Early Years

Although perhaps it started somewhat earlier, the decade of the 1960s produced a love affair between Americans and space exploration... and, particularly the astronauts that were involved in the space program. It undoubtedly started with the space race between America and the Soviet Union, and the launch of Sputnik by the U.S.S.R. in 1957. Then came the bold challenge by President John F. Kennedy before a joint session of Congress on May 25, 1961 - "I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to earth." And, then, on July 21, 1969 astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, flying on Apollo 11, set foot on the surface of the moon. And, as they say, "the rest is history." Indeed, 4-H got caught up in this whole astronaut and space era in a number of ways. But historically, space and flight show up in 4-H history long before the 1960s. Delegates to the 1931 National 4-H Club Congress in Chicago were inspired to get to meet a great national hero - the man who flew over both the North and South Poles - Rear Admiral Richard E. Byrd. One of the major guests attending the 1932 National 4-H Club Congress, handing out awards and honoring the winners, was the famous aviatrix Amelia Earhart. In 1933, Thomas E. Wilson brought a pair of aviators to National 4-H Congress who had become famous only the week before. Marine Major Chester Fordney and Navy LCDR T. G. "Tex" Settle made America's first stratospheric balloon ascension on November 20, 1933 in a balloon that had a gondola brightly inscribed "A Century of Progress", the theme of the 1933 World's Fair. The balloon reached a height of 61,237 feet, a record that stood for many years. It was the first successful trip by man into the upper atmosphere. The pair proved to be popular guests at the 1933 National 4-H Club Congress which took place just a few days after their well-publicized trip into "space".

Model Rocketry Becomes Popular 4-H Project

As the space craze swept America beginning during the 1960s, particularly among young people, it is not surprising that 4-H was involved.

A photo feature on page 55 of the December 1959 National 4-H News magazine for volunteer leaders illustrates this passion:

The Fall 1969 National 4-H Service Committee Comments newsletter reports on the National 4-H Electric Workshop in Minneapolis where representatives from over 30 states exchanged new ideas, methods and literature to update and modernize their local electric programs. One of the highlights of the day-long event was the presentation of David B. Miller, a 1968 national 4-H Electric winner from New York. Not only did he tell his audience how the electric program had helped him, he also challenged them to find better ideas and develop better techniques and more modern programs to interest todays youth. The Nassau County youth told the delegates that while the present 4-H Electric program is exactly what is needed to provide members with an excellent foundation of fundamentals in electricity, "it is inadequate in todays age of technological sophistication. The fundamental need is to reach young people, in the ghetto, inner city, suburb and on the farm with advanced projects which will capture the imagination of older members before they become junior high dropouts." A big part of how to capture this imagination of teenagers centers on space exploration and rocketry in a new era.

David B. Miller of Oceanside, New York, discusses space travel to Mars with C. V. Roseberry, regional vice president for Westinghouse Electric Corporation at the time he was designated a 1968 national Electric winner at National 4-H Congress in Chicago.

During the late 1960s a 4-H Aerospace Development Committee was formed with the purpose of developing the structure and content of a 4-H Aerospace Program.

The National Aerospace Development Committee included: Dr. Edward Frickey, State 4-H Leader, Youth, Purdue University, Indiana, committee chairman; Mrs. Georgia T. Roberson, associate extension specialist (4-H), Clemson University, South Carolina; William Shane, assistant state leader, University of Idaho; Stanley R. Meinen, assistant state leader, 4-H, University of Minnesota; Jesse James, state leader, 4-H, New Hampshire; Dr. Kemp L. Swiney, program leader, 4-H-Youth Development, Extension Service, USDA; Dr. Jerry Macklin, educational director, National 4-H Foundation; and T. W. Thompson, director of Program Services, National 4-H Service Committee.

At their first meeting in February 1970 at Purdue University, Dr. Swiney reported that 29 states had indicated some activity with aerospace projects in 1969. He also pointed out that there is a tremendous need for aviation education. In the next ten years personnel requirements include 39,000 air crew members, 225,000 airplane mechanics, 300,000 pilots, 137,000 stewardesses and 100,000 air traffic controllers.

