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Mercury-Redstone 3
Mission insignia
Mission statistics
Mission name	Mercury-Redstone 3
Spacecraft name	Freedom 7 (also its callsign)
Spacecraft mass	Launch: 4,040 pounds (1,830 kg) Landing: 2,316 pounds (1,051 kg)
Crew	Alan B. Shepard
Launch vehicle	Redstone
Launch pad	LC 5, Florida, USA
Launch date	May 5, 1961, 14:34:13 UTC
Landing	May 5, 1961, 14:49:35 UTC
Mission duration	15 min 28 sec
Apogee	116.5 miles (187.5 km)
Distance traveled	303 miles (488 km) downrange
Maximum velocity	5,134 miles per hour (8,262 km/h)
Peak acceleration	Launch: 6.3 g. Re-entry: 11 g
Crew photo
Alan Shepard in Freedom 7 spacecraft before launch
Related missions
Previous Subsequent Little Joe 5B MR-4

The Mercury-Redstone 3, MR-3 or Freedom 7 spaceflight was the first human spaceflight by USA and took place on 5 May, 1961, with Alan Shepard as the astronaut. It was part of Project Mercury which was an attempt by the USA to bring an astronaut into orbit around the Earth before the Soviet Union during the Cold war. This first manned mission, however, was only a 15-minutes suborbital flight meaning above the limit of space at an altitude of 100 km (62 mi) and down again. The last part of the mission name came from the Redstone rocket that was used for launching the spacecraft. It was the fourth mission by that rocket in the project; the former being unmanned test flights of which one carried a chimpanzee.

The launch of MR-3 took place at Cape Canaveral, Florida close to the Atlantic Ocean. After the rocket had burned out, the spacecraft with Shepard onboard separated from it and continued until it reached an altitude of 116.5 miles (187.5 km) before falling back and landing by parachute on the ocean off the Bahamas. Here it was picked up by helicopter and brought to an aircraft carrier. During the flight, Shepard observed the Earth and tested the reaction control system of the spacecraft together with a pack of small rockets meant for bringing a spaceraft down from orbit on later missions. It was also Shepard who had given the mission it alternative name Freedom 7 setting a trend of astronauts naming their spacecraft during the rest of the project.

The mission was a technical success even though it failed to bring the first man into space; just 3 weeks before, the Soviet Union had carried out their first orbital flight. MR-3 was followed by another suborbital mission the same year and four orbital missions the following two. Its success also encouraged President Kennedy to launch the Apollo Moon Program a few weeks after the mission.^{[Not verified in body]}

Preparation[link]

The Freedom 7 spacecraft, Mercury capsule #7, was delivered to Cape Canaveral on December 9, 1960. It had originally been expected that a mission could be launched soon after the spacecraft was available, but Capsule #7 turned out to require extensive development and testing work before it was deemed safe for flight. However, as it had been earmarked since the summer as the first crewed spacecraft, the decision was taken to delay the mission until this particular capsule was ready, with a tentative launch date of 6 March, rather than use an alternative capsule.^[1] The booster originally intended for the flight, Redstone #3,^[2] had been delivered to the Cape in early December;^[3] however, it was then used on the MR-1A test flight on 19 December.^[4] The replacement, Redstone #7, did not arrive at the Cape until late March; by this time, however, the mission had already been postponed to await the results of another test flight.^[5]

In late 1960, there had been a growing number of concerns about the standards of the Redstone launch vehicle; the MR-2 test flight, crewed by a chimpanzee, had had technical problems during the launch leading to the spacecraft flying too high, too far and too fast.^[6] As a result, the mission was two minutes longer than planned, and the re-entry subjected the passenger to 14.7g rather than the planned figure of approximately 12g. The splashdown point was sixty miles from the nearest recovery ship, and it was over two and a half hours before a helicopter could recover the capsule and its passenger - by which time it had almost sunk.^[7] As a result, NASA was unwilling to launch the MR-3 mission without further development work; by late February, there were still seven major alterations they had made to the booster which required testing.^[8] An additional testing flight was accordingly added to the schedule, MR-BD (for "Booster Development"; it was originally known as MR-2A). This would launch on March 28, pushing the MR-3 flight back a month to April 25.^[9] The MR-BD flight was almost completely successful, ensuring that the crewed MR-3 flight could proceed without further significant delay.^[10]

The pilot for MR-3 had been chosen several months in advance, in early January, by the head of the program, Robert R. Gilruth. He had selected Alan Shepard as the primary pilot, with John Glenn and Gus Grissom as his backups; the other members of the Mercury Seven continued to train for later missions. The three names were announced to the press on 22 February without any indication as to which of the three was expected to fly the mission.^[11] Shepard's name was only announced publicly after the initial launch attempt had been canceled, as Gilruth wished to keep his options open in the event that last-minute personnel changes were required.^[12] Glenn served as Shepard's backup on launch day,^[13] with Grissom focusing on training for MR-4, the next suborbital mission.^[14]

The initial launch attempt, on May 2, was canceled due to weather problems two hours and 20 minutes before the launch time, with Shepard waiting in a hangar already suited and prepared. The flight was rescheduled for two days later, when it was delayed one more day due to inclement weather conditions, until 5 May, with an expected launch time of 7:20 a.m. EST.^{[Note 1][15]}

Flight[link]

The countdown began at 8:30 p.m. the previous night, with Shepard entering the spacecraft at 5:15 a.m. ET, just over two hours before the planned launch time. At 7:05 a.m., the launch was held for an hour to let cloud cover clear - good visibility would be essential for photographs of the Earth - and fix a power supply unit; shortly after the count restarted, another hold was called in order to reboot a computer at Goddard Space Flight Center. The count was eventually resumed, after slightly over two and a half hours of unplanned holds, and continued with no further faults.^[16]

Launch of MR-3 on May 5, 1961

Mercury-Redstone 3 finally lifted off at 9:34 a.m. ET, watched by an estimated 45 million television viewers in the United States.^[17] Shepard was subjected to a maximum acceleration of 6.3g just before the Redstone engine shut down, two minutes and 22 seconds after launch. Freedom 7's space-fixed velocity was 5,134 miles per hour (8,262 km/h), close to the planned value. Ten seconds later, the escape tower was jettisoned. At the three-minute mark, the automated attitude control system rotated Freedom 7, turning it so the heat shield faced forward ready for re-entry.^[18]

Shepard was now able to take manual control of the spacecraft, and began testing whether he was able to adjust its orientation. The first thing he did was position the spacecraft to its retrofire attitude of 34 degrees pitch (nose of spacecraft pitched down 34 degrees). He then tested manual control of yaw, motion from left to right, and roll. When he took control of all three axes, he found that the spacecraft response was about the same as that of the Mercury simulator; however, he could not hear the jets firing, as he could on the ground, due to the levels of background noise.^[19]

