Benedict Dead. Stop the Presses.

Veteran Journalist dies
Howard Benedict, 77
Cocoa, Florida

As a journalist he watched the birth of the Space Age. He brought it to us, moment by moment, launch after launch, as we reached for the stars. Lofting humans, men he knew on a first name basis, friends of his, into the unknown frozen darkness of Space. He celebrated our their victories and mourned their deaths. Now we mourn his.
Howard Benedict, 77, an Associated Press reporter for more than 37 years, he covered the Space Race from the word "go." He covered more than 2000 launches and wrote three books about Space and co-wrote "Moon Shot: The Inside Story of America's Race to the Moon" a New York Times bestseller.
It could be argued his greatest achievement was in helping form the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation with the Mercury 7 astronauts. One of the ASF scholars is now a Mars mission manager at NASA. According to their site:

Emily Eelkema, Astronaut Scholar from the University of Minnesota, has recently been promoted to Mission Manager for the Mars Exploration Project. She will be one of three mission managers in charge of running the twin rovers. "The mission manager oversees the daily planning process," says Eelkema. "They also monitor overall spacecraft health." Eelkema has been at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory for 5 years. She joined the MER project just before they landed on Mars last year.

Benedict, who is survived by his wife, died at his home Monday. But I am certain his soul is sailing through the stars today.