DOROTHY NOVOTNY
Not long after graduating from UNO in 1962, Dorothy Novotny began preparing herself for life “in the final frontier” — space. Her efforts were chronicled in a 1967 article she wrote for the American Journal of Nursing: “Suited for Space Life.” In it, she recounted her experiences as one of the first two women to graduate from the U.S. Air Force’s Aerospace Nursing Program. Training included jumps from a helicopter into the ocean, experiencing weightlessness in a C-130, time on a centrifuge and rides in simulated flights in the Gemini spacecraft. She never made it to space, but five years after her article Novotny was part of the NASA team that performed autopsies on the three astronauts who died in the Apollo 1 crash. She retired as a Lt. Col. in 1979.