Edward White
Edward Higgins White, II (November 14, 1930 - January 27, 1967) was an American astronaut.
He was born in San Antonio, Texas and earned a B.S. from the U.S. Military Academy in 1952, and an M.S. in aeronautical engineering from the University of Michigan in 1959. He later married and had two children, Bonnie, and Edward III.
He was chosen with the second group of astronauts in 1962. As pilot of Gemini 4 was the first American to make a spacewalk, and was backup command pilot for Gemini 7. White was also made Astronaut specialist for the flight control systems of the Apollo CSM. By the usual process of crew rotation in the Gemini programme White would have been in line for a second orbital flight as Command Pilot of Gemini 10 but instead in 1966 was promoted to be command module pilot for the first Apollo program flight.
He died with fellow astronauts Virgil Grissom and Roger Chaffee in the tragic Apollo 1 fire at Cape Kennedy. He was buried with full military honours at West Point. Had he lived White would certainly have gone on to be Commander of a later Apollo mission and walk on the moon.
As the result of a coroners inquiry many years after his death it was determined that his widow, Pat White, took her own life.
Edward White during
EVA. He was the first American astronaut to perform a spacewalk, during the
Gemini 4 mission.
Last updated: 10-29-2005 02:13:46
