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In March 1966, we wrote that the Northrop F-5 supersonic fighter (below) had been plucked from obscurity—it went straight from Air Force training grounds to the war in Vietnam. The F-5 had been developed a decade earlier to replace aging F-84s and F-86s in countries receiving U.S. military assistance; at home, though, it was eclipsed by “supersophisticated fighter-bombers” like the F-105 Thunderchief and F-4 Phantom. But the F-5s proved their worth when a squadron took flight in Vietnam.

UC Berkeley space scientist Greg Delory devoured Carl Sagan’s books as a kid; now he hunts for extraterrestrial water—and life—in the solar system.


Jeff Greason learned to pick locks at Caltech, from none other than Richard Feynman; now he burns LOX (liquid oxygen) in engines built by his California rocket company.


Alexander Poleschuk spent six life-changing months aboard the space station Mir; now this Russian ex-cosmonaut obsesses over his nation’s lofty space goals—and its inability to pay for them.