The committee, at this first meeting, resolved to develop a broad program that offers many opportunities for projects. Immediate identifiable projects included those dealing with aircraft, aviation, and rocketry. Aviation B models, flight, aircraft, the airport and airspace; Rocketry B models, flight, the rocket, launching and outer space. Self-determined projects also would be encouraged.

Committee members were assigned to develop specific sub-topics of the projects.

As guidelines for the development of materials, committee members were encourage to keep members= materials experience-centered, provide for learning experiences and for flexibility. It was decided to aim first program materials at the 12-16 age group. Materials for other age groups would be developed later.

Additional information on this development committee or on resulting materials have not yet been located.

For a number of years, Estes Industries, Penrose, Colorado, as a 4-H partner, carried promotional display ads in the National 4-H News magazine. The ads promoted leaders= packets, model rockets, Porta-Pad launchers, Solar Launch Control Systems and related items for sale at discounted prices.

While 4-H Rocketry was a project offered through community clubs in many counties across the country, there also were a number of Model Rocket 4-H Clubs that were started with rocketry as their sole project area. A brief article in the February, 1979 issue of National 4-H News discusses the Sullivan County 4-H Model Rocketry Club in Lopez, Pennsylvania and how the members spent three days at the Pennsylvania Ag Progress Days launching rockets, giving demonstrations and talking about 4-H and their model rocketry club to hundreds of kids and parents attending the show.

The May 1980 National 4-H News carried a photo feature on model rocketry... including the front cover photo.

		The article, authored by Alan S. Fisher, a teen leader in the aerospace and photography projects in Audrain County, Missouri, describes how 27 Audrain County 4-H members were experiencing the thrill and excitement of constructing and launching their own model rockets through the county-wide aerospace project. Fisher says, "Model rocketry is a rapidly growing hobby and sport as well as a valuable educational tool emerging throughout the nation. Now 4-H has joined its ranks, integrating the satisfaction of model construction and craftsmanship into a project teaching the fundamentals of rocket design, solid propellant engine operation, aerodynamics and space science." He continues, "We planned our project first to demonstrate how an inexpensive hobby can be used as an amateur scientific tool, teaching the basics of aerodynamics. At the same time, the youngsters experience a sense of achievement as they watch their own handiwork soar into the sky and return to be recovered safely." While their first meeting covered the rudiments of model rocket design and safety procedures, the fun began at the second meeting when members sat down with rocketry catalogs from several companies and chose their model from the hundreds of designs available commercially. There were several meetings of a workshop nature as members built their rockets... and, then the launching day in a farm pasture brought smiles and success.
A live demonstration at the Audrain County 4-H Fair displayed bursts of applause from spectators signaling the thrill as rocket after rocket successfully lifted off the three launch pads. The kids demonstrated their skill at assembling and launching a working rocket for curious onlookers, parents and friends.

In the 4-H television series "Blue Sky Below My Feet",NASA and 4-H joined together to explore space technology and how it related to life on earth. The series, produced in 1985, consisted of three half-hour television programs featuring:

• NASA shuttle astronauts
• Impulse - the animated satellite
• Members of the Blue Sky 4-H Club
• Actual scenes of astronauts in space and training for space at the Johnson Space Center.

The television series was a joint effort between Arthur Young International; Extension Service, United States Department of Agriculture; State Extension Services of the Land Grant Universities; National 4-H Council; and National Aeronautics and Space Administration cooperating. Programs were produced by The Production Center at Arthur Young, Reston, Virginia in partnership with 4-H Youth and Home Economics & Human Nutrition, Extension Service, USDA. Educational and promotional materials were produced by staff at Arthur Young, National 4-H Council, Extension Service, USDA and the Cooperative Extension Service, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.

Some segments in the series involved astronauts who are 4-H alumni - Don Williams, Mack Lee, Bob Crippin and Ellison Onizuka - filming in Houston at the Johnson Space Center. Additional segments were filmed at the Philadelphia School of Textiles and Design and at Campbell Soup Company in Camden, New Jersey. 4-H members from Maryland selected through an audition process, participated in filming of additional segments.

