Ed White became the first American to walk in space
On this day · 3 June 1965
On June 3, 1965, Ed White floated free outside his capsule and enjoyed it so much that mission control had to order him back inside.
On June 3, 1965, astronaut Edward H. White II opened the hatch of Gemini IV, pushed himself into the void, and became the first American to walk in space. He drifted for about 21 minutes, tethered to the spacecraft by a 25-foot umbilical and a 23-foot safety line, the two wrapped in gold tape into a single golden cord.
In his hand he gripped a Hand-Held Self-Maneuvering Unit, an oxygen-jet gun that let him steer himself across the gap before its fuel ran dry within minutes. After that, he moved by twisting his body and tugging the tether, sailing high above the Pacific and then the Gulf of Mexico.
White was so reluctant to come back that he called it the saddest moment of his life.
He was the second person ever to perform a spacewalk, following Soviet cosmonaut Aleksei Leonov by less than three months, but his excursion lasted roughly twice as long.
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