We used to joke about canned men, putting people in a can and seeing how far you can send them and bring them back. That's not the purpose of this program... Space is a laboratory, and we go into it to work and learn the new.

John Glenn

Categorized in : People Men Space

America had an emphasis on the individual and so education became... by John Glenn

America had an emphasis on the individual and so education became available for everyone.

emphasis individual america

America is in a newly competitive position around the world, and unless we keep our lead in education for all of our people and do the research along with that, other nations will start outdoing us and they will be leaders in the world.

leader america people

I think a mentor gets a lot of satisfaction in a couple of ways. They're doing something constructive, so they feel good about that. And when they see the results of this, with the young people they're working with, it's very, very rewarding.

couple people thinking

I was sold on flying as soon as I had a taste for it. by John Glenn

I was sold on flying as soon as I had a taste for it.

aviation flying taste

The moment of twilight is simply beautiful. by John Glenn

The moment of twilight is simply beautiful.

moments twilight beautiful

We (the DOE) are poisoning our people in the name of national sec... by John Glenn

We (the DOE) are poisoning our people in the name of national security.

names doe people

We're going to go to the moon. We're going to go on to Mars. We're going to set up a base on the moon. OK, but no money to pay for it, nothing in the budget for it. And so the decision made at that time was to cancel the whole shuttle program to save money, which I think was very, very short sighted.

moon decision thinking

That was a real fireball. by John Glenn

That was a real fireball.

star-gazing moon real

I think no matter where we go in space to me the important thing is not only getting there and getting back, but it's also doing research, because that opens up as a possibility with that new distance of travel in space.

distance space thinking

Liftoff is very, very gentle, contrary to what most people think. Because you remember, the weight of the booster - the amount of thrust on the engine is just barely enough to get the booster underway. And so it's a very gentle liftoff, contrary to what most people think when they see all the fire and smoke of launch.

fire people thinking

We had an airplane, a Beechcraft Baron, that we - I had since 1981. And Annie [Glenn] and I both of had to have knee replacements unfortunately over the past year, and it made it more difficult to climb up on the airplane. We weren't using it that much so we did - it hurt a lot but I finally sold the airplane.

airplane hurt past

I still love to fly and I'll never get over that. by John Glenn

I still love to fly and I'll never get over that.

get-over stills

Americans just want us to... not be concerned if they can be constitutionally justified... Why, if we had to do that we could not pass most of the laws we enact around here.

law want america

Most of our competitor nations around the world have a national education system and America is the only major nation in the world that operates off of local school boards. They receive very little direction from state boards of education or from the nation. So local school boards direct basically what happens and too often they're not willing to track or to do the supervision of the education system that will make it world competitive.

track america school

We had a lot of confidence that there was going to be a successful mission. We weren't off on some suicide effort, certainly [with Friendship 7].

effort successful suicide

I hate to think that we may be out there seven to ten years out and dependent on the Russians for our journey into space.

hate journey thinking

Because now, you know, it's going to be a number of years yet before we have our own new boosters and new spacecraft to go to our own International Space Station and proceed with all the research that we spent $100 billion putting up there to give us that research capability for the future for people right here on Earth.

space numbers years

I think in America we have to get back to being the best educated general citizenry in the world and make sure we do not lose our lead in research, if we're to have a leadership position in the world.

research america thinking

If we could do something that enhances the body's immune system here on Earth, it would be a tremendous step forward in the fight against disease and cancer and other things.

cancer fighting steps

On K-12 education America has gone down, down, down compared to the other nations. It doesn't mean that we have gotten dumber. It just means that we have not advanced as fast in those areas as other nations have done, and we're way down right now.

gone mean america