John Glenn was an American astronaut, politician, and military pilot. He was born on July 18, 1921, in Cambridge, Ohio. Glenn became the first American to orbit the Earth on February 20, 1962, aboard the Friendship 7 spacecraft, completing three orbits. His historic flight made him a national hero and a symbol of the Space Race during the Cold War. After his career as an astronaut, Glenn served as a U.S. Senator from Ohio from 1974 to 1999. He returned to space in 1998 at the age of 77, becoming the oldest person to fly in space on the Space Shuttle Discovery. Glenn passed away on December 8, 2016.