The Dawning of a New World

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"Houston, Tranquility Base here. The Eagle has landed."

Neil Armstrong
July 20, 1969

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I've heard that astronaut Neil Armstrong, the man who took the first steps on the moon, was a modest man, not prone to hyperbole.

When he said, "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind" as he descended the ladder on the lunar module and planted his foot on the moon's surface, I believe he really did understand the huge implications of that single, simple act. Regardless of how educated they were, all people — and it was estimated that half a billion people worldwide were watching — could understand what it meant to put a foot on the ground, and most could probably grasp that it was merely the first step on a journey that would take mankind into an era of unimagined developments and changes.

But all would not be revealed at once. In a manner of speaking, it was the first day of school for the human race. Science continues to build on things that were discovered via NASA's missions to the moon.

I was a small boy at the time, of course, so I didn't understand everything. Nevertheless, for me, the most heart–stopping moment on Apollo 11's historic voyage was the descent of the lunar module to the moon's surface on this day in 1969. I understood enough to know there were risks in that procedure.

Earlier, the lunar module had separated from the command module, which was piloted by Michael Collins, and Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin began their journey to the moon.

As the lunar module descended, computers were reporting lots of errors — which turned out not to be errors, after all, just computer miscalculations — and Armstrong and Aldrin reported back to mission control that they were passing lunar landmarks four seconds earlier than expected and would be "long" — landing west of their intended landing site.

The folks back in Houston would easily adapt their design for later flights — but nobody in the viewing audience knew that. Viewers were told that the lunar module might not have enough fuel to re–connect with the command module if it didn't land within a certain time. Turned out the astronauts were receiving premature low fuel warnings, and there was no crisis after all.

But no one knew that. I remember feeling a genuine concern for the men on board — and a genuine sense of relief when they reported a successful landing with a few seconds to spare.

I wasn't the only one who responded that way — but I was part of a decidedly smaller subset that may have felt such anxiety for the first time in their lives on that occasion.

"Tranquility, we copy you on the ground," came the reply from Mission Control. "You got a bunch of guys about to turn blue. We're breathing again. Thanks a lot."

It was the first mission to the moon. The astronauts and the crew on the ground were learning things that would be adjusted on succeeding flights, but, in July 1969, it was all new.

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The astronauts did not step out on the moon right away. NASA had scheduled a five–hour sleep period for them because they had been up since early that morning, but the astronauts apparently did not sleep. With an unexplored frontier waiting just outside their door, I guess that would have been like asking a kid to sleep late on Christmas morning. Anyway, Armstrong and Aldrin spent the downtime preparing for their historic moon walks instead of napping.

While not mentioned publicly at the time, Aldrin also took communion prior to going out on the moon's surface. He did so privately because, at the time, NASA was contending with atheist Madalyn Murray O'Hair's lawsuit that demanded that astronauts abstain from religious activities while in space.

I think that originated when the crew of Apollo 8 read passages from the Bible on Christmas Eve.

So Aldrin took communion on the moon with a special kit that had been prepared by his pastor, but he drew no attention to it.

When he returned to earth, Aldrin gave the chalice he used to his church, which still has it. Every year, on the Sunday closest to July 20, the church commemorates his lunar communion.

Once the astronauts were on the moon, I figured the hard part was over. I mean, all they had to do was go out the door of the lunar module, climb down that ladder and walk around on the surface, right? Nothing to it.

I suppose I was much too young to understand that, until someone did get out and walk around, no one really knew what to expect. All kinds of possibilities went through people's minds — and it's safe to say that most, if not all, were not good.

Before Armstrong and Aldrin walked on the moon, there was still a kind of mysterious aura surrounding it. Astronauts had been close enough to the moon to peer at its surface from their space capsules, and they thought they knew what to expect — but no one was really sure.

The moon, Shakespeare said, "comes more nearer earth than she was wont and drives men mad." And there did seem to be a kind of madness settling upon the earth around the time of Apollo 11's journey to the moon.

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Most of the madness at the time was brought on by the space race. At the height of the Cold War, Russia and the United States were driven mad in a desperate race to get to the moon first. America won that race 50 years ago today.

But the madness wasn't confined to space. There were times that summer when it seemed the world was on the brink of spinning out of control.

