The following month, the Space Task Group was set up at NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia. Robert R. Gilruth served as its director. On the 26th of November, NASA Administrator T. Keith Glennan adopted a suggestion by Abe Silverstein to call the new human spaceflight program Project Mercury. Silverstein was the director of Space Flight Development at the Space Task Group. Glennan announced the name publicly on the 17th of December, 1958. That date was chosen deliberately: it was the fifty-fifth anniversary of the Wright Brothers' first flight.

    The Space Task Group would spend the first weeks of 1959 reviewing the records of 508 military test pilots to find the people who would go.

  • At a brainstorming session on the 1st of December, 1958, someone proposed calling the people who flew into space astronauts. The word meant "star traveler." The team believed they had coined it; in fact, the term had appeared in science fiction since the 1920s.

    A three-man panel drew up formal selection criteria. Candidates had to be under forty, under five feet eleven inches tall, in excellent physical condition, graduates of test pilot schools, and qualified jet pilots. They also needed a bachelor's degree and at least 1,500 total flying hours. The height limit was determined by the spacecraft itself, which could not physically accommodate someone taller. The decision to restrict candidates to military test pilots was made by Glennan, Deputy Administrator Hugh Dryden, and Gilruth. They finalized it in the last week of December 1958. Eisenhower was consulted and agreed.

    There were 508 military test pilots across all services: 225 from the Air Force, 225 from the Navy, 23 from the Marine Corps, and 35 from the Army. A screening team that included psychologist Robert B. Voas went through the records in January 1959, and identified 110 who met the minimum standards. Sixty-nine were brought to the Pentagon in two groups. The first group of 35 arrived on the 2nd of February, 1959. Navy and Marine officers were welcomed by Admiral Arleigh Burke, the Chief of Naval Operations. Air Force officers heard from General Thomas D. White, the Air Force Chief of Staff. Both pledged that no volunteer would face career consequences.

    Physical and psychological testing then followed at the Lovelace Clinic and the Wright Aerospace Medical Laboratory. The program was directed by retired Air Force Brigadier General Albert H. Schwichtenberg. The tests included hours on treadmills and tilt tables, feet submerged in ice water, three doses of castor oil, and five enemas. Jim Lovell was the only candidate eliminated on medical grounds at this stage; that diagnosis was later found to be in error. Of the eighteen who remained, Gilruth found himself unable to limit the selection to six. He chose seven.

    Three finalists who were passed over eventually flew in space anyway. Pete Conrad and Jim Lovell were selected with the 1962 astronaut group. Edward Givens joined the fifth group in 1966.

  • Cooper was 32 at selection, the youngest of the seven; Glenn was 37, the oldest. Shepard stood at the height limit, five feet eleven inches; Grissom was the shortest at five feet seven. Glenn weighed 180 pounds, the spacecraft's maximum; Schirra came in at 185 and had to reduce to qualify. Cooper, at 150 pounds, needed no adjustment.

    All seven were male and white. Women were not yet admitted to military test pilot schools. The first African American to graduate from the Air Force Experimental Test Pilot School was John L. Whitehead Jr., who did so in January 1958; he was not among the finalists. The group also shared characteristics that went beyond the selection criteria. Four were their fathers' namesakes. All were the eldest or only sons in their families. All were born in the United States, raised in small towns, married with children, and Protestant. IQs ranged from 135 to 147. Average flying hours were 3,500, of which 1,700 were in jets.

    Most were fighter pilots; Carpenter was the exception, having flown multi-engine patrol aircraft for most of his career. Two held Naval Academy degrees: Shepard, class of 1944, and Schirra, class of 1945. Neither Glenn nor Carpenter had formally completed their undergraduate degrees at the time of selection. Both were admitted on professional equivalency and both received bachelor's degrees after their 1962 spaceflights. Glenn graduated from Muskingum College in engineering; Carpenter earned his degree in aeronautical engineering from the University of Colorado at Boulder.

