John Glenn: Back To The Future

After waiting 36 years, John Glenn at last prepares to return to space. The mission is different, but the man remains the same

John Glenn has a curious tendency to fly machines that try to kill him. He flew them in the Marines; he flew them with the Air Force; he flew them as a civilian. And each time he did, the fact that they were trying to kill him never seemed to trouble him much. One telling incident happened in 1953, during the Korean War. A World War II veteran and a longtime combat aviator, Glenn had been assigned to fly F9F Panther jets in an attack squadron running raids out of Pohang. During one especially hellish run, Glenn encountered an unexpectedly heavy...

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