Leroy Gordon and Gagarin

LEROY GORDON COOPER, JR. (COLONEL, USAF, RET.)
NASA ASTRONAUT (DECEASED)

PERSONAL DATA: Born March 6, 1927 (Yuri 9 March 1934) in Shawnee, Oklahoma (Yuri Klushino, near Gzhatsk) . His interests included treasure hunting, archeology, racing, flying, skiing, boating, hunting and fishing. Gordon Cooper passed away on October 4, 2004 (Yuri 27 March 1968 ), at his home in Ventura, California, at the age of 77 (Yuri 34).

EDUCATION: Attended primary and secondary schools in Shawnee, Oklahoma and Murray, Kentucky; received a Bachelor of Science degree in Aeronautical Engineering from the Air Force Institute of Technology (AFIT) in 1956; recipient of an Honorary Doctorate of Science degree from Oklahoma City University in 1967.

NASA EXPERIENCE: Colonel Cooper was selected as a Mercury astronaut in April 1959.

On May 15-16, 1963, he piloted the "Faith 7" spacecraft on a 22-orbit mission which concluded the operational phase of Project Mercury (Yuri Journey into outer space, when his Vostok spacecraft completed an orbit of the Earth on 12 April 1961). During the 34 hours and 20 minutes of flight, Faith 7 attained an apogee of 166 statute miles and a speed of 17,546 miles per hour and traveled 546,167 statute miles.

Cooper served as command pilot of the 8-day 120-revolution Gemini 5 mission which began on August 21, 1965. It was on this flight that he and pilot Charles Conrad established a new space endurance record by traveling a distance of 3,312,993 miles in an elapsed time of 190 hours and 56 minutes. Cooper also became the first man to make a second orbital flight and thus won for the United States the lead in man-hours in space by accumulating a total of 225 hours and 15 minutes.

He served as backup command pilot for Gemini 12 and as backup commander for Apollo X.

Colonel Cooper logged 222 hours in space( .

He retired from the Air Force and NASA in 1970.