April 9, 1959 press conference introducing the Original Seven Mercury astronauts | NASA Archives

On April 9, 1959, NASA introduced the Original Seven Mercury astronauts to the public. With the Mercury project, the United States gained its first experience in conducting human space missions that provided scientific and engineering knowledge of astronauts in space. The seven were Alan B. Shepard Jr., Donald K. “Deke” Slayton, Virgil I. “Gus” Grissom, L. Gordon Cooper Jr., Walter “Wally” Schirra Jr., John H. Glenn Jr., and M. Scott Carpenter. Six of the seven flew on Mercury missions; Slayton flew to space later with the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project Mission. Selected excerpts from the full press conference. Video credit: NASAFor more educational content, check out http://www.LaunchNext.org. For more information on the Cosmosphere, go to http://www.cosmo.org.