See Sally Ride’s boundary-breaking life in photos

When pioneering female astronaut Sally Ride died of pancreatic cancer in 2012, a single line in her obituary told the story a lifetime of press coverage and fame had never revealed: her 27-year partnership with another woman, Tam O’Shaughnessy.

The revelation that Ride was a member of the LGBTQ+ community added another first to her lengthy list of historic accomplishments. She was not just the first American woman to go to space—41 years ago on June 18, 1983—but the first known queer astronaut.

The revelation added a new dimension to the intense, brilliant physicist, loyal crew member, and passionate science education advocate. And it led some to question what Ride’s life may have been like in a less homophobic, sexist world.

(How Sally Ride blazed a trail for women in space.)

Photographer Mackenzie Calle has spent years documenting what it means to be an LGBTQ astronaut through her project, The Gay Space Agency.

These photographs explore Ride’s boundary-breaking exploration of space—and some of the accomplishments that have made her an icon of science, women’s history, and LGBTQ achievement.

Ride wore this uniform on her historic first ride into space on June 18, 1983, with the STS-7 space shuttle mission. The assignment came with a healthy dose of sexism: After NASA announced she’d be its first female astronaut, newspapers peppered her with questions about her looks, her reproductive organs, and whether she planned to have children. “It’ll be the first spaceship with a backseat driver,” quipped comedian Bob Hope, though he was booed for the joke.

(Here's why women might be the best suited for spaceflight.)

What didn’t Ride wear in space? Makeup. Though NASA engineers offered to create a spaceflight-ready makeup kit for her journey, she turned them down, and reporters often commented on her freckled, fresh-faced appearance.

If she hadn’t been an astronaut, Ride might have been a pro tennis player. As a child, her tennis prowess was such that it earned her a partial scholarship to the elite Westlake School for Girls in Los Angeles, and she was nationally ranked in junior tennis. Though she briefly dropped out of Swarthmore College to work on her game, she decided she couldn’t cut it as a pro player and went back to school, this time at Stanford University. Tennis’ loss, NASA’s gain.

Like other astronauts, Ride underwent exhaustive training and medical examinations before spaceflight. NASA had to make a few modifications to its spacecraft for Ride and other women, including making seats that could accommodate shorter legs and installing a female-friendly toilet. Despite intense press interest about these changes, Ride attempted to keep the focus on space exploration and her pride in being the nation’s first female astronaut.

After two spaceflights, Ride continued to make history on the ground, this time as the only person to participate in committees investigating both the Challenger and Columbia space shuttle losses in 1986 and 2003, respectively. Ride earned a reputation as a dogged investigator and a vocal critic of NASA’s infamous “faster, better, cheaper” culture, pushing the agency to ensure safer spaceflight for future astronauts.

Ride made two space shuttle flights, but she never flew aboard Discovery, the orbiter represented here on the 1:100 model she owned of the space shuttle stack. However, her one-time husband Steven Hawley made three space flights aboard Discovery—and the model represents her longstanding love of the shuttle program.

This piece of student art was created by a student at Sally K. Ride Elementary School in Germantown, Maryland. Ride’s name also graces a crater where twin lunar probes hit the moon in 2012, along with a U.S. Navy research ship, Research Vessel Sally Ride.

In 2022, Ride became the second woman—after Maya Angelou—featured in the U.S. Mint’s American Women Quarters collection, which emblazoned her face on the reverse of currency. O’Shaughnessy personally approved the woman-designed quarter. Created by portrait artist Elana Hagler and sculptor Phebe Hemphill, it features Ride next to a window on a space shuttle overlooking Earth.

Ride’s cultural impact was underscored when she was turned into a Barbie doll in 2019. Produced as part of Mattel’s “Inspiring Women” series, the doll wore a flight suit like the one Ride donned in space and sported a curly hairdo like Ride wore in real life. It wasn’t the first time Barbie went to space: The first “Astronaut Barbie” was released in 1985, shortly after Ride’s historic second flight.

Ride was no longer the only woman aboard the Challenger orbiter during her second mission, STS-41-G, in 1984. She was joined by Kathryn D. Sullivan, making it the first time two women had flown in space simultaneously. “Sally in orbit was very much like Sally on the ground,” recalled Sullivan in a 2012 interview with NPR. “Very, very bright, right on the money, always sharp and focused, very competitive, and with a great sense of humor.”

This memorabilia reflects various aspects of Ride’s life, from her days as a passionate junior tennis player to her four Stanford University degrees to her historic involvement with NASA.

You May Also Like

HISTORY & CULTURE

What is queer Indigenous art? A conversation between two leading Nigerian creatives

HISTORY & CULTURE

How queer and nonconformist creators are redefining what it means to be Nigerian

HISTORY & CULTURE

How the rainbow flag became a symbol of the LGBTQIA+ community

Ride’s career didn’t start, or end, in space: She served as CapCom—NASA’s capsule communicator, who communicates with in-flight astronauts from Earth—during two space shuttle flights. Ride is also known for a wide-reaching 1987 strategic planning document now called the “Ride Report,” in which she underscored the importance of observing Earth from space, urged the agency to explore more planets, and considered the logistics of human outposts on both Earth and Mars.

After NASA, Ride focused on science education, teaching college courses in physics and developing Sally Ride Science.