Less than 48 hours before Armstrong and Aldrin walked on the moon, a car driven by Sen. Edward Kennedy plunged into the channel on Chappaquiddick Island, Mass. Kennedy survived, but a young woman who was riding in the car with him, 28–year–old Mary Jo Kopechne, perished.

And about three weeks later, the Manson Family would commit a series of highly publicized (for that pre–cable, pre–internet era) horrific murders in California.

Much of the world watched that night. It is said that more than 500 million people witnessed those first steps on the moon and heard Armstrong say, "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind."

And, from that moment on, it really was a new world — a world in which man could fly to the moon and back if he chose to do so.

To Boldly Go Where No Man Had Gone Before

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"The mission was Apollo 11. It was the capstone of an extraordinary effort ... and while men could argue endlessly over whether it had been worth the cost, its success was undeniably an American triumph."

William Manchester

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When this day dawned 45 years ago, many things were true that would not be true anymore when the sun went down.

July 16, 1969 was a Wednesday. I don't know if Wednesday was known colloquially as "Hump Day" then as it is today, but millions of Americans got up that morning and went to work, just as they did every weekday morning. Some commuted great distances — as some do today.

It was summer, which meant that some families were on vacation road trips to landmarks, beaches, amusement parks or baseball games.

Wanderlust is deeply embedded in the American DNA, but, no matter how far any other Americans traveled in July 1969, the concept of travel would be forever changed by three men. Travel generally implies a destination of some kind, and those three men gave that word a makeover on this day.

Those three men — Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins — were the crew of Apollo 11, NASA's fifth manned space mission of the Apollo program.

In recent years, Americans had seen many manned space missions lift off in the Mercury and Gemini programs as well as the Apollo program. They knew the risks all too well, having witnessed the fiery deaths of three astronauts during a ground test for Apollo 1 a couple of years earlier. They knew there was nothing routine about space travel.

Except the destination.

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"Apollo 11, with its 36–story–high Saturn 5 rocket, was fired at Cape Kennedy's launch complex 39A at 9:32 on the morning of July 16, 1969. ... The Saturn's third stage put them into an orbit at a height of 118 miles. After a 2½–hour check of all instruments systems, they refired the third stage. This gave them a velocity ... sufficient to throw them beyond the earth's atmosphere and on their way to the moon, a quarter–million miles away."

William Manchester

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The eventual destination for Apollo 11 would be — as it had been for all space missions that had gone before — a splashdown. American missions splashed down in both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, and Apollo 11 was scheduled to complete its mission with a splashdown in the Pacific.

But in between the liftoff 45 years ago today and the splashdown eight days later, Apollo 11 did something that no other mission had done. It stopped somewhere — the moon. Two members of the crew descended to the moon's surface and walked around. They planted a flag to show they had been there.

And they left the first of several piles of space–travel debris.

On this anniversary, I suppose it is appropriate to wonder what kind of future, if any, America's space program has.

Aldrin has been an advocate of one–way missions for the first travelers to Mars.

And recently he revealed that he saw a UFO during Apollo 11's journey to the moon.

If that one–way trip to Mars materializes, the first travelers might expect to encounter a UFO as well — although Aldrin conceded that it could have been sunlight reflecting off panels from the spaceship. Since he does not know which panel, it qualifies (technically) as unidentified, and it was a flying object — just not, apparently, a flying saucer.

But Aldrin has also said that he believes there must be life somewhere else. If that is true, it seems at least possible that a spaceship from earth bound for Mars could encounter a UFO.

No one knows how long it will take a manned rocket to make the journey. So far, only unmanned probes have been sent, but it typically takes six months to a year for them to cover the 55 million–kilometer distance.

Surely they will bump into a real flying saucer during that time.

Man on the Moon

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"He was the best, and I will miss him terribly."

Michael Collins
Apollo 11 command module pilot

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There may be no more vivid memory from my childhood than that of Neil Armstrong taking his first step on the moon in July 1969 and declaring it "[o]ne small step for man, one giant leap for mankind."

Before his historic moon walk, I don't recall hearing Armstrong's name. I think he flew in space once before — one of the Gemini missions in the mid–'60s, I believe — but I don't think he did anything that was especially noteworthy.