The secondary objective was to make observations of the ground from the spacecraft; returning the spacecraft to automatic control, Shepard found that he was able to distinguish major land masses from clouds easily, and could make out coastlines, islands and major lakes, but had difficulty identifying cities. He had problems working with the spacecraft periscope - early Mercury capsules had a small periscope rather than a viewing window - and had to abandon an attempt to change optical filters on it.^[20]

Under automatic control, the spacecraft had developed a slight movement as it passed through peak altitude; Shepard now switched into the "fly-by-wire" mode, where the pilot used a controller to order the automatic system to fire the rockets for the desired positioning, rather than manually controlling the individual jets. Adjusting roll and yaw, he found the pitch position was around ten degrees too shallow - 25 degrees rather than the desired 35 for reentry - and as he began to correct it, the timed retrorockets fired to send him into reentry. The retrorocket pack - strapped atop the heatshield and so requiring release before reentry - was successfully jettisoned, but the confirmation light failed, requiring Shepard to activate the manual override for the jettison system before it confirmed that the rockets were fully released.^[21]

Timeline of MR-3. The rocket is not shown; it is lifting the spacecraft until 2:22; at 2:32 rocket and spacecraft separate.

Shepard resumed fly-by-wire control after retrofire, reporting that it felt smooth and gave the sensation of being fully in command of the craft,^[22] before letting the automatic systems briefly take over to reorient the capsule for reentry. He then kept control until the g-forces peaked at 11.6g during re-entry; he held the capsule until it had stabilized and then relinquished control to the automated system. The descent was faster than anticipated, but the parachutes deployed as planned, a drogue at 21,000 ft (6.4 km) and a main parachute at 10,000 ft (3.0 km).^[23]

Splashdown occurred with an impact comparable to landing a jet aircraft on an aircraft carrier. Freedom 7 tilted over on its right side about 60 degrees from an upright position, but did not show any signs of leaking; it gently righted itself after a minute, and Shepard was able to report to the circling aircraft that he had landed safely and was ready to be recovered. A recovery helicopter arrived after a few minutes, and after a brief problem with the spacecraft antenna, the capsule was lifted partly out of the water in order to allow Shepard to leave by the main hatch. He squeezed out of the door and into a sling hoist, and was pulled into the helicopter, which flew both the astronaut and his spacecraft to a waiting aircraft carrier, the USS Lake Champlain. The whole recovery process had taken only eleven minutes, from splashdown to arriving aboard.^[24]

The flight lasted 15 minutes, 28 seconds and the spacecraft traveled 302 miles (486 km) from its launch point, ascending to 116.5 miles (187.5 km). Freedom 7 landed at these coordinates: 27°14′N 75°53′W / 27.23°N 75.88°W / 27.23; -75.88. It reached a speed of 5,180 mph (8,340 km/h).^{[citation needed]}

Following the flight the spacecraft was examined by engineers and found to be in excellent shape, so much so that they decided it could have been safely used again in another launch. The Freedom 7 is now on display in the lobby of the Armel-Leftwich Visitor Center at the U.S. Naval Academy, Annapolis, MD. It was placed there after Shepard's death in 1998.^{[citation needed]}

• 

  President Kennedy watching the flight on TV together with Vice President Johnson and others

• 

  Shepard in Freedom 7

• 

  Photo taken by 70mm Earth-Sky Camera mounted on the spacecraft

• 

  HUS-1 helicopter from Lake Champlain recovering Alan Shepard from the Freedom 7 capsule

• 

  Alan Shepard on the deck of the aircraft carrier USS Lake Champlain (CVS-39) after recovery of Freedom 7

Commemorative patch

Depiction in popular culture[link]

In June 1961, Laurie Records issued a 45 rpm single featuring William Allen and Orchestra entitled "Space Flight Freedom 7." It consisted of recreations of the tower to astronaut communications spoken over an instrumental backing. The Mercury-Redstone 3 mission was dramatized in the HBO miniseries From the Earth to the Moon episode "Can We Do This?" (starring Ted Levine as Alan Shepard), as well as in Tom Wolfe's book The Right Stuff, and Philip Kaufman's movie The Right Stuff based on the book. (In Kaufman's film, Scott Glenn plays Shepard.)

Flight events[link]

This unreferenced section requires citations to ensure verifiability.

References[link]

Notes[link]

Citations[link]

Biliography[link]

• Grimwood, J. M. (1963). Project Mercury : a chronology. NASA. hdl:2060/19630011968.  HTML copy
• Alexander, C. C.; Grimwood, J. M.; Swenson, L. S. (1966). This new ocean : a history of Project Mercury. NASA. hdl:2060/19670005605.  HTML copy

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Freedom 7

• Project Mercury - Results of the First U.S. Manned Suborbital Space Flight - NASA - 1961
• NASA NSSDC Master Catalog
• Postlaunch Report for Mercury-Redstone No. 3 (NASA)dead link
• NASA 40th anniversary of the Mercury 7 — Alan B. Shepard, Jr.
• NASA Mercury MR3 press kit - Apr 26, 1961

v t e Project Mercury General NASA (Organizer) Space race (Political background) Space flight (Scientific background) Contractors McDonnell Aircraft Corporation (Space craft) North American Aviation (Test rocket) Related programs USA Gemini (Mercury Mark II) Apollo (Moon program) Soviet Vostok (Rival in space race) Missions Manned Freedom 7 (First suborbital flight) Liberty Bell 7 Friendship 7 (First orbital flight) Aurora 7 Sigma 7 Faith 7 Unmanned LJ-1 Big Joe 1 LJ-6 LJ-1A LJ-2 LJ-1B Beach Abort MA-1 Little Joe 5 MR-1 MR-1A MR-2 MA-2 LJ-5A MR-BD MA-3 LJ-5B MA-4 MS-1 MA-5 Astronauts General Mercury Seven In order of flight (In suborbit:) Alan Shepard Gus Grissom (In orbit:) John Glenn Scott Carpenter Wally Schirra Gordon Cooper (Did not fly:) Deke Slayton Equipment Navy Mark IV (Space suit) Test animals Ham Enos (Background:) Animals in space Subprograms Mercury-Atlas Mercury-Redstone Mercury-Scout Big Joe Mercury-Jupiter (Canceled) Rockets Atlas Redstone Blue Scout II Little Joe Jupiter (Proposed) Other Mercury 13 (Non NASA project inspired by Project Mercury)

Alan B. Shepard, Jr.
NASA astronaut
Nationality	American
Status	Deceased
Born	(1923-11-18)November 18, 1923 Derry, New Hampshire
Died	July 21, 1998(1998-07-21) (aged 74) Pebble Beach, California
Other occupation	Test pilot
Rank	Rear admiral, USN
Time in space	216 hours and 57 min[1]
Selection	NASA Group One (1959)
Missions	MR-3, Apollo 14
Mission insignia
Awards	Navy Distinguished Service Medal Distinguished Flying Cross Congressional Space Medal of Honor

Alan Bartlett Shepard, Jr. (November 18, 1923 – July 21, 1998) was an American naval aviator, test pilot, flag officer, and NASA astronaut who in 1961 became the second person, and the first American, in space. This Mercury flight was designed to enter space, but not to achieve orbit. Ten years later, at age 47 the oldest astronaut in the program, Shepard commanded the Apollo 14 mission, piloting the lander to the most accurate landing of the Apollo missions. He became the fifth person to walk on the Moon, and the only Mercury astronaut to walk on the moon. During the mission he hit two golf balls on the lunar surface.