    Slayton's medical records had shown nothing unusual during the selection process. The condition that would ground him was still undetected.

  • Carpenter's ship's captain had refused to release him when NASA called with news of his selection. Admiral Arleigh Burke, the Chief of Naval Operations, had to intervene personally to secure Carpenter's reassignment.

    In August 1959, agent C. Leo DeOrsey negotiated a $500,000 exclusive contract between the astronauts and Life magazine. The deal granted the publication access to their private lives, homes, and families. Between August 1959 and the 15th of May, 1963, each astronaut received $71,428.71. The arrangement was used as life insurance. NASA's official spokesman from 1959 to 1963 was Air Force Lieutenant Colonel John "Shorty" Powers; the press took to calling him the "eighth astronaut."

    Cooper's wife Trudy had left him in January 1959 after he had an affair with another officer's wife. During the selection interviews, he had told NASA that their marriage was stable. When the press conference approached, he drove to San Diego to find her. Trudy agreed to return and maintain the fiction, drawn by the prospect of the adventure for herself and their daughters.

    General Motors executive Ed Cole gave Shepard a brand-new Chevrolet Corvette as a personal gift. Jim Rathmann, a race car driver who had won the Indianapolis 500 in 1960, ran a Chevrolet dealership in Melbourne, Florida. He persuaded Cole to make the gift a standing arrangement. All of the Mercury Seven except Glenn took up annual leases on new Corvettes for a dollar a year. Cooper, Grissom, and Shepard raced them around Cape Canaveral, with military and local police looking the other way.

    Gene Kranz, who later became a flight director, recalled the dress code that marked an astronaut on sight: "if you saw someone wearing a short-sleeved Ban-Lon shirt and aviator sunglasses, you were looking at an astronaut." The seven also agreed to divide all interview proceeds equally, regardless of who flew first.

  • On the 18th of May, 1959, an Atlas rocket exploded during a test launch. The astronauts publicly joked that they were glad to get that out of the way. It was the standard gallows humor of the test pilot world. Privately, several calculated that one of the seven would die during Project Mercury.

    Carpenter's background in airborne electronics and celestial navigation made him responsible for the spacecraft's communications and navigation systems. Grissom's mechanical engineering degree put him in charge of attitude control. Glenn's experience across many aircraft types led to him overseeing the cockpit layout. Schirra managed the life support systems and pressure suits. Shepard drew on his Navy background to oversee the tracking network and coordinate recovery operations. Cooper and Slayton, both Air Force officers with engineering backgrounds, handled relations with Redstone Arsenal and Convair. Those two contractors built the Redstone and Atlas boosters. The group successfully pushed for a window in the spacecraft and for a greater degree of manual control. Both changes went into the final design.

    Monthly flight pay ranged from $190 to $245, but earning it required four hours of flying per month. Day-trip per diems were set at $9; overnight trips earned $12. Neither figure covered actual costs, so astronauts personally absorbed the difference. Grissom and Slayton drove regularly to Langley Air Force Base to compete for T-33 jets with colonels and generals. Cooper traveled to McGhee Tyson Air National Guard Base in Tennessee, where a friend let him fly F-104B jets. When reporter William Hines published a story about it in The Washington Star, the matter reached Congressman James G. Fulton. A House committee inquiry followed, and within weeks the astronauts had priority access to T-33s, F-102s, and F-106s at Langley. NASA acquired a fleet of T-38s for astronaut use in 1962.

    Atlas rockets like the one that had failed in front of them in May 1959 would later carry four of the seven into orbit.

  • Shepard flew Mercury-Redstone 3 and became the first American in space in 1961. A later diagnosis of Meniere's disease grounded him in 1963. Experimental surgery returned him to flight status in May 1969, and in 1971 he commanded Apollo 14, the third crewed lunar landing. He was the fifth and oldest person to walk on the Moon. He was promoted to Rear Admiral, the first astronaut to reach that rank, and retired from NASA and the Navy in 1974.

