Instruct: Given a question, retrieve passages that can help answer the question.
Query: Who was the first American in space?
Rear Admiral Alan Bartlett Shepard Jr. (November 18, 1923 – July 21, 1998) was an American astronaut, naval aviator, test pilot, and businessman. In 1961 he became the first American to travel into space, and in 1971 he walked on the Moon.
The film accompanies the first female space traveler who was not a space agency employee, Anousheh Ansari, who paid US $20 million for her flight into space.
On July 29, 1958, Eisenhower signed the National Aeronautics and Space Act, establishing NASA. When it began operations on October 1, 1958, NASA absorbed the 43-year-old NACA intact; its 8,000 employees, an annual budget of US$100 million, three major research laboratories (Langley Aeronautical Laboratory, Ames Aeronautical Laboratory, and Lewis Flight Propulsion Laboratory) and two small test facilities. A was approved by President Eisenhower in 1959. Elements of the Army Ballistic Missile Agency and the United States Naval Research Laboratory were incorporated into NASA. A significant contributor to NASA's entry into the Space Race with the Soviet Union was the technology from the German rocket program led by Wernher von Braun, who was now working for the Army Ballistic Missile Agency (ABMA), which in turn incorporated the technology of American scientist Robert Goddard's earlier works. Earlier research efforts within the US Air Force and many of ARPA's early space programs were also transferred to NASA. In December 1958, NASA gained control of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a contractor facility operated by the California Institute of Technology.
A space observatory is any instrument, such as a telescope, in outer space which is used for observation of distant planets, galaxies, and other outer space objects. In 1946, American theoretical astrophysicist Lyman Spitzer was proposed the idea of a telescope in outer space, a decade before the Soviet Union launched the first artificial satellite, "Sputnik" into orbit. However, German scientist Hermann Oberth had first conceived the idea of a space based telescope. Spitzer's proposal called for a large telescope that would not be hindered by Earth's atmosphere. After lobbying in the 1960s and 1970s for such a system to be built, Spitzer's vision ultimately materialized into the world's first space-based optical telescope, "Hubble Space Telescope", which was launched on April 20, 1990 by the Space Shuttle "Discovery" (STS-31).
NASA was established in 1958, succeeding the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA). The new agency was to have a distinctly civilian orientation, encouraging peaceful applications in space science. Since its establishment, most US space exploration efforts have been led by NASA, including the Apollo Moon landing missions, the Skylab space station, and later the Space Shuttle. NASA is supporting the International Space Station and is overseeing the development of the Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle, the Space Launch System and Commercial Crew vehicles. The agency is also responsible for the Launch Services Program which provides oversight of launch operations and countdown management for unmanned NASA launches.
One of the most earliest and notable achievements of SUPARCO activities was its unmanned space flight programme that was recorded on 7 June 1962. SUPARCO made research in the development of first solid-fuel expandable rockets, an assistance provided by the United States. On 7 June 1962, SUPARCO landed a record achievement when it launched first unmanned solid-fuel sounding rocket and took its first initial space flight from the Sonmiani Terminal Launch. The rocket was developed in a joint venture with Air force in a team led by PAF's Air Commodore (Brigadier-General) WJM Turowicz. Known as the "Rehbar-I" (lit. "Teller of the way"), Pakistan had secured its distinction as the third country in Asia and the tenth in the world to conduct successful spaceflight. The unmanned spaceflight mission continued under Turowicz, and according to SUPARCO, since 1962 til the partial termination of mission in 1972, ~200 sounding rockets took high success space flights from Sonmiani Terminal Launch. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) publicly hailed the space flight programme as the beginning of "a programme of continuous cooperation in space research of mutual interest."
Liu was selected for the crew of Shenzhou 9, the first manned mission to the Chinese space station Tiangong 1, along with Jing Haipeng, the first repeat Chinese space traveller, and Liu Wang. Liu became the first female Chinese astronaut to go into space. The mission was launched on June 16, 2012, 49 years to the day after the first female space traveller, cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova was launched. During this manned space mission, Liu performed experiments in space medicine.
