Franklin Story Musgrave is a man of great accomplishment, the winner of countless awards, including the Phi Delta Theta Distinguished Alumnus Award presented in 1994, and the recipient of many other honors. He is a doctor, a retired astronaut, a public speaker and consultant to both The Walt Disney Company Imagineering Group and Applied Minds in California. Throughout his career, Story has launched into many things: his education, unique hobbies, new careers, and most notably, outer space. Now, this Famous Phi is helping to launch Phi Delta Theta’s True Blue Society.
Story was initiated into Phi Delta Theta by the New York Epsilon chapter at Syracuse in 1956 and graduated in 1958. He went on to receive several other degrees including a bachelors from Marietta College; master’s degrees from UCLA, the University of Kentucky, and the University of Houston, as well as, his doctorate in medicine from Columbia University. He entered the United States Marine Corps in 1953 where he flew over 18,000 hours in 160 different types of civilian and military aircraft, including 7,500 hours in jet aircraft. Also an accomplished parachutist, he has made more than 500 free falls — including over 100 experimental free-fall descents involved with the study of human aerodynamics.
In August 1967, he was selected as a scientist-astronaut by NASA and flew on the maiden voyage of Space Shuttle Challenger, which launched from the Kennedy Space Center, Florida, on April 4, 1983. He retired from NASA in 1997, after completing 6 Shuttle missions which makes him the only astronaut to have flown missions on all five Space Shuttles and has him recording 1,281 hours 59 minutes, 22 seconds in space.
Today, when Story is not speaking or consulting, he is captivated by his many hobbies and associations. His hobbies include chess, flying, gardening, literary criticism, microcomputers, parachuting, photography, reading, running, scuba diving, and soaring. Story is a member of Alpha Kappa Psi, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Beta Gamma Sigma, the Civil Aviation Medical Association, the Flying Physicians Association, the International Academy of Astronautics, the Marine Corps Aviation Association, the National Aeronautic Association, the National Aerospace Education Council, the National Geographic Society, the Navy League, the New York Academy of Sciences, Omicron Delta Kappa, Phi Delta Theta, the Soaring Club of Houston, the Soaring Society of America, and the United States Parachute Association.