    Grissom flew Mercury-Redstone 4, the second suborbital Mercury mission, and commanded Gemini 3 in 1965, the first crewed Gemini mission. He was the first NASA astronaut to fly in space twice. He was designated commander of Apollo 1 but died in 1967 in a fire during a launch pad rehearsal test.

    Schirra flew Mercury-Atlas 8, then Gemini 6A, then Apollo 7, the first crewed Apollo mission. That made him the only person to fly Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo. He retired from NASA and the U.S. Navy with the rank of Captain in 1969. He then joined CBS News as Walter Cronkite's co-anchor for the Apollo Moon landing broadcasts.

    Cooper flew Mercury-Atlas 9, the final Mercury mission, and was the first American to spend more than a day in space. He flew Gemini 5 in August 1965, becoming the first astronaut to complete a second orbital spaceflight. His lax attitude toward training eventually put him at odds with Slayton. After Shepard received an Apollo command ahead of him, Cooper retired from NASA and the Air Force with the rank of Colonel in July 1970.

    Carpenter flew Mercury-Atlas 7 in 1962, then took a leave of absence to join the Navy's SEALAB project as an aquanaut. A motorbike accident injured his left arm. Two surgeries, in 1964 and 1967, failed to correct the damage. He resigned from NASA in August 1967 and retired from the Navy in 1969 with the rank of Commander.

    Slayton's atrial fibrillation had kept him grounded for over a decade. He stayed with NASA, first as informal Chief of the Astronaut Office, then as Director of Flight Crew Operations. In July 1970 he was restored to flight status, and in July 1975 he flew as docking module pilot on the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project. He left NASA in 1982.

    Glenn orbited Earth in 1962 on Mercury-Atlas 6, the first American to do so. He retired from NASA in 1964 and from the Marine Corps with the rank of Colonel in 1965. From 1974 to 1999 he served as a Democratic U.S. Senator from Ohio. In 1998, as a sitting senator, he flew on Space Shuttle Discovery on mission STS-95. At the age of 77, he became the oldest person to orbit Earth. He died in 2016 at the age of 95, the last surviving member of the Mercury Seven.

    Between them, the seven had flown Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, and the Space Shuttle: every NASA human spaceflight program of the 20th century.

  • In 1962, the Mercury Seven published their own account in a book called "We Seven." Tom Wolfe's 1979 book "The Right Stuff" offered a less sanitized version of the story. Philip Kaufman directed a film adaptation in 1983, and a television series of the same name followed in 2020.

    In 1984, the surviving Mercury astronauts joined Betty Grissom, Gus Grissom's widow, to found the Mercury Seven Foundation. Its purpose was to raise scholarship money for science and engineering students. The Foundation was renamed the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation in 1995. Shepard was elected its first president and held the position until October 1997, when he was succeeded by Jim Lovell.

    Five characters in Gerry Anderson's television series "Thunderbirds" were named in honor of the Mercury Seven. Scott, Virgil, Gordon, John, and Alan Tracy took their names from Carpenter, Grissom, Cooper, Glenn, and Shepard. The Mercury Seven's management character in the Astronaut Office held through the 1960s. Control finally passed to George Abbey in the 1970s.

    The Mercury 7 group won the Society of Experimental Test Pilots' Iven C. Kincheloe Award in 1963. President John F. Kennedy presented them the 1962 Collier Trophy at the White House "for pioneering manned space flight in the United States." A monument at Launch Complex 14, where the four Mercury-Atlas launches took place, was dedicated on the 10th of November, 1964. Buried beneath it is a time capsule containing reports, photographs, and film, scheduled to be opened in 2464.

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Deke Slayton

Updated

Common questions

Who were the Mercury Seven astronauts?

The Mercury Seven were Scott Carpenter, Gordon Cooper, John Glenn, Gus Grissom, Wally Schirra, Alan Shepard, and Deke Slayton. NASA publicly announced their selection on the 9th of April, 1959. They were chosen from a pool of 508 military test pilots and created a new profession in the United States.

