1967 AAE Distinguished Engineering Alumnus

Neil A. Armstrong

NASA Astronaut
BSAE ’55

He joined the NASA manned space program in 1962 and on March 16, 1966, commanded the Gemini 8 mission. He received the NASA Exception Service Medal after this flight. A licensed pilot at 16, he was a naval aviator from 1949 to 1952. He flew 78 missions in the Korean War and was awarded the Air Medal with clusters. After graduation from Purdue, he joined NACA Lewis Flight Propulsion Laboratory, then transferred to NASA High Speed Flight Station, and did test work on the X-1 rocket airplane. He was an X-15 project pilot, flying that aircraft to over 200,000 feet and approximately 4,000 mph and receiving the Octave Chanute Award of the Institute of Aerospace Sciences for outstanding contributions to development and testing of an adaptive control system in the X-15.