![]() Glenn didn’t actually hear the legendary words “Godspeed, John Glenn.” Finally, with all mechanical issues solved and fair weather forecasted, Glenn was once again strapped into Friendship 7 early on the morning of February 20, 1962. The launch was delayed yet again on January 30 after a fuel leak was discovered, followed by yet another weather delay. Annie refused to speak to them, and when John heard about the pressure put on his wife, he backed her up, leading to a clash with government officials. When the mission was scrapped, the reporters, accompanied by none other than Vice President Lyndon Johnson, tried to gain access to Glenn’s home in hopes of interviewing his wife. On January 27, with television crews already set up to broadcast from both the launch site and Glenn’s home, where his wife, Annie, and his children were anxiously watching, poor weather conditions forced another postponement. Originally scheduled for December 1961 and then pushed to January 13, problems with the new Atlas rocket that would serve as the space capsule’s launching pad caused a two-week delay. Guenter Wendt, the original pad leader for NASA’s manned programs, coaxes a smile from Glenn after a postponement of the mission. John Glenn gave his space capsule its famous nickname. Glenn received an enormous amount of publicity following this feat, which brought him to the attention of the NACA, the predecessor to NASA, who selected him to become one of the Mercury 7 astronauts. After serving in the Korean War, Glenn was appointed to a naval test pilot program, where he completed one of the world’s first supersonic transcontinental flights in 1957. Glenn flew 59 missions in the South Pacific, where one of his wingmen was baseball legend Ted Williams. ![]() Navy aviation cadet program but was eventually assigned to the U.S. Glenn initially enlisted in both the U.S. Just six months after he received his license, the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. Department of Commerce program looking for students to train as pilots. Glenn had fallen in love with flying at an early age, building model airplanes while growing up in Ohio. John Glenn was a star before joining the Mercury program. ![]()
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