Sound recording of President John F. Kennedy’s remarks upon presenting the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Distinguished Service Medal to Astronaut Gordon Cooper in the White House Rose Garden.

The rocket on display represents the launch vehicle for USAF Maj Gordon Cooper’s MercuryAtlas 9 mission on May 1516, 1963. His was the final and longest Mercury mission, lasting more than 34 hours. In his spacecraft Faith 7, Cooper orbited the Earth 22 times. He experienced six times the force of gravity during launch and orbited the Earth at more than 17,000 mph.
Engineers designed Atlas as a nuclear missile and later modified it to carry NASA astronauts. An adapter section near the top of the missile held the Mercury spacecraft and its tall, redpainted escape tower. This tower had a rocket that would pull the astronaut and spacecraft to safety in case of a problem during launch. The adapter section, spacecraft, and escape tower (reproductions in this exhibit) replaced the missile’s nuclear warhead.