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Mercury-Atlas 2 (MA-2) was an unmanned test flight of the Mercury program using the Atlas rocket. It launched on February 21, 1961 at 9:12 a.m. (EST), from Launch Complex 14 at Cape Canaveral. Test objectives for this flight were concerned with the ability of the spacecraft to withstand reentry under the temperature critical abort conditions and with the capability of the Atlas to meet the proper injection conditions. MA-2 flew a successful suborbital mission that lasted 17 minutes 56 seconds. Altitude reached was 114 miles (183 km), speed, 13,227 mph (21,287 km/h).

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[NASA caption] The Mercury spacecraft is being checked shortly after being placed aboard The USS Donner at 10:09 on February 21st. The Mercury capsule landed 1,425 miles downrange after a successful launch boosted by a modified Atlas from Cape Canaveral, Fla.

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From left to right and top to bottom, Gus Grissom, Alan Shepard, Scott Carpenter, John Glenn, Gordon Cooper, Deke Slayton and Walter Schirra pose with James S. McDonnell (back row, second from left), president of the company which designed and manufactured the Mercury spacecraft and Walter Burke, McDonnell Aircraft’s Mercury project manager (middle, far left).

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The first three Americans to fly in space were, from left to right, Virgil “Gus” Grissom; John Glenn; and Alan Shepard . They posed for this photo while anticipating their flights of Mercury Redstone 4, Mercury Atlas 6, and Mercury Redstone 3, respectively.
They personified the Thomas Wolfe–coined term, “the Right Stuff.”
Glenn was the first American to orbit the Earth, while Shepard was NASA’s first astronaut to go into space. Grissom, who six years later lost his life in the Apollo 204 (also known as Apollo 1) fire at Cape Kennedy, flew a suborbital mission, launched between the flights of Shepard and Glenn.

“On February 22, 1961, the Space Task Group announced that Shepard, Glenn, and Grissom had been chosen to begin special training for the Mercury Redstone 3 vault into space. More than a month before the public announcement, Robert Gilruth personally had made his choice, even to the exact flight order of the men selected” (NASA SP-4201, p. 341).

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Jim McNearny, one of the contracted RCA and Technicolor photographers at Cape Canaveral, took this superb photograph of the Mercury Atlas 3 rocket lifting off from pad 14 at Cape Canaveral.

“Mercury Atlas 3 (MA-3) was to be an orbital flight test of the Mercury capsule. The capsule contained a mechanical astronaut. After lift-off, the launch vehicle failed to roll to a 70 degree heading and to pitch over into the proper trajectory. The abort-sensing system activated the escape rockets prior to the launch vehicle’s destruction by the range safety officer, approximately 40 s into the flight. At that time the vehicle had achieved an altitude of about 5 km. The capsule then coasted up to 7 km, deployed its parachutes, and landed in the Atlantic Ocean about 1.8 km north of the launch pad. The capsule was recovered and was found to have incurred only superficial damage. It was subsequently shipped back to the manufacturer for refitting. The refitted capsule was reflown on Mercury Atlas 4” (https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/nmc/spacecraftDisplay.do?id=MERCA3)