*This story has been updated to reflect a change.

On October 7, 1961, NASA astronaut Gus Grissom wrote a letter to his mother because he was frustrated and its subject wasn't appropriate (or safe) to discuss over the phone. The two page, double sided note, in which Grissom vents over John Glenn's selection (and not his) on the U.S.'s first orbital mission, will go on auction at the RR Auction house in New Hampshire, Journal and Currier Online reported. The document is expected to sell for around $80,000, according to RR Auction executive vice president Bobby Livingston.

It's unclear whether Grissom distrusted phone lines or if the time's sensibilities dictated a letter was the more appropriate action. Whatever the case, Grissom was clearly disappointed. Though he'd still be heavily involved in the mission as the controller for the second astronaut, he complained that the position came with no glory and only repercussions if something went wrong.

"The flight crew for the orbital mission has been picked and I'm not on it," Grissom wrote. "Neither Al nor I get one of the first two orbital shots. Glenn gets the first one and Deke Slayton gets the second one. Al is to be the controller for John's shot and I'm going to be Deke's controller. It's not a job I want, I have to do a great deal of work, I'll be gone from home a lot and I don't get any of the credit, but if anything goes wrong I'll get a good deal of the blame."

The addressed envelope below:

Grissom was familiar with blame. Some tied his missed opportunity to the July 1961 Liberty Bell flight, JC Online reported. After becoming the second American to make a suborbital flight, Grissom's space craft landed in the Atlantic Ocean, but quickly sank when the hatch discharged prematurely, letting in water and nearly drowning its passenger in the process. Grissom claimed the incident was not his fault. 

The orbital mission, which launched about four and a half months after Grissom's letter in February of 1962, was successful as Glenn (NASA's "Golden Boy" according to RR Auction) became the first American to orbit earth, RR Auction reported. Though the "Mercury 7" group, consisting of Glenn, Grissom, Donald "Deke" Slayton, Alan Shepard, Gordon Cooper, Scott Carpenter, and Wally Schirra, were fiercely competitive, Grissom remained enthusiastic following Glenn's and Shepard's successful flight, according to RR Auction. He envisioned himself in a certain future Apollo mission. "It's the one we expect to fly to the moon and back," he said at the time.

Grissom would come close, but never made it to the moon. He and two other astronauts (Edward White and Roger Chaffee) died during a preflight test for the Apollo 1 mission, according to RR Auction. Thus, his letters are extremely rare.

Lowell Grissom, Gus's brother, had been keeping the letter in a drawer and brought it to auction to "keep Gus' memory alive and let people know what kind of man he was."

"I kind of think that it shows that he was just a normal kind of guy; that he had deep involvement in the space program but also had a family to take care of," Lowell said of the other details dispersed throughout the letter, such as Grissom's plans to go bowling later that day and his frustration over losing vacation time.

A letter from Alan Shepard to his parents about applying to become an astronaut sold for over $100,000 at auction, according to JC Online. 

Gus Grissom in a dress rehearsal: