Table of contents Foreword Authors' preface Acknowledgements List of illustrations Prologue xiii xvii xxi xxiii xxvii INTO THE WIDE BLUE YONDER 1 Women in astronomy 1 Astronomy in the ancient world 1 The beginnings of modern astronomy 2 'It simply will not do' 3 Caroline Herschel 4 Maria Mitchell 5 The Harvard computers 6 British amateur astronomers 6 From astronomy to space 8 Pioneering women aviators 8 A sheep, a duck and a chicken 8 'She's actually been flying!' 9 Marie Blanchard 10 The first giant leaps 10 Higher, further, faster 11 Into the stratosphere 12 With wings and engines 12 The Wright stuff 13 Magnificent women in their flying machines 13 Women at war 15 The Great War in the air 15 Explorers of the sunht sky 17 Barnstormers and wing-walkers 17 The Roaring Twenties 18
viii Table of contents The first National Women's Air Derby 21 Trophies and races 21 Across the Atlantic and around the world 23 Aviation academics and attainments 23 Winged sisters of the Soviet Union 24 The road to the stratosphere 24 Ascent into history 25 Amy to Austraha 26 AmeHa across the Atlantic 28 A shrinking world and a new war 31 The Air Transport Auxiliary 32 Women's Air Service Pilots 34 Jackie Cochran 35 Soviet female combat pilots 37 Pancho Barnes and the Happy Bottom Riding Club 39 From Aglaonike to Pancho Barnes: pioneers of the skies 40 References 40 A SEAGULL IN ORBIT 43 A Soviet woman in space 43 A female cosmonaut 44 The first female selection 45 Training the cosmonauts 48 Planning for flight 50 A female pressure garment 50 Progress towards launch 51 Mission training 53 Who would fly? 53 The clock is counting 57 A new start: 16 June 1963 58 Seagull ascending 58 The flight programme 60 The seagull lands 62 A second spaceflight? 64 Voskhod 5 and a female EVA? 65 Following Valentina 66 References 67 THE RIGHT STUFF, THE WRONG SEX 69 The seven Mercury astronauts 69 Dee O'Hara: nurse to the astronauts 71 A 'girl astronaut' programme 73 Ruth Nichols and the WADC 'astronaut tests' 75 Betty Skelton and the 'astronaut tests' for LOO^ magazine 76 Jerrie Cobb and the Lovelace 'astronaut tests' 80
Table of contents ix The Lovelace class of 1961 83 The House of Representatives 87 I never said I was an astronaut! 90 Women and the Gemini, Apollo and Skylab programmes 92 Behind the scenes 97 Small steps for women 97 The primary back-up crew: the astronaut family 105 The 'astronauts' wives club' 106 'Extremely pleased, honoured and proud' 107 With admiration and love 108 Hiding the anxiety 108 References 110 THE ROCKET-PLANE AND THE SPACE SHUTTLE 113 A new type of aeroplane 113 Dr Eugen Sanger and his Silbervogel 114 Dr Irene Bredt and the Racketenbomber 115 Ainring and the Sanger-Bredt report 117 The Sanger-Bredt antipodal rocket bomber 118 PapercHp, marriage and attempted kidnap 119 Wings, rockets and wallpaper girls 119 The bat 120 Hanna Reitsch: German test-pilot 121 Mach 1 and beyond 126 Men were engineers; women were computers 128 Brassieres, capstans and rocket-plane pilots 131 Alice King Chatham: the enigma 134 David Clark Company and the two Jacquelines 136 Margaret McGrew and the Mach 2.8 missile 137 Evolution of the Space Shuttle 138 FHghts to the edge of space 139 Rose Lunn and the X-15 139 Women at NASA FRC and the X-15 140 Women at NASA FRC and wingless flight 144 Enter Enterprise 145 US clearance for females on Space Shuttle flights 147 Nichelle Nichols and NASA's minority astronauts 151 Spacelab 156 Supporting the Shuttle 161 Suiting up for the Shuttle 161 Director of Johnson Space Center 163 References 164 SHUTTLENAUTS 167 Selecting for the Shuttle 168
