Donn Fulton Eisele was a United States Air Force officer, test pilot, and later a NASA astronaut. He served as command module pilot for the Apollo 7 mission in 1968. After retiring from both NASA and the Air Force in 1972, he became the Peace Corps country director for Thailand, before moving into private business.
Eisele in 1964
Eisele prior to launching of Apollo 7
The Apollo 7 crew: Eisele (l.), Wally Schirra (c.), and Walter Cunningham (r.)
Barbara Eden, Bob Hope, the Apollo 7 astronauts, and Paul Haney (voice of Mission Control) on The Bob Hope Show (November 6, 1968)
Apollo 7 was the first crewed flight in NASA's Apollo program, and saw the resumption of human spaceflight by the agency after the fire that had killed the three Apollo 1 astronauts during a launch rehearsal test on January 27, 1967. The Apollo 7 crew was commanded by Walter M. Schirra, with command module pilot Donn F. Eisele and lunar module pilot R. Walter Cunningham.
Apollo 7 transmitted the first live television broadcast aboard a crewed American spacecraft.
Schirra's crew in training for Apollo 2, 1966
The crew during water egress training
CSM-101 pre-launch