Guion S. Bluford, Jr.
| Guion Bluford | |
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| NASA Astronaut | |
| Nationality | American |
| Status | Retired |
| Born | Guion Stewart Bluford, Jr. November 22, 1942 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S. |
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Other occupation
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Fighter pilot, engineer |
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Penn State, B.S. 1964 AFIT, M.S. 1974, Ph.D. 1978 UHCL, MBA 1987 |
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| Rank | Colonel, USAF |
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Time in space
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28d 16h 33m |
| Selection | 1978 NASA Group 8 |
| Missions | STS-8, STS-61-A , STS-39, STS-53 |
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Mission insignia
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Guion Stewart Bluford, Jr., Ph.D. (born November 22, 1942), (Col, USAF, Ret.), is an American aerospace engineer, retired U.S. Air Force officer and fighter pilot, and former NASA astronaut, who was the first African American in space. Before becoming an astronaut, he was an officer in the U.S. Air Force, where he remained while assigned to NASA, rising to the rank of Colonel. He participated in four Space Shuttle flights between 1983 and 1992. In 1983, as a member of the crew of the Orbiter Challenger on the mission STS-8, he became the first African American in space as well as the second person of African ancestry in space, after Cuban cosmonaut Arnaldo Tamayo Méndez.
Bluford was born November 22, 1942, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and graduated from Overbrook High School in 1960. He received a Bachelor of Science degree in Aerospace Engineering from the Pennsylvania State University in 1964, a Master of Science degree in Aerospace Engineering from the U.S. Air Force Institute of Technology (AFIT) in 1974, a Doctor of Philosophy degree in Aerospace Engineering with a minor in Laser Physics, again from AFIT, in 1978, and a Master of Business Administration degree from the University of Houston–Clear Lake in 1987. He has also attended the Wharton School of Business of the University of Pennsylvania.
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