F-106B 59-0158 in it's glory years with the 7 Original Mercury Astronauts taken on 1 Jan 1961. Information obtained on 16 April 2002 about the date of this photo: The photo indicates it was taken in 1971, however it was really taken on 1 Jan 1961 as can be seen in this NASA link. Charlie Gindhart was a person who knew the 1971 date must be wrong, because he knew where 58-0158 was during that time, and it wasn't Langley. An e-mail he sent to the NASA Langley Research Center revealed the real date was in fact uncovered to be 1961. The center is changing the photo caption to reflect the error, but we all know this photo has been around a long time so it will remain out there. Another obvious reason this could not have been in 1971 is that Gus Grissom was killed on 27 January 1967 along with fellow astronauts Ed White and Roger Chaffee during a training exercise and pre-launch test for the Apollo 1 mission at the Kennedy Space Center. In addition, photos from that event had been published in Life magazine for a decade by then and that Glenn, Schirra, Cooper, and Carpenter had already left NASA by 1971. Another tell-tale sign is that the AF wasn't painting buzz numbers anymore in 1971 as is painted on the fuselage of 158 here.