Guy Gardner 

After being selected as an astronaut in 1980, Guy Gardner served as a pilot on two NASA space shuttle missions, spending more than 13 days in space aboard Atlantis and Columbia. 

Guy Gardner NASA Bio

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In 1988, he served as a pilot aboard space shuttle Atlantis on STS-27, which carried a Department of Defense payload. In 1990, he piloted space shuttle Columbia for STS-35, which carried the ASTRO-1 astronomy laboratory consisting of three ultraviolet telescopes and one X-ray telescope. 

During his 11 years at NASA, Gardner also worked in many areas of shuttle and space station development and support. He directed the joint U.S. and Russian Shuttle-Mir Program after retiring from the U.S. Air Force in 1992 and held multiple leadership positions at the Federal Aviation Administration in his post-NASA career. 

Gardner was a distinguished combat pilot and test pilot in the Air Force, flying 177 combat missions in Southeast Asia and later commanding the U.S. Air Force Test Pilot School at Edwards Air Force Base in California in 1991 – more than a decade after he graduated from the school and served as a test pilot instructor at the base and test pilot with the 6512th Test Squadron. 

After completing his bachelor’s degree at the Air Force Academy in 1969, Gardner enrolled in a Purdue graduate program designed in cooperation with the Air Force Academy for students with an interest in astronautics. Gardner is one of seven graduates of the program who went on to become astronauts, joining John Blaha, Roy Bridges Jr., John Casper, Richard Covey, Gary Payton and Loren Shriver. 

From 2004-06, Gardner served as Purdue’s director of super project development for the e-Enterprise Center at what is now known as the Discovery Park District at Purdue. He was tasked with overseeing, managing and attracting multidisciplinary, high-technology research projects to campus. It was the first time Purdue had hired one of its astronaut alumni.