Alan Bean, fourth man to walk on moon, at 86
Alan Bean, the fourth man to walk on the Moon who later turned to painting, died yesterday. He was 86.
Mr. Bean, a native of Wheeler, Texas, was a member of the Apollo 12 mission in November 1969, traveling to the moon alongside Pete Conrad and Richard Gordon.
Mr. Bean and Conrad conducted experiments on the moon’s surface and installed a nuclear power generator on the moon.
He was also spacecraft commander of Skylab Mission II in 1973, spending 59 days in space.
In total, Mr. Bean logged 69 days, 15 hours and 45 minutes in space, including 31 hours and 31 minutes on the moon’s surface.
After his space days, Mr. Bean became a painter, inspired in large part by his space travel experiences.
His Apollo-themed paintings featured canvases textured with lunar boot prints and were made using acrylics embedded with small pieces of his moon duststained mission patches.
“In his 18 years as an astronaut, he was fortunate enough to visit worlds and see sights no artist’s eye, past or present, has ever viewed firsthand and he hopes to express these experiences through the medium of art,” NASA wrote in its biography on Bean.
Mr. Bean was hospitalized in mid-May after traveling to Indiana for a speech, the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette reported.
“Alan was the strongest and kindest man I ever knew. He was the love of my life and I miss him dearly,” said Leslie Bean, Alan Bean’s wife of 40 years. “A native Texan, Alan died peacefully in Houston surrounded by those who loved him.”
Mr. Bean had two grown children, a son and a daughter.