Walter Cunningham - Biography

Biography

Walter Cunningham was born in Creston, Iowa on March 16, 1932. He graduated from Venice High School in Venice, California, where a building has since been named for him.

After high school, Cunningham joined the U.S. Navy in 1951, and began flight training in 1952. He served on active duty as a fighter pilot with the U.S. Marine Corps from 1953 until 1956. From 1956 to 1975 he served in the Marine Corps Reserve program, ultimately retiring at the rank of Colonel.

Cunningham received his Bachelor of Arts and literature degree in 1960 and his Master of Arts degree in 1961, both in physics, from the University of California at Los Angeles. He then worked as a scientist for the Rand Corporation while pursuing a doctorate.

In October 1963, Cunningham was one of the third group of astronauts selected by NASA. On October 11, 1968, he occupied the lunar module pilot seat for the eleven-day flight of Apollo 7. Although the flight carried no lunar module, Cunningham was kept busy with the myriad system tests aboard this first launch of a manned Apollo mission. He then worked in a management role for Skylab and left NASA in 1971. In 1974, he graduated from Harvard Business School's Advanced Management Program and later worked as a businessman and investor in a number of private ventures.

In 1977, he published The All-American Boys, a reminiscence of his astronaut days. Cunningham was also a major contributor and foreword-writer for the 2007 space history book In the Shadow of the Moon.

In 2008, NASA awarded Cunningham the NASA Distinguished Service Medal for his Apollo 7 mission.

Currently he is a radio personality and public speaker. In the 1998 miniseries From the Earth to the Moon Cunningham was played by Fredric Lehne. Cunningham is a global warming skeptic.