Certainly not when compared to being the first man to walk on the moon.

Armstrong was an inspirational figure then, and he continued to be an inspirational figure throughout his life, largely because of the values he acquired in his youth in Ohio and carried with him as an adult.

He did not seek the spotlight and often appeared uncomfortable discussing his role in the space program. When the subject of his moon walk came up, as it inevitably did, Armstrong always seemed eager to give credit to all the folks at NASA whose collective efforts had made it possible.

"Those who know him say he is a smart and intensely private, even shy, man determined to live life on his own terms despite having floated down that ladder into the public domain," wrote Kathy Sawyer in the Washington Post Magazine on the 30th anniversary of the first moon landing.

I knew Armstrong was getting old, but I didn't realize just how old (82) until I heard the news yesterday that he had died of complications following heart surgery.

As many have already said, he was a genuine American hero. Forty–three years ago, he was the first man to walk on the moon, inspiring millions of American boys to dream grand and glorious dreams.

But I always believed Armstrong would have happily piloted the command module on that trip and never even walked on the moon if that had been what was asked of him. Instead, Michael Collins was asked to perform that solitary task while Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin took the first steps on the moon.

Armstrong was a team player — not unlike another pioneer from America's space program who died recently, Sally Ride.

Armstrong and Ride were good foot soldiers in the quest to conquer space. If they had been called upon to sweep up or fetch coffee, they would have done so.

But fate had much bigger things in store for them. Armstrong would be the first man to walk on the moon, and Ride would be the first American woman to fly in space.

At a time when positive role models are in shockingly short supply, we've lost two in the span of a single month.

We are much poorer for it.

There and Back Again

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The historic journey of Apollo 11 came to its conclusion 40 years ago today.

It's been a long time since America sent a crew into space in anything other than a space shuttle. I guess you'd have to be over a certain age to remember a time when America's returning star travelers didn't glide into an air base. But in 1969, astronauts returned to earth the way they had been doing for years — splashdown at sea.

So, in late July 1969, Apollo 11 returned to earth. The USS Hornet was on hand to welcome them back, along with President Nixon. The splashdown occurred east of Wake Island in the Pacific.

In the last week, I have written about my memories of the start of that historic mission and the night that man walked on the moon for the first time. In all honesty, I can't remember much about the splashdown.

I guess it was dramatic, but mostly because people were anxious to get the crew back on earth, successfully fulfilling President Kennedy's challenge. I remember that the astronauts were quarantined upon their return and remained that way until someone — a doctor, I presume — verified that they hadn't picked up anything in their trip to the moon and that they weren't likely to expose anyone to anything, either.

After the walk on the moon, the splashdown must have seemed pretty anticlimactic — a capsule bobbing in the waves while a helicopter lowered its basket three times to recover the astronauts.

The fact that there was a splashdown really wasn't noteworthy. We had seen so many splashdowns by that time that it was really nothing special. To me, it simply meant the trip to outer space was over. But this time, the astronauts had done more than just go into outer space.

I'm sure all three of the networks were televising it. But by the time Apollo 11 returned, space travel already seemed to be routine — so routine that, when Apollo 13 encountered difficulties that forced the crew to scrap its planned moon landing nine months later, it came as a shock to most Americans, who apparently had forgotten that three astronauts had died a little more than three years earlier in a launch pad fire on earth.

As you can see in the attached video clip, the astronauts came to the window of their quarantined quarters to talk with President Nixon.

The mission was over. The men were back on earth. There would be parades and rallies and speeches in the weeks and months and years to come.

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In fact, just last Sunday, on the eve of the 40th anniversary of the moon landing, the Apollo 11 crew members, along with former space center director Chris Kraft, were speakers at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington.

Lately, I have witnessed a bit of a revival of the old conspiracy theory that says Apollo 11 was faked. I never thought it was faked. Logic tells me it couldn't have been faked.

I've heard it said that 400,000 people worked on the space program in one capacity or another. My thinking is that figure would include scientists and engineers — and wouldn't necessarily include those who worked on the technical aspects of faked broadcasts, like the people who maintained the sets and the people who operated the cameras.

