History does not write down if Sally Rud rolled her eyes when she looked at the plans of the first set for toiletries gathered for her astronauts, but she would be in her rights to do this. The space agency, of course, knew how to pack men, providing them with more or less basics – deodorant, toothpaste, toothbrush, razor. Women will also get the basics, but there will be more: lipstick, blush, eye eyeliner and, critically, up to 100 swabs, because who knew how much an average woman would be needed in the middle week in space?
This first set for toiletries was planned earlier June 18, 1983, when Ride rose On the shuttle ClauseHaving become the first American woman in space, overcoming the gender barrier, which the Soviets broke with Cosmonaut Valentina TereshkovaA little more than 20 years before the day earlier. Pearing the tampon was not the only unity of the women -abstracts of NASA as a whole, and in particular, I had to endure. Her story is recorded in a new memorable documentary SallyThe winner of 2025 Sundance Film FestivalAlfred P. Sloan feature film.
Among the unforgettable worried moments was a press conference before the flight, during which the Time correspondent raised his hand and asked: “Dr. Roda, a couple of quick questions, sir … maMAM.” There was also a reporter who demonstrated the ride: “Are you crying?” When faced with a particularly narrow problem during training. After landing the broadcast, a bouquet of colors was awarded, intended as a gift from the first space heroine of America – a gift that politely refused to accept, causing all kinds of critics in the main press.
However, more important than all this was private –extremely Private-wagoning, especially her 27-year-old relations with her partner in life there, O'Shnsesses, marriage in general, but was not discovered until it died of pancreatic cancer in 2012 at the age of 61, and O'Schonessi told the world in the necrogue, which she wrote to celebrate the death of her partner. Shortly before his death, the trip, O'Shnsess, gently affecting how, whether she should reveal her secret for more than a quarter of a century.
“I asked Sally about this. I said: “You know:“ I'm a little worried. I don’t know what I'm going to write, you know how I am going to navigate this, ”O'Shnsess recalled in a recent conversation, preceding the release of the film. “And she said:“ You decide. Everything that you decide will be right. ”
The film, written, produced and director Kristina Kostanstini, prime minister on the National Geographic channel on June 16, and becomes available for streaming on Disney+ and Hulu on June 17. As shows, Sally and Tam made a lot of right and hard – they put it into space. There is no minimization, how alien was the idea of the women -abstracts at the beginning, at least in the USA, the film includes the clip of Gordon Cooper, one of the original seven NASA astronauts, interviewed in the early 1960s. “Is there a room in the space program for a woman?” The reporter asked. “Well,” the Cooper answered without a signs of a smile, “we could use a woman and miss her instead of a chimpanzee.”
Only in 1976, a decade and a half after Alan Shepard became the first American in space, NASA opened its process of selection of astronauts for women and color people. More than 8,000 candidates were used; In 1978, NASA chose 35 of them to become astronauts, including Three blacksIN One Asian AmericanAnd Six womenThe trip was among them, like Judith a Remon, which would have lost her life when a transfer Clause Exploded at the beginning of his tenth mission in January 1986. There was a lot of handications inside NASA, in which a woman will fly first, in 1961, among men at the beginning of the flight of Shepard-i Ride and Resnik, they were considered leading candidates. Ultimately, as Sally The trace, the ride was chosen because it struck the planners of the NASA missions, as a little less distracted from the celebrities present on the room one, more concentrating on the mission and less on the story that she would make.
“She loved physics, and she liked the study of space,” says O'Shnsess, “and with those things she could be intense, moving.”
Ride also loved O'Shnsesses – although it was a devotion that was a long time in the process of creation. These two met when the trip was 13 years old, and O'Shnsesse was 12 years old, and they stood in line to register to play in a tennis tournament in South California, where they both grew up. The trip repeatedly rose to tiptoe, and O'Shnsess said: “You are going on your fingers, like a ballet dancer,” she recalls in the film. “It began on our friendship. Sally was quite quiet, but she spoke for eight minutes in a row on different players and how to defeat them, how to give them. ”
Two quickly approached, but went in different directions, when the riding studied physics in the college of Swertmore in Pennsylvania for three semesters, starting since 1968, and then at the University of California at Los -Ageles during a summer semester, before transferring to Stanford as a younger one, and O'Schonessa became a professional tennis since 1971 years. Ultimately playing And the United States is open and Wimbledon. O'Shnsesse accepted her sexuality early, openly and enthusiastically.
