USS Kiowa (AT-72) and squirrel monkey Miss Baker, which were the first living creatures the United States launched into space and returned alive to earth. From 1959 until early 1965, "Kiowa" continued towing operations out of Norfolk, and also performed extensive services at Guantanamo Bay. During the latter part of June and all of July 1965, "Kiowa" operated as a unit of a task force patrolling the West Indies during the second Dominican Republic Crisis, her primary task being to maintain the off-shore pump for petroleum products to besieged Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic. En route to the United States East Coast
Miss Baker the Naval Aerospace Medical Center in Pensacola, Florida until 1971. In 1971, Miss Baker moved to the U.S. Space & Rocket Center in Huntsville, Alabama, where she entertained museum visitors and drew 100–150 letters a day from schoolchildren. The 1977 birthday celebrations brought balloons, camera flashes, and the regular fare of cottage cheese for Miss Baker and Big George. Big George predeceased Miss Baker on January 8, 1979, and three months later, Norman, from the Yerkes National Primate Research Center, became her second mate in a ceremony presided over by Alabama District Court judge Dan McCoy. Miss Baker refused to