In 2005, Master Sgt. Holly Graham started her Air Force career using her hands to fly satellites for the U.S. Air Force Space Command. With a raise of her right hand on February 9, she enlisted into the Space Force, the nation’s newest military branch.
“It was awesome that I got to start my career in space,” Graham said. “Now I can end my career in space.”
Graham was promoted to master sergeant on February 1. Her transition to the Space Force took place one week later.
Graham, a native of Rogersville and graduate of Lauderdale County High School, was one of four Airmen from the 627th Communications Squadron at Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington State who transferred to become Guardians with the Space Force at a ceremony inside the base’s McChord Field Theater.
The U.S. Space Force was established on December 20, 2019, as the newest branch of the U.S. Armed Forces.
In January, the Secretary of the Air Force selected Huntsville’s Redstone Arsenal as the preferred location for the U.S. Space Command’s headquarters. The final determination is expected to be announced in the spring of 2023.
Giving a boost to Huntsville as the preferred location for the Space Command headquarters is the presence of NASA’s historic Marshall Space Flight Center, where scientists and engineers worked on the Saturn V rockets that propelled 24 NASA astronauts to the moon from 1968 to 1972. Vital rocket work continues in Huntsville to this day.
The proposed location of the new Space Command headquarters caught Graham’s attention.
“My grandfather worked on the Saturn V rockets in Huntsville,” Graham said in February. “I’ll have to be sure to tell the Space Force assignment office that if they need someone to go to Huntsville, I’ll go.”
Learn more about the U.S. Space Force here.
Comments are closed.