In addition to the "Blue Sky Below My Feet 4-H television series, the popular 4-H TV series on nutrition - "Mulligan Stew" - also had a complete program dedicated to foods in the space age and where new kinds of food will be grown to feed the world's people. The Mulligan Stew gang in the program "Count Down 4-4-3-2" learns about food directly from the NASA food specialists and from astronauts at the NASA headquarters in Houston. The young TV viewers learn about new kinds of foods being grown, new kinds of packaging and about foods used on space flights.

Additional information on Mulligan Stew can be found in the same section of the 4-H history preservation website as the Blue Sky TV series referenced above.

Navy Cmdr Alan B. Shepherd, Jr. first spaceman in his historic flight over the Atlantic on May 6, 1961 was awarded the National 4-H Alumni Award in 1962. As a 4-H'er in New Hampshire, Shepard's major projects were gardening and poultry.

Captain James A. Lovell, former astronaut on Apollo 8 and 13 space flights, was the keynote speaker at the 1986 National 4-H Congress in Chicago.

Captain Lovell authored a 3-page photo feature in the February 1969 issue of National 4-H News entitled "Message from Apollo 8." He begins the article with: "By the time you read this, the flight of Apollo 8 should be history. Frank Borman, William Anders and I were scheduled to blast off from Cape Kennedy on December 21 to begin a 500,000-mile journey to the moon and back. The entire trip was to last a little more than six days, with Christmas Eve to be spent orbiting the moon. Fantastic? Perhaps, but it's a fact of the times in which we live. It's also only a preview of bigger and more exciting things to come...

As the President's Consultant on Physical Fitness and Sports, Lovell quickly moved the subject from space to health. He writes in the feature that America is making great strides in education and with efforts to eliminate various forms of discrimination... "all well and good, but what about the health and physical fitness of our citizens?... it is widely believed today that we have solved all except two or three of our major health problems and that physical exercise has ceased to be important. Both ideas have as much validity as the thought that there are no more worlds to explore..."

Astronaut Jerry Ross is a veteran of seven space shuttle missions, tied for the record holder for most spaceflights with Franklin Chang-Diaz. A native of Crown Point, Indiana, Ross was a 4-H'er while growing up. As a project to pay back 4-H for the good things it had done for him, Ross launched a project to take seeds from the state trees of the 50 states with him on an Atlantis mission in 1991.

State 4-H offices were encouraged to send in 10 seeds from their state trees. The seeds were refrigerated to prevent them from germinating. After the seeds returned from space they were sent to 4-H clubs in their home states to grow into seedlings and be planted on either Arbor Day or Earth Day of 1992. All but three states participated. During the mission, Ross participated in the first spacewalk by Americans in five years.

Lt. Col. Ellison S. Onizuka, NASA astronaut and Hawaii 4-H alumnus, was very active supporting and promoting 4-H at both the national level and in Hawaii during the mid-1980's.

Unfortunately with the great tragedy of the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster on January 28, 1986, 4-H lost a great friend. The Onizuka Fund for Excellence was established at the National 4-H Council to honor Ellison Onizuka and the crew of the Challenger. Hundreds of contributions for the named fund were received from 4-H members, families, 4-H staff members, leader councils, state 4-H foundations, individuals and corporate friends. During the opening assembly of the 1986 National 4-H Congress in Chicago, Mrs. Lorna Onizuka presented the 4-H flag her husband carried on the Space Shuttle Discovery mission in 1985 to 4-H, stating "The activities Ellison participated in and learned from in 4-H, the friendships he developed, were treasured throughout his life... please accept this flag on his behalf. I know that he's pleased to know that it's being returned to you."

The flag is currently on display at the National 4-H Youth Conference Center in Chevy Chase, Maryland.

Peggy Whitson, 4-H alum, was born in Mount Ayr, Iowa and grew up on a farm outside the nearby town of Beaconsfield. Receiving her doctorate degree in biochemistry from Rice University, Whitson became a biochemistry researcher, NASA astronaut and former NASA Chief Astronaut.

Her first space mission was in 2002, with an extended stay aboard the International Space Station as a member of Expedition 5. Whitson’s second mission launched October 10, 2007, with her as the first female commander of the ISS with Expedition 16. With her two long-duration stays aboard the ISS, Whitson is NASA’s most experienced female astronaut, with just over 376 days in space. She also has performed a total of six career spacewalks, adding up to 39 hours and 46 minutes.

