John Glenn Jr.
John Herschel Glenn Jr. was born on July 18, 1921 in Cambridge, Ohio. He was named after his father John Glenn Sr. John Glenn Sr. had fought in France during World War I, and his hearing had been impaired as a result of the fighting. After the war he started a plumbing business and managed to make a comfortable living for himself and his family. John's mother Clara Sproat Glenn wanted a large family, two of her children died while they were infants. After John was born, the family adopted a young girl named Jean. Clara told her children that each person is placed on Earth for a purpose. Her strong sense of work and duty influenced John throughout his life. John's family life was strict but he enjoyed a happy and carefree childhood. He played stickball and hockey. People could see that John was a natural leader. He was involved with boy scouts in his community but since they moved they did not have a troop because his town was too small. John started a group of his own called Ohio Rangers.John was always interested in airplanes. He read many aviation books and built small wooden models in his room. His childhood hero was Charles Lindbergh, who in 1927 became the first person to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean. Joh
Glenn's first Marine Corps assignment was to Cherry Point, North Carolina. He looked forward to future training in combat planes-fighters and bombers. There were many more pilots than there were planes. Glenn got very little flying time. From Cherry Point, he was transferred to Camp Kearney, California. He was assigned to fly transport planes. From there, he was moved to El Centro Air Station in California. There he trained in fighter planes. Glenn knew that he was as qualified as anybody in the group to make the first flight. He was an excellent pilot, but he was also an ambitious climber who knew how to ingratiate himself with his superiors to get what he wanted. Glenn's worries about the peer vote were justified. The vote, held just before Christmas, went to Alan Shepard. On January 19, 1961, NASA announced the lineup for the first Mercury flight to the astronauts. Alan Shepard would ride the capsule; John Glenn and Gus Grisson would serve as his backups. During the Korean War, Glenn had flown the fastest, most advanced fighter planes the United States had in its arsenal. Like many other military pilots, Glenn realized the best way to get ahead and continue flying was to become a test pilot. He applied for an assignment to the Patuxent River Naval Air Station in Maryland. Glenn was accepted, but the program demanded advanced math skills and a basic knowledge of calculus, which Glenn had not studied in his two years at Muskingum College. He managed to master the math and graduate from Pax River as a marine test pilot in August 1954. The job of test pilots was to "push the envelope" in other words, take risks. Shepard's flight, officially Mercury 3, was scheduled for May 2. Early that morning, he climbed into his pressure suit only to have the liftoff canceled due to bad weather. On the morning of May 5, 1961, workers moved the Redstone rocket and the Mercury capsule that Shepard had named Freedom 7 to the launch pad. Shepard climbed aboard to wait inside the capsule for four hours because a technical problem delayed the launch. Freedom 7 was launched and fifteen minutes after the launch, Shepard splashed down in the Atlantic Ocean, three hundred miles from the launch pad. After the flight of Friendship 7, Glenn and his family moved to Houston, Texas, where NASA had recently established the new Manned Spaceflight Center. As a ground controller, Glenn took part in the Mercury flights. But even while Glenn participated in the later Mercury flights, he had new careers and challenges on his mind. Glenn decided to run for the United States Senate. On January 17, three days before the Ohio Democratic convention, he announced his candidacy. On March 30, Glenn was not feeling well from his slip and fall accident that he dropped out of the race. Peggy Saari and Daniel Baker. Explorers and Discoverers Vol. Ch-He.
Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 3196
Approximate Pages = 13 (250 words per page double spaced)
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