Thomas Patten Stafford was a tall Oklahoman who, born too late for WWII, nonetheless served in the Oklahoma National Guard during high school and college. Starting his undergrad career at the University of Oklahoma on a Navy ROTC scholarship, he applied to Annapolis and was accepted his sophomore year for the Class of 1952, including a summer mid cruise on the battlewagon USS Missouri.
Opting to go Air Forceon graduation, Stafford qualified on the F-86 Sabre in 1954, flying with the Cold War-era 54th FIS and 496th FIS before completing Test Pilot School and becoming an instructor.
Accepted to NASA Group Two in 1962, he would head to space with crewmate Wally Schirra in 1965 on Gemini 6A, on Gemini 9 with Eugene Cernan, and orbit the moon on Apollo 10 with Cernan and his old USS Missouri cabinmate, John Young. Perhaps most famously, he shook hands while in orbit with cosmonaut Alexei Leonov during the Apollo–-Soyuz mission in 1975.
Returning to the Air Force full-time in 1975, Stafford would command the Air Force Flight Test Center at Edwards AFB and was key to the design and development of the F-117 and B-2.
Stafford retired as a lieutenant general in 1979, having flown more than 120 types of fixed-wing and rotary aircraft and three types of spacecraft, with the USAF noting the year prior that had “completed 507 hours and 43 minutes in space flight and wears the Air Force Command Pilot Astronaut Wings. He has more than 6,800 flying hours.”
Via NASA:
Today we mourn the passing of Thomas P. Stafford at the age of 93.
In December 1965, Stafford piloted Gemini VI, the first rendezvous in space, and helped develop techniques to prove the basic theory and practicality of space rendezvous.
Later he commanded Gemini IX and performed a demonstration of an early rendezvous that would be used in the Apollo lunar missions, the first optical rendezvous, and a lunar orbit abort rendezvous.
He served as the commander of the Apollo 10 ‘dress rehearsal’ mission preparing for the first Moon landing and as Apollo commander of the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project (ASTP) mission, a joint space flight culminating in the historic first meeting in space between American Astronauts and Soviet Cosmonauts, which ended the International space race.
Throughout his career, Stafford helped us push the boundaries of what’s possible in air and space, flying more than 100 different types of aircraft.