Photographed in 1988 at Cape Kennedy visitors center. I decided to post this in tribute to today's 50th Anniversary of the 1st United States manned space flight by Astronaut Alan B. Shepard, Jr. The sub-orbital flight in the Freedom 7 spacecraft lasted 15 minutes. Due to the Redstone booster's low thrust capability, orbital velocity wasn't an option for the first two U.S. missions. Admiral Shepard later served as Commander of Apollo 14 and walked on the Moon. Soviet Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin was the first human being to journey into outer space, when his Vostok spacecraft completed an orbit of the Earth on April 12, 1961.
Freedom 7 is displayed at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Shepard 