From Skylab to the Artemis II

Residents of The Glen at Scripps Ranch bring a lifetime of experience, unique careers, and stories tied to major moments in history. One of those residents is Buddy Bregman.

Buddy is a retired aerospace engineer whose work contributed to laying the foundation for America’s space program and whose experience spans the early days of space stations to NASA’s current lunar program, including the Artemis II mission.

After retiring and moving into The Glen at Scripps Ranch, he spends his time mentoring others and sharing his enthusiasm for space exploration, a passion he’s had since childhood.

Artemis II: A Milestone Mission

NASA’s Artemis II mission marked the first crewed flight of the Artemis program and the first time in more than half a century that astronauts traveled around the Moon.

For Buddy, Artemis II is part of a much longer story; it reflects decades of incremental progress built on programs like Skylab and the Space Shuttle, where programs like Skylab and the Space Shuttle helped prove technologies NASA still relies on.

After Artemis II returned safely to Earth on April 10, NASA’s focus shifted toward the next phase of lunar exploration. For those who helped build the foundations of this work, it represents both a culmination and a continuation.

Inspiring Students and Neighbors Through Space Science

Over his 50-year career, Buddy worked on the Viking Mars Lander, Skylab, and contributed to the original Space Shuttle proposal. He began at GE developing satellite systems during the Cold War, later worked in Denver and at Cape Canaveral, and spent years in California with The Aerospace Corporation and in support of the National Reconnaissance Office.

He didn’t consider retiring until he attended a retirement seminar, where he learned about the importance of choosing a retirement community that offered the activities he wanted to pursue.

After nearly 30 years in Los Angeles, Bregman and his wife of 63 years chose to relocate to San Diego to be closer to family. They settled at The Glen at Scripps Ranch, where he has become an active member of the community.

The retirement community is located just 20 minutes from the Fleet Science Center in Balboa Park, where he volunteers and gives presentations on magnetism, gravity, Mars landings, and the construction of the space shuttle to students in grades 2 through 9.

“It’s really exciting to see the light in their eyes when I start explaining the shuttle program,” Bregman told McKnight’s Senior Living during an interview. “It’s a hands-on exhibit for kids, and we get a lot of them that come through with school tours.”

Before the launch, Bregman did a presentation on the program to a packed house of neighbors at The Glen at Scripps Ranch. He said they were just as enthusiastic as the students he meets every week. These talks blend technical insight with personal history, offering a rare perspective from someone who helped build the systems that now carry astronauts farther into space than any crew has in decades.

“We’ve got 530 people here who have been involved in so many different aspects of exciting fields in the United States,” Bregman said. “Some people are lawyers, some people are doctors, some people are engineers, and we are able to talk about our experiences, and that’s the most important thing; to keep active, to keep asking questions, we’re always curious, and you have to do that in your retirement years, so you get the best of everybody’s experience.”