Author Topic: Our beloved Judy Resnik  (Read 146498 times)

Offline Ash41D

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Re: Our beloved Judy Resnik
« Reply #100 on: 08/30/2013 09:24 pm »
41-D traditional pre launch breakfast

51-L press
"I want to do everything there is to be done..."
   - Judy Resnik

Online TJL

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Re: Our beloved Judy Resnik
« Reply #101 on: 08/31/2013 02:23 am »
Great job, Ash!
I'd give you an A+!
That's the first time I've ever seen a crew arrival photo at KSC with a shuttle / 747 in the background.

Offline Ben E

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Re: Our beloved Judy Resnik
« Reply #102 on: 08/31/2013 06:14 am »
Wonderful pictures. Hope you don't mind, but here's a bit of info that I gleaned about Resnik whilst researching her life:

“At the contractors’ factories, we also did some ‘widows and orphans’ appearances,” wrote Mike Mullane, “passing out ‘Maiden Voyage of Discovery’ safety posters to the workers.” Judy Resnik had joked that there were certainly no maidens on this mission! In Riding Rockets, Resnik herself is presented as a tragi-comic figure – tragic in terms of her estrangement from her mother and, of course, her untimely death aboard Challenger, but intensely witty in her interactions with others; her romantic crush on actor Tom Selleck became the stuff of banter among fellow astronauts. “Flirtatious, funny…just a live wire,” was classmate Rhea Seddon’s summary of her. Yet she was an outstanding over-achiever.

Born Judith Arlene Resnik in Akron, Ohio, on 5 April 1949, she was the progeny of a first-generation Jewish-Russian family. Her father, Marvin, was an optometrist and part-time cantor, whilst her mother, Sarah, was a former legal secretary. Soon after entering kindergarten Resnik was able to read and solve simple mathematical problems. She and her younger brother, Charles, received Hebrew schooling and her teachers described as bright, disciplined, personable and a perfectionist. It was whilst at school that she developed her love for mathematics and classical piano. She achieved the highest possible score – 800 – on the mathematics component of her SAT test, graduated from Firestone High School in Akron in 1966 and was accepted into the Carnegie Institute of Technology to study electrical engineering. (By the time she completed her degree in 1970, the institute had been renamed ‘Carnegie-Mellon University’.)

She was initially hesitant about entering engineering, since it was not traditionally a female career path, but realised that her aptitude for mathematics and the sciences would carry her through. “Maybe I liked it,” she once said, “because I was good in it.” Shortly after graduation, she married a fellow engineering student, Michael Oldak, but the pair divorced in 1974. During her short married life, she was employed by RCA, working on custom integrated circuitry for phased-array radar control systems and the specification, project management and evaluation of control systems. She also undertook work for NASA sounding rocket and telemetry programmes.

Resnik later joined the National Institutes of Health as a biomedical engineer and staff fellow, working in the neurophysiology laboratory in Bethesda, Maryland, and at the same time commenced work on her doctorate in electrical engineering. She received her PhD from the University of Maryland in 1977 and joined Xerox as a senior systems engineer.

In Riding Rockets, Mike Mullane noted that Resnik’s first exposure to the space programme and the idea of becoming an astronaut appeared that same year, when she first saw an announcement on the Xerox bulletin board. To Mullane, it underlined the reality that many women had grown up in society, totally closeted and unaware of the possibility that such careers were available, on the basis of gender or colour. In fact, one of the recruiters who drew Resnik to NASA was the African-American actress Nichelle Nichols, famed for her role alongside William Shatner in ‘Star Trek’. Nichols began by affiliating her company, Women in Motion, with the space agency, although its focus extended to ethnic minorities, too, and led to the selection of Resnik and Sally Ride, Guy Bluford and Ron McNair and inspired a number of others, including Mae Jemison, who in 1992 became the first black American woman in space.

When Resnik was selected as one of the first six female astronauts in January 1978, it was widely expected that either she or Sally Ride would be the first to fly. In fact, Rhea Seddon remarked in her oral history that Resnik and Ride received “the sorts of technical assignments that really prepared them for flight”, such as RMS work and capcom duties. “I think most of us felt it would be Sally or Judy.” To Resnik, as one of the 41D crew members, it mattered little. Being a woman astronaut or the second American woman astronaut or the first Jewish woman astronaut was as insignificant as saying that she was “the 40th or 45th…American astronaut to go on the Space Shuttle in a period of a couple of years”. Resnik was simply amazed at how far the space programme had evolved in just a handful of years.

