SD.1), includes extensive clippings, correspondence, writings, photographs, press releases, t-shirts, and printed materials documenting Cobb's role in the space program, her astronaut training, her flying career, and her work in the Amazon. We rely on the generous support of donors, sponsors, members, and other benefactors to share the history and impact of aviation and spaceflight, educate the public, and inspire future generations. An appointment is necessary to use any audiovisual material. A small amount of non-photographic materials found in the photograph binders/albums were removed and added to Series I. Then it took 12 more years before a woman actually flew an American spacecraft. In this one area of the space race, American men had simply chosen not to compete. - Informationen zum Thema Jerrie Cobb NASA space pilot woman pilot female pilot Mercury 13 Amazon", National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture - Cobb, Geraldyn M. "Jerrie", https://www.thoughtco.com/errie-cobb-3072207, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Jerrie_Cobb&oldid=1143859765, University of Science and Arts of Oklahoma alumni, Classen School of Advanced Studies alumni, Short description is different from Wikidata, All Wikipedia articles written in American English, Articles having same image on Wikidata and Wikipedia, Wikipedia articles incorporating text from NASA, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, Named Pilot of the Year by the National Pilots Association, Fourth American to be awarded Gold Wings of the, Honored by the government of Ecuador for pioneering new air routes over the Andes Mountains and Andes jungle, 1962 Received the Golden Plate Award of the, Received Pioneer Woman Award for her "courageous frontier spirit" flying all over the. Died: 18 March 2019 in Florida, United States, aged 88. Papers may be copied in accordance with the library's usual procedures. At 22, she flew for an airplane delivery service and returned to Ponca City as a test pilot in 1955. Born: 5 March 1931 in Norman, Oklahoma, United States. After graduating from Oklahoma Citys Classen High School, she spent one year at the Oklahoma College for Women in Chickasha, Oklahoma (now the University of Science and Arts of Oklahoma). (1931 - 2019) Geraldyn M (Jerrie) Cobb. Cobb and Jane Hart testified about the women's successes. Although Cobb successfully completed all three stages of physical and psychological evaluation that were used in choosing the first seven Mercury astronauts, this was not an official NASA program, and she was unable to rally support in Congress for adding women to the astronaut program. Then, the training moved to psychological exams. Greene, Nick. Lovelace and Flickinger wanted to implement a similar testing program in the U.S., but NASA was already committed to using male military test pilots for astronaut testing. Cobb received many awards including the 1972 Harmon International Trophy as the woman pilot of the year and the Amelia Earhart Gold Medal of Achievement. See Series I for additional photographs. She flew Lend Lease military aircraft around the world and then, in 1959 as a test pilot for Rockwell International, set the Absolute Altitude record of 37,010 feet in its Aero Commander business aircraft. Jerrie Cobb, Rhea Hurrle, and Wally Funk went to Oklahoma City for an isolation tank test. When Geraldyn M. Cobb was born on March 5, 1931 in Norman, Oklahoma, no one would have imagined the heights [] Having taken up flying at just age 12, she held numerous world aviation records for speed, distance and altitude, and had logged more than 10,000 hours of flight time. Some clippings also reference the presence of the space race, with both Soviet and American newspaper articles profiling Valentina Tereshkova, the Soviet cosmonaut who would beat Cobb to be the first woman in space (1963). None of the Mercury 13 ever reached space, despite Cobbs testimony in 1962 before a Congressional panel. Following her deep disappointment that there would be no further testing or entry into the U.S. space program for her, Cobb became a missionary pilot, merging her love of flight with her desire to serve others. Born: 5 March 1931 in Norman, Oklahoma, United States. In the early 1960s, when the first groups of astronauts were selected, NASA didn't think to look at the qualified female pilots who were available. He was right but the first women in space wouldnt fly for NASA. Jerrie Cobb in 1998 at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. By 1960, Cobb had set world aviation records for speed, distance, and altitude flying in Aero Commander airplanes. Copyright 2023 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. But Jacqueline Cochran, the record-setting aviatrix who had funded the Lovelace tests, testified against continuing the program at that time . Bio Oklahoma native Jerrie Cobb received her