John McGaughey '11 - Although the trip to Lawrence County Thursday seemed like old hat at the time for me, being a resident of Bedford, I quickly learned that there was nothing routine about my visit down south. Mitchell, IN, a small town that could almost be forgotten if not for its local hero, the astronaut Virgil Ivan "Gus" Grissom, revealed to me a treasure chest of material for Present Indiana.

From Grissom's boyhood home undergoing restoration on the street that now bears his name, to the limestone memorial resembling the Gemini 3 capsule's Titan rocket booster, to a portrait of Grissom adorning a wall inside the Mitchell Public Library, Mitchell is a town that exudes the essence of Grissom and his dream to conquer space.

In addition to these landmarks, Alex Moseman and I visited the Gus Grissom Memorial located in Spring Mill State Park, just a few miles east of Mitchell. Here you can see the famous Gemini 3 capsule, the first two man spacecraft (piloted by Grissom and his good friend John W. Young) and also the first spacecraft to change its orbit in outer space. Also, the spacesuit Grissom wore for the Gemini program was on display, as well as many other items. 

Photographing the Gemini 3 capsule, nicknamed by Grissom, "Molly Brown," Alex and I were stunned to be within such close range of such an historical artifact. Touching the cold steel of Molly Brown that once brushed the vast reaches of space, I was instilled with a deep sense of pride that a man from my own Lawrence County became an American hero and a pioneer of the final frontier, paving the way for other great astronauts to conquer space.

And I certainly can't forget to mention the other two astronauts from my county, Ken Bowersox and Charles Walker, who are heroes to the people of this county and an inspiration for all of us Southerin Hoosiers with grand aspirations.

Bowersox was the first American to be brought home from space on a Russian vehicle, and Walker was the first recognized payload specialist astronaut; both these men are proud to be from Lawrence County and to follow in the footsteps of Grissom, their hero.