40 pages • 1 hour read
Roberta EdwardsWho Was Neil Armstrong?
Nonfiction | Biography | Middle Grade | Published in 2008A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 4-6Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 4 Summary: “Test Pilot”
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of child death.
In September 1952, Armstrong returned to Purdue. There, he met Janet Shearon, whom he married in 1956 a few months after his graduation. Armstrong decided that he wanted to be an experimental test pilot, and so the couple moved to Edwards Air Force Base in California. Armstrong started flying the new X-15, a rocket-propelled plane that could fly almost 4,000 miles an hour and reach a 207,500-foot altitude. At 50 miles above the earth, Armstrong was actually flying in the lowest part of outer space. In 1957, Armstrong and Jan’s first child, Eric (called Rick by his family) was born. In 1959, their daughter Karen (called Muffie by the family) was born. Unfortunately, when Muffie was two, she took a fall from which she had trouble recovering. When the Armstrongs took her to the doctor, they received the news that Muffie had brain cancer. The little girl lived through the next Christmas but died in January of 1962. Armstrong did not like to talk about Muffie or her death; a week later, he returned to work, keeping his pain to himself. In the wake of his daughter’s death, Armstrong made a life-changing decision: he applied to become a 