pilot's license at age 17, her commercial pilot's license at 18, and flight and ground instructor's rating at 21. . After becoming the first American woman to pass those tests, Jerrie Cobb and Doctor Lovelace publicly announced her test results at a 1960 conference in Stockholm and recruited more women to take the tests. Jerrie Cobb, the first woman to pass astronaut testing, has died. Life Magazine named her one of the nine women of the "100 most important young people in the United States". Jerrie Cobb by her jet fighter in 1961. In the end, thirteen women passed the same physical examinations that the Lovelace Foundation had developed for NASAs astronaut selection process. She first came to Lovelaces attention as a seasoned barnstormer, ferry, and corporate pilot with speed, distance, and altitude records. Prior to the lady astronauts, no women had qualified for astronaut training by NASAs standard. our Subscriber Agreement and by copyright law. The Crimes Of Eric Rudolph, The Atlanta Bomber Who Attacked The 1996 Summer Olympics. SNP will rebrand and shift focus away from independence, predicts Michael Gove, MV Pentalina Incident: Dozens of passengers evacuated as Pentland FerriesMV Pentalina runs aground on Orkney, Geraldyn Jerrie Cobb, aviator. (I am happy, Lord, happy.). Jerrie Cobb succeeded in having House subcommittee hearings held in the summer of 1962, investigating whether NASA was discriminating on the basis of sex, but the results were not what she hoped. Geraldyn Cobb was born on 5 March 1931 in Norman, Oklahoma, the second daughter of a military pilot and his wife. This article incorporates public domain material from websites or documents of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. Copyright in other papers in the collection may be held by their authors, or the authors' heirs or assigns. At NASA, some men agreed. In 1978, Cobb replaced her aging Aero Commander with a Britten-Norman BN-2A Islander well suited for short takeoffs and landings on cleared muddy patches deep in the rainforest. All of them met NASAs basic criteria. There were women on the Mayflower and on the first wagon trains west, working alongside the men to forge new trails to new vistas, Cobb testified in turn. Check out our exhibitionDestination Moon: The Apollo 11 Missionto see how NASA landed the first humans on the Moon in 1969. "If its a new play, people want it to be the best it can be. She was also part of the "Mercury 13", a group of women who underwent some of the same physiological screening tests as the original Mercury Seven astronauts as part of a private, non-NASA program. Although Jerrie Cobb scored in the top two percent of NASA astronaut training, the agency refused to allow women like her to join. The daughter of an Army lieutenant colonel, Ms. Cobb started flying at 12, sitting on a stack of pillows and using blocks to reach the rudder pedals of her father's open-cockpit Waco biplane. By 1960 she had 7,000 hours of flying time. Its photo gallery FAQ states that all of the images in the photo . In 1961, Cobb became the first woman to pass astronaut testing. In total, 68 percent of the "lady astronauts" passed, where only 56 percent of the male trainees passed. She stored fuel at headwaters and flew hundreds of miles up tributaries to indigenous tribes. Although Cobb garnered public support for her mission, NASA once again did not provide Cobb with the opportunity for space flight. Early life. Jerrie Cobb was Americas first woman to complete astronaut training and qualify for space flight. Because of other family and job commitments, not all of the women were asked to take these tests. This was much more grueling than NASAs test, which left astronaut trainees alone in a room for three hours. These televised segments were compiled by the Jerrie Cobb Foundation as part of the publicity campaign to promote Cobb's second attempt for space flight. There is some duplication among the tapes. Kat. Jerrie Cobb's father taught her to fly a biplane at age twelve and by age sixteen she was flying the Piper J-3 Cub, a popular light aircraft. Thank you to Alaska Airlines for sponsoring this episode of the Flight Deck Podcast. Jerrie Cobb, a member of the Mercury 13, is seen testing in 1960 in NASA's Multiple Axis Space Test Inertia Facility. News of her death came Thursday from journalist Miles O'Brien, serving as a family . This page was last edited on 10 March 2023, at 10:23. https://id.lib.harvard.edu/ead/sch01647/catalog Accessed May 01, 2023. Thus three years later, Cobb and her fellow lady space cadets had to watch as the Soviet Union put the first woman in space. Jerrie Cobb served as an inspiration to many of our members in her record breaking, her desire to go into space, and just to prove that women could do what men could do, said Laura Ohrenberg, headquarters manager in Oklahoma City for the Ninety-Nines Inc., an international