Astronaut Calls Kid, 6, Who's Fighting to Save NASA

A 6-year-old Denver boy is such a big fan of outer space that he created an online petition on the White House's We the People website when he heard that Congress might slash NASA funding. Connor Johnson still has a long way to go—about 85,000 signatures—to warrant an official White House response, but a phone call yesterday is delivering a jolt of publicity. It came from none other than Gene Cernan, who was the last astronaut to walk on the moon 41 years ago, reports 9News.

"You've got to dream about things that a lot of other people think you can't do," Cernan told Connor. The youth started the petition when his family pointed out that his gesture of donating $10.41 from his piggy bank to NASA probably wouldn't make much of a difference, reports the Independent. The pitch from Connor himself: "A lot of people want NASA to come back, even grown-ups," he says. "It's just really important so please sign it." (More astronaut stories.)