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Ham's Destiny
(discovered on 090601)

"All six chimps in the colony were accorded equal treatment until the day before the flight, when James P. Henry of STG and John D. Mosely, the veterinarian from Holloman, had to choose the test subject and his substitute. First the animals were given a physical examination, and then they were each checked [314] on sensors, the psychomotor programmer, and consoles for comparative ratings. The competition was fierce, but one of the males was exceptionally frisky and in good humor. A female was selected as his alternate. At nineteen hours before launch these two animals were put on low-residue diets, fitted with biosensors, and checked out in their pressurized couch-cabins. Seven and one-half hours before the flight a second physical examination was given, followed by more sensor and psychomotor tests. About four hours before launch, the two chimps were suited up, placed in their couches, and brought aboard the transfer van, where their environmental control equipment was attached. The trailer truck arrived at the gantry alongside MR-2, and there, an hour and a half before the scheduled launch time, the chimpanzee named "Ham," in honor of Holloman Aerospace Medical Center, still active and spirited although encased in his biopack, boarded the elevator to meet his destiny."

From a NASA report