organisation of licensed women pilots. Professional, 1930s-2012 (#1.1-5.7, FD.1-FD.2, 6F+B.1m-6F+B.4m, 7OB.1-7OB.5, SD.1), Series II. Of additional note are publicity materials, letters of endorsement, letters to legislators and the White House requesting support, and the subsequent responses from NASA officials, all written during the time that Cobb advocated for her second opportunity to fly into space in the 1990s (Space II). Senator Philip Hart of Michigan) campaigned in Washington to have the program continue. [6][20] In 1981, she was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize for her humanitarian work. Note: this press release was prepared by Jerrie Cobb's family. The Subcommittee expressed sympathy but did not rule on the question. Los Angeles, CA, March 11, 2021 Did you know that women make up half of the U.S. college-educated workforce, but only 28 percent make careers in science and engineering? Jerrie Cobb dropped everything and flew to Washington, DC. In the early 1960s, the space race heated up. ", Some early feedback from the readings was skeptical. The trip lasted a total of 29 days, 11 hours, and 59 minutes. An August 1960 photo of Jerrie Cobb identifies the lady space cadet by height, weight, and measurements. Series is arranged alphabetically.Series II, PHOTOGRAPHS, 1931?-2000s (#PD.1-PD.47), includes photographs, slides, and negatives documenting Cobb's astronaut training, her career as a pilot, and her flights ferrying supplies and aid to indigenous peoples in South America. Among them was Jerrie Cobb, who died at age 88 on March 18, 2019. United States Information Agency/PhotoQuest/Getty ImagesJerrie Cobb spent much of her life in the cockpit of a plane, where she racked up twice as many flight hours as astronaut John Glenn. Three days later, Jerrie Cobb took off from McCarran Field in Las Vegas in an Aero Commander. Jerrie Cobb trained on NASA's Multi-Axis Space Test Inertia Facility (MASTIF) in 1960, shortly after the male Mercury 7 astronauts did so. ", "Girl Cosmonaut Ridicules Praying of U.S. Woman Pilot", "The Space Review: You've come a long way, baby! She became a consultant to NASAs space program in 1961. While the seven original male astronauts averaged under 3,000 flight hours each, Cobb brought over 10,000 hours herself. She held four world records in speed, altitude, and distance. By now, Cobb wasnt the only woman taking the astronaut test, 19 women joined in total. Jerrie Cobb, Sign Up for Our Flight Plans Newsletter Subscribe, The Museum of Flight, 9404 E. Marginal Way South, Seattle, WA 98108-4097. [7] When Cobb became the first woman to fly in the Paris Air Show, the world's largest air exposition, her fellow airmen named her Pilot of the Year and awarded her the Amelia Earhart Gold Medal of Achievement. (Notably, the 1964 Civil Rights Act making sex discrimination illegal was still two years away.) Then came the male astronauts (including John Glenn, who had . "Promised the Moon: The untold story of the first women in the space race". [16] Liz Carpenter, the Executive Assistant to Vice President Lyndon Johnson, drafted a letter to NASA administrator James E. Webb questioning these requirements, but Johnson did not send the letter, instead writing across it: "Let's stop this now! There are also letters from and photographs with Cobb and her fianc Jack Ford from the 1950s. In total, 68 percent of the lady astronauts passed, where only 56 percent of the male trainees passed. Other tests examined their lung capacity and endurance. James Bond fans convinced THIS Game Of Thrones actor will become 007, Hardcore coronation fans already camped outside Buckingham Palace, One dead and seven injured in Cornwall nightclub knife attack, Coronation Street actress Barbara Young dies aged 92, Eurovision acts land in Liverpool ahead of Song Contest, Jeff Stelling leaving Sky Sports after 30 years with Soccer Saturday. But NASA still refused to fund the womens testing program, so Lovelace ran his tests on a private basis. In 1959, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) scientist Dr. William Randolph Lovelace selected Cobb, along with 24 other women who were trained pilots, to undergo the same physical and psychological tests that were used to choose the first seven Mercury astronauts. At the time, however, NASA requirements for entry into the astronaut program were that the applicant be a military test pilot, experienced at high-speed military test flying, and have an engineering background, enabling them to take over controls in the event it became necessary. They underwent fourdays of testing, doing the same physical and psychological tests as the original Mercury Seven had. When Amanda Quaid, who played Cobb, sent out an email blast about the production, it caught the eye of The Old Globes artistic director, Barry Edelstein. Geraldyn "Jerrie" Cobb fell in love with flying the first time she climbed into her father's 1936 Waco bi-wing airplane at the age of 12. They contacted President Kennedy and vice-president Johnson. Jerrie Cobb's father taught her to fly a biplane at age twelve and by age sixteen she was flying the Piper J-3 Cub, a popular light aircraft. Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe Institute, Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass. . At the time American Airlines had no female pilots. Her route that morning was a 1,242 mile (2,000 km) triangle with Reno, San Francisco, and San Diego. 2016 Oklahoma Hall of Fame Created with SpaceCraft, (corner of NW 13th Street & Shartel Avenue). From there, she went on to be a record-setting aviator and the first woman to pass qualifying exams for astronaut training in 1960, but wasn't allowed to fly in space because of her . 2000 Inducted into "Women in Aviation International Pioneer Hall of Fame". Episode four of the first season, "Prime Crew", is dedicated to her memory.[26]. At the time, Cobb had flown 64 types of propeller aircraft, but had made only one flight, in the back seat, of a jet fighter. By age twelve she had learned to fly in her father's plane, and at age sixteen while a student . Jerrie Cobb Passed Astronaut Tests but NASA Kept Her Out of Space. "I kept coming away with the fact that when women start talking about flying, they have this euphoric look," she says. 20 years before America's 1st woman astronaut, 13 women trained to go to space. Died: 18 March 2019 in Florida, United States, aged 88. "But I used direct quotes, and theyre shocking. "They Never Became Astronauts: The Story of the Mercury 13." Written as a dual biography, the book centers on female pilots Jackie Cochran and Jerrie Cobb who are vying to be the first female astronauts. This was in part because trainees had to be jet pilots and graduates of military pilot school, and women prior to the 1960s rarely met these requirements because the military had banned women from flying jets. Ten of the 12 were men, and all but one of those a war veteran. Women found freedom in flying; a way they could have total control. We seek, only, a place in our nations space future without discrimination, she told a special House subcommittee on the selection of astronauts. Also included are snapshots from her trips to the Amazon, including with tribal peoples and views from the airplane; other travel to foreign locales; with Jack Ford; as well as a few family photographs, including images of Cobb as a young child. The Bizzarre And Terribly Executed Kidnapping Of Frank Sinatra Jr. What Stephen Hawking Thinks Threatens Humankind The Most, 27 Raw Images Of When Punk Ruled New York, Join The All That's Interesting Weekly Dispatch. Greene, Nick. Cobb published two memoirs, Woman Into Space: The Jerrie Cobb Story with co-author Jane Rieker (1963) and Jerrie Cobb, Solo Pilot (1997). Copying. Tereshkova's launch and the Luce article renewed media attention to women in space. By the fall of 1961, a total of 25 women, ranging in age from 23 to 41, went to the Lovelace Clinic in Albuquerque, New Mexico. She was the first woman to pilot an aircraft around the . NASA didnt fly a woman in space Sally Ride until 1983. Cobb maintained that the geriatric space study should also include an older woman. Get the latest stories in your inbox every weekday. With your help, we can continue to preserve and safeguard the worlds most comprehensive collection of artifacts representing the great achievements of flight and space exploration. The Soviet Union ended up putting the first woman into space in 1963: Valentina Tereshkova. 2022 The Museum of Flight - All Rights Reserved. Jerrie Cobb, first woman to pass astronaut testing, dies | CBC News Loaded. You cant believe how they talked about Cobb in the press. The question of whether women could endure the physical rigors of spaceflight had been debated in popular culture for years, but Cobbs persistent lobbying inspired the House subcommittee hearings that investigated whether NASA was discriminating on the basis of sex. ThoughtCo. https://www.wsj.com/articles/jerrie-cobb-passed-astronaut-tests-but-nasa-kept-her-out-of-space-11557498600. The life of late pilot Jerrie Cobb - America's first-ever female astronaut candidate - was filled with ups and downs in a time in history where sexism kept her from reaching the stars . Daughter of William Harvey Cobb and Helena Butler (Stone) Cobb. Sleeping under the Cub's wing at night, she helped scrape together money for fuel to practice her flying by giving rides. None of the Mercury 13 ever reached space, despite Cobb's testimony in 1962 before a Congressional panel. Then, check out these behind-the-scenes photos from the moon landing. The piece introduced Jerrie Cobb to the nation as a prospective space pilot and praised her as someone who complained less than the Mercury men had. For reference, the