NASA unveils nine new astronauts for the moon effort

Sixteen months after John F. Kennedy pledged to land a man on the Moon by decade's end, NASA needed pilots who could also do the math. On September 17, 1962, in the Cullen Auditorium at the University of Houston, the agency introduced nine new astronauts: Neil Armstrong, Frank Borman, Pete Conrad, Jim Lovell, James McDivitt, Elliot See, Tom Stafford, Ed White, and John Young. Unlike the secretive Mercury Seven selection, this search had been publicly advertised, drawing applicants from the Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, and civilian aviation, not just military test pilots. Two of the nine, See and Armstrong, had flown as civilians…