2:30pm in the Mission Briefing Center
Book signing in the Main Plaza to follow
About On a Mission:
Valerie Neal, emerita curator from the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum and expert on human spaceflight, interviewed many of the US women astronauts to bring their experiences to life. She offers a culturally insightful history of their achievements, the challenges they’ve faced, and their distinctive stories. Collectively, they’ve completed more than 100 space shuttle missions, 10 SpaceX missions, and more than 30 long-duration stays on the International Space Station and Russian Space Station MIR, and they continue to prove themselves in present-day space exploration efforts. With its sweeping look from the first women astronauts to Christina Hammock Koch, assigned to the first crewed Artemis mission around the Moon, there is no comparably thorough book on America’s women astronauts. On a Mission is an inspiring tribute to unsung women’s history.
About Valerie Neal:
Valerie Neal is a space historian and Curator Emerita at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum in Washington DC. Her specialty is human spaceflight, space technology, and space science in the Space Shuttle era and beyond. She is keenly interested in space exploration generally, its place in American culture, and the achievements of women throughout the space program. At the Museum, she collected more than 1500 artifacts of the shuttle era, curated three exhibitions and eight documentary programs for the Smithsonian Channel (cable TV), published books and articles growing from her research, lectured in the USA and abroad, and gave many interviews for US and international media. Before joining the Museum, she was a writer and editor for some 25 NASA publications on Space Shuttle and Spacelab missions, the Hubble Space Telescope and other Great Observatories, space science, and NASA History. She participated in underwater astronaut training in Alabama and mission support in Houston for four Space Shuttle missions. She has taught American Studies and writing courses at the University of Minnesota, the University of Alabama in Huntsville, Vanderbilt University, and Georgetown University. Valerie Neal holds Ph.D. and M.A. degrees in American Studies and a B.A. degree in English and History.