Offline edkyle99

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Re: Our beloved Judy Resnik
« Reply #103 on: 08/31/2013 03:45 pm »
Oh wow Ed, thank you for sharing. I can not imagine how that experience must have been for you.. Did you ever meet Judy during your time at KSC?
I don't remember meeting Judy, but I'm sure I saw her in our building a time or two.  I worked payload processing.  The Mission Specialists would participate in the payload integration tests that we performed in the VPF and O&C Buildings.  They would be out on the test stands flipping switches while we were buried in our control room mimicking ground control during the tests.  Occasionally they would visit our control room or we would be allowed a meet and greet as a morale booster.  I did meet Sally Ride and Cathy Sullivan and others.  Sally spent a good bit of time with us one day when a test of ERBS (STS-41G) was stalled by data communications issues.  She wanted to know *exactly* what was happening and why, down to the bit level. 

 - Ed Kyle
« Last Edit: 09/01/2013 12:01 am by edkyle99 »

Offline notsorandom

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Re: Our beloved Judy Resnik
« Reply #104 on: 08/31/2013 04:15 pm »
Mike Mullane's book Riding Rockets has been mentioned in this thread already but I want to recommend it as well. He knew Judy Resnik very well and the two were good friends. She features prominently in the book and its pretty clear she was a quite remarkable individual.

Offline Ash41D

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Re: Our beloved Judy Resnik
« Reply #105 on: 08/31/2013 09:03 pm »
Wonderful pictures. Hope you don't mind, but here's a bit of info that I gleaned about Resnik whilst researching her life:

“At the contractors’ factories, we also did some ‘widows and orphans’ appearances,” wrote Mike Mullane, “passing out ‘Maiden Voyage of Discovery’ safety posters to the workers.” Judy Resnik had joked that there were certainly no maidens on this mission! In Riding Rockets, Resnik herself is presented as a tragi-comic figure – tragic in terms of her estrangement from her mother and, of course, her untimely death aboard Challenger, but intensely witty in her interactions with others; her romantic crush on actor Tom Selleck became the stuff of banter among fellow astronauts. “Flirtatious, funny…just a live wire,” was classmate Rhea Seddon’s summary of her. Yet she was an outstanding over-achiever.

Born Judith Arlene Resnik in Akron, Ohio, on 5 April 1949, she was the progeny of a first-generation Jewish-Russian family. Her father, Marvin, was an optometrist and part-time cantor, whilst her mother, Sarah, was a former legal secretary. Soon after entering kindergarten Resnik was able to read and solve simple mathematical problems. She and her younger brother, Charles, received Hebrew schooling and her teachers described as bright, disciplined, personable and a perfectionist. It was whilst at school that she developed her love for mathematics and classical piano. She achieved the highest possible score – 800 – on the mathematics component of her SAT test, graduated from Firestone High School in Akron in 1966 and was accepted into the Carnegie Institute of Technology to study electrical engineering. (By the time she completed her degree in 1970, the institute had been renamed ‘Carnegie-Mellon University’.)

She was initially hesitant about entering engineering, since it was not traditionally a female career path, but realised that her aptitude for mathematics and the sciences would carry her through. “Maybe I liked it,” she once said, “because I was good in it.” Shortly after graduation, she married a fellow engineering student, Michael Oldak, but the pair divorced in 1974. During her short married life, she was employed by RCA, working on custom integrated circuitry for phased-array radar control systems and the specification, project management and evaluation of control systems. She also undertook work for NASA sounding rocket and telemetry programmes.

Resnik later joined the National Institutes of Health as a biomedical engineer and staff fellow, working in the neurophysiology laboratory in Bethesda, Maryland, and at the same time commenced work on her doctorate in electrical engineering. She received her PhD from the University of Maryland in 1977 and joined Xerox as a senior systems engineer.

