Wally Funk: The Woman Who Waited 60 Years to Touch the Stars

Have you ever wanted something so badly that you waited your whole life for it? Most of us give up on our childhood dreams as we get older. We tell ourselves it is too late. But not Wally Funk. At 82 years old, she did something most people only dream of. She went to space. And she did it 60 years after she first trained to become an astronaut.

The story of wally funk is not just about space travel. It is about never taking no for an answer. It is about a woman who was told “no” over and over again simply because she was born female. But she never stopped flying. She never stopped aiming higher. In this article, we will take a friendly, deep dive into the incredible life of this American hero. From her childhood in New Mexico to her record-breaking space flight with Jeff Bezos, let’s explore why wally funk is a name we should all remember.

Who is Wally Funk?

Mary Wallace Funk, known to everyone as Wally, was born on February 1, 1939, in Las Vegas, New Mexico . But she grew up in the beautiful artistic town of Taos. Her parents owned a variety store, and her family was surrounded by art from the famous Taos art colony . But Wally was not interested in paintings. She was interested in airplanes.

From a very young age, wally funk knew she belonged in the sky. When she was just one year old, her parents took her to an airport. Little Wally crawled right up to the wheel of a big Douglas DC-3 airplane and tried to turn the nut on it. Her mother looked at her and said, “She’s going to fly” . And she was right. By age seven, Wally was building model airplanes from balsa wood. By age nine, she had her first flying lesson . The sky was calling her, and she was listening.

A Childhood Reaching for the Sky

Growing up in Taos, wally funk was not a typical girl of the 1940s. She was adventurous and fearless. She spent her time riding bikes, riding horses, skiing, hunting, and fishing . At just 14 years old, she became such a good shooter that she won the Distinguished Rifleman’s Award. Her scores were so impressive that the National Rifle Association sent them to President Dwight Eisenhower. And guess what? He wrote back to her .

At the same age, she was also representing the southwestern United States as a top female skier in downhill and slalom races . Wally was not just good at one thing. She was good at everything she tried. But flying was always her true love. She idolized Amelia Earhart, the famous pilot who was the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean . Wally dreamed of following in her footsteps.

Fighting for Her Education

When Wally got to high school, she hit her first roadblock. She wanted to take classes like mechanical drawing and auto mechanics. These were subjects that would help her understand how airplanes worked. But the school said no. Because she was a girl, she was only allowed to take “girl” classes like home economics .

This made Wally furious. So, at just 16 years old, she left high school early and enrolled in Stephens College in Columbia, Missouri . Stephens College had a famous women’s flying club called the “Flying Susies.” This was perfect for Wally. She joined the club and quickly became the top student in her class of 24 fliers . In 1958, she graduated with her pilot’s license . She was only 19 years old.

From there, wally funk went to Oklahoma State University. Why? Because they had the best pilot training program in the country, called the “Flying Aggies” . At OSU, she earned every aviation certificate you can imagine. She learned to fly commercial planes, multi-engine planes, seaplanes, and gliders. She became a flight instructor. She won trophies like “Outstanding Female Pilot” and “Flying Aggie Top Pilot” . She was proving that girls could fly just as well as boys.

Becoming a Professional Aviator

At just 20 years old, wally funk became a professional aviator . Her first job was at Fort Sill, Oklahoma. She worked as a civilian flight instructor, teaching noncommissioned and commissioned officers of the United States Army how to fly . Think about that. She was a young woman teaching grown men in the military how to fly planes. And she was the first woman to ever do this job at a US military base .

In 1961, she moved to California and worked as a charter pilot and chief pilot for an aviation company . She kept adding to her skills. In 1968, she earned her Airline Transport Rating. She was only the 58th woman in the entire United States to do this . She applied to work for commercial airlines, hoping to become a pilot. But every single time, they turned her down. The reason? She was a woman . It was unfair, but Wally did not give up. She just found another way to fly.

