Godspeed, Annie Glenn

[Police Moderator]

Godspeed, Annie Glenn
Monday, February 20, 2012

I’ve long been a subscriber to the timeless theory that for any great man you can name, I can show you a great woman standing right next to him. Wife, mother, sister … it doesn’t matter, she’ll be found if you just search long enough. My best proof of this theory is Annie Glenn, whose husband John, 50 years ago on this very day, gave the United States of America one of the best shots of adrenalin in our nation’s history when he became the first American to ever orbit the globe in space.

I can remember it vividly but, back then, I was too young to grasp how huge the ramifications were. In 1962 we were at the height of the Cold War with Russia and the Soviets had a cosmonaut named Yuri Gagarin who had already done it the April before. The chips were huge – the Berlin Wall had just been built – and the country desperately needed the patriotic boost that finally came after the nation had sat glued to its TV sets before celebrating the greatest ride since Paul Revere.

John Glenn, a handsome fighter pilot in both World War II and Korea, was the ultimate hero, or so one would think, until you asked him himself. His reply has never faltered, not in 90 years – “Annie.”

C’mon, here’s a Marine who was once nicknamed “Magnet” because of the anti-aircraft flak he would attract in enemy skies. After one mission the ground crew counted 240 holes in his plane’s fuselage. In Korea his wingman was a guy named Ted Williams, who could also rather famously clobber a baseball for Boston, and none of us who watched on this day a half-century ago will ever forget that blinking heat-sensor light in the space capsule.

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