In Riding Rockets, Mike Mullane noted that Resnik’s first exposure to the space programme and the idea of becoming an astronaut appeared that same year, when she first saw an announcement on the Xerox bulletin board. To Mullane, it underlined the reality that many women had grown up in society, totally closeted and unaware of the possibility that such careers were available, on the basis of gender or colour. In fact, one of the recruiters who drew Resnik to NASA was the African-American actress Nichelle Nichols, famed for her role alongside William Shatner in ‘Star Trek’. Nichols began by affiliating her company, Women in Motion, with the space agency, although its focus extended to ethnic minorities, too, and led to the selection of Resnik and Sally Ride, Guy Bluford and Ron McNair and inspired a number of others, including Mae Jemison, who in 1992 became the first black American woman in space.

When Resnik was selected as one of the first six female astronauts in January 1978, it was widely expected that either she or Sally Ride would be the first to fly. In fact, Rhea Seddon remarked in her oral history that Resnik and Ride received “the sorts of technical assignments that really prepared them for flight”, such as RMS work and capcom duties. “I think most of us felt it would be Sally or Judy.” To Resnik, as one of the 41D crew members, it mattered little. Being a woman astronaut or the second American woman astronaut or the first Jewish woman astronaut was as insignificant as saying that she was “the 40th or 45th…American astronaut to go on the Space Shuttle in a period of a couple of years”. Resnik was simply amazed at how far the space programme had evolved in just a handful of years.


I dont mind at all! Feel free to add :) i included some pretty interesting facts about Judy on page 5 of this thread if you are interested in checking them out!
"I want to do everything there is to be done..."
   - Judy Resnik

Offline oscar71

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Re: Our beloved Judy Resnik
« Reply #106 on: 09/01/2013 04:28 am »
There was an article which was published in Esquire magazine many years ago about Judy.  From what I remember her parents were at constant war with one another before and after their divorce.  Her mother was never consulted about what to do with Judy's remains and at the time of the article had no idea what had become of them.

In high school she began to date a guy named Len Nahmi who claims that it was he who heard about the astronaut selection and encouraged her to apply.  He says that he helped train her so she could be in physical shape and also gave her his flying books so she could study for her piloting exam.

Apparently Judy took his cigarette lighter up on Challenger and the article notes that Nahmi sued NASA for loss of property.  I can't find the article on line but if anyone can find it, it's a pretty good read and gives a great description of the woman behind the astronaut label.

Offline Ash41D

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Re: Our beloved Judy Resnik
« Reply #107 on: 09/01/2013 05:31 pm »
Here ya go.. You knew I would have it :) haha
http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=AfxVAAAAIBAJ&sjid=aeMDAAAAIBAJ&pg=1280,1923357&output=html_text

Maximize it and it can be easily read.
Enjooooooy!!
"I want to do everything there is to be done..."
   - Judy Resnik

Offline Ash41D

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Re: Our beloved Judy Resnik
« Reply #108 on: 09/01/2013 05:45 pm »
Great job, Ash!
I'd give you an A+!
That's the first time I've ever seen a crew arrival photo at KSC with a shuttle / 747 in the background.

Why thank you!!
"I want to do everything there is to be done..."
   - Judy Resnik

Offline Ash41D

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Re: Our beloved Judy Resnik
« Reply #109 on: 09/01/2013 05:49 pm »
Oh wow Ed, thank you for sharing. I can not imagine how that experience must have been for you.. Did you ever meet Judy during your time at KSC?
I don't remember meeting Judy, but I'm sure I saw her in our building a time or two.  I worked payload processing.  The Mission Specialists would participate in the payload integration tests that we performed in the VPF and O&C Buildings.  They would be out on the test stands flipping switches while we were buried in our control room mimicking ground control during the tests.  Occasionally they would visit our control room or we would be allowed a meet and greet as a morale booster.  I did meet Sally Ride and Cathy Sullivan and others.  Sally spent a good bit of time with us one day when a test of ERBS (STS-41G) was stalled by data communications issues.  She wanted to know *exactly* what was happening and why, down to the bit level. 

 - Ed Kyle

Man, I bet you have some fascinating stories.. Even if you were buried in a little control room. :)
"I want to do everything there is to be done..."
   - Judy Resnik

Offline Judy_Resnik_Fan_Girl_101

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Re: Our beloved Judy Resnik
« Reply #110 on: 03/24/2015 12:28 am »
I am a major Judy Resnik fan girl😊 I am new to this forum so we'll see how this goes.

