<Tr> <Td_colspan="2"> <P> Spacecraft name as painted on the capsule side </P> Alan Bartlett Shepard, Jr . Project Mercury Manned missions ← Mercury - Redstone BD Mercury - Redstone 4 → </Td> </Tr> <P> Spacecraft name as painted on the capsule side </P> <P> Mercury - Redstone 3, or Freedom 7, was the first United States human spaceflight, on May 5, 1961, piloted by astronaut Alan Shepard . It was the first manned flight of Project Mercury, the objective of which was to put an astronaut into orbit around the Earth and return him safely . Shepard's mission was a 15 - minute suborbital flight with the primary objective of demonstrating his ability to withstand the high g - forces of launch and atmospheric re-entry . </P> <P> Shepard named his space capsule Freedom 7, setting a precedent for the remaining six Mercury astronauts naming their spacecraft . The number 7 was included in all the manned Mercury spacecraft names to honor NASA's first group of seven astronauts . His spacecraft reached an altitude of 101.2 nautical miles (187.5 kilometers) and traveled a downrange distance of 263.1 nautical miles (487.3 kilometers). It was the fourth Mercury flight launched with the Mercury - Redstone Launch Vehicle, from Cape Canaveral, Florida, close to the Atlantic Ocean . </P>

Who is the astronaut onboard of freedom 7