SANDY KOZEL

NASA announced the selection of America’s first seven astronauts
on this day in 1959.

CARLATA BRADLEY

On this day in 2003, NASA’s space shuttle Columbia exploded while
re-entering the Earth’s atmosphere. All seven astronauts on board
were killed.

Helmet found in a field after the space shuttle Columbia disaster.

Memorial at the Columbia Debris Site.

During the Vietnam War on this day in 1968, South Vietnamese
National Police Chief Brig. Gen. Nguyen Ngoc Loan executed a
Viet Cong officer with a pistol shot to the head. The scene was
captured in a news photograph shown above.

Vietcong officer Nguyen Van Lem minutes prior to his execution.

MIKE  GRACIA

    

On this day in 1958, Explorer 1 became the United States’ first
satellite in space. The launch of the satellite — twice the size
of a basketball — was an important moment for the country,
as the Space Race with the Soviet Union was just beginning.

The three men responsible for the success of Explorer 1, at left is Dr. William H. Pickering, former director of JPL, which built and operated
the satellite. Dr. James A. van Allen, center, of the State University of Iowa, designed and built the instrument on Explorer that discovered
the radiation belts which circle the Earth. At right is Dr. Wernher von Braun, leader of the Army’s Redstone Arsenal team which built the
first stage Redstone rocket that launched Explorer 1.

On this day in 1945, Private Eddie Donald Slovik became the only
U.S. soldier since the American Civil War to be executed for
desertion.

MIKE GRACIA

Henry Kissinger (seated center) signs the Paris Peace Accords on
this day in 1973 in Paris. The war ended on April 30, 1975, when
Saigon surrendered almost without fighting to the communist
forces, ending the United States’ involvement in Vietnam.

Nguyen Duy Trinh (center) heads the delegation from the Democratic Republic of Vietnam.

At Cape Kennedy, FL, on this day in 1967, astronauts Virgil I.
"Gus" Grissom, Edward H. White and Roger B. Chaffee died
in a flash fire during a test aboard their Apollo I spacecraft.

The charred remains of the Apollo 1 cabin interior.

Buzz Aldrin (Edwin Eugene Aldrin Jr.)

The second person to ever walk on the moon, Buzz Aldrin was the pilot of
NASA’s Apollo 11 mission and was a member of the third group of astronauts
ever selected by NASA. He served as an astronaut from his selection in 1963
until his retirement in 1971. Aldrin served as an U.S. Air Force officer and had
a Command Pilot rating. Appropriately enough, his mother’s maiden name
was Moon.

Aldrin walks on the surface of the Moon during the Apollo 11 mission
in 1969.