‘Wally Funk’s race for space’

Funk, 80, was the youngest of 13 women volunteers to prove that gender had no bearing on their ability to pass the same grueling regimen of physiological tests as NASA's Mercury astronauts. Many went on to lobby for women's inclusion in the astronaut corps. Funk went on to build an impressive aviation career, and reaching space remains one of her ambitions.

Described as an “offbeat odyssey” and “quirky biography,” the book is aimed at appealing to “space history buffs, women in STEM and fans of Hidden Figures.”

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AOPA chronicled the Mercury 13 in 1997.