NASA was well aware of the fact that the first group of astronauts, now down to six after Deke Slayton was sidelined, wouldn’t be enough for the ambitious plans being developed for Gemini and Apollo.
The New Nine were announced on September 17, 1962. Three of them, Armstrong, Lovell, and Conrad, had been among the test pilots considered for the first astronaut group.
Neil Armstrong
Born: August 5, 1930
Hometown: Wapakoneta, Ohio
Died: August 25, 2012
Service: Navy
Neil Armstrong studied aeronautical engineering at Purdue University. The Navy paid for his tuition, and Armstrong joined after he graduated. He flew the F9F Panther during the Korean War. After the war, he left the Navy and returned to Purdue to finish his studies. In 1955, he became a test pilot for NACA at Edwards Air Force Base in California. He flew the X-15 and was selected to participate in the Air Force Man in Space Soonest and Dyna-Soar spaceflight programs.
Being a civilian, he wasn’t eligible to become one of the first astronauts, because NASA was only accepting military test pilots at the time. But that restriction was dropped for the second astronaut class, and Armstrong was accepted.
Armstrong retired from NASA in 1971. He became a Professor of Aerospace Engineering at the University of Cincinnati, teaching there until 1980. He would go on to work at a number of companies and became a spokesman for Chrysler, among others. In 1986, President Ronald Reagan called on him to help the investigation of the Shuttle Challenger disaster. And he worked on a commission to recommend a plan for spaceflight in the 21st century. The result was a book titled Pioneering the Space Frontier, which among other things called for a permanent base on the Moon by 2006 and a mission to Mars in 2015.
When he died in 2012, the White House called him one of the “greatest of American heroes, just of his time, but of all time.”
Frank Borman
Born: March 14, 1928
Hometown: Gary, Indiana
Service: Air Force
Born in Indiana, Borman’s family moved to Tucson, Arizona because he suffered from a series of sinus problems. He learned to fly when he was just 15 and went on to attend the U.S. Military Academy at West Point before joining the Air Force. He earned a Masters in Aeronautical Engineering at Cal Tech in 1957 and started teaching at West Point. By 1960, he was flying as a test pilot at the Air Force Aerospace Research Pilot School until he was selected by NASA.
After his last flight for NASA in 1968, he retired.
The next year, he became a special advisor for Eastern Air Lines. He retired from the Air Force in 1970 and was promoted to Senior Vice President for the airline. He continued to rise in the company, becoming CEO in 1975 and Chairman of the Board in 1976. He held that position until 1986. He now lives on a cattle ranch in southern Montana.
Charles “Pete” Conrad
Born: June 2, 1930
Hometown: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Died: July 8, 1999
Service: Navy
Pete Conrad suffered from dyslexia and struggled as a student until he began attending the Darrow School in New York. He did so well there, he won a Navy ROTC scholarship and was admitted to Princeton University.
He first learned to fly as a teenager, and after he graduated from Princeton in 1953, he became a fighter pilot and a flight instructor. He graduated from the Naval Test Pilot School in 1958, along with Wally Schirra and Jim Lovell.
He was among the candidates in NASA’s first call for astronauts but frustrated by what he, and many other candidates, considered demeaning and unnecessary test, he walked out, leaving a full enema bag on the Lovelace Clinic’s desk.
When NASA began searching for the next candidates, Alan Shepard persuaded him to try again.
After he retired, he became vice president of the American Television and Communications Company, and then went on to serve as a senior leader at McDonnell Douglas.
Jim Lovell
Born: March 25, 1928
Hometown: Cleveland, Ohio
Service: Navy
Lovell had been fascinated by rockets and flying models as a child. After high school, he spent two years at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He then transferred to the Naval Academy, graduating in 1952. From 1954 to 1956, he flew for the Navy, and in 1958, he went to the Navy’s test pilot school along with Schirra and Conrad.
Lovell had been among the first group of astronaut candidates but washed out after a medical test that turned out to be inaccurate. He tried again in 1962 and was accepted as one of the New Nine.
Lovell retired from the Navy and NASA in 1973, going on to work for a variety of businesses, and eventually retiring in 1991 as an executive vice president at Centel. He would go on to be the co-author (with Jeffery Kluger) of Lost Moon: The Perilous Voyage of Apollo 13, which was the basis of the movie Apollo 13. He had a cameo appearance in the movie, playing the Captain of the aircraft carrier that was the recovery ship at the end of the Apollo 13 mission.
