#OTD 40 years ago, Sally Ride became the first U.S. woman to fly to space. Her legacy sparked a fire that continues to ignite, paving the way for future space explorers. ??
Read more about her first flight on STS-7: https://t.co/uYTfw8PcmA pic.twitter.com/V6uOSbDj5v
— NASA's Johnson Space Center (@NASA_Johnson) June 18, 2023
How things have changed in ‘just’ forty years… from the 2012 NBC archives, “Why Sally Ride waited until her death to tell the world she was gay”:
In life, Sally Ride became famous as America’s first woman in space — and in death, she’s now added to her fame as the first acknowledged gay astronaut.
The revelation came in a low-key way: Monday’s obituary from Sally Ride Science, the educational venture she founded a decade ago, referred to Tam O’Shaughnessy as “her partner of 27 years.” A spokeswoman for Sally Ride Science, Terry McEntee, said Ride and O’Shaughnessy, who is the company’s chief operating officer and executive vice president, worked out the phrasing of the announcement before Ride’s death.
In an email today, Sally Ride’s sister, Bear Ride, explained why the former astronaut kept quiet about her sexual orientation.
“In her inherent Norwegian reticence — in this and so many aspects of her personal life (wrestling with pancreatic cancer, for example) — she just didn’t talk much (see Norwegian comment, and add to that the typical tight-lipped scientist thing),” Bear wrote. “If you read interviews from years and years back, you’ll see that there was always a major frustration that she didn’t comment much on ‘how it feels to be the first American woman in space’ — she just didn’t think that way. She wanted to get the job done. Her personal feelings were just that: personal. Not right or wrong — simply Sally. Everyone who knows her well really got that about her.”…
“I was very fortunate to spend time with her right before she passed away,” said Karen Flammer, a research physicist at the University of California at San Diego and one of the founders of Sally Ride Science. “We were able to talk about what she envisioned for our company, and our legacy and her legacy.”
Ride’s status as a former astronaut wasn’t uppermost in her mind, Flammer told me. “Her true passion really was science education, and inspiring more young people, particularly girls, to follow a career path in science and technology,” she said…
Anybody got any information on ‘Out Astronaut’? I can’t find much:
Help @IIAS_NLC in their efforts to better serve the LGBTQ+ community in science and space. @Outastronaut1 is running a scholarship contest for LGBTQ+ individuals. https://t.co/AImR2jQm0H Deadline is June 30th! Chcek it out and spread the word! ???????? pic.twitter.com/Y7FeQR7K9L
— The Inspired 24 (@theinspired24) June 19, 2023
Monday Night Open Thread
Ruckus
A damn fine human being.
I remember the flight, and I like that she broke barriers, even if she was just doing her job. She did a very good job. The world needs a lot of barriers taken down, this was a damn good way to take this one down.
eversor
And now the Jesus Brigade is going to ban astronauts.
Tony Jay
@eversor:
Which is fair enough. The Castle Doctrine provides security for Almighty God just as much as any other American citizen, and what’s the point of spending all that money on rockets anyway when we’ve known since the very early ’70s that there are stairways that can get you there for a very reasonable dollar outlay?
David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch
I thought the first woman astronaut was Alice Cramden
WereBear
@David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch: She trained but never orbited.
Amir Khalid
@Tony Jay:
And we even know the retail operating hours up there.
elliottg
People did not realize Sally Ride was gay? I thought she came out years ago or was outed.
Tony Jay
@Amir Khalid:
It’s a bargain, right?
Obviously the rocket business is just a front for the Deep State operation to syphon off the waters that encircle the Earth both Above and Below. Probably to keep the golf courses in the desert southwest green after all of the Gay started drying up the climate.
It’s all connected, man.
Baud
@elliottg:
People don’t know because being gay is no big deal among decent people anymore.
Brachiator
@elliottg:
I recall reading stories about her being gay years ago. I assumed it was widely known.
I have always been interested in space stuff. I had bubble gum cards featuring the Mercury Seven astronauts. Sally Ride was right up there with them among my astronaut heroes. And she may have been reticent, but she had her own kind of charisma. Not all astronauts do.
ETA. I am relatively ancient, but if there was such a thing as affordable space tourism, say, to a space station resort, I would be there in a heartbeat.
Debbie(Aussie)
@Tony Jay
@Tony Jay: sometimes a like button would come in handy. So glad I didn’t have a mouthful of anything😄
satby
@Baud: But 40 years ago it would have gotten her quietly bounced from the space program. I’m confident they knew at NASA, but the deal was probably a very strict “don’t ask, don’t tell”. And forty years ago, that was the progressive approach that still got the RW enraged.
Bruce K in ATH-GR
As I recall, Sally Ride’s orientation wasn’t confirmed until after her passing – some may have suspected, but that was the first I heard of it.
The Sally Ride story that sticks with me is the one about the Challenger disaster investigation, specifically the famous moment when Richard Feynman demonstrated what ice-cold temperatures do to the sort of O-rings that were used in the shuttle’s solid-fuel boosters. In his memoirs, Feynman gave credit for the insight to another member of the commission, General Donald Kutyna of the Air Force, but he strongly suspected by the way Kutyna brought up the issue to him that Kutyna had been tipped off to the problem by someone inside NASA. Kutyna didn’t reveal until after Ride had died that she had been his source.
WereBear
@satby: I did watch the documentary, and believe Sally Ride was one of the first class Nichelle Nichols recruited for NASA.
She did cast a wider net.
Chris T.
@elliottg: I had no idea. Doesn’t really matter, who cares what I knew? :-) But I am a font of trivia so if I had come across that bit of information, I’m sure I would have squirreled it away…
lowtechcyclist
@Tony Jay:
Brilliant!
lowtechcyclist
@Amir Khalid:
The hours don’t matter anyway.
Tony Jay
@Debbie(Aussie):
@lowtechcyclist:
While I’m trying to get my head around the existential Scheißeverse that is modern British politics, this keeps me going. 8-)
LiminalOwl
@elliottg: I thought the same when I read this. Certainly today’s news is not the first time I’ve seen the info.
LiminalOwl
@Brachiator: Ditto on all counts. Well, almost all. I didn’t know those bubble-gum cards existed!
When I was 9—the year of the Moon landing—I told my parents I wanted to be an astronaut. They told me no, they didn’t want me to be part of the military-industrial complex. (I tell this story often, explaining that when I was discouraged from science careers—astronaut was the one I wanted most, and the most blatantly discouraged, but there were others—it was not because I was a girl but for very different political reasons!)
lowtechcyclist
@LiminalOwl:
Didn’t they tell you not to trust anyone over 30? ;-)
(I’m assuming that would have included them!)
LiminalOwl
@lowtechcyclist: LOL. It did, and they didn’t.
LiminalOwl
From the world of Filk music (no, not a typo), a classic, and one of my favorite songs:
HOPE EYRIE, by Leslie Fish
James E Powell
@Brachiator:
For those of us who came of age in the 60s, it is almost impossible to explain to those who did not the esteem in which the astronauts were held. There are no current analogs.
Sandia Blanca
@LiminalOwl: Sally Ride died 11 years ago, so the information about her orientation is not news any longer.