When did NASA announce the Mercury Seven astronauts to the public?

NASA announced the Mercury Seven on the 9th of April, 1959, at a press conference in Washington, DC. Two hundred reporters attended the event. Time magazine immediately compared the seven to Columbus, Magellan, Daniel Boone, and the Wright brothers.

Why was Deke Slayton grounded and unable to fly the Mercury program?

Slayton was grounded because doctors detected an atrial fibrillation, an erratic heart rhythm, before his scheduled Mercury flight. He remained with NASA in management roles, serving as Director of Flight Crew Operations. He was restored to flight status in July 1970 and finally flew in space in July 1975 on the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project.

What was the Life magazine deal that the Mercury Seven signed?

In August 1959, agent C. Leo DeOrsey negotiated a $500,000 exclusive contract between the Mercury Seven and Life magazine, granting the publication access to the astronauts' private lives, homes, and families. Between August 1959 and the 15th of May, 1963, each astronaut received $71,428.71 from the arrangement.

Did all of the Mercury Seven astronauts fly in space?

All seven Mercury astronauts eventually flew in space. As a group they participated in all four NASA human spaceflight programs of the 20th century: Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, and the Space Shuttle. Gus Grissom, who flew both Mercury and Gemini missions, died in 1967 before the Apollo program's crewed flights began.

What record did John Glenn set when he flew on the Space Shuttle in 1998?

Glenn flew on Space Shuttle Discovery on mission STS-95 in 1998 and, at the age of 77, became the oldest person to orbit Earth at the time. He was a sitting U.S. senator from Ohio when he flew, and the only member of the Mercury Seven to fly on the Space Shuttle. He died in 2016 at the age of 95, the last surviving member of the group.