Yelena Vladimirovna Kondakova (; born March 30, 1957) was the third Soviet/Russian female cosmonaut to travel to space and the first woman to make a long-duration spaceflight. Her first trip into space was on Soyuz TM-20 on October 4, 1994. She returned to Earth on March 22, 1995 after a five-month stay at the Mir space station. Kondakova's second flight was as a mission specialist on the United States Space Shuttle Atlantis during mission STS-84 in May 1997. She was the last Russian female in space until her successor cosmonaut Elena Serova flew to the International Space Station (ISS) on 25 September 2014.
The first transatlantic flight by rigid airship, and the first return transatlantic flight, was made just a couple of weeks after the transatlantic flight of Alcock and Brown, on 2 July 1919. Major George Herbert Scott of the Royal Air Force flew the airship R34 with his crew and passengers from RAF East Fortune, Scotland to Mineola, New York (on Long Island), covering a distance of about in about four and a half days.
Academy Award winner Dennis Muren offers a memory of 1955: “[M]y pal Bruce and I hurried into the Hawaii Theatre on Hollywood Boulevard to see a new color movie, "Conquest of Space". We were eight years old. ... ‘Reeling’ by on the giant screen, we saw a giant circular space station in orbit one hundred [sic] miles up, seemingly in orbit above me over Hollywood. Wow! And that was just the beginning. Awesome rocket ships of various shapes flew about. ... Finally, the movie ended with a skillful landing and joyful liftoff from the desolate red surface of Mars. ...”
As a result of the space race between USA and the Soviet Union in the 1950s, NASA was created in 1958 from NACA (National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, formed 1915) and other related organizations.
Mercury-Redstone 1 (MR-1) was the first Mercury-Redstone unmanned flight test in Project Mercury and the first attempt to launch a Mercury spacecraft with the Mercury-Redstone Launch Vehicle. Intended to be an unmanned sub-orbital spaceflight, it was launched on November 21, 1960 from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida. The launch failed in a peculiar fashion which has been referred to as the "four-inch flight".
Whiting reported aboard "Langley" on 20 March 1922, the day of her commissioning, as her first executive officer, also serving on an acting basis as her first commanding officer and thus becoming the first person to command a U.S. Navy aircraft carrier. "Langley" was far too slow to keep up with the battle fleet, and her main purpose was to serve as a laboratory for the exploration of the new naval warfare discipline of aircraft carrier operations, with her personnel and those of her embarked air squadrons experimenting to discover what practices worked best. Flying a Vought VE-7, Lieutenant Virgil C. Griffin made the first takeoff from an American carrier from "Langley" on 17 October 1922, and Lieutenant Commander Godfrey Chevalier made the first landing on 26 October 1922 in an Aeromarine 39B. On 18 November 1922, Whiting himself made the worlds first catapult launch of an aircraft from an aircraft carrier while aboard "Langley", piloting a Naval Aircraft Factory PT while "Langley" was at anchor in Virginias York River.
The Earth Day 20 International Peace Climb was an expedition to reach the summit of Mount Everest during Earth Week 1990 led by Jim Whittaker, the first American to climb Mount Everest (in 1963), and marked the first time in history that mountaineers from the United States, Soviet Union and China had roped together to climb a mountain, let alone Mount Everest.
On March 1, 1954, the U.S. detonated its first practical thermonuclear weapon (which used isotopes of lithium as its fusion fuel), known as the "Shrimp" device of the Castle Bravo test, at Bikini Atoll, Marshall Islands. The device yielded 15 megatons, more than twice its expected yield, and became the worst radiological disaster in U.S. history. The combination of the unexpectedly large blast and poor weather conditions caused a cloud of radioactive nuclear fallout to contaminate over . 239 Marshall Island natives and 28 Americans were exposed to significant amounts of radiation, resulting in elevated levels of cancer and birth defects in the years to come.
