Chuck Hollinshead, former director of Public Affairs at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, died Jan. 25, 2021 in Asheville, North Carolina. He was 89. Hollinshead helped shape the course of media services at the Florida spaceport and throughout the agency over 28 years, 17 as director of Public Affairs.
In 1983, The Right Stuff movie premiered claiming to tell the story of test pilots and those who became America’s first astronauts. The film received acclaim from the majority of the critics who wrote reviews. But, as an accurate chronicle of efforts to pave the road to space, it failed. Astronaut Wally Schirra summed it up best: “The movie was fun. It was well-produced and the acting is great. But as history, it‘s merely ‘Animal House’ in space.’”
In 1976, America’s second-generation human space program came together with an iconic story line inspired by the nation’s first efforts to “boldly go where no one has gone before.” Key players in the popular televisions series, Star Trek, attended the rollout of NASA’s prototype Space Shuttle orbiter, Enterprise.
This is the second of a two-part series on the history of commercial flight. For years, aerospace corporations took the world to the skies. Now these companies and more are supporting efforts well beyond the Earth’s atmosphere. The Space Age began on Oct. 4, 1957, with the launch of the Sputnik satellite by the Soviet Union. An American satellite, Explorer 1, soon followed, with plans for sending humans into space in the near future.
On a brisk day just over a century ago, what started as a venture between two brothers changed the world forever. On Dec. 17, 1903, Orville and Wilbur Wright opened the realm of air travel with their first flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. In 10 short years, commercial aviation became a reality. Fast forward another 50 years and humans not only were flying in the air, but also in space.
The Vehicle Assembly Building, or VAB, is the most recognizable structure at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. It is so big, it can be seen from miles away. Now that the center is a premier, multi-user spaceport, industry partners soon will share the facility. It also is the only building in the world where human spaceflight rockets have been prepared for trips to low-Earth orbit, the Moon and — in the future – to Mars.
Employees at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center work in high-tech facilities alongside hundreds of wildlife species in the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge. The diverse, 144,000-acre landscape provides a habitat for hundreds of species of wildlife and plants. This feature includes photos of numerous types of animals that live at the Florida spaceport.
In Greek mythology, Artemis was the twin sister of Apollo. Artemis now is the name of NASA’s program to return astronauts to the Moon by 2024. In honor of Women’s History Month, musician Lindsey Stirling performed her composition, “Artemis,” on the roof of the Launch Control Center at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center.
On Feb. 15, 2020, a Northrop Grumman spacecraft was launched atop an Antares rocket from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. The Cygnus capsule, christened the “S.S. Robert H. Lawrence,” will deliver more than 7,400 pounds of cargo to the International Space Station. The name honors the first African American to be selected as an astronaut.
When a person is called a “rocket scientist,” it can be referring to someone who supports space exploration, or it can simply mean he or she is very intelligent. A “rock star” usually refers to a member of a successful musical band or someone highly renowned in a particular field. Dr. Brian May could be considered both.