Wally Schirra was of America's first astronauts and the only one of the original seven to fly in all three pioneering space programs - Mercury, Gemini and Apollo.

Walter M. Schirra, Jr. (Captain, USN, Ret.) is one of the most important pioneer astronauts in the history of American Spaceflight. Wally was born March 12, 1923 in Hackensack, New Jersey and graduated from the U.S Naval academy in 1945. During the Korean War he flew 90 combat missions for the US Air Force as an exchange pilot, where he received the Distinguished Flying Cross. In 1959 he was selected as one of the 7 original Mercury Astronauts and in 1962 became the 5th American in space piloting the Mercury-Atlas 8 (Sigma 7) on a six-orbit mission lasting 9 hours, 13 minutes, and 11 seconds. Wally is the only person to have flown in America’s first 3 space programs, flying in Gemini 6A in 1965 with Tom Stafford and commanding the first successful Apollo Mission (Apollo 7) in 1968. After retiring from NASA, Schirra lived in San Diego and wrote several books about his experiences. He passed away on May 3, 2007.

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