On April 10, 1978, VWoA dedicated Westmoreland Assembly by driving its first car off the line, a two-door white Rabbit (in "Rabbit C" or mid trim level, as with all the initial production) — which had actually been assembled the week before and was shipped after the plant dedication to Volkswagen's Wolfsburg headquarters for its museum. Toni Schmücker, Richard E Dauch, James McLernon, U.S. Treasury Secretary Michael Blumenthal, Pennsylvania Governor Milton Shapp and 1,200 employees were on hand the day the first car came off of the line. In his remarks, Schmücker, CEO of Volkswagen AG, paraphrased Neil Armstrong remarks when stepping onto the moon, saying "this may be one small step for America, but it is a giant step for Volkswagen."
Satellite in the Sky is a 1956 British CinemaScope science fiction film in Warner Color, produced by Edward J. Danziger and Harry Lee Danziger, directed by Paul Dickson, and starring Kieron Moore, Lois Maxwell, Donald Wolfit, and Bryan Forbes. The film was distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures. Special effects were by Wally Veevers, who would later work on Stanley Kubrick's "" (1968). 
After initial experiments using high-speed aircraft, scientists in Great Britain create the "Stardust", the first manned spaceship to orbit the Earth. Some of the crew members have concerned loved ones. Barbara (Thea Gregory), the wife of Larry Noble (Jimmy Hanley), and Ellen (Shirley Lawrence), the girlfriend of radio operator Jimmy Wheeler (Bryan Forbes), are afraid that the space flight will be dangerous.
The first satellite (USA-53 or 1990-019B, 19,600 kg) launched for the program was deployed on March 1, 1990 by the Space Shuttle "Atlantis" as part of Mission STS-36. Objects associated with the satellite decayed on March 31, 1990, but the satellite was seen and tracked later that year and in the mid-1990s by amateur observers. The second satellite (USA-144 or 1999-028A) was launched on May 22, 1999, and by 2004 the launch of a third satellite was planned for 2009. Circumstantial evidence suggested that the third satellite might be the payload of the Delta IV Heavy launch designated NROL-15, which was launched in June 2012. That launch deposited a payload into geosynchronous orbit but, given the stealth/deception hypothesis, there remains the possibility of other, undetected payloads.
The USSR intended to have the first artificial satellite of Mars beating the planned American Mariner 8 and Mariner 9 Mars orbiters. In May 1971, one day after Mariner 8 malfunctioned at launch and failed to reach orbit, Cosmos 419 (Mars 1971C), a heavy probe of the Soviet Mars program M-71, also failed to launch. This spacecraft was designed as an orbiter only, while the next two probes of project M-71, Mars 2 and Mars 3, were multipurpose combinations of an orbiter and a lander with small skis-walking rovers that would be the first planet rovers outside the Moon. They were successfully launched in mid-May 1971 and reached Mars about seven months later. On November 27, 1971 the lander of Mars 2 crash-landed due to an on-board computer malfunction and became the first man-made object to reach the surface of Mars. On 2 December 1971, the Mars 3 lander became the first spacecraft to achieve a soft landing, but its transmission was interrupted after 14.5 seconds.
The Space Shuttle "Challenger" Memorial was dedicated on May 20, 1986, in memory of the crew of flight STS-51-L, who died during launch on January 28, 1986. Transcribed on the back of the stone is the text of the John Gillespie Magee, Jr. poem "High Flight", which was quoted by then President Ronald Reagan when he addressed the disaster. Although many remains were identified and returned to the families for private burial, some were not, and were laid to rest under the marker. Two crew members, Scobee and Smith, are buried in Arlington. On February 1, 2004, NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe dedicated a similar memorial to those who died when the Shuttle "Columbia" broke apart during reentry on February 1, 2003. Astronauts Laurel Clark, David Brown and Michael Anderson, who were killed in the "Columbia" disaster, are also buried in Arlington.