These were his only two space flights, as his flight status was interrupted for five years (1964–69) during the Mercury and Gemini programs by Ménière's disease, an inner-ear disease that was surgically corrected before his moon flight. Shepard served as chief of the Astronaut Office from November 1963 – July 1969 (approximately the period of his grounding), and from June 1971 – August 1, 1974 (from his last flight, to his retirement). He was promoted from captain to rear admiral on August 25, 1971.^[2] He retired from the US Navy and NASA in 1974.

During retirement he became a successful businessman. He died of leukemia in 1998, five weeks before the death of his wife of 53 years. They were survived by their three daughters.

Biography[link]

Shepard was born in Derry, New Hampshire to Lt. Col. Alan B. Shepard, Sr. and Renza (née Emerson) Shepard. He attended primary and secondary schools in East Derry and Derry including Pinkerton Academy from which he graduated with the class of 1940. He was one of many famous descendants of Mayflower passenger Richard Warren.^[3]

Naval career[link]

Shepard began his naval career after graduation from the United States Naval Academy in 1944, and served on the destroyer USS Cogswell while it was deployed in the Pacific Ocean during World War II. He subsequently entered flight training at Corpus Christi, Texas and Pensacola, Florida, and received his naval aviator wings in 1947. He was assigned to Fighter Squadron 42 based at Norfolk, Virginia and Jacksonville, Florida, and served several tours aboard aircraft carriers in the Mediterranean Sea with the squadron.

In 1950, he attended the U.S. Naval Test Pilot School at Patuxent River, Maryland. After graduation, he participated in flight test work which included high-altitude tests to obtain data on light at different altitudes and on a variety of air masses over the American continent; test and development experiments of the Navy's in-flight refueling system; carrier suitability trials of the F2H-3 Banshee; and Navy trials of the first angled carrier deck. He was subsequently assigned to Fighter Squadron 193 based at Moffett Field, California, a night fighter unit flying Banshee jets. As operations officer of this squadron, he made two tours to the western Pacific on board the carrier USS Oriskany.

Shepard returned to Patuxent for a second tour of duty and engaged in flight testing the F3H Demon, F8U Crusader, F4D Skyray, and F11F Tiger. He was also project test pilot on the F5D Skylancer, and his last five months at Patuxent were spent as an instructor in the Test Pilot School. He later attended the Naval War College at Newport, Rhode Island, and upon graduating (master of arts in military science) in 1958 was assigned to the staff of the Commander-in-Chief, Atlantic Fleet, as aircraft readiness officer.

He logged more than 8,000 hours flying time—3,700 hours in jet aircraft.

NASA career[link]

[edit] Mercury: Freedom 7 pilot

In 1959, Shepard was one of 11 military test pilots invited by the newly-formed National Aeronautics and Space Administration to volunteer for the first US manned space flight program. Following a gruelling series of physical and psychological tests, NASA selected Shepard to be one of the original group of seven Mercury astronauts.

Shepard in the Freedom 7 capsule before launch

In January 1961, Shepard was chosen for the first American manned mission into space. Although the flight was originally scheduled for October 1960, delays by unplanned preparatory work meant that this was postponed several times, initially to March 6, 1961 and finally to May 5.^[4] On April 12, 1961, Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin had become the first person in space and to orbit the Earth.

On May 5, 1961, Shepard piloted the Freedom 7 mission and became the second person, and the first American, to travel into space.^[5] He was launched by a Redstone rocket, and unlike Gagarin's 108-minute orbital flight, Shepard stayed on a ballistic trajectory—a 15-minute suborbital flight which carried him to an altitude of 116 statute miles (187 km) and to a splashdown point 302 statute miles (486 km) down the Atlantic Missile Range. Unlike Gagarin, whose flight was strictly automatic, Shepard had some control of Freedom 7, spacecraft attitude in particular. The launch was seen live on television by millions.

Shortly before the launch, Shepard said to himself: "Don't fuck up, Shepard..."^[6] This quote was reported as "Dear Lord, please don't let me fuck up" in The Right Stuff,^[7] though Shepard confirmed this as a misquote. Regardless, the latter quote has since become known among aviators as "Shepard's Prayer."^{[citation needed]}

According to Gene Kranz in his book, Failure Is Not an Option, "When reporters asked Shepard what he thought about as he sat atop the Redstone rocket, waiting for liftoff, he had replied, 'The fact that every part of this ship was built by the low bidder.'"

Shepard during Freedom 7 flight on May 5, 1961

After a dramatic Atlantic Ocean recovery, Commander Shepard observed, "…didn't really feel the flight was a success until the recovery had been successfully completed. It's not the fall that hurts; it's the sudden stop."^[8] After his successful return, Shepard was celebrated as a national hero, honored with parades in Washington, New York and Los Angeles and received the NASA Distinguished Service Medal from President John F. Kennedy.^[9]

Later, he was scheduled to pilot the Mercury-Atlas 10 Freedom 7-II three-day extended duration mission in October 1963. The MA-10 mission was cancelled on June 13, 1963. He was the back-up pilot for Gordon "Gordo" Cooper for the MA-9 mission.

Gemini: Chief astronaut[link]

After the Mercury-Atlas 10 mission was cancelled, Shepard was designated as the command pilot of the first manned Project Gemini mission. Thomas Stafford was chosen as his co-pilot. In early 1964, Shepard was diagnosed with Ménière's disease, a condition in which fluid pressure builds up in the inner ear. This syndrome causes the semicircular canals and motion detectors to become extremely sensitive, resulting in disorientation, dizziness, and nausea. The condition caused him to be removed from flight status for most of the 1960s (Gus Grissom and John Young were assigned to Gemini 3 instead).

Also in 1963, he was designated Chief of the Astronaut Office with responsibility for monitoring the coordination, scheduling, and control of all activities involving NASA astronauts. This included monitoring the development and implementation of effective training programs to assure the flight readiness of personnel for crew assignments on manned space flights; furnishing pilot evaluations applicable to the design, construction, and operations of spacecraft systems and related equipment; and providing qualitative scientific and engineering observations to facilitate overall mission planning, formulation of feasible operational procedures, and selection and conduct of specific experiments for each flight.

Apollo: Apollo 14 commander[link]

Shepard poses next to the American flag on the Moon during Apollo 14.

Shepard was restored to full flight status in May 1969, following corrective surgery (using a newly-developed method) for Ménière's disease. He was originally assigned to command Apollo 13, but as it was felt he needed more time to train, he and his crewmates (lunar module pilot Edgar Mitchell and command module pilot Stuart Roosa) swapped missions with the then crew of Apollo 14 (James Lovell, Ken Mattingly and Fred Haise).

