MOTHER'S PRIDE GOES INTO SPACE - News

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Oct. 25, 2008
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

MOTHER'S PRIDE GOES INTO SPACE

By MAGGIE LILLIS
REVIEW-JOURNAL

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Helen Garriott, left, her son Robert Garriott and friend Rose Turner share a toast in the cramped kitchen of Helen's Las Vegas apartment on Thursday night. They gathered to watch Helen's son Richard land safely in a Russian Soyuz space capsule after spending 12 days on the international space station.
Photo by David Becker/Review-Journal

Richard Garriott

Richard Garriott, pictured from a computer monitor, speaks on a satellite phone after landing in a grassy field in Kazakhstan on Thursday. Garriott's mother, Helen Garriott, was watching his landing on her home computer in Las Vegas.
Photo by David Becker/Review-Journal

Helen Garriott was a world away from her son as he spent the past two weeks on the international space station, but she was with him all the way.

From her Las Vegas home, she kept watch over every step of the 47-year-old American space tourist's journey.

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Garriott, 78, has seven three-ring binders brimming with photos, articles, e-mail exchanges and other information about Richard Garriott's 12-day trip printed from her computer, where she often sat for hours watching live satellite feeds from the space station.

Armed with her digital camera, she and another son, Robert, and a neighbor watched the Russian Soyuz capsule safely touch down Thursday night.

The landing was uneventful by mission control's standards, but the trio made a party out of it around Helen's computer in her narrow kitchen.

"I only held my breath some of the time," she said. "I almost feel like I made the trip with him."

In many ways, she did.

Garriott, a lifelong artist, and her son tested an art project together aboard a zero-gravity plane flight in Las Vegas in March. They released droplets of ink inside a plastic bag on canvas while bumping and floating into their fellow flyers.

The whole weightless experience is chronicled in one of her many memory binders.

"That was just gobs of fun. I haven't done anything like that before," Helen said.

The pair chatted about the art project during a six-minute personal call Richard made to his mother while orbiting the Earth on Sunday. It was a success.

While in orbit Richard also displayed pieces of her artwork, which will be auctioned for charity.

But Helen Garriott is no newcomer to the space program.

Richard Garriott paid $30 million for the space flight to follow in the footsteps of his father, Owen K. Garriott, a former NASA astronaut who flew three space missions in the 1970s and 1980s. Owen was in Kazakhstan for the landing.

Richard once played the Harry Chapin 1974 folk rock song "Cats in the Cradle" for his mother to drive the message home -- "I'm going to be like you, Dad."

"Ever since he was 13, he had his sights set on space," Helen said.

At the time, the family would keep track of Owen's progress in Houston and scramble to their NASA-issued "squawk box" when they knew he would be able to talk with them.

Helen's Las Vegas apartment is a time capsule from that past.

Pictures of Owen and his crew in space are mounted on the wall, but are smaller than the shot of the men and their wives, including Helen, standing with President Nixon in the White House.

A telescope is perched near the balcony, space shuttle replicas line a bookshelf, and patches from both Richard's and Owen's space flights hang on the wall.

In another room, Helen has a separate table where she has microscopes to analyze various things and books about protozoans checked out from the library.

"I've always been interested in science," said Helen, who admitted to aspiring to be a botanist at one point.

The sense of adventure is something Helen gladly passed on to her four children.

Eye problems prevented Richard from joining the NASA space program but his dream didn't fade. After corrective eye surgery and financial boosts from sponsors, the computer game designer made his dream a reality.

He was the sixth space tourist to travel on the Russian spacecraft to the International Space Station, a fete he arranged through Space Adventures Ltd. Richard is an investor and board member for the company as well.

His mission caps off a list of other adventures including parachuting from a hot-air balloon, traveling to the deep reaches of the ocean in a Russian submarine, and visiting the wreckage of the Titanic, which sank to the floor of the Atlantic Ocean in 1912.

"He's an adventurer, that's for sure," his mother said. "This is about as far as he can go."

Helen moved to Las Vegas eight years ago for a change of pace from her native Oklahoma.

"I had run out of things to do and I began watching soaps on TV and I said, 'This isn't going to work, I've got to get a life,' " she said.

For the last few weeks, Richard's flight has been her life, and she is proud of that.

"It's been absolutely perfect. They couldn't have asked for a better flight," Helen said.

"He has already said he wants to go back."

Contact reporter Maggie Lillis at mlillis@ revewjournal.com or 702-383-0279.