The Mercury 13: So Close to Space

Now we get to the most important part of the wally funk story. In February 1961, something exciting happened. A doctor named William Randolph Lovelace started a secret program. He wanted to see if women could be astronauts. He invited women pilots to come to his clinic in New Mexico and take the same tests that the male Mercury 7 astronauts took .

Wally wrote to him and shared all her accomplishments. She was only 21, younger than the preferred age range. But Dr. Lovelace invited her anyway . Twenty-five women were invited. Nineteen showed up. And thirteen passed all the tests. Wally was the youngest of the group . The media later called them the “Mercury 13” .

The tests were brutal. The women spent hours in sensory deprivation tanks. This means floating in dark, silent water to see if they would hallucinate. Most people could not handle it for long. Wally funk stayed in the tank for 10 hours and 35 minutes without hallucinating. That was a record . On some tests, she actually scored better than John Glenn, the famous astronaut . She was third best in the whole program .

But then, it was over. The program was canceled before the women could take their final test. Without warning, their dreams of going to space were crushed. The reason? They were women. At a government hearing, astronaut John Glenn testified that “the fact that women are not in this field is a fact of our social order” . In other words, society was not ready for female astronauts.

Never Giving Up on the Dream

Most people would have given up after being told “no” so many times. But wally funk is not most people. She kept flying. She kept working. And she kept applying to NASA. Four different times, she applied to become an astronaut. Four different times, they turned her down . They said she did not have an engineering degree or experience as a test pilot . But really, the door was just not open for women yet.

So Wally built an amazing career outside of NASA. In 1971, she became the first woman to complete the FAA’s General Aviation Operations Inspector Academy course . She was the first female field examiner for the Federal Aviation Administration . In 1974, she made history again. She became the first female Air Safety Investigator for the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) . In this job, she investigated over 450 plane crashes . She traveled all over the country figuring out why planes went down.

While doing all this, wally funk also competed in air races. In 1975, she won the Pacific Air Race, beating 80 other pilots . She also placed high in the famous Powder Puff Derby. She was not just sitting around waiting for space. She was living a full, adventurous life in the sky.

A Lifetime of Teaching and Inspiring

One of the most amazing things about wally funk is how many people she taught. Over her long career, she soloed more than 700 students. That means she helped them fly alone for the first time. And she put more than 3,000 students through various flight training programs . She was a chief pilot for five different aviation schools .

She became a renowned speaker on aviation safety. She traveled the world sharing her knowledge. In 1986, she was the key speaker for the United States at The World Aviation Education and Safety Congress . She was an expert, and people respected her knowledge.

In 1987, she became Chief Pilot at Emery Aviation College in Colorado, where she oversaw flight programs for 100 students . Even in her 80s, she was still giving flying lessons every Saturday . Her motto was simple: “Higher, faster, longer” .

Finally Getting Some Recognition

In 1995, something wonderful happened. Lt. Col. Eileen Collins was about to become the first woman to pilot a Space Shuttle. NASA invited wally funk and six other Mercury 13 women to watch the launch . They got a VIP tour of the Kennedy Space Center. It was a small gesture, but it meant the world. NASA was finally acknowledging these women and what they had done.

In 2007, the US Congress formally honored the Mercury 13. They passed a resolution calling them “pathfinders for NASA’s female astronauts” . They encouraged young women to follow in their footsteps. It was official recognition, 46 years after their program was canceled.

But Wally still wanted to go to space. In 2010, she put down $200,000 of her own money for a ticket on Virgin Galactic, Richard Branson’s space plane . She was 71 years old. She told a reporter, “I will get up there somehow. I’ll be flying ’til I die” .

The Big Day: July 20, 2021

Then, in July 2021, the phone rang. It was Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon and Blue Origin. He invited wally funk to be his “honored guest” on the first human flight of his New Shepard rocket . He told her, “No one has waited longer. It’s time” .

On July 20, 2021, at 82 years old, Wally Funk climbed into a rocket. The date was special. It was exactly 52 years after Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walked on the moon . The rocket launched from the desert in West Texas. It traveled at nearly three times the speed of sound. It crossed the Kármán line, the official boundary of space, 62 miles above Earth .