As the oldest astronaut in the program at age 47, Shepard made his second space flight as commander of Apollo 14 from January 31 – February 9, 1971, America's third successful lunar landing mission. Shepard piloted the Lunar Module Antares to the most accurate landing of the entire Apollo program. This was the first mission to successfully broadcast color television pictures from the surface of the Moon, using a vidicon tube camera. (The color camera on Apollo 12 provided a few brief moments of color telecasting before it was inadvertently pointed at the Sun, ending its usefulness.) While on the Moon, Shepard used a Wilson six-iron head attached to a lunar sample scoop handle^[10] to drive golf balls. Despite thick gloves and a stiff spacesuit which forced him to swing the club with one hand, Shepard struck two golf balls; driving the second, as he jokingly put it, "miles and miles and miles."^[11]

Following Apollo 14, Shepard returned to his position as Chief of the Astronaut Office in June 1971. He was appointed by President Nixon in July 1971 as a delegate to the 26th United Nations General Assembly, serving from September to December 1971. He was promoted to rear admiral by Nixon that same year before retiring both from the Navy and NASA on August 1, 1974.

Later years[link]

After Shepard left NASA, he served on the boards of many corporations. He also served as president of his umbrella company for several business enterprises, Seven Fourteen Enterprises, Inc. (named for his two flights, Freedom 7 and Apollo 14).^[12]

In 1994, he published a book with two journalists, Jay Barbree and Howard Benedict, called Moon Shot: The Inside Story of America's Race to the Moon. Fellow Mercury astronaut Deke Slayton is also named as an author.^[13] The book generated some controversy for use of a staged photo purportedly showing Shepard hitting a golf ball on the Moon^[14] The book was also turned into a TV miniseries in 1994.^[15]

Shepard died of leukemia near his home in Pebble Beach, California on July 21, 1998, (the 29th anniversary of the first moonwalk), two years after being diagnosed with that disease. He was the second person to die who had walked on the Moon. His wife of 53 years, Louise Brewer, died five weeks afterward. Both were cremated, and their ashes were scattered together by a Navy helicopter over Stillwater Cove,^[16] in front of their Pebble Beach home.^[12]

They had three daughters, Laura (born in 1947), Juliana (born in 1951) and Alice (born in 1951). Alice was Louise's niece, but raised as their own daughter.^[17] He also had six grandchildren.

Awards and honors[link]

During his life, Shepard was awarded the Congressional Space Medal of Honor (by President Jimmy Carter in 1978 for his pioneering Mercury flight); two NASA Distinguished Service Medals (1961 and 1971), the NASA Exceptional Achievement Medal, Naval Astronaut Wings, the Navy Distinguished Service Medal, and the Distinguished Flying Cross. He received the Langley Award (highest award of the Smithsonian Institution) on May 5, 1964; the Lambert trophy^{[disambiguation needed ]}; the Iven C. Kincheloe Award; the Cabot Award; the Collier Trophy; and the City of New York Gold Medal for 1971.

He was inducted into the U.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame on May 11, 1990.

The Navy named a supply ship, Alan Shepard (T-AKE-3), for him in 2006. A geodesic dome was built in his honor in Virginia Beach, Virginia but was demolished in 1994.^[18]

A Redstone missile, from which the Redstone booster used to launch Shepard aboard Freedom 7 was derived, is on display in the Warren, New Hampshire town square.

The McAuliffe-Shepard Discovery Center in Concord, New Hampshire is named after Shepard and Christa McAuliffe.

Interstate 93 in New Hampshire, from the Massachusetts border to its intersection with Route 101 in Manchester, is named in his honor. It passes through his native Derry. Interstate 565 in northern Alabama connecting Decatur, Alabama and Huntsville, Alabama is officially the Admiral Alan B. Shepard Highway.

His hometown of Derry has the nickname Space Town in honor of his career as an astronaut.^[19] Following an act of Congress,^[20] the Post Office in Derry is designated the Alan B. Shepard, Jr. Post Office Building.

His high school alma mater in Derry, Pinkerton Academy, has a building named after him; and the school team name is the Astros after his career as an astronaut.^[21] Alan B. Shepard High School, in Palos Heights, Illinois, which opened in 1976, was named in his honor. Framed newspapers throughout the school depict various accomplishments and milestones in Shepard's life. Additionally, an autographed plaque commemorates the dedication of the building. The school newspaper is named Freedom 7 and the yearbook is entitled Odyssey. Its television news show is called NASA – News About Shepard Astros.

Other schools which honor his memory include Alan B. Shepard Middle School, Deerfield, Illinois; Alan B. Shepard Middle School, San Antonio, Texas; Alan B. Shepard Elementary School, Bourbonnais, Illinois, Alan B. Shepard Elementary School, Old Bridge, New Jersey and, formerly, Alan B. Shepard Elementary School in Highland Park, Illinois (closed).

Alan Shepard Park in Cocoa Beach, Florida, a beach-side park south of Cape Canaveral, is named in his honor.^[22]

In a 2010 Space Foundation survey, Shepard was ranked as the ninth most popular space hero (tied with astronauts Buzz Aldrin and Gus Grissom).^[23]

In 2011, NASA honored Shepard with an Ambassador of Exploration Award, consisting of a moon rock encased in Lucite, for his contributions to the U.S. space program. His family members accepted the award on his behalf during a ceremony on April 28 at the U.S. Naval Academy Museum in Annapolis, Maryland, where it is on permanent display.^[24]

On May 4, 2011, the US Postal Service issued a first-class stamp in Shepard's honor—the first US stamp to depict a specific astronaut. The first day of issue ceremony was held at NASA's Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex.^[25]

Shepard Technology Award[link]

Each year, the Space Foundation, in partnership with the Astronauts Memorial Foundation and NASA, present the Alan Shepard Technology in Education Award for outstanding contributions by K–12 educators or district-level administrators to educational technology. The award recognizes excellence in the development and application of technology in the classroom or to the professional development of teachers. The recipient demonstrates exemplary use of technology either to foster lifelong learners or to make the learning process easier.^[26] Recipients include:

• 2001 Lori Byrnes
• 2002 Thomas F. Hunt, Frank E. Waller
• 2003 Brian Copes
• 2004 Charles Geach
• 2005 Ronald F. Dantowitz
• 2006 Kathy R. Brandon
• 2007 Luther W. Richardson
• 2008 Kevin L. Simmons
• 2009 Ricardo V. Soria^[27]
• 2010 Allen V. Robnett^[28]

In media[link]

• 1965 – The character of Alan Tracy in the Thunderbirds was named after him.^[29]
• 1983 film The Right Stuff – played by Scott Glenn
• 1998 HBO TV series From the Earth to the Moon – played by Ted Levine
• 2005 BBC TV series Space Race – played by Todd Boyce
• 2001 opening montage, Star Trek: Enterprise
• 2002 film Race to Space, played by Mark Moses
• 2004 - He is briefly mentioned in Metal Gear Solid 3 when he is said to be piloting a Lockheed M-21 in game.
• 2007 – The player character in BioWare's sci-fi video game series Mass Effect is surnamed "Shepard" in his honor.
• 2011 - Alternative music band They Might Be Giants briefly referred to him in the song ″Can't Keep Johnny Down″ from their album Join Us, in the following lyric: "Some dude/Hitting golf balls on the moon/Bathroom in his pants/And he thinks he's better than me..."

