The Honorable Charles Bolden

Major General, U.S. Marine Corps (Ret.)
12th NASA Administrator
Founder & CEO Emeritus, The Charles F. Bolden Group

First as a Marine Corps Major General and then as NASA Administrator, Charles F. Bolden Jr. has dedicated his life to the service of the United States, working to secure our nation’s security and prosperity and guiding efforts to explore our universe and better understand our fragile planet.  In 2009, President Barack Obama appointed Bolden to be the 12th NASA Administrator, making him only the second astronaut to hold that position.  While heading NASA, Bolden oversaw the transition from the Space Shuttle system to a new era of exploration, fully focused on the International Space Station (ISS) and aeronautics technology development.

Bolden led the development of the Space Launch System and the Orion Crew Capsule.  Bolden also oversaw the shift toward commercial space initiatives handling resupply of the ISS.  He created NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate, responsible for developing the technology that will make future exploration missions successful. Bolden’s tenure included the triumph of the Mars Curiosity Rover landing, the success of the Juno mission that is helping us understand the planet Jupiter more completely, increasing the number of satellites tasked with Earth observation tasks, and continuing progress toward the December 2021 launch of the James Webb Space Telescope.  Not forgetting that the first “A” in NASA stands for Aeronautics, Bolden also focused his attention on NASA’s aeronautics programs and the agency’s goal of developing airplanes that can travel faster, farther, quieter and greener than ever before.

During his career as a NASA astronaut, Bolden flew on four Space Shuttle missions, logging over 680 hours in space.  He piloted Space Shuttle Columbia in 1986 (STS-61C) and Space Shuttle Discovery in 1990 (STS-31) – the mission that deployed the Hubble Space Telescope

Bolden was inducted into the U.S Astronaut Hall of Fame in 2006 and the National Aviation Hall of Fame in 2016. He served as a U.S. Department of State Science Envoy for Space from 2018-2019.

Bolden serves today as the Founder and CEO Emeritus of The Charles F. Bolden Group LLC, a veteran-owned small business specializing in space/aerospace exploration, national security, leadership, education (STEM+AD) and health initiatives.