John Glenn , an aviation legend and the first American astronaut to orb the Earth , die this afternoon at the years of 95 .
Glenn passed away at a hospital in Columbus , Ohio , having been admittedmore than a week ago , although the cause of his hospitalization is not yet apparent and wasonly reported yesterday . He lived a foresightful living of remarkably sound health , and died surrounded by his family line .
Glenn was a highly - decorated devil dog who pilot nearly well-nigh 60 scrap missions in the South Pacific during World War II , followed by another 90 during the Korean War . After the Korean War , Glenn remained in the military as a trial cowcatcher , flying supersonic aircraft and other country - of - the - nontextual matter military models . On July 16th , 1957 , he broke the transcontinental focal ratio criminal record , taking off from Los Alamitos Naval Air Station in California , and touching down 3 hours and 23 second by and by at Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn , New York .
At the height of the military subdivision airstream between the US and the Soviet Union , aviation phonograph recording were a big peck . This one earned Glenn the accolade of being selected for Project Mercury , the United States’first military personnel - in - outer space program . A few years subsequently , on February 20th , 1962 , Glenn rocket his way into the annals of spaceflight history , becoming the first American to orbit the Earth — three times , in just under five hours — inside a petite Mercury capsule called Friendship 7 .
Glenn was received back on Earth to perhaps more fanfare than any American astronaut since — crowds cheer up , banding playing , invitations to the White House and Congress . Two Soviet astronaut had revolve the Earth the twelvemonth prior , a fact which leave many fearful that America was losing a race to dominate the biggest frontier yet to its fully grown military rival . With Glenn ’s abbreviated off - Earth flight , America ’s pride and self - trust were furbish up .
Glenn leave the astronaut programme in 1964 to pursue a career in government , later learning that NASA and President Kennedy had decided he was too cute to ever fly in distance again . He would up serve four terms as a Democratic US senator from Ohio between 1974 and 1999 , and even made an abortive bid for the presidency in 1984 . , lose the democratic primary nomination to Walter Mondale .
During his time in the senate , Glenn bear tightlipped attention to matter concern NASA , technology , and national refutation . He became an expert in weapons systems and nuclear proliferation , and was generally deliberate a measured voice of reason — a temperate most of the sentence , although his voting record became more liberal in his last two terms . His term of office as senator was unusually scandal - free .
Years as a lawmaker did little to soften Glenn ’s appetite for daring feats , and in 1998 , the retired astronaut made spaceflight history again , becoming the oldest homo in space as part of a seven - person work party aboard the quad bird Discovery . Glenn , who convinced NASA to appropriate him to return to space on the basis of pull ahead aesculapian knowledge , technically served as the mission ’s payload specialist . In reality , he was something of a human guinea pig , allowing himself to be subject to a bombardment of physiological and neurologic tests during the nine - twenty-four hours flight .
Glenn returned to Earth a 2nd fourth dimension even more of a legend than he was before . He would go on to receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Congressional Gold Medal .
“ John Glenn is , and always will be , Ohio ’s ultimate hometown hero , and his glide by today is an social occasion for all of us to grieve,”saidOhio Gov. John R. Kasich . “ As we bow our head and share our grief with his beloved married woman , Annie , we must also turn to the sky , to present his noteworthy journeys and his long year of divine service to our state and nation . ”
Glenn was the last surviving appendage of the original seven Project Mercury spaceman , follow the death of Scott Carpenter in 2013 .
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