The whole flight lasted just over 10 minutes. But for wally funk, it was the moment she had waited for since she was a little girl touching airplane wheels in New Mexico. During the flight, she could be heard whooping with joy and saying “wow” . After the capsule parachuted back to Earth, she climbed out and spread her arms wide. She was grinning from ear to ear. “I want to go again. Fast!” she told the cheering crowd .

A Record-Breaking Achievement

By flying that day, wally funk became the oldest person ever to go to space. She broke a record that had been held by John Glenn for 23 years. Glenn had flown on the Space Shuttle at age 77 in 1998 . Wally was 82 years and 169 days old . Later that same year, actor William Shatner (Captain Kirk from Star Trek) flew on another Blue Origin flight at age 90, breaking Wally’s record for oldest person . But Wally still holds the record for the oldest woman to travel to space .

After the flight, she received her astronaut wings from a former Space Shuttle commander . She was officially an astronaut. Sixty years after she first trained, she had finally made it. In 2022, the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum awarded her the Michael Collins Trophy for Lifetime Achievement . In 2024, she was inducted into the Guinness World Records Hall of Fame .

Life Today: The Last Survivor

Today, wally funk lives in Grapevine, Texas . After her space flight, her hometown threw a big parade for her . She is now the last surviving member of the Mercury 13 . All the other women have passed away. Wally is the only one who lived long enough to finally reach space.

She still loves adventure. She collects and restores antique automobiles, including a beautiful 1951 Rolls-Royce . She has logged over 19,600 hours of flight time in her life . That is more than two full years spent in the air. And true to her word, she is still going. She told a reporter after her flight, “I did a lot of places but the most fabulous thing of my life was being with Blue Origin. And of course… I want to go back up with him again” .

What We Can Learn from Wally Funk

The story of wally funk teaches us so much. It teaches us that dreams do not have an expiration date. You are never too old to reach for the stars. It teaches us that rejection is not the end. Wally was told “no” more times than we can count. But she kept going. She kept flying. She kept living.

It also teaches us about fairness. The Mercury 13 women were just as qualified as the men. They passed the same tests. Some did even better. But because of discrimination, they were denied their chance. Wally’s story reminds us how important it is to keep fighting for equality. Today, half of NASA’s astronaut recruits are women . That change happened because of pioneers like Wally Funk.

Finally, her story teaches us about joy. Look at the photos of Wally after her space flight. She is beaming. She is celebrating. She waited 60 years, and when her moment finally came, she enjoyed every single second of it. That is a beautiful way to live.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. Who is Wally Funk?
Wally Funk is an American aviator and one of the Mercury 13, a group of women who trained to be astronauts in the early 1960s. In 2021, at age 82, she became the oldest woman to fly to space .

2. How old was Wally Funk when she went to space?
She was 82 years old when she flew on Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket on July 20, 2021 .

3. What was the Mercury 13?
The Mercury 13 was a group of 13 women who passed the same physical tests as NASA’s male astronauts in the early 1960s. They were never allowed to go to space because of their gender .

4. Did Wally Funk ever become a NASA astronaut?
No. She applied to NASA four times and was rejected each time. She finally flew to space with the private company Blue Origin in 2021 .

5. What records does Wally Funk hold?
She holds the record for the oldest woman to travel to space. She also previously held the record for oldest person in space until William Shatner flew later in 2021 .

6. Is Wally Funk still alive?
Yes! As of 2026, Wally Funk is alive and living in Grapevine, Texas. She is the last surviving member of the Mercury 13 .

Conclusion

Wally Funk is proof that patience and passion can move mountains. She faced closed doors at every turn. She was told she could not do things because she was a girl. But she never believed it. She just kept flying higher, faster, and longer. For 60 years, she carried the dream of space in her heart. And when she finally got there, she made it count.

The story of wally funk is one of the most inspiring stories of our time. It reminds us that it is never too late. It reminds us to keep dreaming, no matter how old we get. Wally once said, “I’ll be flying ’til I die” . And knowing her, she probably will.