Ed Dwight: A space pioneer who finally became an astronaut (2024)

Ed Dwight could have been the only black astronaut in the 1960s – but politics got in the way. In 2024, at the age of 90, he finally got his chance to go into orbit.

Humanity has entered a new age of space tourism. For a minimum of $450,000 (£360,000), people with deep pockets can claim the title "astronaut" after a short sub-orbital flight to the edge of space and back and up to 10 minutes experiencing weightlessness above the Earth.

On these near-spaceflights, currently offered by Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic, there is usually one member of the crew whose name and story captures the headlines – and often a free ride.

In 2021, on Blue Origin's first passenger flight, it was 82-year-old aviator and former Mercury 13 member Wally Funk. A few months later, it was actor and former Star Trek captain William Shatner. In May, on Blue Origin's seventh short-duration flight from Earth to the edge of space and back, it was Ed Dwight.

Dwight is an acclaimed sculptor whose work can be seen in galleries and as public monuments across the United States. Like Shatner, he was also 90, but it was not just his age or sculptures that merited the attention. It was also his background as America's first black astronaut candidate.

"There are folks who only know him as an artist," said Antonio Peronace.

Executive director of Space for Humanity, the charitable not-for-profit organisation which paid for his flight and wants to increase access to space for everyone.

"Then suddenly they learn, wait a second, you have this whole other chapter of your life? So I think it was eye-opening for a lot of folks to learn that of his background."

That background is indeed eye-opening.

Dwight was an aeronautical engineer, a captain in the US Air Force and at test pilot school in 1961 when he received a letter from the Pentagon, authorised by President John F Kennedy, asking him if he'd like to become the first black astronaut. After first dismissing it was a joke, he accepted. It wasn't until later, that Dwight discovered this was a political move in order to appeal to black voters.

"The president went to Nasa and says, 'Would you train this guy?' And Nasa says, 'No, because you'll destroy our programme, you'll destroy our tax base and we'll never get another dime from the public if you put a black in this programme right now,'" Dwight told BBC 5 Live in 2019.

"The reputation of the first seven astronauts was that these guys were superheroes," he said, referring to the famous Mercury Seven selected in 1958. "If you would've placed a black or a woman in the middle of this mix too soon these guys would be ordinary people again in the eyes of the world, especially the tax-paying public. So the president had to invent another space programme – a military space programme."

Dwight therefore underwent astronaut training as part of the military's Manned Orbiting Laboratory programme. When Kennedy's government announced that they had selected America's first black astronaut, Dwight was feted on magazine covers and travelled the country giving talks.

After training at Edwards Air Force Base, he was placed eighth as a contender for Nasa's Astronaut Group 3 in October 1963. Only the first seven were selected as famous the Mercury Seven. One month later, Dwight's astronaut career was effectively over.

"The day the president got killed, my life changed," said Dwight. "22 November 1963 was literally the end of our project."

He was offered several posts out of the country after the president's assassination but remained with the Air Force for several more years. His chances of going into space, however, had died along with Kennedy.

An American black astronaut would not go into space until 20 years later, when Guion "Guy" Bluford – also an aerospace engineer and USAF pilot – flew with Nasa. Bluford was part of the 35-strong astronaut class selected in 1978 for the Space Shuttle programme. It was the first time that astronauts were not all white, male or from a military background.

The 2023 documentary film, The Space Race, chronicles the experiences of US black astronauts, including Bluford and Dwight, as well as the injustices and racism many of them faced at the time.

"Dwight completed the courses for experimental test pilot and aerospace research at Edwards Air Force Base and so he had all of the qualifications that his white peers did," one of the film's directors, Lisa Cortez, told me during a Space Boffins podcast.

"Ed Dwight was an incredibly qualified black person who was just in the wrong place at the wrong time," said Cortes "As he always says, if he had come around 20 years later, there would have been enough social progress in the US that would have supported his visibility and his right to be considered and really embraced as an astronaut candidate."

The film shows how Dwight is not weighed down with bitterness about being sidelined. After all, he went onto have an extremely successful second career as a sculptor showcasing black American history. His pieces include civil rights activists Martin Luther King, Harriet Tubman and bronze and granite statues in Detroit celebrating the Underground Railroad, the name for the network of secret routes and safe houses established during the early part of the 19th Century to help slaves escape from Southern states.

Space for Humanity, whose donations have placed people in space via Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic, accepts applications to fly into space from anyone and often champions 'firsts' – sending the first Mexican-born woman and the first Egyptian into Space. Dwight, however, did not apply for his spaceflight.

"He was in our sights," said Space for Humanity's Peronace. "Occasionally we select an individual that doesn't go through the application process – like Ed Dwight – where we know that their story has been and or will be very impactful to individuals."

The impact that Dwight's history had on others was plain to see as his spaceflight was attended on the ground by Nasa's first black administrator, former astronaut Charlie Bolden Jr, as well as current Nasa astronaut Victor Glover, who was recently announced as pilot for the Artemis II mission around the Moon in late 2025.

Dwight had applied to Nasa several times after completing his military astronaut training but was not selected. Those were different times and Nasa has long since honored Dwight's role in spaceflight and today's diverse astronaut corps reflects modern America.

"We knew we were helping to make this chapter of a space dream come true," said Peronace, "because we want to reignite the idea of breaking down barriers at that elevation. Not to give up, to show bravery in the face of adversity, and Ed Dwight embodies all that."

Dwight will now become an ambassador for Space for Humanity. "You can't even calculate the folks he could potentially inspire and that's what we're in it for."

The best quote, however, comes from Dwight himself after his spaceflight, over 60 years after his astronaut training concluded.

"I thought I didn't need this in my life," he said, "but I lied. I really did need it."

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