Alfred Worden

Vocation

Notable

Family

American astronaut, selected by NASA in April 1966. He served as command module pilot on the fourth manned lunar landing mission. While his fellow Apollo 15 astronauts, David R. Scott and James B. Irwin, carried out their mission on the surface of the moon, Worden was in complete solitude, orbiting alone in space. The son of Merrill Bangs and Helen Crowell Worden, he attended Jackson High School in Jackson, Michigan. After graduation, he attended the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York. Finishing in the upper ten percent of his class, he received his Bachelor of Science degrees in Astronautical-Aeronautical Engineering and Instrumentation Engineering in 1955. From 1957-61, he served as a fighter pilot and armament officer at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland. After his selection by NASA, Worden served on the support crew for Apollo 9 and the back-up crew of Apollo 12; Worden made only one space flight, which took place on 7/26-8/07/1971. He was the recipient of the NASA Distinguished Service Medal in 1971. On 9/01/1975, he resigned from NASA and retired from the Air Force with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. He then entered the private sector where he worked for several different corporations including Ames Research Center in California and B.F. Goodrich Company, Aerospace Division. His experiences in space prompted him to write a book of poetry titled "Hello Earth: Greetings from Endeavor," 1974 and a children’s book called "I Want to Know About a Flight to the Moon," 1974. He later wrote another book on the subject of home energy conservation. Worden has been married three times. Both his first marriage to Pamela Ellen Vanderbeek and his second marriage to Sandra Lee Wilder ended in divorce. His third wife is Jill Lee Hotchkiss. He has four children. He has two daughters from his first marriage, Merrill Ellen (1/16/1958) and Alison Pamela (4/06/1960). He has a stepdaughter from his second relationship, Stephanie (1968) and a daughter from his third union, Tamara Lynn. Link to Wikipedia biography