Roll Call Tribute

Aaron Cohen, an emeritus professor at Texas A&M University and the former director of NASA's Johnson Space Center who helped create the space shuttle program, died in 2010 in College Station after a long fight with cancer. He was 79.

A 1952 graduate of Texas A&M, Cohen was named director of the Johnson Space Center in 1986 after the space shuttle Challenger exploded, killing teacher Christa McAuliffe and six astronauts. He told The Associated Press then that flying the shuttle safely would depend on "paying attention to detail" and he would encourage those who worked for him to do so.

Cohen was at the helm when shuttle flights resumed nearly three years later and continued to lead the center until 1993, when he returned to A&M as the H.B. Zachary Professor in the College of Engineering.

At A&M, he taught a two-semester mechanical engineering design course to seniors until his retirement in 2000, when he became professor emeritus of mechanical engineering. He received an honorary doctorate from A&M in January.

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