VAN HORN, Texas (NEWSnet/AP) — Ed Dwight, the United States’ first Black astronaut candidate more than six decades ago, rocketed into space Sunday, flying with Jeff Bezos’ rocket company.

Dwight, 90, went through a few minutes of weightlessness with five other passengers aboard the Blue Origin capsule as it skimmed space on a roughly 10-minute flight. He called it “a life changing experience.”

“I thought I really didn’t need this in my life,” Dwight said shortly after exiting the capsule. ”But, now, I need it in my life .... I am ecstatic.”

Dwight was joined by four business entrepreneurs from the U.S. and France and a retired accountant.

Dwight was an Air Force pilot when he was championed by President John F. Kennedy as a candidate for NASA’s astronaut corps. But he wasn’t chosen for the 1963 class.

After leaving the military in 1966, Dwight worked at IBM, then started a construction company before earning a master’s degree in sculpture in the late 1970s. His sculptures focus on Black history and include memorials and monuments. Several of his sculptures have been flown into space.

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