01/16/1978 AD hired

NASA selected Dr. Ride as an astronaut candidate in January 1978. She completed her training in August 1979

In January 1977, Ride spotted an article on the front page of The Stanford Daily that told how the National Air and Space Administration (NASA) was recruiting a new group of astronauts for the Space Shuttle program and wanted to recruit women. No women had previously been NASA astronauts, although the Soviet Union's cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova had flown in space in 1963. Ride mailed a request for, and received the application forms. When asked for three persons with knowledge of her qualifications, she gave the names of three with whom she had been in relationships: Colson, Tompkins and Tyson.

Ride's was one of 8,079 applications NASA received by the June 30, 1977 deadline. She then became one of 208 finalists. She was the only woman among the twenty applicants in the sixth group, all applicants for mission specialist positions, who reported to NASA's Johnson Space Center (JSC) in Houston, Texas, on October 3, for a week of interviews and medical examinations.

Her physical fitness impressed the doctors. They also placed her in a Personal Rescue Enclosure to see if she suffered from claustrophobia. She was asked to write a one-page essay on why she wanted to become an astronaut.

Finally, she was interviewed by the selection committee.  On January 16, 1978, she received a phone call from George Abbey, NASA's director of flight operations, who informed her that she had been selected as part of NASA Astronaut Group 8. She was one of 35 astronaut candidates in the group, of whom six were women.

Houston, TX

Lattitude: 29.7627° N
Longitude: 95.383° W
Region: North America

Modern Day United States

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