| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| nndairy |
Posted - Apr 19 2026 : 11:53:04 AM
For the intermediate level of the Her-Story badge I read the book Sally Ride; America's First Woman in Space by Lynn Sherr. The first thing I learned is that I had her confused with Christa McAuliffe. Christa was the teacher on board the challenger shuttle that exploded at takeoff, not Sally Ride! Sally was the first female from the United States to orbit Earth. She was chosen among 6 females astronauts in her class at NASA for the honor. It was not Sally's goal to become an astronaut. She was quoted by friends saying that she wanted to be famous, but for being an astrophysicist-tennis player or winning the Nobel Prize, not an astronaut. Sally loved research and earned her PhD from Stanford. One day on before class she picked up a copy of the school newspaper that read "NASA to Recruit Women." Once accepted to NASA she understood the importance of being a female astronaut and worked incredibly hard to be the best that she could be. She helped develop (and became an exceptional operator of) a robotic arm that would retrieve and repair satellites in space. Sally was a very private person and chose not to use her fame for monetary gain. She instead used it to help interest youngsters, especially females, in science. She held camps at college universities for middle school students and teachers. She wrote children's books that "made science cool" and fun. She also cared greatly for Earth and was against putting weapons in space but greatly supported using satellites for research. She used her experience as an astronaut investigating the challenger disaster. She also wrote a report known as the Ride Report (but officially titled "NASA Leadership and America's Future in Space"). It was a strategic planning effort to shape the future of NASA and it ruffled a lot of feathers because she prioritized Earth over traveling to Mars. Sally died of pancreatic cancer at the age of 61 and many never even knew she was sick.
~Heather
“I would rather be on my farm than be emperor of the world.” — George Washington
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