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Please enter your name Name: Please enter your email Email: Please enter a comment COMMENTS : (word count limit is 300) You have reached the maximum number of words allowed Current Word Count: Note: Comments made by reporters and editors of the Las Vegas Review-Journal are presented with a yellow background. showboater wrote on October 26, 2008 11:21 AM: Hey, check out the Obama t-shirt from egomaniacs who spend $35 million to amuse themselves! Maybe Obama ought to spread THEIR wealth around since they want the rest of us taxed to death. If you do some googling on the Garriotts and Space Adventures and NcSoft you're going to read about a lot of unhappy and broken investors, disappointment and layoffs. These bums are predators, and now they want to tell you who to vote for. Pride, vanity and profound selfishness.... CT Wolf wrote on October 26, 2008 12:49 AM: I'm so sick of hearing about Obongo this, Obongo that. Are you too tired of hearing about the media's new "boy"? If so, visit C H l M P O U T . C O M RealAmerican wrote on October 25, 2008 11:27 PM: Betty, bend over dear while I give you the offical hand salute of the New Obama Administration. The self indulgent sone spends $30 million on a flight of fancy while the mother no doubt sucks off the public dole in a cracker box hell hole of an apartment! Meanwhile the radical left want to redistribute the wealth! ya right, that's going to work out real good. The rumor is if Obama loses the election the blacks will riot in the streets. Watch what happens when he does win and it wont be riots you will see from white americans, you will be seeing a 2nd Revolution and overthrow of this corrupt government! Dont thinks so brother? Well its already started! Jen wrote on October 25, 2008 05:57 PM: So you all see a t-shirt and go into orbit - I can't wait until November 5 when I can read a human interest article without the wackos showing up. Herb wrote on October 25, 2008 04:05 PM: As soon as I saw that Obama shirt I lost interest in this family and whatever kind of space trip they are going on. Too bad Obama fans can't all go up in space and start their own Marxist colony. mike wrote on October 25, 2008 03:05 PM: Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) has been attacking Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) as a “tax-and-spend liberal” for his plan to roll back the Bush tax cuts. Under President Bush, however, whose tax plan McCain wants to make permanent, only 4.8 million jobs were created. President Clinton, however, created 23 million jobs after raising income taxes and investing at home mike wrote on October 25, 2008 03:04 PM: Elliott Parker, Ph.D., who is a Professor of Economics at the University of Nevada-Reno. Using data from the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Economic Analysis, Dr. Parker first compared the economic performance of Republican and Democratic presidencies from 1929 through the end of 2005. He found that the Real GDP Growth Rate (annual average) was 1.9% for Republican administrations and 5.1% for Democratic administrations during this time. Real GDP Growth Rate Per Capita was .7% for the Republicans and 3.8% for the Democrats. However, the professor pointed out that the years comprising the Great Depression and WWII should probably be excluded from the comparison. So economic performance from 1949 (end of Truman administration) to 2005 was compared, which showed Real GDP Growth Rate (annual average) under Republican administrations now stood at 2.9% and Democratic administrations at 4.2%. Real GDP Growth Rate Per Capita was 1.7% for the Republicans and 2.9% for the Democrats. These results prompted Dr. Parker to conclude that “the economy has grown significantly faster under Democratic administrations, and more than twice as fast in per-capita terms.” The University of Nevada-Reno economics professor also uncovered the following while conducting the economic comparison between Republican and Democratic presidential administrations from 1949 to 2005: • Unemployment Rate- Republicans 6.0%, Democrats 5.2% • Change In Unemployment Rate- Republicans +0.3%, Democrats -0.4% • Growth of Multifactor Productivity- Republicans 0.9%, Democrats 1.7% • Corporate Profits (share of GDP)- Republicans 8.8%, Democrats 10.2% • Real Value of Dow Jones Index- Republicans 4.3%, Democrats 5.4% (in logarithmic growth rates)- Republicans 2.8%, Democrats 4.4% • Real Weekly Earnings- Republicans 0.3%, Democrats 1.0% • CPI Inflation Rate- Republicans 3.8%, Democrats 3.8% M wrote on October 25, 2008 02:39 PM: Meanwhile, over 500 people get laid off at the Bellagio in the last two days, whilst hundreds of other employees at other MGM Mirage properties get canned and the RJ isn't saying a word. City Center is in financial trouble due to mismangement and casino workers are paying the price. Speak up RJ or do your advertisers forbid it? dur wrote on October 25, 2008 12:32 PM: was, good luck finding that $250k job! Tell me how it goes, m'kay? Captain Obvious wrote on October 25, 2008 11:57 AM: Please let me correct my statement Mad Anerican. This idiot should use some of the donated 30 million dollars to hire a maid for his mother, and feed about 20,000 starving people for a year. I'm sorry that I overlooked the selfishness of this idiot that would waste this much money on his own pleasures. Read All Comments