Developing Mach-21 Airmen

In episode 41 of "The Air Force Starts Here" podcast we look back in history at the Air Force’s role in space here with AETC History and Museums Program Director, Mr. Gary Boyd, and AETC historian Mr. Rudy Purificato. Randolph Air Force Base has a history steeped in space innovation, which all occurred in Building 661. Building 661 was home to the U.S. Air Force School of Aerospace Medicine and inaugurated the world’s first Department of Space Medicine in 1949. While there, many space firsts occurred like the first simulated fight to the moon, training of the first primates to go into sub-orbit and orbit -as well as the development of pressurized and heat resistant space suits.