All sources

55 references cited across the entry

  1. 1The Mercury 7 CaperSmithsonian Magazine
  2. 2Astronaut SelectionNASA — November 30, 2006
  3. 3Magazine14 New Astronauts Introduced at Press ConferenceNASA — October 30, 1963
  4. 4InterviewThe MATS Flyer Interviews Major Gus GrissomGus Grissom — Military Air Transport Service, United States Air Force — February 1963
  5. 5Biography – John H. GlennDavid DeFelice — April 3, 2015
  6. 6NewsCollege says Glenn degree was deservedOctober 4, 1983
  7. 7NewsFuture challenging for new astronautsApril 10, 1959
  8. 8NewsMercury project team introducedApril 10, 1959
  9. 9Mercury – April 1959Heather Deiss — 2013-06-05
  10. 10MagazineRendezvous with DestinyApril 20, 1959
  11. 11NewsScott Carpenter, One of the Original Seven Astronauts, Is Dead at 88Richard Goldstein — October 10, 2013
  12. 12L. Gordon Cooper Jr.Tara Gray — NASA
  13. 13John H. Glenn, Jr.Tara Gray — NASA
  14. 14NewsJohn Glenn, American hero, aviation icon and former U.S. senator, dies at 95Joe Hallett
  15. 15John Glenn, First American to Orbit the Earth, DiesNed Potter — ABC — December 8, 2016
  16. 16Detailed Biographies of Apollo I Crew – Gus GrissomMary White — NASA
  17. 17Walter M. Schirra Jr.Tara Gray — NASA
  18. 18Alan B. Shepard, Jr.Tara Gray — NASA
  19. 19Donald K. "Deke" SlaytonTara Gray — NASA
  20. 20Military Hazardous Duty Pay Charts 1955–1967Navy Cyberspace
  21. 21MagazineThe Big StoryAugust 24, 1959
  22. 22Life Magazine and the Mercury Seven Astronauts: A Historic Case of Media ControlGinger Rudeseal Carter — Northeast Louisiana University — October 6–8, 1994
  23. 23The Original "Voice of the Astronauts" – John "Shorty" PowersMarketing the Moon
  24. 24MagazineBooks: Skywriting with Gus and DekeR.Z. Sheppard — September 24, 1979
  25. 25MagazineCinema: Saga of a Magnificent SevenRichard Schickel — October 3, 1983
  26. 26NewsNat Geo Hands Series Order To Adaptation Of Tom Wolfe's 'The Right Stuff' From Leonardo DiCaprio's Appian Way – TCAPeter White — Deadline Hollywood — February 10, 2019
  27. 27About ASFAstronaut Scholarship Foundation
  28. 28NewsJohn Glenn and the courage of the Mercury SevenSarah Kaplan — 2016-12-08
  29. 29NewsThunderbirds are go: First pictures of TV remakeMichael Idato — 18 January 2015
  30. 30NewsCooper the Cool Handles a Hair-RaiserTom Wolfe — October 25, 1979a
  31. 31NewsAstronauts Have Their Day at the White HouseOctober 11, 1963
  32. 32Launch Complex 14Air Force Space Museum
  33. 33BookThe Real Stuff: A History of NASA's Astronaut Recruitment ProgramJoseph D. Atkinson et al. — Praeger — 1985
  34. 34BookGus Grissom: The Lost AstronautRay E. Boomhower — Indiana Historical Society — 2004
  35. 35BookSelecting the Mercury Seven: The Search for America's First AstronautsColin Burgess — Springer — 2011
  36. 36BookFaith 7: L. Gordon Cooper, Jr., and the Final Mercury MissionColin Burgess — Springer — 2016
  37. 37BookWe Seven: By the Astronauts ThemselvesM. Scott Carpenter et al. — Simon & Schuster Paperbacks — 2010
  38. 38BookFor Spacious Skies: The Uncommon Journey Of A Mercury AstronautScott Carpenter et al. — NAL Trade — 2003
  39. 39BookA Man on the Moon: The Voyages of the Apollo AstronautsAndrew Chaikin — Penguin Books — 2007
  40. 40BookWhere No Man Has Gone BeforeW. David Compton — NASA — 1988
  41. 41BookLeap of FaithGordon Cooper et al. — Harper Collins — 2000
  42. 42BookThe All-American BoysWalter Cunningham — ipicturebooks — 2009
  43. 43BookHistory of the USAF Experimental Test Pilot School 4 February 1951 – 12 October 1961Charles V. Eppley — United States Air Force — March 1963
  44. 44BookDistinguished African Americans in Aviation and Space ScienceBetty Kaplan Gubert et al. — Oryx Press — 2002
  45. 45BookThe Astronaut Wives ClubLily Koppel — Grand Central Publishing — 2013
  46. 46BookFailure Is Not an Option: Mission Control from Mercury to Apollo 13 and BeyondGene Kranz — Simon & Schuster — 2000
  47. 47BookVolume VII Human Spaceflight: Projects Mercury, Gemini, and ApolloNASA — 2008
  48. 48BookThe Making of an Ex-AstronautBrian O'Leary — Michael Joseph — 1971
  49. 49BookApollo Expeditions to the MoonRobert Sherrod — NASA — 1975
  50. 50BookMercury Rising: John Glenn, John Kennedy, and the New Battleground of the Cold WarJeff Shesol — W. W. Norton & Company — 2021
  51. 51BookDeke! U.S. Manned Space: From Mercury to the ShuttleDonald K. "Deke" Slayton et al. — Forge — 1994
  52. 52BookThis New Ocean: A History of Project MercuryLoyd S. Jr. Swenson et al. — NASA — 1966
  53. 53BookLight This Candle: The Life & Times of Alan Shepard, America's First SpacemanNeal Thompson — Crown Publishers — 2004
  54. 54BookFrom Engineering Science to Big Science: The NACA and NASA Collier Trophy Research Project WinnersJannelle Warren-Findley — NASA History Office, Office of Policy and Plans — 1998
  55. 55BookThe Right StuffTom Wolfe — Farrar, Straus, and Giroux — 1979

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