On January 28, 1986, seven NASA astronauts boarded Space Shuttle Challenger, poised skyward on 39B at Kennedy Space Center in Florida, for a mission long anticipated and soon to be eternally remembered for tragic reasons. Seventy-three seconds into its mission, Space Shuttle Challenger exploded miles above Cape Canaveral.
All seven astronauts aboard perished: Mission Commander Francis R. Scobee, Pilot Michael J. Smith, Mission Specialist Ellison Onizuka, Mission Specialist Ronald McNair, Mission Specialist Judith A. Resnik, Payload Specialist Gregory Jarvis, and Payload Specialist Christa McAuliffe – a teacher who became the first civilian in space.
McAuliffe encapsulated the dreams of so many when she was chosen from more than 11,000 applicants for NASA’s Teacher in Space program. Part of her mission on Space Shuttle Challenger was to conduct experiments and teach lessons in orbit. McAuliffe’s legacy has been honored in many ways, including on a 2021 United States Mint Commemorative Silver Dollar.
The coin portrays McAuliffe in three-quarter view on the obverse, while the reverse depicts a group of high school students looking up at the stars with McAuliffe shown as a teacher and pointing upward to the star-filled heavens. The reverse also carries the special inscriptions “I TOUCH THE FUTURE. I TEACH.” These words, hearkening to McAuliffe’s background as a teacher, speak to her dreams of inspiring the young to pursue futures in science and technology.
When the coin was released in 2021, it embarked on a Special Label program bearing the logo representing the Astronaut Memorial Foundation (AMF), an organization partnered with NASA that was founded shortly after the Challenger tragedy. AMF’s mission is to honor the lives of astronauts who sacrificed all in missions to explore space while educating and inspiring others through the Center for Space Education. Approximately 50% of the fees for this PCGS Special Label were donated to the AMF.