John Glenn; A Memoir

New York: Bantam Books, 1999. First Printing [Stated]. Hardcover. Very good/Very good. x, 422 pages. Illustrations. Index. DJ has slight wear and soiling. Minor edge soiling. Signed by the author (Glenn) on half-title page. John Herschel Glenn Jr. (July 18, 1921 - December 8, 2016) was a United States Marine Corps aviator, engineer, astronaut, businessman and politician. He was the first American to orbit the Earth, circling it three times in 1962. Before joining NASA, Glenn was a distinguished fighter pilot in World War II, China and Korea. He shot down three MiG-15s, and was awarded six Distinguished Flying Crosses and eighteen Air Medals. In 1957, he made the first supersonic transcontinental flight across the United States. His on-board camera took the first continuous, panoramic photograph of the United States. He was one of the Mercury Seven, military test pilots selected in 1959 by NASA as the nation's first astronauts. On February 20, 1962, Glenn flew the Friendship 7 mission, becoming the first American to orbit the Earth, and the fifth person and third American in space. He received the NASA Distinguished Service Medal in 1962, the Congressional Space Medal of Honor in 1978, was inducted into the U.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame in 1990, and received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2012. A member of the Democratic Party, Glenn was first elected to the Senate in 1974 and served for 24 years, until January 1999. In 1998, while still a sitting senator, Glenn flew on Space Shuttle Discovery's STS-95 mission, making him, at age 77, the oldest person to fly in space and the only person to fly in both the Mercury and the Space Shuttle programs. Derived from a Kirkus review: Mr. Smith goes to NASA, then Washington, then NASA again. Decorated fighter pilot in two wars, first American to orbit the earth, US Senator, Presidential candidate, oldest man in space, it's a wonderful life Glenn recalls in this earnest, memoir written with Nick Taylor. He clearly intends his amazing journey to affirm the Capraesque virtues of hard work, religion, and patriotism he learned while growing up in Ohio. Only occasionally does he toss out hints of the flinty fighter-jock professionalism that, as surely as patriotism, pushed Glenn into space. Glenn still resents the possibility that his anti-philandering warning to fellow Mercury astronauts nixed his chances of becoming the first American in space. His accounts of his campaigns and political life, including a 24-year Senate career, flare into life, as when he depicts his friend Bobby Kennedy. The writing achieves liftoff in such instances as when Glenn proudly recalls wife Annie's humor, self-sacrifice, and fortitude in dealing with her stuttering, and when he recounts his epochal space flights. He remembers the frustrating delays that preceded his 1962 Friendship 7 mission, the beauty of sunsets seen from space, the peril posed by a defective heat shield, and the national euphoria on his return to earth. In discussing his Discovery shuttle flight 37 years later, he provides fascinating details on quantum advances achieved in space travel during the interim. Glenn's story of how he became a example of the heroic age of discovery is enduringly thrilling.