For Pete Conrad, who was born in Philadelphia and raised in Devon, life started out smoothly. His family lived comfortably on Waterloo Avenue with a nanny, chauffeur, maids, and a chef, according to a report in Main Line Today.

In the 1940s, however, the Conrad family’s comfortable life ended when Conrad’s father suffered a financial slide due to the Great Depression.

In 1947, Pete Conrad failed out of The Haverford School. While reading his books, he suffered from headaches and the words all ran together. Today, Conrad would be diagnosed as dyslexic.

[uam_ad id=”58459″]

Advertisement

He attended an alternative school in New Lebanon, N.Y., where he excelled at sports and made the academic honor roll. He went on to attend Princeton University on a full Navy scholarship, graduating in 1953.

In 1958, he was accepted into the Navy’s test-pilot school and was invited to apply for NASA’s first class of astronauts. Initially, he washed out of the program, but he reapplied and joined NASA in 1962.

In 1969, Conrad commanded the Apollo 12 mission, and spent almost eight hours on the surface of the moon.

Read more about Pete Conrad in Main Line Today by clicking here.

[uam_ad id=”71799″]