On this date 20 February1962, Astronaut John Herschel Glenn, Jr. became the first American to orbit the Earth in the "Friendship 7" spacecraft. Two Soviet cosmonauts had previously orbited the earth in Vostok spacecraft. The first human in space, Yuri Gagarin made one orbit in the
Vostok 1 and Gherman Titov made 17 orbits in the
Vostok 2.
Glenn was the third American to be launched into space as part of NASA's Project Mercury - flights by Alan Shepherd (Freedom 7) and Virgil "Gus" Grissom (Liberty Bell 7) each lasted approximately 15 minutes.
When John Glenn safely landed he instantly became a national hero. His flight was commemorated by dozens (probably hundreds) of different souvenir items. Here are five objects from my wife's collection of space memorabilia.
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| America's First Man In Orbit 33 1/3 RPM album cover (front) |
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| America's First Man In Orbit 33 1/3 RPM album cover (back) |
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| America's First Man In Orbit 33 1/3 RPM album cover and album |
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| A commemorative plate reads John H. Glenn Jr - Feb 20, 1962 - First American to Orbit the World |
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| A small button reading "1st American Astronaut in Orbit - John H. Glenn, JR" |
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| "Around the World in 80 Minutes - 1st American in Orbit- Astronaut John Glenn - Welcome Back to Earth" |
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| Another large button reading "Welcome Back to Earth, Glenn" |
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| This photo shows the relative sizes of the three buttons. |
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