Steven J. McAuliffe Steven J. McAuliffe Steven James McAuliffe (born March 3, 1948) is a Senior United States District Judge of the United States District Court for the District of New Hampshire. He is the widower of Christa McAuliffe, one of the victims of the 1986 Space Shuttle Challenger disaster. Born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, he attended Marian High School in Framingham, where he met his future wife Christa Corrigan. He graduated from Virginia Military Institute with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1970. His wife had his VMI ring with her on the shuttle; his classmates replaced the ring after her death. McAuliffe
Steven J. McAuliffe by the United States Senate on October 8, 1992, and received commission on October 10, 1992. He served as Chief Judge from 2004 to 2011. He assumed senior status on April 1, 2013. McAuliffe continues to serve as a founding director for the Challenger Center for Space Science Education. He has two children, Scott and Caroline, with his first wife, Christa; they were 9 and 6, respectively, when she died in 1986. In early 1992, he married Kathleen E. Thomas, a reading teacher for the Concord School District, and mother of two children. Steven J. McAuliffe Steven James McAuliffe (born