Interview with Walter Cunningham

Published July 6, 2011

At a June gathering of astronauts during SpaceFest III held at the Starr Pass Resort in Tucson, Atlantis’ final launch on Friday sparked strong opinions from nearly a dozen Apollo and shuttle astronauts. Apollo 7 astronaut retired Marine Col. Walter Cunningham, 79, Houston, Texas, was selected by NASA to train as an astronaut in 1963. On Oct. 11, 1968, he served as lunar module pilot for the Apollo 7 mission, along with spacecraft commander Walter M. Schirra, Jr., and command module pilot Donn F. Eisele. The 11-day flight was the first manned flight test of the third generation U.S. spacecraft. Cunningham was also the backup lunar module pilot to the crew of Apollo 1. When the Apollo 1 spacecraft burned up on the pad, killing the entire crew, Cunningham, Schirra, and Eisele were assigned to fly the first manned Apollo mission. After retiring from NASA in 1971, Cunningham wrote "The All-American Boys: the human side of the space program," released in 1977.