Space Shuttle ade

A Blast From The Past: Shuttle Through The Decades from NPR on Vimeo.
While looking at the short NPR video over at Vimeo of the Space Shuttle's beginnings, it occurred to me - perhaps belatedly - why this last launch is such a sad event. The whole premise of sticking yourself on top of a burning candle just doesn't compare with the elegance of returning to earth in the same vehicle you took off in with a certain degree of style. A glide landing on an airstrip is so much more civilized than a splashdown in some ocean waiting to be fished out by a glorified trawler.
So, in that sense, the Space Shuttle, did live up to it's promise. It may not have been the cheap, reusable space truck that was envisioned, but it made space travel civilized.