Scobie beamed with pride over the space shuttle as he said to me, “It’s like Buck Rogers! Who would ever think we’d have it? It’s beautiful, partner. The Orlando Sentinel Star’s special edition featured a large color photo of the shuttle on the launch pad and a huge headline blaring “Space Odyssey: 1981.” Hotels, motels, bars and restaurants on the Space Coast were packed with tourists and reporters, and local people were thrilled that the area would be back in the space business after a long lull in manned launches since the Apollo and Skylab programs ended in the mid-1970s. Flags festooned town roads, and businesses posted signs and banners voicing messages like “Good luck, astronauts” and “Hail Columbia.” Newspapers published special editions to commemorate the upcoming launch.
The ambiance of the area that calls itself the Space Coast was like a high-tech version of Dodge City during a cattle drive. As an Athens writer, I have covered such events as protest marches, political conventions and presidential inaugurations for many years, but being on the scene for the first space shuttle launch was an event that is indelibly etched into my mind.Īs the day of the spaceship’s launch neared, towns like Titusville and Cocoa Beach near the launch site bustled with excitement. I was amazed at the age of 10 in 1957 when Russia’s Sputnik became the first satellite to orbit Earth, and I have for decades followed the space programs of both the Soviets and the Americans that culminated in footsteps on the moon and space stations orbiting Earth.
SPACE SHUTTLE LAUNCH THIS MORNING SERIES
I was captivated by Walt Disney’s 1955 television series about space travel narrated by Wernher von Braun, the World War II Nazi rocket scientist who was brought to America after the war to lead the postwar U.S. I have been a long-time space buff ever since my childhood days watching “Flash Gordon” and “Captain Video” on early 1950s black-and-white television and reading the science fiction tales of Ray Bradbury and Arthur C. The first flight of the mighty machine was a must-see, so I flew down to Florida to view the launch of Columbia and write my impressions of the historic event.
I covered the spaceship’s premier launch as a columnist for the Athens Observer newspaper. It has been 40 years since I saw the first space shuttle thunder into the blue Cape Canaveral sky on Apr.
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