Including the Apollo 11 crewmen who did so, a dozen Americans walked on the moon and came back to earth to talk about it. If Apollo 11 was staged, those missions must have been staged as well. And I guess it would mean that Apollo 13's aborted mission also was faked.

How could you keep all those people quiet for 40 years? Well, some have died, but (as far as I know) no one has died of suspicious or seemingly unnatural causes.

I've heard it said it would have been impossible for a conspiracy to kill President Kennedy to succeed, even one involving as few as a dozen men. What are the odds of keeping close to half a million people quiet about a trip to the moon?

It probably would have been easier to actually land men on the moon than to handle the logistics such a conspiracy would entail.

The Original Moon Walk

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I don't know how long my life will last, but I think I will always remember the night of July 20, 1969.

And I think anyone who is old enough to remember that day will say the same thing. My brother, for example, was 6 years old, and I'm sure he remembers it, but anyone who was younger than that might not have much recollection of it.

Anyway, I feel pretty safe in assuming that most of the people who were alive on that day remember it because that is the day that two men landed on the moon and then walked on the moon's surface. No man had ever done that before, and less than a dozen Americans have done it since.

In hindsight, though, I really wonder why we were all so concerned about whether Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin would be able to descend from the lunar module to the surface of the moon. I'm not sure of the exact distance, but my guess is that it was about 15–20 feet down a ladder. What did we all think might happen? Did we think they would spontaneously explode because of the change of pressure? Did we think they would go flying off into space, never to be seen again?

There was always more reason for concern — at least I thought so — when the astronauts were landing the lunar module on the moon or taking off to rendezvous with the command module.

In fact, the landing was quite dramatic. It was unexpectedly drawn out, and the crew had less than 30 seconds of fuel to spare. Armstrong and Aldrin compensated for faulty computer readings and landed safely. After that, I figured walking on the moon was a mere formality — and a somewhat unremarkable one, at that.

Boy, was I wrong.

As I recalled in this blog last year, my family went to our pastor's home to watch the moon walk, and we all shared the big moment when Armstrong spoke his immortal words, "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind." My memory is of our pastor's rather large living room filled with adults and children, none of whom made a sound as they watched Armstrong make his descent down that ladder.

It is a lasting memory, of course. It is a moment I will always remember, not only because of what I witnessed but because of those with whom I shared the moment.

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And I also remember the actual landing on the moon, a moment that left Walter Cronkite himself at a loss for words.

That rarely happened with Cronkite, and Americans really seemed to take their cue from "Uncle Walter" at times. When Ted Koppel says, "When Walter rejoiced over man landing on the moon, America rejoiced with him," you can take that to the bank.

Those who saw him, grinning from ear to ear, as two men fulfilled what must have been a boyhood fantasy of his (and countless others) will never forget the scene. Cronkite was devoted to the neutrality of the newsman, but he could hardly be neutral on that day, even without saying much.

Today is also a sad reminder how tragic it is that Cronkite didn't live to see the 40th anniversary of this achievement. I can't help but think that he would have had some unique insights to share. He was always capable of putting every event in the perspective it deserved. And Apollo 11 deserved a lot of attention.

July 20, 1969 was truly an historic day for all Americans — but especially so for the people of Wapakoneta, Ohio. That is the town where Armstrong was born in 1930. On this occasion, Bob Greene reflects on Armstrong's "giant leap from Ohio" at CNN.com.

The summer of '69 was unique. A lot of memorable things happened that summer — the Woodstock festival, the Manson family murders, the Stonewall riots. John Lennon and Yoko Ono recorded "Give Peace a Chance" during their famous bed–in. Ted Kennedy's presidential ambitions probably died at Chappaquiddick while Apollo 11 was on its way to the moon, although Kennedy did try to win his party's presidential nomination in 1980.

In fact, the whole year was filled with transitional and noteworthy moments. Richard Nixon became president in January. The man Nixon served as vice president, Dwight Eisenhower, died in March. Charles DeGaulle was replaced as president of France. Charles became the prince of Wales. Joe Namath made good on his "guarantee" that the New York Jets would win the Super Bowl and, later that year, the "Amazin' Mets" won the World Series.

But that summer will always be remembered for the landing on the moon.

Reaching for the Stars

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Forty years ago today, man embarked on the most significant journey in his existence on this planet — Apollo 11's trip to the moon.