While Canada was the third country to build a satellite which was launched into space, it was launched aboard an American rocket from an American spaceport. The same goes for Australia, who launched first satellite involved a donated U.S. Redstone rocket and American support staff as well as a joint launch facility with the United Kingdom. The first Italian satellite San Marco 1 launched on 15 December 1964 on a U.S. Scout rocket from Wallops Island (Virginia, United States) with an Italian launch team trained by NASA. By similar occasions, almost all further first national satellites was launched by foreign rockets.
Guion Stewart Bluford Jr., Ph.D. (born November 22, 1942), (Col, USAF, Ret.), is an American aerospace engineer, retired U.S. Air Force officer and fighter pilot, and former NASA astronaut, who was the first African American in space (but not the first African American astronaut). Before becoming an astronaut, he was an officer in the U.S. Air Force, where he remained while assigned to NASA, rising to the rank of Colonel. He participated in four Space Shuttle flights between 1983 and 1992. In 1983, as a member of the crew of the Orbiter "Challenger" on the mission STS-8, he became the first African American in space as well as the second person of African ancestry in space, after Cuban cosmonaut Arnaldo Tamayo Méndez.
At the time ESA was formed, its main goals did not encompass human space flight; rather it considered itself to be primarily a scientific research organisation for unmanned space exploration in contrast to its American and Soviet counterparts. It is therefore not surprising that the first non-Soviet European in space was not an ESA astronaut on a European space craft; it was Czechoslovak Vladimír Remek who in 1978 became the first non-Soviet or American in space (the first man in space being Yuri Gagarin of the Soviet Union) – on a Soviet Soyuz spacecraft, followed by the Pole Mirosław Hermaszewski and East German Sigmund Jähn in the same year. This Soviet co-operation programme, known as Intercosmos, primarily involved the participation of Eastern bloc countries. In 1982, however, Jean-Loup Chrétien became the first non-Communist Bloc astronaut on a flight to the Soviet Salyut 7 space station.
Shepard became the first American in space by making a suborbital flight in May 1961. He went on to fly in the Apollo program and became the only Mercury astronaut to walk on the Moon. Gus Grissom, who became the second American in space, also participated in the Gemini and Apollo programs, but died in January 1967 during a pre-launch test for Apollo 1. Glenn became the first American to orbit the Earth in February 1962, then quit NASA and went into politics, serving as a US Senator from 1974 to 1999, and returned to space in 1998 as a Payload Specialist aboard STS-95. Deke Slayton was grounded in 1962, but remained with NASA and was appointed Chief Astronaut at the beginning of Project Gemini. He remained in the position of senior astronaut, in charge of space crew flight assignments among many other responsibilities, until towards the end of Project Apollo, when he resigned and began training to fly on the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project in 1975, which he successfully did. Gordon Cooper became the last to fly in Mercury and made its longest flight, and also flew a Gemini mission. Carpenter's Mercury flight was his only trip into space. Schirra flew the third orbital Mercury mission, and then flew a Gemini mission. Three years later, he commanded the first manned Apollo mission, becoming the only person to fly in all three of those programs.
Since 2001, Space Adventures has launched seven clients on eight successful missions to the International Space Station (ISS). In April 2001, the company sent American businessman Dennis Tito for a reported $20 million payment, making him the first space tourist. South African businessman Mark Shuttleworth did the same in April 2002, becoming the first African in space. Gregory Olsen became the third private citizen to travel to the ISS in October 2005, followed by the first female space tourist, Anousheh Ansari, who completed her 10-day orbital mission in September 2006. Charles Simonyi, an ex-executive at Microsoft, became the fifth space tourist who visited the ISS in April 2007, then again in March 2009. He is the world’s first private space explorer who launched to space twice. In 2008, game developer Richard Garriott, the first second-generation U.S. astronaut, became the sixth client to travel to the ISS. In October 2009, Cirque du Soleil founder, Guy Laliberté, became the first Canadian space tourist to have launched to space.