Almost Astronauts: 13 Women Who Dared To Dream
Almost Astronauts: 13 Women Who Dared to Dream
Almost Astronauts: 13 Women Who Dared To Dream
Margaret A. Weitekamp, Tanya Lee Stone
They had the right stuff. They defied the prejudices of the time. And they blazed a trail for generations of women to follow.What does it take to be an astronaut? Excellence at flying, courage, intelligence, resistance to stress, top physical shape — any checklist would include these. But when America created NASA in 1958, there was another unspoken rule: you had to be a man. Here is the tale of thirteen women who proved that they were not only as tough as the toughest man but also brave enough to challenge the government. They were blocked by prejudice, jealousy, and the scrawled note of one of the most powerful men in Washington. But even though the Mercury 13 women did not make it into space, they did not lose, for their example empowered young women to take their place in the sky, piloting jets and commanding space capsules. ALMOST ASTRONAUTS is the story of thirteen true pioneers of the space age.

Book Details

Genre: 

  • Educational
  • Environment
  • Historical Nonfiction
  • Science

Age Level: 

  • 12 and up
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Most everyone has heard of the Mercury 7, the first human
spaceflight program in the Untied States. It lasted from
1959 through 1963, and the goal was to beat the Russians in
putting the first human in orbit around the Earth. Everyone
pretty much knows John Glenn, Scott Carpenter, and the rest
of the crew that trained, but very few people know of the
thirteen women who trained and never got to go into space.
Jerrie Cobb was the first woman pilot to take all the same
tests that the men took, and even scored higher than the

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