THE MERCURY 13

Five decades ago, women were considered too weak, tooemotional, too, well, womanly, to participate inAmerica’s astronaut program. And, of course, theysimply weren’t qualified.

In June 1957, Geraldyn (Jerrie) Cobb’s goal was set to the breakthe world altitude record forlightweight aircraft of 27,000 feet.She was hoping for 30,000.

She knew that at several miles up breathing becamedifficult, vision was impaired, and a pilotcould slip into unconsciousness. She alsoknew that – as absurd as it seemed – shehad to worry about her appearance as well.Unspoken social customs for women pilotsdictated that she wear a dress and highheels under her protective clothing. Sodressed, she flew to 37,010 feet.

Dr. W. Randolph Lovelace II,chairman of NASA’s Life SciencesCommittee, and Brigadier GeneralDonald Flickinger of the Air Forcehelped design the medical testingprocedures for the astronaut

candidates. Lovelace and Flickinger were interested intesting women for potential spaceflight.

After a chance meeting with Dr. Lovelaceand General Flickinger just months afterthe press conference introducing theMercury 7 astronauts, Jerrie Cobb becametheir test subject. When the press learnedabout Cobb’s tests they dubbed her “America’s firstwoman astronaut.”

Flickinger approached NASA with the ideaof testing women for their viability asastronauts. NASA was not interested. Thespace agency believed women werephysically incapable of handling thedemands of space. Flickinger and Lovelace,decided to test a woman as part of theirown independent experiment. If theirresults proved that a woman scored well on the sametests that the Project Mercury astronauts underwent,Flickinger would again approach NASA with the data.

In February 1960, Jerrie Cobb beganastronaut tests. For six days Cobbbattled tilt tables, electrical stimulationto the nerves, three feet of rubber hoseslithered down her throat, exhausting

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physical endurance exercises, frozen ears, frozen hands,frozen feet, brainwave measurements, radiation counts,and the nightly dose of humility – barium enemas. In all,doctors scheduled a total of seventy-five tests to measurethe range of her body’s capability.

Dr. Lovelace compared her scores with the ProjectMercury astronauts, and initial indicators suggested thatshe had done very well. But he knew that NASA wouldview Jerrie Cobb’s exceptional test scores as a fluke andnot representative of women pilots in general. He begancompiling a secret list of women pilots who had rackedup more than a 1,000 hours in the air, not an easy task inthe 1960s, since women were not allowed to fly for themilitary and were not being hired by airlines. Heeventually selected 12.

Jerri Sloan’s flying credentials: 1,200 flyinghours, commercial pilot’s license, multi-engine rating, air-race honors, andexperience flying B-25s.

Jan Dietrich and Marion Dietrich wereidentical twins. Jan became a flightinstructor and corporate pilot, logging aphenomenal 8,000 hours flying time.Marion flew charters and ferried aircraftfor various clients, piling up 1,500 hours.

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Wally Funk got her first job at Fort Sill,Oklahoma, in 1959, at age 20, as a CivilianFlight Instructor of noncommissioned andcommissioned officers of the United StatesArmy. Still flying today, she has logged almost 20,000hours – over 2 years in the air.

Gene Nora (pronounced Janora) Stumbough was an air race competitor.In 1962, after NASA refused to considerthe “girl astronauts” she captured whatat the time was (to her) the best possiblejob in aviation for a female. She flew as a salesdemonstration pilot for the Beechcraft factory inWichita, Kansas. Initially she flew as one of the ThreeMusketeers, an introductory formation flight through thecontiguous 48 States. Only the Navy’s Blue Angels(1946) and France’s Patrouille de France (1931) areolder formation flying units.

Janey Hart’s husband Philip Hart hadbeen elected U.S. senator from Michigan.She earned her first pilot’s license duringWorld War II, and later became the firstlicensed female helicopter pilot inMichigan. Even though she was 40 yearsold, the oldest woman to be invited for astronaut testing,Hart made the cut. Bea Steadman earned her private

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pilot’s license at 17 and her commercial rating at 21, andeventually earned the highest FAA license, the AirlineTransport Pilot license.

Rhea Hurrle was a competitive air racerand charter pilot with more than 2,000flying hours.

Sarah Gorelick had B.S. in Mathematics,with minors in Physics and Chemistry. Sheheld a Commercial Pilots license, withAirplane Single and Multi Engine Landratings, Single Engine Sea, Instrument, Rotorand Glider ratings.

Myrtle Cagle, known as “K” had 4,300hours of flying time – more than some ofthe Mercury 7. She held a CommercialPilots license, with Airplane Single andMulti Engine Land ratings, an Instrumentrating and was a Certified FlightInstructor, Certified Flight InstrumentInstructor and Certified Ground Instructor.

Irene Leverton tried to join theWASPs (Women’s Air Force ServicePilots) at age 17 using fake id. When

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she was tested, she had built up 9,000 hours, more thanany of the Mercury 7.

Jean Hixson, carefully listed all herqualifications, including her WASPexperience, 4,000-plus flying hours,high-altitude flying, explosivedecompression experience, low-pressure chamber indoctrination,graduate degree in education, specialization in scienceand mathematics from the University of Akron, and herstudy of Russian as a foreign language. Hixsonemphasized the value of a teacher in space in capturingthe imagination of the nation’s schoolchildren – 25 yearsbefore Christa McAuliffe died in the Challengerexplosion.

By the end of August, 1961, Randy Lovelace couldconfirm that 13 American women – the Mercury 13 –had passed the same tests as the Project Mercuryastronauts.

