Ground-breaking scientist, 70-year military veteran dies
By the MVI
Monessen native and retired U.S. Air Force colonel Dr. Tom Tredici, known for helping design the gold visor Apollo astronauts used to protect their eyes while walking on the moon, died April 28 in San Antonio, Texas, at age 98.
The last scientist to work at Brooks City-Base after the Air Force moved the base’s missions to Ohio, Tredici maintained an office near the installation’s fabled centrifuge that had trained NASA astronauts, writing a history of the Air Force’s School of Aerospace Medicine, where he had worked 40 years.
He began that project after retiring at 90.
He piloted B-17G Flying Fortress bombers from Great Britain, tended to the wounded in the Korean and Vietnam wars, and served as chief of ophthalmology at the U.S. Air Force School of Aerospace Medicine.
Long before Tredici began his successful military and medical careers, he was just another Monessen kid learning to speak English.
During a 2012 interview with now-Mon Valley Independent Managing Editor Stacy Wolford, he described his life as being full and fascinating.
“It has been quite an adventure,” Tredici said following his 90th birthday.
To read the rest of the story, please see a copy of Saturday’s Mon Valley Independent, call 724-314-0035 to subscribe or subscribe to our online edition at http://monvalleyindependent.com.
