BY SAUNDRA AMRHEIN
The Cincinnati Enquirer
The two 11-year-olds sat like statues before their school television sets -- one in Florida, the other in northern Ohio.
As the clock ticked down in 1962 for Friendship 7, they, like other children across America, watched in awe and fear, hoping John Glenn would make it.
Thirty-six years after that successful Earth orbit, Carl and Kris Kalnow of Hyde Park are hard-pressed to convey the wonder of the space race and fear of Soviet competition to their three children.
It is the eve of the Kalnows' departure for Florida, where they will watch the second flight of Mr. Glenn when he blasts off aboard Discovery.
Mr. Kalnow, a Cincinnati investment banker and trustee for Mr. Glenn's alma mater, Muskingum College, was invited by the school to attend. He wanted his family to be part of the historic moment. "So much of this was unknown, the whole experience was new," Mr. Kalnow said, describing Mr. Glenn's first trip on the Mercury rocket.
Aside from fretting over Mr. Glenn's ability to survive zero gravity, children feared the capsule could not return without frying Mr. Glenn.
"When he came back, everybody was just ecstatic," Mrs. Kalnow said. "He really was a hero."
The couple still feel a sense of awe in Mr. Glenn's presense at trustee meetings or functions.
"The whole thing with John Glenn was such a big deal," Mrs. Kalnow said. "It's hard to make our kids have the same feeling." Though the two girls, 11-year-old Caroline and 9-year-old Kelsey, are excited about the trip, they first balked at missing Halloween events.
It helped that a trip to Walt Disney World was thrown into the deal.
"I'd rather do this because it's a once-in-a-lifetime thing," Kelsey said. "You can have a Halloween party every year."
For her 13-year-old brother, Chip, it's going to take more than Mickey Mouse and a taste of history to spark his interest. If it were up to him, Chip would be waiting this trip out.
"I didn't really have a choice," he said, stretched on a patio recliner.
His mother remarks on the seventh-grader's short memory. Just a few years ago, Chip attended a weeklong space camp in Huntsville, Ala.
"When he came back from space camp, he was so excited," Mrs. Kalnow said. "He brought us back space food, magazines and a hat. He was talking about it constantly. He was the one who talked his sister into going." Caroline will attend in March.
For a generation accustomed to shuttle flights, enthusiasm is fleeting.
"Now that people have been going to space so much, they don't really realize the risk it is," Caroline said. "People just think they're going up for fun, but they're really going up there to learn more things about space for different projects."
Mr. Glenn's second flight makes Mrs. Kalnow look back on her own life. So much has changed. Yet as John Glenn returns to space, she's not feeling quite so old.
"Here's somebody who did this so many years ago when I was a little kid. I was my kids' age when he originally took off," Mrs. Kalnow said. "Now I realize how I've changed and all the years passed, and for him to go and do the same thing again is incredible."
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