Mercury men were the seven original American astronauts. They Never Became Astronauts: The Story of the Mercury 13. Ollstein hopes audiences will leave her play with a sense of how hard these women fought, and how many of their stories are lost. But when pilot Jerrie Cobb petitioned for the space agency to accept female astronaut trainees like her, she was shut down. . The Mercury 13 were thirteen American women who took part in a privately funded program run by William Randolph Lovelace II aiming to test and screen women for spaceflight.The participantsFirst Lady Astronaut Trainees (or FLATs) as Jerrie Cobb called themsuccessfully underwent the same physiological screening tests as had the astronauts selected by NASA on April 9, 1959, for Project Mercury. John Glenn, the first American to orbit Earth, testified in a 1962 Congressional hearing on allowing women in the space program that It is just a fact the men go off and fight the wars and fly the airplanes and come back and help design and build and test them. "You learn so much that when you put together the show, youre very specific about what each character brings to the table," Sardelli says. "I would give my life to fly in space, I really would," Cobb told The Associated Press at age 67 in 1998. And as. Jerrie Cobb, Rhea Hurrle, and Wally Funk went to Oklahoma City for an isolation tank test. As time passes, the Mercury 13 trainees are passing on, but their dream lives on in the women who live and work and space for NASA and space agencies in Russia, China, Japan, and Europe. "[15], Cobb lobbied, along with other Mercury 13 participants, including Jane Briggs Hart, to be allowed to train alongside the men. Cobb "pioneered new air routes across the hazardous Andes Mountains and Amazon rain forests, using self-drawn maps that guided her over uncharted territory larger than the United States". After public testimony by Cobb, Hart, and Cochran, as well as NASA representatives George Low and astronauts John Glenn and Scott Carpenter, the Subcommittee finished the hearings without taking any action. 1960, Life magazine published an article titled, A Lady Proves That Shes Fit for Space Flight.. The United States Naval School of Aviation Medicine agreed to test Jerrie Cobb for ten days in Pensacola, Florida. In an attempt to win over passengers, the airline invited Cobb to fly the aircraft on a highly publicized four-hour test. Aviator Jerrie Cobb was born in Norman, Oklahoma, on March 5, 1931, the daughter of Lieutenant Colonel William H. Cobb and Helene Butler Stone Cobb. [23][24], Laurel Ollstein's 2017 play They Promised Her the Moon (revised in 2019) tells the story of Jerrie Cobb and her struggle to become an astronaut. In the 1950s, female pilots were rare. They were: Expecting the next round of tests to be the first step in training which could conceivably allow them to become astronaut trainees, several of the women quit their jobs in order to be able to go. As a consequence, the U.S. didn't fly women in space until the 1980s, while the Russians flew their first female astronaut in 1962. Jerrie Cobb passed a series of tests meant for Navy pilots and astronauts. Jerrie Cobb made another push to revive the women's testing. Likewise, Ollstein finds the historical setting helps people get past the usual detachment of reading about national politics in the news. She should have gone to space, but turned her life into one of service with grace. Members of the FLATs, also known as the "Mercury 13," attend a shuttle launch in this photograph from 1995. Box 500 Station A Toronto, ON Canada, M5W 1E6. Although the group has been called the Mercury 13, a misleading and ahistorical moniker, Cobb called them her Fellow Lady Astronaut Trainees.. At her invitation, eight of the First Lady Astronaut Trainees attended her launch. Jerrie Cobb, who began ying when she was so small she had to sit on pillows to see out of the cockpit, dedicated her life to ying solo missions to the Amazon rain forest; Wally Funk, who talked her way into the Lovelace trials, went on to become one of the rst female FAA investigators; Janey Hart, mother of eight and, at age forty, the Tanya Lee Stone. [12], In 1962, Cobb was called to testify before a Congressional hearing, the Special Subcommittee on the Selection of Astronauts, about women astronauts. Ultimately, 13 of these women surpassed every requirement in the first round of testing (some with better scores than the more famous "Mercury Seven"). For context, it's worth noting that women had a long and distinguished history in aviation, which was the field from which aerospace sprung . She wrote to President Kennedy in protest, and Congress convened to investigate. In 1961, NASA Administrator James Webb appointed Cobb as a consultant to NASA's space program, but this role did not include space flight.
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