With the Challenger disaster of January 1986, besides Ellison Oniuzuka, 4-H had another connection. The science project of 4-H'er John C. Vellinger was part of the payload aboard the ill-fated space craft. The science project, "Chicks in Space," was lost. However, the experiment went on to successfully re-fly on the space shuttle Discovery. When Discovery lifted off in March, 1989, carrying Vellinger's chick embryo experiment, Purdue University senior and Indiana 4-H alumnus got his second chance at finishing a project which he began when he was a ninth-grade 4-H member.

The experiment consisted of a special incubator designed to cradle the fertile chicken eggs during their journey. Vellinger said his experience in wiring and building circuits as a 4-H electric energy project member was valuable in his work designing and building the incubator. He reconstructed the experiment to carry chick embryos at two different stages of development with the weightlessness of space. Vellinger then studied chicks hatched from the returned embryos against a control group of earth-hatched chicks to explore the effects of zero gravity on the development of bone, muscle, and organ tissue in animal embryos. The experiment started the discussion of whether or not gravity is required for reproduction of some species, important for consideration of long-term space travel by human pioneers.

The idea for the space chicks project began to take shape when Vellinger was a student at Tecumseh Junior High School in Lafayette, Indiana. He entered a contest to propose an idea for a shuttle experiment. Not winning the first contest, Vellinger redesigned the project several times before succeeding in getting it selected on the third try.

In July, 2013, representatives from NASA Headquarters Office of Education made a special presentation to Lisa Lauxman, Director of Youth and 4-H at NIFA, USDA. A 4-H flag was launched into space aboard the Space Shuttle Endeavour on June 13, 2009, as part of the STS-127 mission. Lisa received the flag framed along with photographs and other mementos from the NASA mission. Mary Sladek, NASA Manager for Informal Education, said that the flight of the flag commemorated the long and continuing national collaboration between NASA and 4-H. That relationship currently includes joint efforts in the NASA Adopt a Pixel citizen science project and 4-H National Youth Science Day.

In addition to the 4-H flag at the U.S. 4-H Headquarters which flew on the Space Shuttle Endeavour, and the 4-H Onizuka flag at the National 4-H Youth Conference Center which flew to space on the Space Shuttle Discovery, there is an additional 4-H space flag at the National 4-H Center. At the time of the 1991 dedication of the Tennessee Dining Room in Kellogg Hall a set of flags were also presented - a Tennessee flag which had flown over the state capitol in Nashville donated by Governor Ned Ray McWherter and a 4-H flag which had traveled to outer space on the 1989 mission of the U.S. Space Shuttle Atlantis, carried by Astronaut Mary Cleave.

The current Administrator of NASA, Maj. Gen. Charles Bolden, Jr., was a 4-H'er while growing up in his native South Carolina. At NASA, Bolden has overseen the safe transition from 30 years of space shuttle missions to a new era of exploration focused on full utilization of the International Space Station and space and aeronautics technology development. He has personally traveled to orbit four times aboard the space shuttle between 1986 and 1994, commanding two of the missions and piloting two others. His flights included deployment of the Hubble Space Telescope and the first joint United States-Russian shuttle mission, which featured a cosmonaut as a member of his crew.

A 4-color rack card has been produced as a promotional aid for 4-H involvement in space exploration.

The rack card is availalbe for download as camera ready artwork in 3 different formats: EPS, PDF and TIF.

Printers Notes:
Both the 'Obverse' and 'Reverse' files are needed to produce the rack card. The images are in CMYK format at 300dpi and are Full Bleed.

EPS (Encapsulated Post Script)
Astronauts_Obverse.eps	5543 KB
Astronauts_Reverse.eps	5657 KB
PDF (Adobe Portable Document Format)
Astronauts_Obverse.pdf	5579 KB
Astronauts_Reverse.pdf	5288 KB
TIF (Tagged Image Format)
Astronauts_Obverse.tif	12087 KB
Astronauts_Reverse.tif	12087 KB