Gallery[link]

Shepard as Mercury astronaut   Shepard receiving the NASA Distinguished Service Medal from John F. Kennedy in 1963   Shepard at Houston's Mission Control during Gemini 6 in 1965   Shepard (right) with Apollo 14 crewmate Ed Mitchell in 1970   Shepard in 1970   Video image of Shepard golfing on the Moon during Apollo 14

Notes[link]

	United States Navy portal
	Spaceflight portal

 This article incorporates public domain material from websites or documents of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

References[link]

• Kranz, Gene. Failure Is Not an Option: Mission Control from Mercury to Apollo 13 and Beyond. ISBN 0-7432-0079-9.

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Alan Shepard

• Obituary, NY Times, July 23, 1998 "Alan B. Shepard Jr. Is Dead at 74; First American to Travel in Space"
• Alan Shepard – Daily Telegraph obituary
• Alan Bartlett Shepard at Find a Grave
• Alan Shepard: 1st American in Space – slideshow by Life magazine

David Icke
Icke in 2008
Born	David Vaughan Icke (1952-04-29) 29 April 1952 (age 60) Leicester, England
Residence	Ryde, Isle of Wight
Occupation	Writer and speaker
Years active	Since 1990
Known for	Football, television sports, books on global politics
Political party	Formerly the Green Party
Website
www.davidicke.com Icke's YouTube channel.

David Vaughan Icke (pronounced /aɪk/, or IKE, born 29 April 1952) is an English writer and public speaker, best known for his views on what he calls "who and what is really controlling the world." Describing himself as the most controversial speaker in the world, he is the author of 19 books and has attracted a global following that cuts across the political spectrum. His 533-page The Biggest Secret (1999) has been called "the Rosetta Stone for conspiracy junkies."^[1]

Icke was a well-known BBC television sports presenter and spokesman for the Green Party, when in 1990 a psychic told him he was a healer who had been placed on Earth for a purpose, and that the spirit world was going to pass messages to him so he could educate others. In March 1991 he held a press conference to announce that he was a "Son of the Godhead" – a phrase he said later the media had misunderstood – and the following month told the BBC's Terry Wogan show that the world would soon be devastated by tidal waves and earthquakes. He said the show changed his life, turning him from a respected household name into someone who was laughed at whenever he appeared in public.^[2]

He continued nevertheless to develop his ideas, and in four books published over seven years—The Robots' Rebellion (1994), And the Truth Shall Set You Free (1995), The Biggest Secret (1999), and Children of the Matrix (2001)—set out a moral and political worldview that combined New-Age spiritualism with a passionate denunciation of totalitarian trends in the modern world. At the heart of his theories lies the idea that a secret group of reptilian humanoids called the Babylonian Brotherhood controls humanity, and that many prominent figures are reptilian, including George W. Bush, Queen Elizabeth II, Kris Kristofferson, and Boxcar Willie.^[3]

Michael Barkun has described Icke's position as "New Age conspiracism," writing that he is the most fluent of the conspiracist genre. Richard Kahn and Tyson Lewis argue that the reptilian hypothesis may simply be Swiftian satire, a way of giving ordinary people a narrative with which to question what they see around them.^[4]

Personal life and career[link]

Early life and education[link]

Icke was born in Leicester General Hospital to Beric Vaughan Icke and Barbara J. Icke, née Cooke, who were married in Leicester in 1951. Icke was the middle child; there was a brother seven years older, and another seven years younger. Beric had wanted to be a doctor, but his family had no money, so he joined the Royal Air Force instead. He was awarded a British Empire Medal for gallantry in May 1943 after helping to save the crew of an aircraft that had crashed into the Chipping Warden air base in Oxfordshire. Along with a Squadron Leader, he ran into the burning aircraft, without protective clothing, and saved the life of a crew member who was trapped inside.^[5]

After the war, Beric got a job in the Gents clock factory, and the family lived in a slum terraced house on Lead Street, near Wharf Street in the centre of Leicester. When Icke was three, they moved to a housing estate known as the Goodwood, one of the 1950s council estates the post-war Labour government built. "To say we were skint," he wrote in 1993, "is like saying it is a little chilly at the North Pole." He remembers having to hide under a window or chair when the council man came to collect the rent—after knocking, the rent man would walk round the house peering through the windows to see whether anyone was at home. His mother never explained that it was about the rent; she just told him to hide, and Icke writes that he still gets a fright whenever he hears a knock on the door.^[6]

He was always a loner, spending hours playing with toy steam trains, and preferring to cross the street rather than speak to anyone. He attended Whitehall Infant School, then Whitehall Junior School, where he spent most of his time feeling nervous and shy, often to the point of almost fainting during the morning assembly and having to leave before he passed out. The family doctor suggested a referral to a child psychologist, but his father put his foot down.^[7]

Football and first marriage[link]

He made no effort at school and failed at practically everything, but when he was nine, he was chosen for the junior school's football team. It was the first time he had succeeded at anything, and he came to see football as his way out of poverty. He played in goal, which he writes suited the loner in him and gave him a sense of living on the edge between hero and villain.^[7]

After failing his 11-plus exam in 1963, he was sent to the city's Crown Hills Secondary Modern, rather than the local grammar school, where he was given a trial for the Leicester Boys Under-Fourteen team. He decided to leave school at 15 after being talent-spotted by Coventry City, who signed him up in 1967 as their youth team's goalkeeper. He also played for Oxford United's reserve team and Northampton Town, on loan from Coventry. Rheumatoid arthritis in his left knee, which later spread to the right knee, ankles, elbows, wrists, and hands, stopped him from making a career out of football. Despite often being in agony during training, he managed to play part-time for Hereford United – including in the first team when they were in the Fourth Division of the English Football League, and when they were promoted to Division Three – before the pain in his joints forced him to retire in 1973 at the age of 21.^[9]

He met his first wife, Linda Atherton, in May 1971 at a dance at the Chesford Grange Hotel near Leamington Spa; she was working as a van driver for a garage in Leamington. Shortly after they met, Icke had another one of the huge rows he had started having with his father—always a domineering man, his father was upset that Icke's arthritis was interfering with his football career—so he packed his bags and left home. He moved into a tiny bedsit and worked in a local travel agency during the day, travelling to Hereford twice a week in the evenings to play football. He and Linda were married on September 30 that year, four months after they'd met. A daughter was born in March 1975, followed by a son in December 1981, and another son in November 1992. Though the couple divorced in 2001, they remain good friends; she runs his publishing arm, David Icke Books, as well as producing some of his DVDs.^[10]