Offline Rocket Science

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Re: Our beloved Judy Resnik
« Reply #111 on: 03/24/2015 12:50 am »
I am a major Judy Resnik fan girl I am new to this forum so we'll see how this goes.
Welcome to the forum! :)
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Offline llanitedave

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Re: Our beloved Judy Resnik
« Reply #112 on: 03/24/2015 01:27 am »
Wow, if there ever was an old thread worth resurrecting, this is the one!  I hadn't seen it before, so thanks for giving me the opportunity!  I was also a major fan of Judy, and I was so sad for her loss, along with that of those other remarkable people on Challenger.  We lost some of the best people in the world that day.
"I've just abducted an alien -- now what?"

Offline Nascent Ascent

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Re: Our beloved Judy Resnik
« Reply #113 on: 03/24/2015 01:29 am »
Judy worked at RCA Missile and Surface Radar at Moorestown, NJ a few years before I did.  Our group designed hybrid circuitry for the AEGIS Phased Array radar systems.

I was at RCA that day we lost the Shuttle and those fine people.  There was a hushed eerie silence that day.  Stunned disbelief.

Offline Kansan52

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Re: Our beloved Judy Resnik
« Reply #114 on: 03/24/2015 10:50 pm »
I heard this story about Judy told by 41-D Commander Hartsfield. (It was a gathering of most of the remaining crew so it may have been someone else but memory says it was the Commander.)

41-D had an Imax camera. They had left the gear and chain cover behind to save weight. Judy's hair was a globe of hair in weightlessness. So, as the camera was running, her hair was ingested by the Imax.

The Commander said she was able to describe her trouble with words even an old Navy salt had not heard in his travels. They extricated her and she swore eveyone to secrecy.

Next morning wake up music was 'Hair'.

Offline woods170

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Re: Our beloved Judy Resnik
« Reply #115 on: 03/25/2015 07:41 am »
I heard this story about Judy told by 41-D Commander Hartsfield. (It was a gathering of most of the remaining crew so it may have been someone else but memory says it was the Commander.)

41-D had an Imax camera. They had left the gear and chain cover behind to save weight. Judy's hair was a globe of hair in weightlessness. So, as the camera was running, her hair was ingested by the Imax.

The Commander said she was able to describe her trouble with words even an old Navy salt had not heard in his travels. They extricated her and she swore eveyone to secrecy.

Next morning wake up music was 'Hair'.
Yeah, I know this one. Hartsfield also shared this story with his STS-61A crew members. Needless to say, the story then percolated down to some press folks given that STS-61A was a high-profile mission in both Germany and the Netherlands. It was one of those journalists that told me about the little IMAX-meets-hair incident on 41-D.

Check out this link to get an idea where Judy's hair got caught.
http://www.nasa.gov/topics/shuttle_station/features/imax_84HC447_prt.htm

Offline SteveSpace

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Re: Our beloved Judy Resnik
« Reply #116 on: 03/25/2015 05:12 pm »
One very amazing woman!

Offline Kansan52

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Re: Our beloved Judy Resnik
« Reply #117 on: 03/25/2015 05:32 pm »

Yeah, I know this one. Hartsfield also shared this story with his STS-61A crew members. Needless to say, the story then percolated down to some press folks given that STS-61A was a high-profile mission in both Germany and the Netherlands. It was one of those journalists that told me about the little IMAX-meets-hair incident on 41-D.

Check out this link to get an idea where Judy's hair got caught.
http://www.nasa.gov/topics/shuttle_station/features/imax_84HC447_prt.htm

Certainly shows the exposed belt and pully! Thanks!!

Offline Judy_Resnik_Fan_Girl_101

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Re: Our beloved Judy Resnik
« Reply #118 on: 04/01/2015 08:57 pm »
Judy is my favorite and it seems like she's yours too...

Offline Ash41D

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Re: Our beloved Judy Resnik
« Reply #119 on: 04/06/2015 09:41 pm »
Thank you so much!!! I am super glad that you have enjoyed my thread... I thought it had been long since forgotten. So I am happy to see Judy is still getting a little recognition around here

Ash
X
"I want to do everything there is to be done..."
   - Judy Resnik

 

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