Jerrie Cobb next took part in an experimentmore psychologically challenging than anytest the Mercury 7 encountered. The men’sisolation test confined the astronauts to asilent, dark room for two or three hours.John Glenn’s experience was typical. By

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feeling his way around the darkened chamber, Glennlocated a desk and then discovered a writing tablet left inthe desk drawer. With a pencil that he had tucked intohis shirt pocket, Glenn scribbled eighteen pages, tracingone line to the next by sliding his finger along the paper.By contrast, Cobb faced the sensory isolation tank.

Jerrie Cobb’s run in the tank shattered every previousrecord. Six hours in the water was thought to be theabsolute limit of tolerance. Cobb remained in sensoryisolation for nine hours and forty minutes, her runfinally terminated by an observer.

Rhea Hurrle spent 10 hours inthe tank before her run wasstopped by a testing observer.Wally Funk remained in the tankuntil observers asked her to comeout. In the report to Dr. Lovelace,Shurley wrote that Funk “gave no evidence of anyapproach to limits to her tolerance. Funk’s total time insensory isolation was ten hours and thirtyminutes.

Jerrie Cobb passed all the tests the ProjectMercury astronauts had taken, scoring aswell as they had.

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Lovelace wrote to each of the Mercury 13 announcingthat they would undergo the same tests on September18.

On September 12, telegrams arrived attheir houses. Randy Lovelace hadreceived word from the Navy thatNASA had no interest in the tests goingforward. NASA determined thatsending an American woman into spacewas not a priority. The official statement was, “NASAdoes not at this time have a requirement for such aprogram.”

Janey Hart dialed Liz Carpenter in VicePresident Lyndon Johnson’s office. Theyhad operated in the same nationalDemocratic circles for years and shared arespect and fondness for Lady BirdJohnson. Carpenter arranged an interviewfor Hart and Jerrie Cobb. She urged theVice President to give the women some encouragementand drafted a letter to NASA’s James Webb forJohnson’s signature. Her recommendations to Johnsonwere clear: hear the women’s petition, show them theletter to James Webb, and offer them some support.

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Johnson listened and said as much as he would like tohelp the cause of women astronauts, but the questionjust was not up to him to address.

Cobb and Hart never saw the letter toJames Webb that Liz Carpenter haddrafted. Johnson decided not to show it tothem because he had no intention ofsigning it. After the women left, Johnsonscribbled forcefully across the bottom ofthe page: “Lets Stop This Now!”

The House Committee on Science and Astronauticsagreed to three days of hearings investigate allegedgovernment discrimination against women in thenation’s space program.

Only Cobb and Janey Hart would speak forthe Mercury 13. For NASA, the witnesseswere George Low, director of spacecraftand flight missions in the Office ofManned Space Flight, and astronaut JohnGlenn.

On July 17, 1962, Jerrie Cobb told the committee, “Weseek only a place in our Nation’s space future withoutdiscrimination. We ask as citizens of this Nation to beallowed to participate with seriousness and sincerity in

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the making of history now ... We offer you thirteenwomen pilot volunteers.”

John Glenn was asked, Would yousupport a program to train womenastronauts? “I wouldn’t oppose it,”Glenn replied, but then he added, “Isee no requirement for it.”

In October, 1962, the House Committee on Science andAstronautics concluded that “some time in the futureconsideration should be given to inaugurating a programof research to determine the advantages to be gained byutilizing women as astronauts.”

As far as NASA was concerned, the case of women inspace was closed.

NASA had more questions to answeron June 16, 1963, when Sovietcosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova.Tereshkova was a textile worker andan amateur parachutist. She was nota pilot. “I’ve fought the battle solong, I can’t help feeling a little regret,” Jerrie Cobb said.“I know ... we could have done it. I’m glad a womanmade it. But I’m sorry she’s not an American.”

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Hoping that James Webb at least might be chagrined tosee another space record go to the Russians, Cobbformally applied to the NASA astronaut trainingprogram a few weeks later. NASA rejected herapplication outright, stating that it had come in after thedeadline and would not be considered.

In 1978, NASA selected thirty-five newastronauts from a pool of 8,079 applicants.They included NASA’s first African-American, Asian-American, and six womenastronauts. The women, all missionspecialists, were selected for their scientificexpertise and were not pilots orcommanders who would actually fly theshuttle. Selected as NASA’s first womenastronauts were Anna Fisher, ShannonLucid, Judith Resnik, Sally Ride, MargaretSeddon, and Kathryn Sullivan. But SallyRide was the one who would make spacehistory. When she lifted off the launch pad on June 18,1983, and became the first American woman in space.

In 1998, President Bill Clinton announcedthat NASA had selected Eileen Collins tobecome the first woman to command theshuttle. A 42-year-old Air Force lieutenant

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colonel, Collins slid into the left seat for her history-making flight in July 1999.

On the ground at Cape Canaveral, watching the liftoff ofthe space shuttle Columbia, were Jerrie Cobb, JaneyHart, Wally Funk, Jerri Sloan Truhill, Sarah GorelickRatley, Irene Leverton, B Steadman,and Rhea Hurrle Woltman. Collinshad invited the surviving Mercury 13women to be her personal guests atblastoff. She wanted them to share inthe celebration because shegenuinely believed the day alsobelonged to them. Without the Mercury 13, shedeclared, the country would not be celebrating womenastronauts and the first female shuttle commander.

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