Betty Grissom
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August 8, 1927
Betty Grissom | |
|---|---|
 Grissom in 1961 | |
| Born | Betty Lavonne Moore August 8, 1927 Mitchell, Indiana, U.S. |
| Died | October 7, 2018 (aged 91) Houston, Texas, U.S. |
| Burial place | Arlington National Cemetery |
| Spouse | |
| Children | 2 |
Betty Lavonne Grissom (née Moore; August 8, 1927 – October 7, 2018) was the wife of American astronaut Gus Grissom, one of the Mercury Seven astronauts.
After her husband's death, she was the plaintiff in a successful lawsuit against a NASA contractor which established a precedent for families of astronauts killed in service to receive compensation. Her husband died in the first fatal accident in the history of the United States space program.[1][2] Grissom has been portrayed in the books The Right Stuff (1979) by Tom Wolfe and The Astronaut Wives Club (2013) by Lily Koppel and by the actors Veronica Cartwright and JoAnna Garcia in the film and television adaptations of those books.[3]
Betty Lavonne Moore was born in 1927 in Mitchell, Indiana to Claude and Pauline (née Sutherlin) Moore. Her father worked at a cement plant.[1] She met Gus Grissom when she was a freshman and he was a sophomore in high school. The two were married in 1945. Grissom worked as a late-night telephone operator for Indiana Bell while her husband studied mechanical engineering at Purdue University.[4] Gus was selected as an astronaut after flying over a hundred combat missions in Korea. He became one of the Mercury Seven and was the second American in space.[5] Betty Grissom formed the Astronaut Wives Club along with the wives of the other Mercury 7 astronauts, to support one another while their husbands prepared for and achieved spaceflight.[6]
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