Sports presenter[link]

The loss of his position with Hereford meant that he and his wife had to sell their home, and for several weeks they lived apart, each moving in with their parents, but he found a job in 1973 as a reporter with the weekly Leicester Advertiser, through a contact who was a sports editor at the Daily Mail. He moved on to the Leicester News Agency, and through them did some programmes for BBC Radio Leicester, then worked his way up through the Loughborough Monitor, the Leicester Mercury, and BRMB Radio in Birmingham.^[11]

He worked for two months in Saudi Arabia in 1975, helping them run their national football team; it was intended to be a longer-term position, but he missed his wife and new daughter so much that he decided not to return after his first holiday back to the UK. He got his job back at BRMB, then applied successfully to work for Midlands Today at the BBC's Pebble Mill studios in Birmingham, and in 1981 moved on to become a sports presenter for the BBC's national programme, Newsnight. The following year he achieved his ambition when offered a job co-hosting Grandstand, at the time the BBC's flagship national sports programme.^[12]

He moved in 1982 to Ryde on the Isle of Wight, somewhere he had always wanted to live. He appeared on the first edition of British television's first national breakfast show, the BBC's Breakfast Time, on 17 January 1983, presenting the sports news for them until 1985. He also published his first book that year, It's a tough game, son!, about how to break into football.^[13]

He continued to work for BBC Sport until 1990, often on Grandstand and snooker programmes, and also at the 1988 Summer Olympics, but despite his professional success – he was by then a household name – a career in television began to lose its appeal for him. He wrote in Tales from the Time Loop (2003) that he was beginning to find television workers insincere, shallow, and vicious, with rare exceptions.^[14] His contract with the BBC was terminated in August 1990 thanks to a political row, when he refused to pay his Community Charge, a controversial local tax introduced that year in England by Margaret Thatcher. He did end up paying it, but his announcement that he was willing to go to jail rather than pay prompted the BBC, by charter an impartial public-service broadcaster, to distance itself from him.^[15]

Green Party, meeting with psychic healer[link]

Icke had begun to flirt with fringe medicine and New Age philosophies during the 1980s, in an effort to find relief from his arthritis, and this encouraged his interest in Green politics.^[16] He wrote his second book in 1989, It Doesn't Have To Be Like This, an outline of his views on the environment, and became involved with the Green Party from 1988 to 1991, rising to become one of their four Principal Speakers, a position the party had created in lieu of a leader. The Observer called him "the Greens' Tony Blair."^[17] He was regularly seen at high-profile events. He was invited in 1989 to debate animal rights during a televised debate at the Royal Institute of Great Britain, alongside Tom Regan, Mary Warnock, and Germaine Greer, and in September 1990 his name appeared on advertisements for a children's charity along with Audrey Hepburn, Woody Allen, and other celebrities.^[18]

He wrote that 1989 was a time of considerable personal despair for him, and it was during this period that he began to feel a presence around him.^[19] In March 1990 he had a sudden feeling while standing in newsagent's that a magnetic force was pulling his feet to the ground, and said he heard a voice tell him to look at a particular section of books. One of the books there was by Betty Shine, a psychic healer in Brighton. He decided to visit her to ask for help with his arthritis.^[20]

Icke said he had a mystical experience near this pre-Inca burial site in Peru.

Shine told him during their third meeting that she had a message for him from Wang Yee Lee, a being who she said looked like a Chinese mandarin and had Socrates standing next to him.^[21] The message was that Icke had been sent to heal the Earth. He would become famous, but would face opposition. The spirit world was going to pass ideas to him, which he would speak about to others, sometimes not understanding the words himself. She said he would write five books in three years; that in 20 years there would be a different kind of flying machine, where we could go wherever we wanted and time would have no meaning; and there would be earthquakes in unusual places, because the inner earth was being destabilized by having oil taken from the seabed.^[22]

As part of the process of making sense of this, he decided in February 1991 to visit the pre-Inca Sillustani burial ground near Puno, Peru, and while there felt drawn to a large mound of earth, at the top of which lay a circle of waist-high stones. As he stood in the circle, he again felt his feet pulled to the earth as if by a magnet, and an urge to outstretch his arms. His feet started vibrating, and his head felt as though a drill was passing through it. Two thoughts entered his mind: that people will be talking about this in 100 years, and then, "it will be over when you feel the rain." He said his body started shaking as though plugged into an electrical socket and new ideas began to pour into him. Then it started raining, and the experience ended as suddenly as it had begun. He described it later as the "kundalini"—a term from Indian yoga describing a libidinal force that lies coiled at the base of the spine—exploding up through his spine, activating his brain and his chakras, or energy centres, triggering a higher level of consciousness.^[23]

He returned to England and began to write a book about the experience, Truth Vibrations, which was published in May that year. At a Green Party conference in Wolverhampton on 20 March 1991, before the book appeared, he resigned from the party, telling them he was about to be at the centre of "tremendous and increasing controversy," and winning a standing ovation from them after the announcement.^[24]

Turquoise period[link]

What followed was what Icke calls his "turquoise period." He writes that he had been channelling for some time, and had received a message through automatic writing that he was a "Son of the Godhead," interpreting "Godhead" as the "Infinite Mind."^[25] He now began to wear only turquoise, which he saw as a conduit for positive energy. He had met Deborah Shaw, an English psychic living in Calgary, Alberta, in August 1990, and after he returned from Peru, they began a relationship, which led to the birth of a daughter in December 1991. At one point, Shaw moved in with him and his wife. Shaw changed her name to Mari Shawsun, while Icke's wife became known as Michaela, which she said was an aspect of the Archangel Michael. They became known in the press as the "turquoise triangle."^[17]

In March 1991, a week after he resigned from the Green Party – and shortly after his father died – the three of them held a press conference to announce that Icke was a son of the Godhead. He said the world would end in 1997, preceded by a number of disasters, including a severe hurricane around the Gulf of Mexico and New Orleans, eruptions in Cuba, disruption in China, a hurricane in Derry, and an earthquake on the Isle of Arran. Los Angeles would become an island, New Zealand would disappear, and the cliffs of Kent would be under water by Christmas. He told reporters the information was being given to them by voices and automatic writing.^[26]

He wrote in 1993 that he had felt out of control during the press conference. He heard his voice predict the end of the world, and was appalled. "I was speaking the words, but all the time I could hear the voice of the brakes in the background saying, 'David, what the hell are you saying?'" His predictions were splashed all over the next day's front pages, to his great dismay.^[27]

Terry Wogan interview[link]

The headlines attracted an invitation to appear on the BBC's prime-time Terry Wogan show, Wogan, on 29 April 1991. When asked if he was claiming to be the son of God, he did not disagree, and amid laughter from the studio audience, he repeated that Britain would soon be devastated by tidal waves and earthquakes.^[28] He also talked about politics and the environment:

