A Short Biography of Astronaut Sally Ride

Sally Ride was born in Los Angeles, California on May 26, 1951 to Dale and Joyce Ride. Sally had a normal childhood and enjoyed being outdoors and playing sports (The First Woman in Space). While growing up, her father quit his job, sold their house and they traveled to Spain where Sally fell in love with tennis and studied the sport with Wimbledon athlete Alice Marble (The First Woman in Space). She could have become a professional tennis player after placing 18^th in the junior tennis circuit (The First Woman in Space).

At the age of 15, after returning home from Spain, she fell in love with science while attending the Westlake School for girls. She got a scholarship for tennis which she believes taught her self-control, self-discipline, gave her a good demeanor and taught her to control her emotions (The First Woman in Space). When given the chance to attend Swathmore College on the east coast, Sally chose science over her love of tennis. There, she studied astrophysics (The First Woman in Space).

After trying to once again establish her tennis career, she realized that she did not have what it took to play pro and got into Stanford University where she took up physics (The First Woman in Space). After having science and physics for so many years, she wanted something more on the artsy side, so she took an English literature class where she fell in love with Shakespeare. Sally earned her Bachelor of Arts in English literature and a Bachelor of Science in Physics (along with a doctorate) in 1973. She continued her education and went on to earn her master's degree in 1975 (The First Woman in Space). After continuing her education in physics she earned her Ph.D. in astrophysics (Women of the Hall).

Sally had always prepared herself to be a teacher, taking after her father (The First Woman in Space). And yet twenty-two years after the United States first sent a manned mission to space, Sally became the first American woman in space where she was a mission specialist on the Challenger (Women of the Hall). In 1977 she had applied to be an astronaut after seeing an ad that NASA was looking for young scientists to be mission specialists to monitor the technology used in the flights (Women of the Hall). Out of 8,000 people who applied for the positions, 1,000 of them were women. Out of the 1,000 women who applied, six were chosen to contribute to a group of 35 new astronauts (Women of the Hall). Sally completed her one-year training and evaluation in August of 1979 which made her eligible as a mission specialist for future Space Shuttle flights (Astronaut Bio: Sally Ride, 2004).

"The thing that I'll remember most about the flight is that it was fun. In fact, I'm sure it was the most fun I'll ever have in my life," (Women of the Hall). On the six-day mission of the Challenger, Sally had many responsibilities. She was in charge of testing a robotic arm that was used to deploy and retrieve satellites, assist the commander and shuttle pilot during ascent, re-entry, and landing, and she also acted as the flight engineer (Women of the Hall). Sally also acted as an on-orbit capsule communicator on the STS-2 and STS-3 missions (Astronaut Bio: Sally Ride, 2004).

During the Challenger mission, Sally and the crew deployed satellites for Canada and Indonesia and operated the Canadian-built Remote Manipulator System (RMS) which performed the first deployment and retrieval exercise with the Shuttle Pallet Satellite (SPAS-01. They conducted the first formation flying of the orbiter with a free-flying satellite (SPAS-01) and carried and operated the first cooperative materials science payload (OSTA-2) made by the United States and Germany, amongst other tasks (Astronaut Bio: Sally Ride, 2004). The Challenger Mission lasted 147 hours and came to end on June 24, 1983 at the Edwards Air Force Base in California (Astronaut Bio: Sally Ride, 2004).

On October 5, 1984 Sally served as a mission specialist on STS 41-G which launched from Florida from the Kennedy Space Center (Astronaut Bio: Sally Ride, 2004). This eight day mission was used to deploy the Earth Radiation Budget Satellite and conduct scientific observations of the earth with the OSTS-3 pallet and Large Format Camera. This mission lasted a total of 197 hours and came to end on October 13, 1984 at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida (Astronaut Bio: Sally Ride, 2004).

Sally was assigned to be mission specialist on STS 61-M in June of 1985 but ended her training early in order to serve as a member of the Presidential Commission on the Space Shuttle Challenger Accident (Astronaut Bio: Sally Ride, 2004). After completing the investigation, she was appointed Special Assistant to the Administrator at NASA headquarters for long range and strategic planning (Astronaut Bio: Sally Ride, 2004).

Sally Ride has acquired many accomplishments along the way. In 1987 she wrote a proposal to establish a lunar base and then left NASA to accept a fellowship at the Stanford Center for International Security and Arms Control (Women of the Hall). Sally has gone on to write a children's book titled To Space and Back which describes her missions and experiences in space. Not only did she publish a children's book, but she also wrote two others titled Voyager: An Adventure to the Edge of the Solar System and The Third Planet: Exploring the Earth from Space (Women of the Hall). She received the Jefferson Award for Public Service and was awarded the National Spaceflight Medal twice (Women of the Hall). She is now a faculty member at the University of California in San Diego where she teaches physics (Women of the Hall). In 1989 she also became head of the Space Institute of the University of California (The First Woman in Space). She is well honored and respected as being a vital woman in United States history.

References

Astronaut Bio: Sally Ride. (2004). Retrieved Mar. 06, 2006, from Astronaut

Bio: Sally Ride Web site: http://www.jsc.nasa.gov/Bios/htmlbios/ride-sk.html.

The First Woman in Space. (n.d.). Retrieved Mar. 06, 2006, from Sally Ride

Web site: http://library.thinkquest.org/J0112623/ride.html.

Women of the Hall. (n.d.). Retrieved Mar. 06, 2006, from National Women's

Hall of Fame Web site: http://www.greatwomen.org/women.php?action=viewone&id=125.