James McDivitt
Born: June 10, 1929
Hometown: Chicago, Illinois
Service: Air Force
McDivitt began his higher education and Jackson Junior College, Jackson, Michigan in 1947. Before graduating, he joined the Air Force, flying combat missions during the Korean War. He returned to his education in 1957, earning a degree in Aeronautical Engineering in 1959. He then went to Edwards Air Force Base, becoming a test pilot.
After his flight on Apollo 9, McDivitt became the Manager of the Apollo Spacecraft Program. He was offered the job of Shuttle Program Director but chose to retire from both the Air Force and NASA in 1972.
He went on to work Consumer Powers Company, Pullman and finally Rockwell International. He retired in 1995.
Elliot See
Born: July 23, 1927
Hometown: Dallas, Texas
Service: Navy Reserve
See attended the University of Texas until he was received an appointment from the United States Merchant Marine Academy. He graduated in 1949 and went to work for General Electric. He was called up for active service in the Navy between 1953 and 1956, before going back to work at GE where he became a test pilot. He and Neil Armstrong were the only civilian test pilots accepted to as members of the New Nine.
Unfortunately, See was killed before his first scheduled flight as Commander of Gemini 9.
Thomas Stafford
Born: September 17, 1930
Hometown: Weatherford, Oklahoma
Service: Air Force
Tom Stafford first became interested in flying at the start of World War II and made his first flight when he was 14. While he was in high school, he served in the Oklahoma National Guard. He was accepted at the U.S. Naval Academy. During his freshman year, he served aboard the battleship USS Missouri, where his roommate was John Young. After graduating in with honors in 1952, he joined the Air Force and became a pilot. In 1958, he finished first in his class at the Air Force Test Pilot School at Edwards Air Force Base. Three days before he was accepted as a member of the New Nine, he had just begun classes at Harvard Business School.
At the end of 1975, after his last mission with NASA, he became the commander of the Air Force Flight Test Center. He managed the development of the XST, which eventually became the F-117 Nighthawk stealth bomber. He retired from the Air Force in 1979.
He then served on the boards of several corporations. In 1990, he led a committee advising NASA on its future plans, which concluded that there should be a return to the Moon in 2004 and a Mars mission in 2012. He worked as an advisor for Space Station Freedom, which eventually evolved into the International Space Station.
His autobiography, We Have Capture: Tom Stafford and the Space Race, was published in 2002.
Ed White
Born: November 14, 1930
Hometown: San Antonio, Texas
Died: January 27, 1967
Service: Air Force
White’s father was an Air Force General, and White was accepted to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, where he earned his degree in 1952. He then joined the Air Force and became a fighter pilot in Europe. He began studying Aeronautical Engineering at the University of Michigan, earning a master’s degree in 1959. After that, he went to the Air Force Test Pilot School at Edwards Air Force Base.
John Young
Born: September 24, 1930
Hometown: San Francisco, California
Died: January 5, 2018
Service: Navy
Young was born in San Francisco, but his family moved when he was very young to Cartersville, Georgia and then Orlando Florida. After high school, he attended the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, graduating with honors in 1952. An ROTC cadet, he joined the Navy. He became a pilot in 1954, first flying helicopters and then fighters. In 1959, he graduated from the Navy Test Pilot School, and set records flying the F-4 Phantom II fighter. He would eventually retire from the Navy in 1976.
Young’s career with NASA was long. After his flight to the Moon with Apollo 16, he stayed with the agency, becoming the Chief of the Space Shuttle Branch of the Astronaut Office in 1973, and when Alan Shepard retired, he took his place as Chief of the Astronaut Office.
That work didn’t keep him out of space. He went on to fly two missions on the Space Shuttle Columbia, in 1981 and 1983. After the Challenger was destroyed, he became a Special Assistant to Johnson Spaceflight Center director Aaron Cohen. In 1996, he became the Associate Director (Technical) at Johnson.
Young finally retired from NASA in 2004 after forty-two years of service. He had flown every operational NASA spacecraft except the Mercury. Before his death in 2018, astronaut Scott Kelly wrote that Young was “an astronaut’s astronaut, a living legend. I wanted to be just like him.”
find it interesting how they seemed to change branches more than I was aware of...an AF/Spacebrat, i became aware of the fact that most of the 'tough' missions went to Navy pilots. I get it, for example, Butch Wilmore, currently on the ISS, on CFT Starliner, has made 653 carrier landings