Animals in space human in space. On 13 December 1958, a Jupiter IRBM, AM-13, was launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida, with a United States Navy-trained South American squirrel monkey named Gordo on board. The nose cone recovery parachute failed to operate and Gordo was lost. Telemetry data sent back during the flight showed that the monkey survived the 10 g of launch, 8 minutes of weightlessness and 40 g of reentry at 10,000 miles per hour (16,000 km/h). The nose cone sank downrange from Cape Canaveral and was not recovered. Monkeys Able and Baker became the first monkeys to survive spaceflight after their
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