When you survey the world today ... when a child dies in this world of preventable disease every two seconds, when the economic system of this world must destroy the Earth simply for that system to survive; when you see all the wars, and when you see all the pain, and when you see all the suffering, is it a force of love and wisdom and tolerance that is in control of this planet?^[30]

The interview proved devastating for him. The BBC was criticized for allowing it to go ahead, Des Christy in The Guardian calling it a "media crucifixion."^[31] Wogan interviewed Icke again in 2006, acknowledging that his comments during the first interview had been "a bit sharp."^[28] Icke disappeared from public life for a time, unable to walk down the street without people mocking him. His children were followed to school by journalists and ridiculed by schoolmates, and his wife would open the back door to get the washing in only to find a camera crew filming her.^[32] He told Jon Ronson in 2001:

One of my very greatest fears as a child was being ridiculed in public. And there it was coming true. As a television presenter, I'd been respected. People come up to you in the street and shake your hand and talk to you in a respectful way. And suddenly, overnight, this was transformed into "Icke's a nutter." I couldn't walk down any street in Britain without being laughed at. It was a nightmare. My children were devastated because their dad was a figure of ridicule.^[29]

Writing and lecturing[link]

Icke said the interview had been the making of him in the end, that the laughter had set him free. He wrote that every bridge back to his past was ablaze, giving him the courage to develop his ideas without caring what anyone thought of him.^[33] He continued to write, turning himself into a prolific and popular author and speaker, and in 1995 set up his own publisher, Bridge of Love Publications, later called David Icke Books.^[34] He met his second wife, Pamela Leigh Richards, in Jamaica in 1997. He and Linda divorced in 2001, though they remain the best of friends, and she is involved in the management of his publishing business. He and Pamela married in 2001 and separated in 2008.^[35]

Icke addressed the Oxford Union in 2008.

Lewis and Kahn write that Icke has produced a consolidation of all conspiracy theories into one project with unlimited explanatory power, his work cutting across class lines and political divisions.^[36] By 2006 he had lectured in 25 countries, his lectures were attracting audiences of several thousand, his books had been translated into eight languages, and his website was getting 600,000 hits a week. The Biggest Secret went through six reprintings between 1999 and 2006, and Alice in Wonderland and the World Trade Center Disaster (2002) became a top-five seller in South Africa.^[34]

He has become known in particular for his lengthy lectures, sometimes speaking for up to eight hours, then selling DVDs of the talks produced by his ex-wife, Linda Atherton. In February 2008 he was invited to address the Oxford Union, the University of Oxford's debating society. His book tour for Human Race Get Off Your Knees: The Lion Sleeps No More (2010) encompassed lectures in Australia, Croatia, the Netherlands, and the United States, and ends in October 2012 with a talk at London's Wembley Arena, tickets ranging from ₤35 to ₤55. During the tour, he received a standing ovation in November 2011 in New York after an eight-hour lecture to a 2,000-strong crowd at the Nokia Theater in Times Square.^[37]

He stood for parliament in the UK in July 2008 as "Big Brother—The Big Picture" in the Haltemprice and Howden by-election, coming 12th with 110 votes and losing his deposit. He explained that he stood because, "if we don't face this now we are going to have some serious explaining to do when we are asked by our children and grandchildren what we were doing when the global fascist state was installed. 'I was watching EastEnders, dear' will not be good enough."^[38]

Key ideas[link]

Icke combines metaphysical discussion about the nature of the universe and consciousness with conspiracy theories about public figures being satanic paedophiles, and how apparently random events are attempts to control humanity. He argued in The Biggest Secret that human beings originated in a breeding program run by a race of reptilians called Anunnaki from the Draco constellation, and that what we call reality is just a holographic experience; the only reality is the realm of the Absolute. He believes in a collective consciousness that has intentionality; in reincarnation; in other possible worlds that exist alongside ours on other frequencies; and in acquired characteristics, arguing that our experiences change our DNA by downloading new information and overwriting the software. We are also able to attract experiences to ourselves by means of good and bad thoughts.^[39]

Global Elite[link]

Icke argues that humanity was created by a network of secret societies run by an ancient race of interbreeding bloodlines from the Middle and Near East, originally extraterrestrial. Icke calls them the "Babylonian Brotherhood." The Brotherhood is mostly male. Their children are raised from an early age to understand the mission; those who fail to understand it are pushed aside. The spread of the reptilian bloodline encompasses what Norman Simms calls the odd and ill-matched, extending to 43 American presidents, three British and two Canadian prime ministers, various Sumerian kings and Egyptian pharaohs, and a smattering of celebrities such as Bob Hope. Key Brotherhood bloodlines are the Rockefellers, the Rothschilds, various European royal and aristocratic families, the establishment families of the Eastern United States, and the British House of Windsor—Icke identified the Queen Mother in 2001 as "seriously reptilian."^[40]

The Illuminati, Round Table, Council on Foreign Relations, Chatham House, the Trilateral Commission, the Bilderberg Group, the International Monetary Fund, and the United Nations, are all Brotherhood created and controlled, as are the media, military, CIA, Mossad, science, religion, and the Internet, with witting or unwitting support from the London School of Economics.^[41] At the apex of the Brotherhood stands the "Global Elite," identified throughout history as the Illuminati, and at the top of the Global Elite stand the "Prison Wardens." The goal of the Brotherhood—their "Great Work of Ages"—is world domination and a micro-chipped population.^[40]

Reptoid hypothesis[link]

Icke introduced the reptoid hypothesis in The Biggest Secret (1999), which identified the Brotherhood as descendents of reptilians from the constellation Draco, who walk on two legs and appear human, and who live in tunnels and caverns inside the earth. He argues that the reptilians are the race of gods known as the Anunnaki in the Babylonian creation myth, Enûma Eliš.^[42] According to Barkun, Icke's idea of "inner-earth reptilians" is not new, though he has done more than most to expand it.^[43]

The Draco constellation from Uranographia by Johannes Hevelius, 1690. Icke's "reptoid hypothesis" posits that humanity is ruled by descendents of reptilians from Draco.^[44]

Lewis and Kahn write that Icke has taken his "ancient astronaut" narrative from the Israeli-American writer, Zecharia Sitchin, who argued—for example in Divine Encounters (1995)—that the Anunnaki had come to Earth for its precious metals. Icke argues that they came specifically for "monoatomic gold," a mineral he says can increase the carrying capacity of the nervous system ten thousandfold. After ingesting it, the reptilians can process vast amounts of information, speed up trans-dimensional travel, and shapeshift from reptilian to human form.^[45] They use human fear, guilt, and aggression as energy. "Thus we have the encouragement of wars," he wrote in 1999, "human genocide, the mass slaughter of animals, sexual perversions which create highly charged negative energy, and black magic ritual and sacrifice which takes place on a scale that will stagger those who have not studied the subject."^[46] Lewis and Kahn argue that Icke is using allegory to depict the alien, and alienating, nature of global capitalism.^[47]

