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It was the time of the Cold War and so there were was a lot of pressure on the - to get going and the Russians were claiming that they were - Soviets were claiming they were ahead of us in technology. And so it was against that backdrop that the early space flights took off.

John Glenn

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John Glenn
Age: 95 †
Born: 1921
Born: July 18
Died: 2016
Died: December 8
Aircraft Pilot
Astronaut
Businessperson
Former United States Senator
Military Officer
Politician
Screenwriter
Test Pilot
Cambridge
Ohio
John Herschel Glenn Jr.
Early
Soviets
Took
Flights
Cold
Backdrop
Technology
Claiming
Space
Russians
Flight
War
Ahead
Going
Pressure
Time

More quotes by John Glenn

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If we could do something that enhances the body's immune system here on Earth, it would be a tremendous step forward in the fight against disease and cancer and other things.
John Glenn
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To sit back and let fate play its hand out and never influence it is not the way man was meant to operate.
John Glenn
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The most important thing we can do is inspire young minds and to advance the kind of science, math and technology education that will help youngsters take us to the next phase of space travel.
John Glenn
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I don't know what you could say about a day in which you have seen four beautiful sunsets.
John Glenn
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There is still no cure for the common birthday.
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We had a lot of confidence that there was going to be a successful mission. We weren't off on some suicide effort, certainly [with Friendship 7].
John Glenn
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If there is one thing I’ve learned in my years on this planet, it’s that the happiest and most fulfilled people I’ve known are those who devoted themselves to something bigger and more profound than merely their own self interest.
John Glenn
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Just because I'm 77 doesn't mean I don't have a dream.
John Glenn
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This is a day we have managed to avoid for a quarter of a century. We've talked about it before and speculated about it, and it finally has occurred. We hoped we could push this day back forever.
John Glenn
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We're going to go to the moon. We're going to go on to Mars. We're going to set up a base on the moon. OK, but no money to pay for it, nothing in the budget for it. And so the decision made at that time was to cancel the whole shuttle program to save money, which I think was very, very short sighted.
John Glenn
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I think we're a long ways from really putting colonies of people out there who would live their whole lives out there in space. I don't see that happening for quite some time.
John Glenn
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I think that it's good for us to be able to travel in space and do research in space, and I emphasize the research, because space travel to me is far more than just seeing how far we can go.
John Glenn
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America put more money into research, into the new and the unknown than any nation in history, and the same thing with education, and those two things led us into a worldwide preeminence in a very short period of time.
John Glenn
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America is in a newly competitive position around the world, and unless we keep our lead in education for all of our people and do the research along with that, other nations will start outdoing us and they will be leaders in the world.
John Glenn
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When others kid me about being bald, I simply tell them that the way I figure it, the good Lord only gave men so many hormones, and if others want to waste theirs on growing hair, that's up to them.
John Glenn
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I am a stranger. I come in peace. Take me to your leader and there will be a massive reward for you in eternity.
John Glenn
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To get your name well enough known that you can run for a public office, some people do it by being great lawyers or philanthropists or business people or work their way up the political ladder. I happened to become known from a different route.
John Glenn
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I think no matter where we go in space to me the important thing is not only getting there and getting back, but it's also doing research, because that opens up as a possibility with that new distance of travel in space.
John Glenn
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That whole day [ of the space flight] is very vividly impressed on my memory because it was such a new experience. We hadn't done that before. And then I've recalled it so often since then I think that it's a - it's remained very vivid over the past 50 years, seems to me like about a week or two instead of 50 years.
John Glenn
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There had been a number of failures but we weren't going out to ride a failure. And we felt they'd corrected all the difficulties with the boosters before that time and the launch problems. And so we had a lot of confidence that there was going to be a successful mission. We weren't off on some suicide effort, certainly.
John Glenn