X Table of contents The first Shuttle selection process 169 Twenty-nine new guys and six new girls 172 Follow-on selections, 1980-90 174 New roles for new astronauts 177 Seats to spare? 180 Ascan training 182 The first Ascans 183 Training to survive 184 Technical training 186 Technical assignments 187 Pilot-pool training 189 Shuttle crew training 192 Astronaut Office branch office assignments 193 First female crew-members on the Shuttle 194 References 194 SALLY AND SVETLANA 197 Blazing a new trail 198 The first assignments 198 The Soviet response 199 A varied selection 200 Svetlana, Soyuz and Salyut 203 Soyuz T-7: a mission to Salyut 204 Experiments to perform 204 No special privileges 205 After the flight 207 Ride, Sally, ride 208 Sitting next to Sally 208 Preparing to fly 209 'Definitely an E ticket' 211 Sally Ride: from sport to space 211 'Isn't science wonderful?' 212 Back in training 215 Following Sally 215 Female shuttlenauts 215 A voyage of discovery 216 'Hi Dad' 216 A well-behaved solar array 217 Ice-busters 218 'Don't fall in love with your mission' 218 Kathy, Anna, Rhea and Shannon 219 First American EVA 219 Kathy Sullivan 220 STS 41-G and the first US female EVA 220 Two up and two down 221
Table of contents xi Anna Fisher 222 Satellites for sale 223 An exhausting exercise 223 Orbital surgery 224 Rhea Seddon 224 Girl Scout camp 225 A most successful international mission 226 Shannon Lucid 226 Into orbit... by a nose 227 Mission accomphshed 227 References 228 SHUTTLE SPECIALISTS AND PASSENGERS 231 From the planet Earth 231 A laboratory for space 232 Manned spaceflight engineers 234 International Shuttle candidates 238 Spaceflight participants 239 New NASA selections 242 Triumph to tragedy 244 A 'full-up' mission 245 Cleave's comet 246 A helping hand 247 McAuHffe's ultimate field trip 248 'The vehicle has exploded' 249 After Challenger 250 Return-to-Flight 251 Launch after launch 253 Probes and observatories 254 The Shuttle-Mir years 273 An all-female Shuttle crew 285 An all-female Salyut visiting mission 285 Considering an all-female Shuttle mission 287 The Shuttle-ISS years 290 The end of an era 290 Return to flight 297 References 301 STATIONS IN SPACE 305 Savitskaya spacewalks 305 Soyuz T-8 306 Soyuz T-12 308 The first female steps into space 308 The 1980 selection disbanded 310 Commercial customers 311
xii Table of contents Journalist cosmonauts 311 An actor's life 313 'Astronaut wanted - no experience necessary' 314 New Russian female cosmonauts, 1989-2004 316 Women on Mir, 1991-98 317 The first female on Mir 317 A Russian female long-duration mission - at last 318 Back-up to Norm 320 Two Yuris and a Shannon 323 Entente cordiale 326 'Too short' Lawrence 328 A new station, a new era, 1988-2004 329 Science with the second crew 329 Seats on Soyuz 331 Andromede 332 The first ISS Science Officer 334 The future of ISS operations 336 Female space-station yuhangyuans? 336 References 337 EARTH ORBIT AND BEYOND 339 And so to Mars 339 An all-woman Mars crew? 339 The Extended Duration Orbiter Medical Project 340 Bed rest experiments continue 340 International cooperation - or confrontation? 341 Family or space? 341 The ISS and women's health 342 From outer space to inner space: combating cancer 343 From outer space to inner space: osteoporosis 351 From outer space to inner space: ageing 354 To boldly go 356 The journey continues 362 References 363 CONCLUSION 367 Appendix 1 Spaceflight chronology, 1963-2003 371 Appendix 2 Careers and experience 379 Appendix 3 Spaceflight records and EVAs 383 Appendix 4 NASA Shuttle missions with female crew-members, 1983-2004.. 387 Glossary 393 Bibliography 397 Index 401