WASHINGTON -- Former Apollo 12 astronaut Richard Gordon, one of a dozen men who flew around the moon but didn't land there, has died, NASA said. He was 88.
After retiring from NASA in 1972, he became executive vice president of the New Orleans Saints football team. He went on to be an executive in energy and science companies.
Richard "Dick" F. Gordon Jr. was a test pilot chosen in NASA's third group of astronauts in 1963. He flew on Gemini 11 in 1966, walking in space twice. During Apollo 12 in November 1969, Gordon circled the moon in the command module Yankee Clipper while Alan Bean and Charles Conrad landed and walked on the lunar surface.