WASHINGTON – For a time, Dayton appeared to have made a powerful case for landing one of the retired NASA space shuttles.

The orbiter would have been housed at the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, which attracts more than a million visitors a year. The Air Force had included a request for $14 million in the Obama administration’s budget to transfer the shuttle Atlantis to Dayton.

Ohio produced one of the most famous of all American astronauts — John Glenn — who personally urged NASA Administrator Charles F. Bolden to send the shuttle to Dayton.

Lawmakers from both parties, including House Speaker John Boehner, R-West Chester Twp., and Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, joined in the lobbying campaign. And it seemed obvious that sending a shuttle to Dayton would provide a boost to President Barack Obama’s re-election chances next year in a state he has to win.

In the end, none of that was enough. Those who have followed the process suggest that the White House apparently was not willing to pressure NASA to send a shuttle to Ohio. Instead, the White House seemed content to let NASA make its decision without undue political interference.

“Ohio always seems to be taken for granted,’’ complained former Republican congressman David Hobson of Springfield. “It’s a bummer.”

NASA’s decision sparked a round of finger-pointing by the state’s politicians. Brittany Bramell, a Boehner spokeswoman, charged that “the Obama administration chose not to support Dayton,” even though the speaker believed that the museum “would make the ideal home for a retired shuttle.”

Brown, who had repeatedly pleaded with White House officials to send a shuttle to Dayton, complained that NASA “was directed to consider regional diversity when determining the shuttle locations. Unfortunately, it looks like regional diversity amounts to which coast you are on.”

Brown, joined by Republicans Steve Austria of Beavercreek and Mike Turner of Centerville, called on the Government Accountability Office to investigate NASA’s decision-making process, including who were the officials on a team that examined the different sites across the country.

In a conference call with reporters, Olga Dominguez, a NASA assistant administrator, said that “reaching the largest population possible has always been part of our criteria. ... It is unfortunate that the middle of the country did not fare as well as the coasts.”

The decision also was a setback for Brown and Boehner. Brown, who faces a tough re-election battle next year, talked directly with Vice President Joe Biden and White House chief of staff William Daley. But there was no sign the White House was willing to help Brown politically by getting a shuttle for his home state.

Boehner, by contrast, was less visible in trying to win the shuttle that would have been housed close to his district. But Boehner’s aides insisted he worked to bring a shuttle to Dayton, with Bramell saying that “time and again, Congressman Boehner was vocal with his support for the National Air Force Museum.”

The disappointment was deep. “It’s hard to tell how deeply this will resonate,” said Michael Gessel, vice president in the Washington office of the Dayton Development Coalition. “I think in Dayton, for some, it will resonate for a long time.”