posted 06-12-2023 06:03 PM               

Space Cover 705: Firsts by American Women Astronauts

The first woman in space was Russian cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova in 1963 on Vostok 6. Then in 1983, Sally Ride became the first American woman in space on STS-7 (Forty years ago this week). Then the Soviet Union beat America again in space with the first woman, Svetlana Savitskaya, to perform an EVA (Extra Vehicular Activity) in 1982. Then in 1984, Kathy Sullivan, on STS-41G, became the first American woman to perform an EVA.

Eileen Collins finally achieved a space first by an American woman by being the first woman to serve as Pilot on a spaceflight on STS-63. Then on STS-93, she became the first woman commander of a spaceflight.

American Peggy Whitson, with 675 days, has the most total time spent in space of any space traveler, male or female. Not actually a first, but she is in first place with the most total time in space.

The two covers above mark Sally Ride's STS-7 Shuttle flight, with the top cover signed by her and the other cover autographed by the entire STS-7 crew and canceled for launch and landing.

Kathy Sullivan became the first American woman to perform an EVA on Shuttle flight 14, STS-41G. She nicely signed the top cover and the bottom cover is autographed by the STS-41G crew.

Eileen Collins autographed the top cover for her first Shuttle flight, STS-63, where she became the first woman to serve as Pilot on a spaceflight. The second cover is autographed by the STS-114 crew, it being the second Shuttle flight that Collins served as Commander. STS-114 was the first Shuttle flight after the loss of STS-107/Columbia and helped return the Shuttle program back to regular flights.

Peggy Whitson signed the top cover in person for me in the Apollo-Saturn V Center just before the STS-87 launch and is canceled in 2002 for her first Shuttle flight, STS-111. This second cover is a Russian cover flown on the ISS and signed there by Whitson and all the other STS-111 crew, including the ISS Expedition 4 and 5 crews.

posted 06-16-2023 03:06 PM               

The below display panel shows all six of the newly selected women astronauts on a SV/Rank cover signed by all six: Sally Ride, Judith Resnik, Shannon Lucid, Kathryn Sullivan, M. Rhea Seddon, and Anna Fisher. Both the depicted cover, photo, and fully signed NASA letterhead, of which I think Bob had featured on an earlier SCOTW-posted topic, were signed quite early on when first selected by the Space Agency to fly on the shuttle.

In addition to physicist Sally Ride becoming the first U.S. woman astronaut to fly in space, she was also the first U.S. female to fly in space twice.

Judy Resnik, the first Jewish astronaut, was a pioneer for women entering the space program. Unfortunately, Resnik, an electrical, software, and biomedical engineer became the first full-time woman astronaut to lose her life during a spaceflight launch mission along with six other crew members.

Oceanographer Kathryn Sullivan became the first American female astronaut to perform an EVA (spacewalk) in space and served as the first shuttle payload commander for another flight. As a non-space event, she was the first woman to dive to the Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench, the deepest part of the Earth's oceans.

Emergency physician and chemist Anna Fisher was the first mom in history to fly in space. It was her only space trip on Shuttle Mission 51-A in 1984.

Three-time shuttle veteran, surgeon Rhea Seddon, became one of the first female astronauts to serve as a shuttle payload commander and the first American astronaut couple, having married fellow astronaut Robert "Hoot" Gibson in 1981.

The most accomplished woman astronaut in the world will have to be biochemist Shannon Lucid. She had become the first U.S. female to live and work on a space station. Lucid held the record for most time in space from 1996-2007 by a woman and the longest duration spaceflight by any U.S. astronaut from 1996-2002. In addition, Lucid had been the first woman space flier to receive the Congressional Space Medal of Honor.

For Tom, above is a quick montage of signed Eileen Collins covers, one quite early in her NASA career, along with three hand-signed in-person glossy photos of her in training. Also included are a couple of crew signed covers from her first two shuttle flights. I do have more signed STS-63/93 single and crew signed covers that I'll try to post soon.

posted 06-19-2023 01:32 PM               

This first series of covers are for the first US female astronauts that flew from 1983 to 1990. That would be 13 shuttle orbital missions with 10 different women shuttle mission specialist astronauts; Sally Ride, Judy Resnik, Kathy Sullivan, Anna Fisher, Rhea Seddon, Shannon Lucid, Bonnie Dunbar, Mary Cleave, Ellen Baker, and Marsha Ivins. At the moment, only one mission (STS-33) is missing with Kathy Thornton that will be added later on.

Not included in this series is Shuttle 51-L/ Challenger with Christa McAuliffe as the the first Teacher-in-Space participate. But Challenger and her crew of seven, which included Resnik, did not achieve orbital spaceflight, also, I do not know of any fully crew signed emblem or insignia covers that had been signed before the tragic launch occurred. A big thanks to Bob Mcleod for providing some of the depicted emblem covers from way back.