Michael Collins

Trivia

• In 1980 he took the job as Vice President of LTV Aerospace. He resigned in 1985 to start his own business.
• After retiring from NASA in 1970 he took a job in the Department of State as Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs. A year later he became the director of the National Air and Space Museum. He held this position until 1978 when he stepped down to become undersecretary of the Smithsonian Institution.
• He unsuccessfully applied for the second astronaut group but was accepted for the third group.
• He was accepted to the USAF Experimental Flight Test Pilot School at Edwards Air Force Base in 1960.
• Prior to becoming an astronaut, he had attended the United States Military Academy, and from there he joined the United States Air Force and flew F-86s at Chambley-Bussieres Air Base, France.
• Selected as part of the third group of fourteen astronauts in 1963, he flew in space twice. His first spaceflight was Gemini 10, when he and command pilot John W. Young performed two rendezvous with different spacecraft and Collins undertook two EVAs.
• Is a former American astronaut and test pilot.