Icke writes that the Anunnaki have crossbred with human beings, the breeding lines chosen for political reasons, arguing that they are the Watchers, the fallen angels, or "Grigori," who mated with human women in the Biblical apocrypha. Their first reptilian-human hybrid, possibly Adam, was created 200,000–300,000 years ago. There was a second breeding program 30,000 years ago, and a third 7,000 years ago. It is the half-bloods of the third breeding program who today control the world, more Anunnaki than human, he writes. They have a powerful, hypnotic stare, the origin of the phrase to "give someone the evil eye," and their hybrid DNA allows them to shapeshift when they consume human blood.^[48]

In Children of the Matrix (2001), he added that the Anunnaki bred with another extraterrestrial race called the "Nordics," who had blond hair and blue eyes, to produce a race of human slave masters, the Aryans. The Aryans retain many reptilian traits, including cold-blooded attitudes, a desire for top-down control, and an obsession with ritual, lending them a tendency toward fascism, rationalism, and racism. Lewis and Kahn write that, with the Nordic hypothesis, Icke is mirroring standard claims by the far right that the Aryan bloodline has ruled the Earth throughout history.^[49]

Dimensions[link]

The reptilians not only come from another planet, but are also from another dimension, the lower level of the fourth dimension, the one nearest the physical world. Icke writes that the universe consists of an infinite number of frequencies or dimensions that share the same space, just like television and radio frequencies. Some people can tune their consciousness to other wavelengths, which is what psychic power consists of, and it is from one of these other dimensions that the Anunnaki are controlling this world—though just as fourth-dimensional reptilians control us, they are controlled, in turn, by a fifth dimension. The lower level of the fourth dimension is what others call the "lower astral dimension." Icke argued that it is where demons live, the entities Satanists summon during their rituals. They are, in fact, summoning the reptilians.^[50] Barkun argues that the introduction of different dimensions allows Icke to skip awkward questions about which part of the universe the reptilians come from, and how they got here.^[51]

Problem-reaction-solution[link]

In Tales From The Time Loop (2003), Icke argues that most organized religions, especially Judaism, Christianity and Islam, are Illuminati creations designed to divide and conquer the human race through endless conflicts, as are racial, ethnic, and sexual divisions. He cites the Oklahoma City bombing and 9/11 as examples of events organized by the Global Elite.^[52] The incidents allow the Elite to respond in whatever way they intended to act in the first place, a concept Icke calls "order out of chaos," or "problem-reaction-solution". He writes that there are few, if any, public events that are not engineered, or at least used, by the Brotherhood:^[17]

Image by Neil Hague from Icke's Infinite Love is the Only Truth (2005), showing the Brotherhood, or "Red Dresses." This image depicts George W. Bush, Tony Blair and Queen Elizabeth II as members of the Brotherhood.

You want to introduce something you know the people won't like. ... So you first create a PROBLEM, a rising crime rate, more violence, a terrorist bomb ... You make sure someone else is blamed for this problem ... So you create a "patsy," as they call them in America, a Timothy McVeigh or a Lee Harvey Oswald. ... This brings us to stage two, the REACTION from the people—"This can't go on; what are THEY going to do about it?" ... This allows THEM to then openly offer the SOLUTION to the problems they have created ..."^[53]

Red Dresses[link]

In Infinite Love is the Only Truth (2005), Icke introduces the idea of "reptilian software." He says that there are three kinds of people. The highest level of the Brotherhood are the "Red Dresses." These are "software people," elsewhere called "reptilian software," or "constructs of mind." They lack consciousness and free will, and their human bodies are holographic veils.^[54]

A second group, the so-called "sheeple"—the vast majority of humanity—have what Icke calls "back seat consciousness." They are conscious, but they do whatever they are told and are the main source of energy for the Brotherhood. They include the "repeaters," the people in positions of influence who simply repeat what other people have told them. Doctors repeat what they are told in medical school and by drug companies, teachers repeat what they learned at teacher training college, and journalists are the greatest repeaters of all. The third group, by far the smallest, are those who see through the illusion; they are people like Neo from the film, The Matrix. They are usually dubbed dangerous or mad. The "Red Dress" genetic lines keep obsessively interbreeding to make sure their bloodlines are not weakened by the second or third levels of consciousness, because consciousness can rewrite the software.^[54]

Moon Matrix[link]

The Moon Matrix is introduced in Human Race Get Off Your Knees: The Lion Sleeps No More (2010), in which he writes that the Earth and the collective human mind are manipulated from the Moon, a spacecraft and inter-dimensional, inter-density portal controlled by the reptilians. The Moon Matrix is a broadcast from that spacecraft to the "human body-computer," specifically to the left hemisphere of the brain, which gives us our sense of reality. He writes: "We are living in a dreamworld within a dreamworld—a Matrix within the virtual-reality universe—and it is being broadcast from the Moon." Unless people force themselves to become fully conscious, their minds are the Moon's mind, an idea further explored in his Remember Who You Are: Remember 'Where' You Are and Where You 'Come' From (2012).^[55]

Reception[link]

Protests[link]

In The Robots' Rebellion (1994), Icke introduced the idea that the Global Elite's plan for world domination was laid out in The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, a hoax published in Russia in 1903, which supposedly presented a plan by the Jewish people to take over the world.^[56] According to Mark Honigsbaum, Icke refers to it 25 times in the Robot's Rebellion, calling it the "Illuminati protocols."^[57]

In his 2001 documentary about Icke, Jon Ronson cited this cartoon, "Rothschild" (1898), by Charles Léandre, arguing that Jews have long been depicted as lizard-like creatures out to control the world.^[58]

The Protocols portrays the Jewish people as "cackling villains from a Saturday matinee," as Jon Ronson put it in his documentary about Icke, David Icke, the Lizards and the Jews (2001).^[56] It was published in English in 1920 by The Dearborn Independent, Henry Ford's newspaper, becoming mixed up with conspiracy theories about anti-Christian Illuminati, international financiers, and the Rothschilds, a Jewish banking dynasty. After it was exposed that year as a hoax by The Times of London, Michael Barkun writes that it disappeared from mainstream discourse until interest in it was renewed by the American far right in the 1950s.^[56] Barkun argues that Icke's reference to it is the first of a number of instances of him moving dangerously close to antisemitism.^[59]

Icke's use of the Protocols was greeted with dismay by the Green Party's executive. They had allowed him to address the party's annual conference in 1992, despite the controversy over his Wogan interview, but in September 1994 decided to deny him a platform.^[60] Icke wrote to The Guardian protesting against the decision, denying that The Robots' Rebellion was antisemitic, and rejecting racism, sexism and prejudice of any kind, but in the same letter insisted that whoever wrote the Protocols "knew the game plan" for the 20th century.^[61] Barkun argues that Icke was trying to have it both ways, offended by the allegation of antisemitism while "hinting at the dark activities of Jewish elites."^[62]