Eugene Merle Shoemaker:
Dr. Shoemaker helped pioneer the field of astrogeology by founding the Astrogeology Research Program of the USGS in 1961 at Flagstaff, Arizona. He was its first director. He was prominently involved in the Lunar Ranger missions to the Moon, which showed that the Moon was covered with a wide size range of impact craters. Dr. Shoemaker was also involved in the training of the American astronauts.
He was set to be the first geologist to walk on the Moon but was disqualified due to being diagnosed with Addison's disease, a disorder of the adrenal gland. Shoemaker would train astronauts during field trips to Meteor Crater and Sunset Crater near Flagstaff.
Coming to Caltech in 1969, he started a systematic search for Earth orbit-crossing asteroids, which resulted in the discovery of several families of such asteroids, including the Apollo asteroids.
Dr. Shoemaker spent much of his later years searching for and finding several previously unnoticed or undiscovered meteor craters around the world. It was during one such expedition that Dr. Shoemaker died in a car accident while on the Tanami Road northwest of Alice Springs, Australia in July 1997.
On July 31, 1999, some of his ashes were carried to the Moon by the Lunar Prospector space probe in a capsule designed by Carolyn Porco. To date, he is the only person to have been buried on the Moon.
The brass foil wrapping of Dr. Shoemaker's memorial capsule is inscribed with images of Comet Hale-Bopp, the Barringer Crater, and a quotation from Romeo and Juliet reading:
"And, when he shall die
Take him and cut him out in little stars
And he will make the face of heaven so fine
That all the world will be in love with night
And pay no worship to the garish sun."
