She was much more than her two missions into space aboard the shuttle Challenger back in 1983 and 1984. She was more than being America's first woman in space. She was a pioneer in changing the world's culture and sensibilities about women's role in math and science. She demolished the pigeonholes surrounding women concerning those two endeavors. Her name was Sally Ride, and author Lynn Sherr has done a formidable job of telling Dr. Ride's story in her new biography called Sally Ride: America's First Woman in Space.
The reason the writing task was formidable was because Dr. Ride was so close to the vest when it came to revealing her life story and her feelings about it: "I'm not used to analyzing my feelings and emotions--much less used to trying to communicate them." Sadly, Sally Ride died at age 61 while she was realizing another successful chapter in her ambitious and successful career--as the CEO of a science training company she co-founded.
But Sherr, who spent over 30 years as a news correspondent for ABC News and many of those years covering the space shuttle program, is up to the task of telling Sally's story. Through numerous interviews with those who knew Dr. Ride and through her experiences as a friend of Sally's, she has created a comprehensive and poignant look at a leader in America's space program, a consistent fighter against sexist bigotry and stereotypes, and an innovative creator of science programs for children, especially girls.
During her years growing up in California, Sally Ride's Norwegian-heritage parents reinforced what she said about her formative years: "There was absolutely no sense--through all the years growing up--that there was any limit to what I could do or what I could pursue." Her cut-short career was a testament to that value: top-ranked tennis player (Billie Jean King urged her to turn pro), doctorate in physics with a specialty in astrophysics and an honors degree in English Literature (all from Stanford), NASA astronaut and key investigator of the Challenger and Columbia shuttle disasters, an astrophysics professor and director of the California Space Institute at the University of California San Diego, and the creator/CEO of a company that changed the way children are taught science. And she did all of this battling the intense misogyny of the era including a teacher who told the teenage Sally, who wanted passionately to devote her life to physics, that she had a "first-rate mind, wasted in science." She overcame that derision and many more obstacles on her life's journey to becoming a scientist, astronaut, science educator, and scientific business executive who happens to be a woman.
At a time when homosexuality was regarded as a social deviation, 1971, Sally had her first homosexual experience. For the last 27 years of her life, she was living with her partner, Tam O'Shaughnessy, without the world knowing about their relationship. In the interim, she was married to another astronaut, Steve Hawley, for years. Those intimate experiences in her life, tastefully described by Sherr, only matter in the sense that they try to get at an appreciation of her psychology, the pressures of her milieu, and her responses to that milieu.
At the 25th anniversary of her historic accomplishment in 2008, Dr. Ride said: "And I knew it was important, but I didn't realize the emotional impact it had on so many women, just realizing this was something a woman could do that no one thought she could do. And I think it changed a lot of attitudes, it changed a lot of aspirations. For young women in college, it made them think about their careers differently."
For her contributions to the field of science and space exploration, Dr. Sally Ride received many honors, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the NASA Space Flight Medal, the NCAA's Theodore Roosevelt Award, and the Order of Magellan in 1985, one of only seventeen explorers to receive such an honor. She was also inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame, the National Aviation Hall of Fame, and the Astronaut Hall of Fame. Her company, Sally Ride Science, "is projected to have directly touched the lives of more than two million youngsters in just thirteen years."
Lynn Sherr's biography is an appropriate tribute to a revered scientist, intrepid explorer, exceptional teacher, and a pioneer in the battle against sexism and male chauvinism.
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Top reviews from other countries
Amazon Customer
Fantastic bio about a really complex woman/scientist/astronaut
Reviewed in Canada on April 8, 2018David Stibbards
A credible book about an incredible woman.
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 22, 2016