Walt Cunningham

Biography

Full Name: Ronald Walter Cunningham
Born: March 16, 1932 in Creston, Iowa
Died: January 3, 2023, Houston, Texas
Joined NASA: October 17, 1963
Left NASA: August 1, 1971
Space Flights: 1
Time in Space: 10 days, 20 hours, 8 minutes

MISSION ASSIGNMENTS

Gemini 8
Assignment: Capcom (Cape)

Apollo 7
October 11-12, 1968
Assignment: Lunar Module Pilot
Flight Duration: 10 days, 20 hours, 8 minutes

HIGHLIGHTS

M.Sc., Physics, UCLA, 1961
Ph.D., Physics, Harvard, 1974

Joined the Navy in 1951 but transferred to the Marine Corps in 1953 and served on active duty until 1956.

Prior to selection by NASA, worked as a research scientist for the Rand Corporation.

October 1968, Lunar Module Pilot on Apollo 7, the first flight of the Apollo program where he and crewmates Wally Schirra and Donn Eisele performed the first test of the Apollo Command and Service Modules in an earth orbital flight.

November 1968. assigned as Chief of the Skylab Branch, Flight Crew Directorate, Johnson Space Center where he worked until retirement from NASA and the USMC.

Post NASA Business Career :
1971-74 : Senior Vice-President, Century Development Corp.
1974-76 : President, Hydrotech Development Company
1976-79 : Senior Vice-President, 3D International
1979-87 : Founder, the Capital Group, a private investment firm
From 1986, Managing General Partner of the Genesis Fund, a hi-tech investment company.

Author of “The All-American Boys” in 1977, a book on his reminiscences on the human factor in the space program.

Gallery

Previous | Next