Former NASA astronaut to speak at Alumni Center

This Friday, held in conjunction with the This is Auburn Speaker Series, former NASA astronaut and Auburn alumna Jan Davis will present “An Auburn Astronaut: My Journey into Space.”

Davis’ speech will be part of the Auburn University Libraries’ "Discover Auburn Women of Distinction," a lecture series celebrating 125 years of Auburn women. The speech will be held at 3 p.m. in the atrium of the Auburn Alumni Center.

Davis earned bachelor’s degrees from Auburn University and the Georgia Institute of Technology in mechanical engineering and biomedical engineering, respectively, before completing graduate research work at the University of Alabama in Huntsville.

As an astronaut she logged more than 670 hours, and orbited the earth 325 times on three space shuttle flights. She joined NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville in 1979 as an aerospace engineer, and was selected in 1987 to join the Astronaut Corps at the Johnson Space Center in Houston.

Davis held many leadership positions with NASA before retiring from the agency in 2005. She continues to work with Gastion Technologies, a NASA contractor at the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville.

In 2012, she received Auburn University’s Lifetime Achievement Award. She is married to the Honorable Dick Richardson, judge for the District Court of Madison County, and has two children. She speaks frequently on topics related to space and science.