Chuck Yeager becomes the first person to break the sound barrier, flying the XS-1 aircraft above Muroc Field.

The Soviet Union launches Sputnik I, the world's first artificial satellite, into orbit and ignites the Space Age.

NASA announces Project Mercury, aiming to send an American human being into space inside an unpiloted capsule.

Volunteer military pilots undergo invasive physical examinations at the Lovelace Clinic in Albuquerque to qualify as astronauts.

NASA publicly introduces the seven selected astronauts—Carpenter, Cooper, Glenn, Grissom, Schirra, Shepard, and Slayton—at a Washington press conference.

The Mercury Seven begin their astronaut training at Langley Air Force Base in Virginia.

A chimpanzee named Ham is successfully launched into suborbital space and returns safely to Earth.

Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin becomes the first human being to orbit the Earth, leaving America behind once again.

Alan Shepard becomes the first American in space during a roughly 15-minute suborbital flight in the Mercury capsule.

President Kennedy announces that the United States will land an astronaut on the moon, committing NASA to an ambitious new goal.

The exit hatch of Gus Grissom's Mercury capsule blows off unexpectedly after splashdown, and the spacecraft sinks to the ocean floor.

John Glenn becomes the first American to orbit the Earth, completing three successful circuits in the Mercury-Atlas capsule.

Glenn's orbital flight triggers nationwide celebrations, including a massive ticker-tape parade through New York City drawing enormous crowds.

Gordon Cooper completes the longest American spaceflight yet, manually landing the capsule after the automatic controls fail.

Project Mercury concludes and the military test pilot community formally honors the Mercury Seven with the prestigious Kincheloe Award.

The Right Stuff traces the arc of early American spaceflight from Chuck Yeager's legendary sound-barrier breakthrough to the triumphant conclusion of Project Mercury. After the Soviet Union launches Sputnik and shocks the nation, NASA races to select and train the Mercury Seven astronauts for an unpiloted space capsule. Despite falling behind the Soviets when Yuri Gagarin becomes the first human in space, the United States responds with Alan Shepard's suborbital flight and John Glenn's historic orbital mission. Glenn's return sparks the greatest surge of American patriotism since World War II, and the program finds its footing despite Gus Grissom's capsule sinking after splashdown. The Mercury program ends on a high note with Gordon Cooper's record-setting flight and the formal recognition of the astronauts by the military test pilot community they had long sought to impress.

The headline events of the American space race.

Pete Conrad discovers the decapitated, charred body of fellow pilot Bud Jennings after a crash in Jacksonville.

Jane Conrad begins hallucinating that a uniformed official is solemnly walking up her driveway to announce Pete's death.

Chuck Yeager breaks two ribs in a drunken horse-riding accident the night before his record attempt but conceals the injury.

The US military publicly announces Yeager's sound-barrier achievement, sparking national fascination with high-speed test flight.

Scott Crossfield reaches Mach 2 in the D-558-2 Skyrocket, pushing the speed record well beyond Yeager's original achievement.

Pete Conrad and fellow test pilots receive a classified summons to the Pentagon for a secret briefing on Project Mercury.

Pete Conrad openly refuses to comply with humiliating psychological tests at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, effectively ending his Mercury candidacy.

The Mercury Seven's promoter Leo DeOrsey secures the astronauts a lucrative exclusive deal with Life magazine to profile the group and their wives.

Gordon Cooper awkwardly tells the press he misses the thrill of actual flying, creating an embarrassing distraction for NASA.

The Mercury Seven gather at the Konaki Hotel in San Diego and argue over whether to restrict their reckless off-duty behavior.

Two consecutive Redstone rocket tests at Cape Canaveral end in failures, threatening to derail the entire Project Mercury mission.

Alan Shepard is selected as the first astronaut to fly through a peer vote among the Seven, stunning frontrunner John Glenn.

Soviet cosmonaut Gherman Titov completes 17 full orbits of the Earth just sixteen days after Grissom's suborbital flight.

