MAJOR GENERAL JOE ENGLE - PRINTED ILLUSTRATION SIGNED IN INK CO-SIGNED BY: COLONEL RICHARD "DICK" COVEY, MIKE (JOHN M.) LOUNGE, WILLIAM FISHER, ROBERT L. CONELY, JAMES D. A. VAN HOFTEN - HFSID 47045

DISCOVERY STS-51I CREW: JOE ENGLE, DICK COVEY, MIKE LOUNGE, WILLIAM “BILL” FISHER and JAMES “OX” VAN HOFTEN
Five space shuttle astronauts pen their names on this illustration of the Space Shuttle Columbia
Printed Illustration Signed in Ink: "Joe Engle", "Dick Covey", "Ox van Hoften", "Bill Fisher" and "Mike Lounge". B/w, 14x11. Captioned: "Space Shuttle Columbia". 1984 drawing by Robert L. Conely, who has signed in pencil beneath his printed name. Fine condition. Columbia was America's first space shuttle. The signers, Engle, Covey, van Hoften, Fisher and Lounge, were aboard the seven-day Discovery mission launched August 27, 1985, during which the crew repaired the Syncom 3 satellite. Accompanied by unsigned color 10x8 NASA photograph of the five-man crew. Fine condition. JAMES “OX” VAN HOFTEN (b.1944), who holds a Ph.D. in hydraulic engineering, was a U.S. Navy pilot from 1969 to 1974, flying 60 combat missions in Southeast Asia. After a stint teaching engineering at the University of Houston and publishing several scientific articles, Van Hoften became an astronaut in 1979. He flew on two space missions aboard Challenger (1984) and Discovery (1985), logging 330 hours in space with 22 hours of activity outside the spacecraft. He joined the Bechtel Corporation in 1986, rising to Senior Vice President. Aeronautical engineer RICHARD “DICK” COVEY (b.1946), a graduate of the U.S. Air Force Academy and Purdue University, flew two combat fighter tours in Southeast Asia (1970-1974) before becoming a test pilot. Joining the astronaut corps in 1979, Covey flew on space shuttle missions STS-85, 88, 90 and 93, amounting to a combined 640 hours in space. He was mission commander of both the Atlantis and the Endeavor on the crafts' final two missions. Covey was Mission Control spacecraft communicator on the ill-fated final flight of Challenger, voicing the command, "Challenger, go at throttle up." After leaving NASA, Covey was Chief Operating Officer of United Space Alliance, a joint venture of Boeing and Lockheed Martin (2006-2007). JOE H. ENGLE (b.1932), who was named a NASA astronaut in 1966, tested the X-15, flew the STS-2, STS-51I and was a member of the Society of Experimental Test Pilots. During the second orbital test flight of Columbia, Engle became the first and only pilot to manually fly an aerospacecraft from Mach 25 to landing. Over the course of his career he flew more than 155 types of aircraft. Engle is also the only human being to have flown two different types of winged vehicles in space (X-15 & Space Shuttle) and was inducted into the Astronaut Hall of Fame in 2001. WILLIAM “BILL” FISHER (b.1946) is a medical doctor who officially became a NASA astronaut in 1981. He was a mission specialist on the highly successful Discovery STS-51I mission. MIKE LOUNGE (1946-2011) was an engineer who, after nine years of exemplary service in the Navy, went on to become an astronaut. He was a crewmember of three different Space Shuttle flights: On the STS-51I, he served as a mission specialist, and on STS-26 he functioned as the flight engineer. He worked at the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center beginning in 1978, and retired from his post at NASA in 1991. Covey and Lounge were also aboard the Discovery after it was redesigned and was the first space shuttle launched after the Challenger disaster. Two items.