Mercury Redstone 1 is fueled in preparation for launch on 21 November 1960 at Cape Canaveral, carrying the first human-rated spacecraft to achieve a successful spaceflight but on a subsequent launch (Mercury Redstone 1-A) as Mercury Redstone 1 failed to take off and was known as the “four-inch flight.” Fred Santomassino was a contracted NASA / RCA photographer at Cape Canaveral.

After the launch failure of a Mercury capsule mated to an Atlas rocket (Mercury Atlas 1, 29 July 1960), Mercury Redstone 1 (MR-1) was the first scheduled flight of the Mercury capsule mated to the Redstone booster. Launch of MR-1 was attempted on 21 November 1960, but after rising a few inches from the pad, the engines cut off and the rocket settled vertically back on the launcher. The termination of thrust resulted in the escape tower being jettisoned, but the spacecraft did not separate from the booster due to g-load sensing requirements not being met.

The Mercury capsule was refurbished and mated to a new launch vehicle to be launched as Mercury Redstone 1A (MR-1A) launched on December 19, 1960 from Launch Complex 5 at Cape Canaveral, using the same undamaged Mercury capsule atop a Redstone launch vehicle. The mission objectives of this unmanned suborbital flight were to qualify the spacecraft for spaceflight and for an upcoming primate suborbital flight. The mission was completely successful. The Mercury capsule reached an altitude of 130 miles (210 km) and a range of 235 miles (378 km). The Mercury spacecraft was recovered from the Atlantic Ocean by recovery helicopters about 15 minutes after landing. The flight time was 15 minutes and 45 seconds. (https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/nmc/spacecraft/display.action?id=MERCR1)