Today’s prompt from Long and Short Reviews is an interesting fact the blogger knows. In keeping with this week’s Space Camp theme, I’m going to throw some astronaut trivia atcha!

And so, some astronaut fun facts from previous and current Space Camp reading:

• Wally Schirra is the only one of the Mercury originals to participate in the Mecury, Gemini, and Apollo programs. He left Apollo after some tension between the Apollo 7 crew and Houston led to all three of the Apollo 7 crew never flying again.
• Alan Shepard was the only one of the Mercury seven to walk on the moon. Despite being grounded before the Apollo program launched due to an inner-ear problem, an experimental surgery put him to rights again. Long the head of the Astronaut Office, Shepherd was able to participate in a lunar landing and (in his usual devil-may-care attitude) struck a golf ball from the surface of the Moon. He declared his first shot to be a slice. His fellow Mercury original, Deke Slayton, had also been grounded for medical reasons, but was able to participate in the Apollo-Soyuz mission with Russia.
• John Young was the longest-serving member of the astronaut corps, beginning in the Gemini program, participating in a lunar landing, and being promoted to head of the astronaut office after Shepherd retired, where he oversaw the shuttle program and flew its first flight himself. He retired after 42 years.
• The US Air Force was not content to leave space to a civilian ‘science’ program, and had begun their own, complete with eight chosen men. This program was eventually folded into NASA, and unfortunately only one of the ‘magnificent eight’ joined NASA properly. Had the others maintained their interest, their number would have included the first black astronaut, Robert H. Lawrence. Unfortunately, he was killed in a plane wreck in ’67. Three of NASA’s own had died in plane crashes: one because of a birdstrike and two because poor visibility led to the plane crashing into a building while attempting to land.