“I was on the tennis highway, and there were several strange women,” she said Time. “But it was also just an atmosphere, even direct women. No one cared about who you were sleeping with … I was going to gay -bars in the dignity of Francisco and danced with my friends. “
Everything was different for the trip. When she was in Stanford, she fell in love with her neighbor in the room, and they were together for four years. But Ride insisted on maintaining relationships to a large extent under the wrap, and this secrecy was not for her partner. “She could not be so closed and decided to continue her life,” says O'Shnsess.
Later, Ride will choose a partner on the opposite Polov, Marry other astronauts Steve Hawley In 1982, a step that was not just a kind pose for public activity in a country that was not ready for same -sex marriages, but less than a real union of the heart. “They were really good friends,” says O'Shnsessess. “They had a lot in common. He was an astronomer, Sally was physics. They had something that could be discussed. Both were so excited in that they were chosen as astronauts, and they both liked sports, so I think they had a solid friendship. ”
This was not enough. They divorced in 1987, but even before they did it, Ride and O'SHAUGHNESSY started drifting, how simple than just friends. At that time, O'Shnsesse lived in Atlanta, after leaving the tennis route; Ride, who lived in Houston, often visited her.
“I never thought that we would become romantic,” says O'Shnsesses, “but it just turned one afternoon in the spring of 1985. When she came to the city, we usually went to run and long walks and just had a time together. Returning to our place, we just said. I had an old coconel named Annie, I leaned toward him, and the next that I realized that I turned, that I turned, that I turned, that I turned, that I turned, that I turned, that I turned, that I turned to him. Look at her, and I could say that she was in love with me. ”
As O'Shnsesses recalls in the film, she said: “Oh, boy, we have problems.” Ride replied: “We should not be. We do not need to do this. ” Then they kissed.
The ride would ultimately fly twice in space, rising for the second time in 1984again on board shuttle ClauseThe field after this vessel of the snake came into tragic destruction, blowing up 73 seconds in his last flight and earned the life of all seven crew members, Ride and Neil Armstrong, commander of Apollo 11 and the first person on the moon, served on Commission This has studied the causes of the accident. Drive Leave NASA In 1987, the adoption of a scholarship in Stanford, and then became a professor of physics at the University of California at the San Dig. In 1989, O'Shonesses moved west to live with her. It will not Until 2013A year after the death of Ride, that California will forever legitimize same -sex marriages, and it will not be Until 2015 that the Supreme Court will do the same throughout the country. It was good with Ride, which, as in her relationship with a neighbor in a college room, continued to believe that her love for O'Schonesses should remain a quiet and relatively personal thing. But all that began to change in 2011.
At the beginning of this year, when Ride first showed signs of the disease – a sore appetite and yellowed cheeks. Her doctor diagnosed pancreatic cancer. “The doctor never said at what stage he never said the worst stage. We thought that she would become better, and we all tried, ”recalls O'Shnsess. “She did acupuncture, we meditated, we became vegans. And then one day we are in the oncologist, and he said: “The time has come for the hospice.” And Sally and I were in shock. “
Shortly before his death, the trip was concerned that O'Shnsesses would not be allowed to visit her in the hospital, help make decisions on intensive care or share property because they were not married and could not be in California. Thus, they went to the next best thing, registering as certified internal partners, which granted them the necessary rights.
“This is the worst phrase,” says O'Shnsessess. “Previously, we called each other certified home chickens, because it is such a bad term.”
Whatever name they pass, they could not enjoy their recently legalized status for a long time. Ride took place on July 23, 2012, only 17 months after she was diagnosed. At first, NASA did not plan any official memorial or celebration of the life of Ride. Then, next month, Armstrong died and The memorial was held in the Washington National Cathedral, with 1500 people Present.
“I'm angry,” says O'Shnsessess. She called Then senator Barbara Mikulsky (D, MD.) Near the head of the Senate on allocations and controlled the NASA budget. Mikulsky called then NASA administrator Charlie BoldenWhich first proposed a relatively intimate business for 300 people in the National Museum of Air and Cosmos. O'Shnsess pressed and ultimately received approval on A much more preliminary event in the center of Kennedy In 2013.
Today the legacy of Ride's Legacy lives in Sally Ride ScienceA non -profit organization founded by Ride and O'Shaughnessy in 2001 to inspire girls to become scientifically literate and attract girls and women to STEM fields. He also lives in Astronaut Peggy WitsonWhich now holds the US record for most of the time spent in space for 675 days for four missions. He lives in Christina KochWhich will become the first woman to go to the moon when she flies aboard Artemis II on her journey in a circle in 2026. He lives in the current NASA. The body of astronauts of 46 people, of which 19Ride flew high, Ride quickly flew, and Ride Fly Fly – prompting the service of both science and human justice in this process. Sally Powerfully tells her a story.