Scott Carpenter splashes down 250 miles past the target landing site after neglecting fuel levels during his orbital flight.

Pete Conrad joins the second group of NASA astronauts alongside Neil Armstrong, Frank Borman, and Jim Lovell.

Behind the public spectacle of Project Mercury lay a series of personal and institutional struggles that quietly determined its course. The story begins in the dangerous world of naval test flight, where Pete and Jane Conrad endure constant loss, before pivoting to Chuck Yeager's record-breaking exploits at Edwards Air Force Base and the public excitement those feats generated. The selection process for the Mercury Seven is grueling and often humiliating, filtering out capable pilots like Pete Conrad while elevating those who thrived under unusual conditions. Once chosen, the Seven negotiate publicity contracts, clash over off-duty behavior, and work to maintain a heroic public image even as rocket failures threaten to cancel the program. The Soviet Union's relentless advances keep the pressure high, and individual missions end in both triumph and embarrassment, as Scott Carpenter's errant splashdown vividly illustrates. Conrad's eventual selection for the second astronaut group provides a satisfying bookend to his journey through a program that once rejected him.

The behind-the-scenes moments that shaped the space program.

The Conrads endure a relentless cycle of accidents and funerals at Patuxent River, cementing the deadly rhythm of test pilot life.

Chuck Yeager arrives at Muroc Field after his World War II combat career and joins the top-secret XS-1 project.

British pilot Geoffrey de Havilland is killed attempting to break the sound barrier, making the feat seem physically impossible.

Chuck Yeager retires from test flight, effectively closing the legendary golden age of Edwards Air Force Base.

Chuck Yeager lets slip at a public Air Force event that he never volunteered for Mercury because it involves no real flying.

NASA engineers reveal they view astronauts primarily as passive biomedical test subjects rather than skilled pilots controlling a spacecraft.

The Mercury Seven successfully lobby NASA to redesign the space capsule to include a window and meaningful pilot controls.

The X-15 program at Edwards Air Force Base pulls ahead of Project Mercury in the race toward the edge of space.

Alan Shepard is forced to urinate inside his spacesuit after NASA delays the rocket launch for over four hours.

Betty Grissom is deeply offended when the government gives her husband Gus far less public recognition than Shepard received after his flight.

A chimpanzee named Enos successfully orbits the Earth, clearing the way for John Glenn's upcoming orbital spaceflight.

Deke Slayton is removed from flight status due to a minor heart irregularity, costing him his Project Mercury mission.

NASA flight director Chris Kraft labels Scott Carpenter a washout after Carpenter's fuel-wasting, dangerously errant reentry alarms the entire ground team.

Wally Schirra's precise, fuel-conserving orbital flight persuades the astronaut community that Mercury should focus on operational piloting rather than science experiments.

Chuck Yeager's NF-104 spins out of control and he catches fire during ejection, ending his career as a record-breaking test pilot.

Beneath the headline events of The Right Stuff lies a series of pivotal turning points that define the book's deeper argument about courage, identity, and cultural myth. The story begins with the deadly routine of test pilot life at Patuxent River before tracing Yeager's arrival at Muroc Field, where Geoffrey de Havilland's death had made breaking the sound barrier seem physically impossible. The tension between true piloting and the passive astronaut role drives the Mercury Seven to fight NASA engineers for control of their own spacecraft, even as the X-15 program threatens to render them irrelevant. Individual crises—Shepard's pre-launch indignity, Slayton's grounding, Grissom's wife's public humiliation, and Carpenter's near-disaster—reveal the human cost behind every mission and the fragility of the astronauts' heroic image. Schirra's textbook flight ultimately resolves the debate over what an astronaut should be, cementing the Seven's credentials as genuine pilots with the right stuff. The book closes as Yeager's fiery ejection over the Mojave marks the definitive end of his era and the astronauts' full inheritance of the pilot's throne.

The key decisions and revelations that redefined pilots, astronauts, and heroism.