Third in a series

Young Achiever wants to be astronaut

Ten-year-old Alexander Ecklund knows he wants to be an astronaut. And he's already taken the first political step to making that happen.

The young Wildwood resident thinks his best chance would be to attend the U.S. Naval Academy. He said that's because the academy "produces the most astronauts per year of any college."

But he knows each academy appointment must be endorsed by a U.S. congressman. So Alexander already has written to tell U.S. Rep. Todd Akin (Rep., Mo.) of his interest.

Alexander said, "He wrote back and said I needed to be older. Of course, I already knew that. But, he did give me a lot of other good stuff." Alexander plans to keep reminding Representative Akin of his interest in the coming years.

By the time he enters college, Alexander will certainly have a very full resume. He's already done enough things in school, church and community to be named a 2003 St. Louis Young Achiever of the Year.

(Young Saint Louis.com first announced the Achiever winners in May, 2003. Since then, YSL.com has been running profiles of individual elementary and middle school winners. To read the May announcement story, click here.

(To read a June profile on Kristen Delia, click here. To read a July profile on Meghan Biotnott, click here. For more about the program, visit www.iln-gateway.org.)

Alexander will be in 5th grade at Babler Elementary School in the fall. But, he's certainly not just waiting around for school to start. His summer program is very busy and varied.

In sports, he played baseball with the Ellisville Rams team in early summer and he's also on a competitive swim team.

On the first day after school was out in June, Alexander was on his way to a week-long space camp. It was at the U.S. space installation at Huntsville, Ala. There, he got to experience the weightlessness and strong G-forces that the astronauts feel in space flight.

When he got back, he rented a violin so he could attend a summer music camp. In Alexander's elementary school, all fourth graders have mandatory violin classes. In later grades, music classes are voluntary.

Alexander decided to continue violin this fall. He went to the music camp to get ready.

Another summer activity involves Mr. Snuffles. He was the hamster in Alexander's 4th grade class. In a year-ending auction, Alexander made the winning bid for Mr. Snuffles.

The hamster is now on the living room table in the Ecklund home in Wildwood.

Alexander's Achiever award was based on his school, church and community accomplishments through the end of 2002.

In school, he ranked in the 96th percentile for science and 93rd percentile in reading. He also attended his school district's accelerated Creative Education Center.

One class he especially liked was architecture. His favorite architect is Frank Lloyd Wright. One of Alexander's class projects was to design on a computer-generated floor plan for a family residence.

"I designed a home for a scientist and his family who lived in Antarctica or Alaska," he said. One of the features of the two-story home was lots of indoor recreation area. "They certainly couldn't play outdoors," he said.

In Cub Scouts, he's almost completed the Webelos program. As a part of that, he turned out to be the top seller in the group's fund-raising project.

Last November, Alexander had popcorn sales of $4,098 around his neighborhood. That made him the top sales person in the whole district.

"We had our whole living room completely filled with cans of popcorn. We even put the customers' names in a computer database so we could keep track of them." he said.

The sales period was all of November, 2002. But, he accomplished his sales in just three weeks. "I took one week off for my grandmother's funeral," he said.

Then, there is his ACE Birdhouse Co. Alexander made and sold birdhouses so he could earn $200 needed to attend a baseball camp in Fenton.

His birdhouses come in different models to suit different types of birds. There were three models of bluebird houses. And then there were the robin "ledges" because "robins like to make their nest in the open," he said.