An Independence Day ceremony will carry somewhat extra space to a presidential museum.
“There’s simply so many nice science feminine icons that we will construct,” mentioned Barber, who additionally designed a bronze statue of Journey that was dedicated in June 2022 on the Cradle of Aviation Museum on Lengthy Island, within the better New York Metropolis space.
The New York statue of Journey was created by Colorado-based sculptor brothers George and Mark Lundeen, working with fellow artist Joey Bainer. The Lundeen brothers will even be constructing the brand new statue of Journey, Barber mentioned.
Associated: Pioneering women in space: A gallery of astronaut firsts
The Lundeen brothers are frequent collaborators with Barber and have made three different space monuments. They made a statue of Apollo 13 astronaut Jack Swigert at america Capitol together with one other designer. With Barber, they created a monument to the three Apollo 11 crewmembers at NASA’s Kennedy House Middle in Florida, in addition to a monument to the three Apollo 13 astronauts at House Middle Houston, close to NASA’s Johnson House Middle.
Sally Journey was among the many first ladies chosen by NASA in 1978 as a part of a brand new push for feminine and minority astronauts publicized by Nichelle Nichols , the Black “Star Trek” actor. In 1983, Journey grew to become the primary U.S. girl to fly to space and, after her demise in 2012, she was additionally recognized as the primary recognized homosexual or lesbian astronaut.
Journey flew twice in space: on space shuttle mission STS-7 in June 1983 and on STS-41-G in October 1984. After her astronaut profession, Journey served with the Rogers Fee investigating the Challenger tragedy; the space shuttle exploded 37 years in the past in the present day on Jan. 28, 1986 throughout launch, killing all seven astronauts on board.
Then, after the shuttle Columbia broke up throughout its reentry to Earth’s environment, killing seven crewmembers on Feb. 1, 2003 — 20 years in the past subsequent week — Journey additionally served on the Columbia Accident Investigation Board on the lookout for root causes of the incident.
A statue of Sally Journey, the primary American girl to fly into space, was unveiled outdoors the Cradle of Aviation Museum in Lengthy Island, New York on June 17, 2022. (Picture credit score: Steven Barber by way of collectSPACE.com)
Traditionally, there was a dearth of statues representing people aside from males. In 2011, for instance, the Washington Post reported (opens in new tab) solely 394 statues of girls throughout america, in comparison with 4,799 male statues listed within the Smithsonian Establishment’s American Artwork Museum’s Artwork Inventories Catalog on the time.
Different genders weren’t mentioned within the report, and to make sure, statuary gaps additionally exist in representing totally different ethnicities, sexual orientations and different dimensions of humanity. Barber mentioned that, as such, he’s interested by commissioning different monuments of feminine astronauts. He has been discussing some concepts with potential people or, if they’re deceased, their households and different connections.
Journey has been honored in quite a few different boards not too long ago. In October 2022, Northrop Grumman named one among its Cygnus cargo spacecraft “SS Sally Journey” after the famed astronaut. The U.S. Navy additionally named a ship after her: the R/V Sally Journey.
Her legacy was additionally honored on a U.S. postage stamp, a U.S. quarter-dollar coin, a Barbie doll, a Little People figure (opens in new tab) , a LEGO minifigure and thru the naming of a lunar website the place two NASA spacecraft slammed into the floor in 2012, in accordance with House.com accomplice collectSPACE (opens in new tab) .
Comply with Elizabeth Howell on Twitter @howellspace (opens in new tab) . Comply with us on Twitter @Spacedotcom (opens in new tab) or Fb.
