Simi Man’s Ashes Aboard 1st Orbiting Crypt

Shot into orbit aboard a funeral rocket Monday morning, James Spellman Sr. achieved in death what he could only dream of in life--space travel.

This morning, a tiny aluminum tube full of the former Simi Valley man’s cremated ashes is still whizzing around the Earth--along with the remains of Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry, psychedelic philosopher Timothy Leary and 21 other aerospace luminaries and average citizens--aboard a first-of-its-kind orbiting crypt.

The craft is to spin through the upper fringes of the atmosphere for two to six years, say officials of Houston-based Celestis Inc., the company that organized the launch.

Then its decaying orbit will send it plunging back toward Earth, to burn up harmlessly on reentry like a shooting star.

“I saw the [on-board] video, an aft-looking view as the vehicle powered its way up into lower Earth orbit,” said James Spellman Jr., who helped land his father a spot on the Celestis rocket through his own lobbying on behalf of commercial space exploration.

“It looks like it was fine,” he said. “It’s a bit of satisfaction, knowing that it’s been successful and that my dad is a rather unique pioneer in doing something not too many people living or deceased have done.”

Ginger Spellman wept when she learned of the launch.

James Spellman had been husband to her. He had helped raise their children in Simi Valley amid the booms of rocket engine tests as Rocketdyne muscled its way through the Space Race of the ‘60s, ‘70s and early ‘80s.

He had worked as a dedicated Air Force recruiter, and later a real estate broker. And he had made good friends who were with him through the last of his 67 years, until fast-moving brain cancer claimed his life in October.

So when word came from 50,000 feet above the Canary Islands that the rocket had safely dropped from beneath the wing of an L-1011 jet called Stargazer, ignited its motor and zipped into space piggybacked aboard a Spanish satellite, Ginger Spellman said, “I broke down.

“I went over to his picture--we have his picture here and we have [the rest of] his ashes here--and I had my few moments with him,” she said from their home near Lake Isabella, still holding back tears.

“It’s very moving,” she said. “I think it’s fantastic that he’s the one to go on the first mission up there. He’s setting a record.”

She is ambivalent about having Spellman ride the same craft as counterculture godfather Leary, saying only of the latter, “There’s always one bad apple in the bunch, so say I’m happy he is in the company of Gene Roddenberry and let it go at that.”

James Spellman Sr.’s closest friends say he would have loved the idea of having his ashes shot into space.

Longtime friend Chic Cicchelli recalls working as a civilian aircraft spotter just after World War II in Plainfield, N.J., where he met Spellman, the Air Force sergeant in charge of his division.

Cicchelli also remembers visiting Spellman where he lay dying of inoperable brain cancer at the Veterans Administration Hospital in Westwood last fall.

“He’d smile and say, ‘That’s good going, boys,’ ” Cicchelli said Monday. “I’m just so thrilled for him. I think he’d like that he was part of something that’s active, and brand new and a frontier.”

Spellman is in rich company.

The rocket carries a quarter-ounce each of ashes from his remains and those of Roddenberry and Leary.

The funds for Leary’s final trip were primarily contributed by his friends Susan Sarandon, the actress, and Tony Scott, director of “Top Gun” and other films, according to space industries consultant Carol Rosin, who said she told Leary about Celestis a few weeks before he died last year.

“He loved the idea that he was going to take this flight,” said Rosin, who was also on hand for the launch. “He would say, ‘Ride the light into space.’ ”

As for Roddenberry, Celestis officials say that one of the first people to buy a memorial flight was Majel Roddenberry, widow of the “Star Trek” creator who died in 1991. It was actually his ashes’ second ride into space--as a tribute, a bit of remains was taken along on a 1992 NASA mission.

The rocket also carries the ashes of Krafft Ehricke, a German V2 engineer who worked on this nation’s Apollo space program; Princeton physicist Gerard K. O’Neill, who conceptualized orbiting space colonies; and Todd Hawley, founder of the International Space University.

There are blue-collar passengers too--a Seattle dockworker, a New York restaurateur, a San Francisco graphic designer and a Chicago antifreeze salesman, according to the launch service’s Website, https://www.celestis.com

All were able to raise $4,800, the going rate for rocket-launched “interment” conducted by Celestis Inc., which plans to sent up two to three funeral shots per year.

Spellman’s family plans to fulfill his dying wish to have the bulk of his remains interred at Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia next month.

But his son says the family is proud to have a symbolic part of James Spellman Sr.’s remains join the Celestis space shot, which he likened to the ancient tradition of the Viking funeral.

“The family members would put the body of a loved one on a boat and cast it adrift on the sea,” said James Spellman Jr. “That was their universe, their life. . . . And as the boat drifted off to sea, they would fire flaming arrows into the ship to set it afire, cremating the body.

“As we homestead on the moon or go up on Mars, . . . we will have people that will live and ultimately die in space,” he said. “You’re going to have to answer the question, what are you going to do with the body? Are you going to ship it back to Earth or bury it where it falls?”

Times staff writer David Colker contributed to this report.