The 1983 film "The Right Stuff" is a film based on the 1979 book The Right Stuff by Tom Wolfe about the first American National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) astronauts known as the "Mercury Seven", all men and all military test pilots. The film begins with the test pilots, then the testing and selection of astronauts, and finally the first four space flights. Test pilot Chuck Yeager rolls a quarter, Astronaut Alan Shepard is awarded a NASA medal, and astronaut Virgil I. "Gus" Grissom takes small coins and rolls of coins to a bar and also onto a space flight.

The Happy Bottom Riding Club was a bar located at Edwards Air Force Base. The base was located in the California desert north of Los Angeles. In the late 1940's and early 1950's the bar was a hangout for the test pilots who flew experimental jet aircraft. The owner places photographs of test pilots who have died in crashes on the wall.

Chuck Yeager (Sam Shepard), a famous Air Force pilot, hangs out there.

Chuck handles a quarter (US 25 cents coin) which was the price of a drink then. Some new test pilots arrive from other military facilities including Gordon "Gordo" Cooper, Virgil I. "Gus" Grissom (Fred Ward), and Donald K. "Deke" Slayton (Scott Paulin). Gordo (left) handles two quarters.

A closer look at the quarters.

The quarters are silver Washington quarters, minted from 1932 to 1964. On October 4, 1957 the Russians launch the Sputnik satellite into space and American government officials are shocked.

They decide to fund an expanded space program which would require recruiting astronauts from the ranks of test pilots as they are believed by the NASA administrators to have the "right stuff" for flying in space. Numerous men apply and are put through various physical tests, some of them quite bizarre. Finally the NASA administrators select seven men and hold a news conference.

The Russians launch some of their men "cosmonauts" into space and the Americans decide to launch a special "astronaut."

This astronaut is a chimpanzee named Ham who becomes LIFE Magazine's cover story. Several astronauts visit the NASA Moffett Field (California) wind tunnel.

This NASA facilty tests airplane flight characteristics. In 1961 astronaut Alan Shepard is the first American to fly into space and is awarded a medal by President Kennedy.

The medal is the NASA Distinguished Service Medal. President Kennedy holds a round medal which was the design used from 1959 to 1964.

Alan wears the medal's second design which has edges on the sides which was used starting in 1964. The astronauts and their friends hang out at local bars in Florida.

Although the hotel and bar are supposed to be located in Florida, the bar is actually the Mermaid Room in the El Rancho Inn located in Millbrae, California. Gus and Gordo hang out at the bar watching the "mermaids."

Gus has rolls and stacks of nickels (five cent coins) and dimes (ten cent coins) in front of him. A nickel roll is 40 coins or $2.00 and a dime roll is 50 coins or $5.00.

Gus plays with minature space capsules and offers one to a waitress.

Gus places a dime into a dime roll. Later his reason for carrying coin rolls will become apparent. On July 21, 1961, Gus is launched into space and lands in the ocean.

The space capsule door opens accidently causing the capsule to sink. Gus is rescued by a helicopter and taken to a ship.

When he arrives on the ship coins and coin rolls fall out of his clothes onto the deck.

Gus starts picking up the money while a ship officer watches.

These are nickel coins and rolls. The fate of the dimes was discovered years later. The Happy Bottom bar catches fire and is destroyed.

Various people who had happy times visit the remains. The Mercury astronauts are taken to Houston Texas for a massive indoor production celebrating the opening of the NASA Houston facility.

Gus and his wife Betty are among the astronauts honored at this Texas motorcade. Gordon Cooper gets his flight on May 15, 1963.

A large crowd of tourists with cameras ready watch Gordo blast off.

Sam Shepard as Chuck Yeager
Fred Ward as Virgil "Gus" Grissom
Dennis Quaid as Gordon "Gordo" Cooper
Ed Harris as John Glenn
Scott Glenn as Alan Shepard
Lance Henriksen as Walter "Wally" Schirra
Scott Paulin as Donald K. "Deke" Slayton
Barbara Hershey as Glennis Yeager
Veronica Cartwright as Betty Grissom
Donald Moffat as Lyndon B. Johnson
Mary Jo Deschanel as Annie Glenn
Director: Philip Kaufman
Writers: Philip Kaufman
Based on the 1979 book The Right Stuff by Tom Wolfe