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After 60 years of persistence, Wally Funk becomes an astronaut
David Clark Scott
If you鈥檙e going to strap yourself into a 60-foot-tall rocket in West Texas, you鈥檇 probably want the experience, verve, and exuberance that Mary Wallace 鈥淲ally鈥� Funk brings.聽
On Tuesday morning, Ms. Funk joined Amazon鈥檚 Jeff Bezos; his brother, Mark; and Dutch teenager Oliver Daemen on their Blue Origin journey to the edge of space. In doing so, the 82-year-old pilot became the oldest person ever to fly above , the boundary of space. But that鈥檚 not really too surprising. Ms. Funk has had a lifetime of firsts:
But what probably put her on Mr. Bezos鈥� radar was her participation in . In 1961, as NASA prepared seven American male astronauts for the new frontier of space, a secret, privately funded group of female pilots underwent 鈥� and passed 鈥� the same NASA tests.聽
None of the 13 women were given the opportunity to touch the hem of space 鈥� until today. 鈥淭hey鈥檇 say, 鈥榃ally, you鈥檙e a girl, you can鈥檛 do that!鈥� Guess what? You can still do it if you want to do it. And ,鈥� said Ms. Funk recently.
And so she has, once again. 鈥淚 loved it!鈥� she exclaimed afterward.
