Browse Exhibits (5 total)

Between November 2022 and August 2023, the University of Houston-Clear Lake Archives and Special Collections worked with Marilyn K. Lunney and the Lunney family, to coordinate the donation to the Archives of the Glynn S. Lunney Papers (HSF-90). Now housed within our Human Space Flight (HSF) Collection, the Lunney Papers is a seminal collection for UHCL Archives from a person who was groundbreaking in the development of American and international human space flight. He is best known for his roles with the Apollo 11 and Apollo 13 missions—primarily as the team leader during the Apollo 13 oxygen tank explosion on April 13, 1970. While many people consider him an American hero and flight director pioneer, Glynn Lunney wanted to be known for his relationships with his family, friends, and communities. He valued family and community above most things.

His family want Glynn to be remembered as a whole person, who was dedicated to his family, friends, work, and country. He was not perfect. Lunney worked to be more than a NASA engineer and flight director, and his collection demonstrates what was important to his life. Glynn Lunney was a major supporter of the University of Houston-Clear Lake, as well as supporting and researching in the UHCL Archives and Special Collections. Prior to his passing, it was Lunney’s wish that his historical records were donated to UHCL Archives.  

This physical and corresponding online exhibit highlights some of the most unique historical items in Glynn Lunney’s surviving records, which he curated and believed best represented what was important to him. Lunney kept photographs of and correspondence with his family; items from his children; letters written by and to school children interested in NASA; and photographs covering key moments in his NASA career that many would not have thought were as special as his roles with Apollo 11 and Apollo 13. Glynn remained in touch with his family, friends, and residents from his hometown region in Pennsylvania.

The Glynn S. Lunney Papers is composed of correspondence, telegrams, photographs, negatives, personnel records, resumes, notebooks, flight plans, binders, scrapbooks, papers, transcripts, press materials, booklets, proclamations, awards, certificates, agendas, event programs, invitations, flyers, yearbooks, newsletters, magazines, newspaper articles, ephemera, audio reel tapes, artifacts, and miscellaneous materials, documenting the personal and professional life of NASA engineer, flight director, and program manager Glynn S. Lunney of Old Forge, Pennsylvania, and Houston, Texas. The collection spans from his high school years in Pennsylvania, through post-retirement life. The materials date from the 1940s through 2013, with the bulk of the materials dating from 1960 to 1990. 

One of the largest sets of materials in the collection is photographs. The collection contains over 1,700 original photographs documenting all aspects of Glynn Lunney’s life, work, and some parts of his family’s lives between the 1940s through the 2010s. The greatest strength of the photographs is their documentation of his role with various NASA missions at NASA Johnson Space Center from 1965 to 1984. The largest set of photographs in the entire collection documents the operation of the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project from October 1970 through the program’s conclusion in 1975 between the United States and Russia (then the Soviet Union). Some of the most unique and most original photographs in the collection relate to ASTP. There are photographs from every meeting and training held both in Houston, Texas, and Moscow, Russia, between the USSR-US Joint ASTP Working Group.

Another important set of materials included in the papers is correspondence, which Lunney curated to maintain a specific set representative of the different types of people and purposes for which people corresponded with him. There are unique letters from NASA Johnson Space Center Director Christopher C. Kraft Jr., retired Apollo 7 astronaut Walter Cunningham, and astronaut and NASA official Deke Slayton.

What follows are selections of materials documenting all aspects of Glynn Lunney’s life from childhood through retirement. The materials are arranged in chronological order. The biography featured in this exhibit was researched and written by Matthew M. Peek, Associate Director of the University of Houston-Clear Lake Archives and Special Collections, for the biographical note within the finding aid for the Glynn S. Lunney Papers (HSF-90). All of the information was taken from a variety of sources, some of which had different details about aspects of Glynn Lunney’s life. Most of the information in this biography was taken from Lunney’s resumes, Lunney’s original NASA personnel records, and newspaper clippings found within this collection. A lot of information was taken from Lunney’s obituary, NASA press release upon Lunney's passing, Lunney’s NASA JSC History Oral History Project oral history interviews transcripts, and various online press sources. This biographical note is intended for reference for researchers to understand the collection, and have an authoritative timeline history of Lunney’s life and career.

Selected materials from the Maxime A. Faget Collection at the University of Houston-Clear Lake.

Selected items from the collecting areas of the University Archives at the University of Houston - Clear Lake.