The world held its collective breath on July 16, 1969, as the rocket lifted off. Four days later, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin took their first steps on the moon.

In today's Washington Post, Aldrin repeats a call he issued at CNN.com last month for missions to Mars.

This time, Aldrin puts a little more flesh on the bones of his proposal. But he is clear that it is not an objective that can be met in a few years. It is a long–term project.

"If we avoided the pitfall of aiming solely for the moon, we could be on Mars by the 60th anniversary year of our Apollo 11 flight," he writes.

Aldrin insists that this plan "wouldn't require building new rockets from scratch, as current plans do, and it would make maximum use of the capabilities we have without breaking the bank. It is a reasonable and affordable plan — if we again think in visionary terms."

July 16 is memorable for a lot of things — visionary in nature or not.

• In 1945, the atomic age began with the first detonation of a nuclear weapon in a test near Alamogordo, N.M. Less than a month later, the United States dropped two nuclear weapons on Japan, and World War II came to an end.


• In 1973, four years after the launch of Apollo 11, Alexander Butterfield revealed the existence of a taping system in the Nixon White House during his testimony before the Senate Watergate Committee. The tapes that were produced by that taping system ultimately led to the end of Nixon's presidency.


• And, in 1999, John F. Kennedy Jr., his wife Carolyn and sister–in–law Lauren died in a plane crash off Martha's Vineyard. The timing of the crash was ironic, since Kennedy's father had been the one who challenged America to go to the moon in the early 1960s.

In fact, although July marked the triumph of President Kennedy's vision, it has also been a month of tragedy for his family.

Not only did his son die in that plane crash, but also, while Apollo 11 was on its way to the moon, President Kennedy's youngest brother, Ted, drove his Oldsmobile off a bridge on Chappaquiddick Island, injuring himself and killing his passenger, 28–year–old Mary Jo Kopechne.

A Giant Leap For Mankind

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When I was a boy, summer meant many things.

Of course, it meant no school — a fact from which all the other blessings of childhood seemed to flow.

As a child, I grew up on a lake — which was kind of like having an enormous swimming pool in a backyard that was really a rocky hillside. (When I say "rocky," I mean it. Civil War enthusiasts could have re-enacted the South's unsuccessful assaults on Devil's Den or Little Round Top on our hillside.)

(One summer, when I was a teenager, a friend of mine named Johnny got a sailboat and he kept it on our property because his family didn’t live on the lake, like mine did, and he needed a place to keep his boat.

(A perk for letting him use our property was being allowed to use the sailboat whenever we wanted, but I never really became a skillful sailor. I guess I was better at operating our fishing boat.)

There was only one movie theater in my small hometown in central Arkansas in those days. When I was a child, the merchants sponsored a weekly movie for the local kids during the summer. Kids got to see movies at no cost to them (but they still had to pay for soft drinks, popcorn and candy), and mothers got a few hours of freedom.

The mothers took turns driving the neighborhood kids to the theater each week, and that’s where I saw ”Planet of the Apes,” ”The Trouble With Angels,” ”Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory” and many other movies from the late 1960s and early 1970s.

Summer also meant baseball cards and homemade ice cream and fireworks on the Fourth of July. It meant "camping" in a treehouse with the boys who lived across the road and playing cards by the light of a Coleman lantern into the wee hours of the morning.

And, one special summer, it meant watching a man walk on the moon for the first time.

On this day, 39 years ago, Apollo 11 landed on the surface of the moon. A few hours later, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin emerged from the spiderlike lunar module to take man's first steps on the moon.

It was a different world in 1969. We didn’t have cable TV or fancy graphics to explain things (including a space mission).

Gas only cost 30 cents/gallon.

We didn’t have e-mail to help us keep in touch, but postage stamps only cost 6 cents. (If that sounds cheap, bear in mind that the minimum wage was $1.60/hour.) Of course, self-adhesive stamps were still a long way off in the future so if you used a stamp, you had to lick it yourself.

For kids, the neat new toys were things like "Silly String," "Nerf Ball" and "Toss Across." Traditional gender roles were still being taught, so girls were encouraged to play with dolls and "Easy-Bake Ovens."

