Former US Senator and Astronaut John Glenn dies at 95
John Glenn was revered as an all American hero after his 1962 flight as the first U.S. astronaut to orbit the earth. He also held a long career in the U.S. Senate.
He was the last survivor of the original Mercury 7 astronauts.
Glenn was hospitalized for more than a week at the James Cancer Hospital in Columbus Ohio.
He leaves a successful history and life behind. He was a fighter pilot that ran 59 missions and a test pilot - as well as setting a transcontinental speed record flying from Los Angeles to New York City in three hours, 23 minutes and 8 seconds.
Glenn also had success in politics. He served 24 years in the Senate representing the state of Ohio longer than any other senator in the state's history and ran for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1984.
At age 77 Glenn returned to space in the shuttle Discovery in 1988, making him the record holder for the oldest person in space.
Glenn reportedly joked that the only astronaut he was jealous of was Neil Armstrong, the first man to walk on the moon.
"I've been very fortunate to have a lot of great experiences in my life and I'm thankful for them," he said in 2012.
In 1959, Glenn described what space travel meant to him in Life Magazine: "Space travel is at the frontier of my profession. It is going to be accomplished, and I want to be in on it. There is also an element of simple duty involved. I am convinced that I have something to give this project."
He did not forget the Creator of space, either, in the midst of all his success.
"To look out at this kind of creation out here and not believe in God is to me impossible," Glenn once said in a news conference from space.
Glenn leaves behind his childhood sweetheart Anna Margaret Castor. They met when they were toddlers.
"I don't remember the first time I told Annie I loved her, or the first time she told me," Glenn would write in his memoir. "It was just something we both knew," he said.
The couple also had two children, Carolyn and John David.
Jeb Bush sent his regards today over Glenn's death on Twitter.
God bless this great American hero. Godspeed, John Glenn. https://t.co/u4sfG6w1qU
— Jeb Bush (@JebBush) December 8, 2016
