Sally Ride (1951- ) was a U.S. astronaut who, in 1983, became the first woman in the American space program to take part in a space shuttle mission. Sally earned a Ph.D in 1977. A year later she was accepted into the astronaut training program for the space shuttle; she obtained her pilot's license during that training. Her first flight into space was made on June 18-24, 1983, aboard the shuttle Challenger. As a mission specialist she took part in launching two communications satellites, and in launching and retrieving a test satellite. Sally later took part in the 13th shuttle mission, on October 5-13, 1984. She was not the first woman in space, though; that honor went to the Soviet cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova in 1963.

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