Robert Laurel Crippen (born September 11, 1937) in Beaumont Texas is a retired United States Navy Captain and former astronaut for the United States Department of Defense and for NASA. He was the pilot of the First Space Shuttle flight and flew three additional missions as commander. Crippen is a recipient to the Congressional Space Medal of Honor. He married Pandora Lee Puckett of Miami, Florida. She was NASA’s first female lead Orbiter Project Engineer on the Space Shuttle Atlantis and Challenger at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. He has three daughters from a previous marriage.