I think we're here to stay.
I think if I hadn't been stubborn,
I'd been talked out of here earlier.
There are grand adventures in life, and some people get to have them
as part of their job.
My goodness, how does that happen?
I can remember driving through the gate
and I just could not stop smiling.
I was actually working for NASA.
It was awesome.
American Pioneers and The Hubble Space Telescope.
So I grew up in Southern
California, starting back in the late 50s. in the L.A.
area when there was still a lot of open ground around.
Pretty adventurous young girl.
We could safely go roam all day long
with a group of friends, from literally dawn to dusk.
It was right up my alley.
Kathy Sullivan's early love of adventure drove her to break new ground,
eventually becoming an inspiring figure in space exploration.
I knew two things really were a strong interest for me.
I was really inspired and curious and fascinated
by the grand adventure that I was seeing the early astronauts have on television.
I watched everything from Alan Shepard's 15 minute flight on forward.
And it was just a scale of drama
and boldness and adventure that even the world had never seen.
And, you know, watching that at a young age was a great inspiration to me.
But it mainly made me curious,
how do people get that kind of adventure in their life?
There are grand adventures in life, and some people get to have them
as part of their job. My goodness, how does that happen?
Watching those early astronauts planted the seed of curiosity,
but Kathy didn't see herself in their place just yet.
So although I
was really inspired and enthralled by the adventure that I saw
the early astronauts having, that did not translate into “I want to be an astronaut.”
I mean, you know, it sort of,
I never thought of my life that way.
I need to know what job title I want was never how it occurred to me.
So off I went to graduate school after finishing my undergraduate degree
to become a deep sea oceanographer, and I was having a grand time doing that,
going out to sea, I was having my own kind of adventures,
very much like the space adventures in a lot of ways, you know, obviously
slower, different hazards, certainly less risky overall than spaceflight.
But similar challenges, we’re going off far from shore.
You've got measurements and experiments you want to do.
How do you think about the gear? How do you make it work at sea?
How do you have backups and redundancy and etc., etc., etc.
Her work as an oceanographer was the perfect training ground for
what was to come.
Kathy.
Success in remote, demanding environments would prove invaluable
as she took the next step toward becoming an astronaut.
The influences that prompted me to go ahead and apply were,
that inquisitive drive, the love of learning, the opportunity
to learn something new, try something new was always intriguing to me.
You know, you may as well try.
The only people that have zero chance of getting in are the people who don't apply.
And if you know the fates favor you and you get selected,
then you get to see the Earth with your own eyes from orbit.
Instead of looking at other people's pictures.
Kathy's skill set earned her a place in NASA's first class of female astronauts.
Among those six trailblazing women, she made history
as the first American woman to perform a spacewalk.
A powerful testament to her determination and skill.
Her journey with NASA was far from over.
She would soon find herself involved in one of the most ambitious
scientific projects of the century, the Hubble Space Telescope.
I certainly remember the very first time
I went into the enormous clean room where Hubble was being built.
I mean, it's 90ft tall and 120ft long
and hyper clean, hyper clean air.
And the telescope just I mean, it just looked like something Tiffany's had built.
We're going to look for the label somewhere.
That's a telescope by Tiffany's.
Just glistening silver.
Fabulous. Gorgeous piece of work.
Huge.
Hubble represented more than an engineering marvel.
It was a bridge to the cosmos, a beacon of human ingenuity
and perseverance that would reveal the mysteries of the universe.
Kathy would become part of the space shuttle mission
that would launch and deploy Hubble.
Her role in bringing Hubble to life became an extension
of her mission to inspire future generations.
She wanted young people to see that science isn't just about reaching
the stars.
It's about understanding and impacting the world around them.
Stay curious.
Learn how to learn,
get good at communicating.
Whatever work or job or civic role or family role.
Knowing how to express things well is never going to go down in value.
It's only going to go up.
Kathy's dedication to exploration didn't end with NASA.
She went on to serve as the chief scientist
at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration,
where she shifted her focus to understanding our planet.
Her work at NOAA reinforced her belief that exploration isn't confined to space.
It's about safeguarding the Earth and ensuring a sustainable future for all.
I think our world is going to need really skilled
and knowledgeable scientists and engineers.
Forever and ever and ever.
I mean, we live in a built society.
We we're enmeshed in a highly technical society,
knowing how it operates, sustaining it, maintaining it,
improving it both incrementally and in radical ways.
All flows from some deep knowledge of how things work.
Kathy Sullivan's life journey from the depths of the ocean
to the vastness of space reminds us of the pursuit of knowledge knows no bounds.
As the first American woman to walk in space
and as the NOAA administrator, her legacy serves as a beacon
to those who have curiosity and a desire to learn, inspiring future generations
to reach for the stars and embrace the spirit of exploration.
Couple your passions.
Understand you're going to have to match your passions and your dreams.
With really hard work.
That's how you get to the stars or to any other destination.
“Dr. Kathy Sullivan's groundbreaking achievements as an astronaut and scientist, including her contributions to the Hubble Space Telescope, have inspired generations and showcased the limitless potential of humans in exploration and discovery.”