Badge, NASA Guest, STS-7 Landing, Joyce Ride, Sally Ride

This NASA ID badge owned by (Carol) Joyce Ride, Dr. Sally K. Ride's mother, allowed her into the viewing area for the landing of her daughter's first flight, STS-7. She later gave the badge to her daughter. Sally Ride's parents were at Kennedy Space Center in Florida, the expected landing site of STS-7, but unfavorable weather forced the shuttle to land at Edwards Air Force Base in California instead. Ride's parents watched the landing from the privacy of an ABC News trailer, which recorded their joyous reaction to the shuttle's landing.

Sally Ride became the first American woman in space when she flew aboard STS-7 in 1983. Her second and last space mission was STS-41G in 1984. A physicist with a Ph.D., she joined the astronaut corps in 1978 as a part of the first class of astronauts recruited specifically for the Space Shuttle Program. Viewed as a leader in the NASA community, she served on the Rogers Commission after the Challenger disaster in 1986 as well as the Columbia Accident Investigation Board (CAIB) in 2003. She also led the task force that produced a visionary strategic planning report in 1987 titled, “NASA Leadership and America’s Future in Space,” but known popularly as the Ride Report.

After she retired from NASA in 1987, Dr. Ride taught first at Stanford and later at the University of California, San Diego. Until her death in 2012, she was president and CEO of Sally Ride Science, a company that promoted science education.

Dr. Ride’s partner, Dr. Tam O’Shaughnessy, donated the ID badge to the Museum in 2013.