In the aftermath of the Soviet Union’s first manned space flights, the United States urgently kick-started its space program. In May and June 1961, the United States conducted two manned suborbital flights. To match the Soviets’ two manned orbital space flights, NASA commenced the Project Mercury. On February 20, 1962, Astronaut John H. Glenn, Jr. became the United States’ first and the third man in history to orbit the Earth. This historical Type 1 photograph shows the triumphant John Glenn posed in front of the Friendship 7 spacecraft along with Chief Test Conductor T.J. O’Malley and NASA’s Spacecraft Test Coordinator Paul Donnelly. A NASA catalog number is printed on the top left border of the front of the photo. The type 1 photo has a small portion of its upper left corner missing, creases in the white border of both top corners, a rough edge along a small section of the top edge, slight rounding on the other three corners – that said, none of this encroaches into the printed part of the photograph. The reverse of the photo has the printed NASA caption and credits. The photo has been graded Type 1 Authentic and encapsulated by PSA.