On the radio, people were listening to the Beatles' "Get Back," the Rolling Stones' "Honky Tonk Women," and the Fifth Dimension's "Aquarius/Let the Sun Shine In." On TV, people were watching ”The Carol Burnett Show,” ”Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In” and ”Mission: Impossible.”

And "Star Trek." (Ironically, the original incarnation of "Star Trek" — with William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy — was canceled the month before Apollo 11.)

There were a lot of people who thought a trip to the moon was a mission: impossible — or, to borrow a phrase from a popular song of the era, an "impossible dream." I can only wonder what they would think of the technological advances we’ve witnessed in the last 39 years.

Apollo 11 had a lot to do with the changes that have been possible — thanks to the discoveries we’ve made as a result of our space program.

Apollo 11 was special, and everyone knew it. We had all seen rockets lift off before, but it seemed like the world held its collective breath for this one. Everyone knew where this mission was going — to the surface of the moon. The stakes had never been higher.

Four days later, the world held its breath again as Armstrong guided the lunar module to the moon’s surface and then, a few hours later, he and Aldrin left their vehicle and walked on the moon.

The day of the moon landing and walk was a Sunday, as the anniversary is today. I remember that morning, during the church service, the pastor of my church, known to all as ”Brother Ben,” invited everyone in the congregation to the parsonage next to the church to watch the moon walk that night.

It was a hot July day, but after lunch, I went out to our open-air carport. Gulf Oil was a huge sponsor of the space program in those days, and its gas station attendants had been giving away punch-out lunar module model kits in anticipation of the big event.

I had constructed one of those models and I wanted to simulate the moon landing. So I drew a circle on the carport floor with a piece of chalk, tied some string to my lunar module, climbed on top of our car and slowly lowered the model space vehicle to the circle.

I think Armstrong was a better pilot than I was! I missed on my first attempt, but it wasn't entirely my fault. A slight breeze (ordinarily welcome on a hot summer day) took my model off course just enough to miss the landing circle the first time, but I succeeded in landing in the circle on my second attempt.

It was a sobering reminder of how capricious fate can be, even if you think you've prepared for every eventuality.

Not everyone took Brother Ben up on his offer, but my family did. That afternoon, we watched the lunar module land on the moon from our own living room, but we drove into town to share the moon walk with Brother Ben and other members of the congregation a few hours later.

When we arrived at the parsonage, one of Brother Ben’s sons was avidly watching the TV coverage and getting pointers from the anchormen about how to photograph the historic moment.

In 1969, there were no private VCRs so no one could make a video tape. A photograph of the TV screen was the best anyone could do. And Brother Ben’s son wanted to get some tips for making a photograph of a TV image using his new Polaroid camera.

Later that evening, we took turns shooting photos of Armstrong and Aldrin with that Polaroid camera. My photo wasn’t bad, although, as I recall, I goofed and one of my thumbs obscured a portion of the lens. But my image was one of the clearest — not bad, considering I was 9 years old at the time.

Perhaps the moment I will always remember occurred a few weeks after the moon landing.

My family was visiting my grandparents in Texas in late July or early August. I was out walking with my grandfather in the country on a moonlit night. We were walking near a lake and came upon a pier. We walked to the end of it and looked up into the sky.

We stared at the moon for a few minutes, then my grandfather said simply, "Our flag is flying up there now." Then we turned around and began our walk back to rejoin the rest of the family.

My grandfather passed away a couple of months later. I've always been grateful that he lived to see the historic achievement of Apollo 11.

This weekend, TV Land has been showing the film "Apollo 13" every evening — which serves as an interesting tribute to those days, whether by design or coincidence, on the 39th anniversary of Apollo 11.

Apollo 13's nearly tragic flight took place less than a year after Apollo 11. Only one other moon mission had been launched between July 1969 and April 1970, but people had become spoiled. The fact that people all around the world were shocked to discover that space flight was hardly a routine thing is testimony to how well everyone involved with Apollo 11 — including the crew's support staff on the ground — did the job of sending men to the moon and returning them to the earth.

Judging from the world's reactions to the losses of the space shuttle Challenger in 1986 and its sister ship Columbia in 2003, the people at NASA have continued to maintain their high standards.

And, for that, we have all prospered.