Happy 40th Moon Man

The monchromic photograph of man's first step on the moon. NASA Photo

It is officially the 40^th anniversary of man’s first steps on the moon. I have talked about this a couple times already on the last couple weeks already. It is one of those events that you will always remember if you were old enough to witness the landing and moonwalk.

I was close to seven when Apollo 11 landed on the surface of the Moon in the geographic area known as the Sea of Tranquility. Like I had written earlier, my parents did not want a television in the house and it was the Moon landing that lead them to purchasing one. Mom had the J.C. Penney televison on from the time of the lift off until splash down. When the lunar module was landing I still remember Mom snapping photographs the scene on the  television, with a flash no less. She would only stop to pick up the Super 8 movie camera to film the screen. It might have been a sign I knew which direction I was going in life when I tried to tell her the flash was going the only thing seen on the TV. She only had one photograph that showed something that remotely resembled a Moon landing, the rest were just reflections of the flash on the glass screen.

Initially I didn’t think the mission to the Moon was anything new, I had already had a Major Matt Mason and his Space Station in my room for a couple years and thought that the Major and a few others were there. Mom managed to beat it into my thick skull that this was the first time and Major Matt Mason was just “pretend”.

The Apollo 11 landing was also my first clear recollection of a news cast or report, which was Walter Cronkite. It was easy to tell that he was overwhelmed by the event that unfolded on the live broadcast.

There was one thing that I found out later about the Apollo 11 mission and the risk the astronauts were taking. While the mission was underway, the Nixon White House was planning for the Apollo 11 crew’s funerals. On July 18, 1969 Bill Safire sent a memo President Nixon’s Cheif of Staff H. R. Haldeman titled In the Event of Moon Disaster which detailed the Presidential protocol if the Moon shot ended in the worst possible way. Luckily Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins and Edwin “Buzz” Alrin all made it back to Earth safely and that document never had to be followed.

Somewhere along the last forty years America has lost its way with the space program. I always thought it would be possible to have the Moon partially colonized in thirty years after the first Moon landing. We could have sent men to Mars by now if NASA’s budget had not been cost and other misplaced priorities by America’s leaders.

If you want to relive the day that Apollo 11 touched down on the Moon The John F. Kennedy Library and Museum have a website that will recreate the Moon mission on your computer screen.