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Moon landing anniversary
Thirty-four years ago today, On July 20, 1969, Commander Armstrong and
fellow astronaut Edwin Aldrin successfully touched down on the lunar surface. As Armstrong became the first person to step the Moon's surface, he spoke the unforgettable phrase, "That's one small step for man; one giant leap for mankind". There has always been some controversy over whether he meant to say "a man" or just "man". He and Aldrin explored the Moon's surface for 2.5 hours. Armstrong was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in recognition of his accomplishments and his contributions to the space program. Susan and I were living in Columbia, Missouri then, where I was finishing my degree in journalism. We were riveted to our black-and-white TV through the entire process, from the separation of the Lunar Lander, through the hair-raising last moments of the landing (they had only 30 seconds of fuel left), the long six hours before Neil Armstrong exited the spacecraft, and then the breathtaking first step onto the moon. Less than two months after that momentous day, on September 9, 1969, the U.S. Post Office had issued a large pictorial stamp showing Armstrong's first step onto the lunar surface: http://www.ingraham.ca/bob/stepmoon.jpg. Edwin Aldrin and Neil Armstrong spent several hours on the moon before blasting back into space to rendevous with Michael Collins, who was obiting the moon as commander of Apollo 11. Collins must have had the lonliest job in the world during those hours. And if the Lunar Module had malfunctioned on the moon's surface, Armstgrong and Aldrin would have been more surely marooned than anyone in history. Rescue would have been impossible. There is a small personal chapter in the saga of the moon landing. Before we were married, Susan had a summer job in the typing pool at Ryan Aeronautical in San Diego. Ryan (the company that had designed and built Lindbergh's Spirit of St. Louis) had the contract to design the landing legs for what was then called the Lunar Excursion Module, or LEM. Some public relations type, or perhaps a politician, decided that the "Excursion" part of the name had to go, and Susan's job that summer consisted primarily of whiting out the words "Lunar Excursion Module" and "LEM" on engineering documents and typing in the words "Lunar Module" and "LM," a job that could be done with a few keystrokes today. She says that she used an electric typewriter with in interchangeable "type ball," probably an IBM selectric. One of the balls was used for engineering symbols. In any event, my wife helped get Neil Armstrong on the moon! :^) |
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#2
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Thirty-four years ago today, On July 20, 1969, Commander Armstrong and
fellow astronaut Edwin Aldrin successfully touched down on the lunar surface. As Armstrong became the first person to step the Moon's surface, he spoke the unforgettable phrase, "That's one small step for man; one giant leap for mankind". There has always been some controversy over whether he meant to say "a man" or just "man". He and Aldrin explored the Moon's surface for 2.5 hours. Armstrong was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in recognition of his accomplishments and his contributions to the space program. Susan and I were living in Columbia, Missouri then, where I was finishing my degree in journalism. We were riveted to our black-and-white TV through the entire process, from the separation of the Lunar Lander, through the hair-raising last moments of the landing (they had only 30 seconds of fuel left), the long six hours before Neil Armstrong exited the spacecraft, and then the breathtaking first step onto the moon. Less than two months after that momentous day, on September 9, 1969, the U.S. Post Office had issued a large pictorial stamp showing Armstrong's first step onto the lunar surface: http://www.ingraham.ca/bob/stepmoon.jpg. Edwin Aldrin and Neil Armstrong spent several hours on the moon before blasting back into space to rendevous with Michael Collins, who was obiting the moon as commander of Apollo 11. Collins must have had the lonliest job in the world during those hours. And if the Lunar Module had malfunctioned on the moon's surface, Armstgrong and Aldrin would have been more surely marooned than anyone in history. Rescue would have been impossible. There is a small personal chapter in the saga of the moon landing. Before we were married, Susan had a summer job in the typing pool at Ryan Aeronautical in San Diego. Ryan (the company that had designed and built Lindbergh's Spirit of St. Louis) had the contract to design the landing legs for what was then called the Lunar Excursion Module, or LEM. Some public relations type, or perhaps a politician, decided that the "Excursion" part of the name had to go, and Susan's job that summer consisted primarily of whiting out the words "Lunar Excursion Module" and "LEM" on engineering documents and typing in the words "Lunar Module" and "LM," a job that could be done with a few keystrokes today. She says that she used an electric typewriter with in interchangeable "type ball," probably an IBM selectric. One of the balls was used for engineering symbols. In any event, my wife helped get Neil Armstrong on the moon! :^) A great reminder of those pioneering days - and I remember it so well! As a boy of almost 13 (oops - the truth is out!) I spent every spare moment watching those fuzzy monochrome images. I even recorded every word on an old valve reel-to-reel tape recorder (no Videos then!). As for the USA Stamp (nice!) issued on 09/09/1969...... How did they know it was my 13th. Birthday? David ~{ 8-) |
#3
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I remember staying up to watch the landing I was 10
We had a connection to the landing, my uncle worked for NASA (still does) and sent us pictures of the moon that were passed out to employees. Unfortunately after several moves the pictures got lost (rats rats rats). I've visited NASA several times both before the Space Center was built and after. Before was better, you could walk around some of the facility and go in the cafeteria and a small gift shop, now everything is escorted and you take a cart for most of the tour. Mission control is TINY looks huge on TV but its about the size of my living room. I did get into the Director's Show, the art exhibit the have every year, (3 paintings) back in the late 80's. Unfortunately my car had a breakdown and I didn't get to go to the reception. Didn't have the security clearance to go see the exhibit later either A couple of my most prized covers are the ones I have for John Glenn's trips up. Shell "Bob Ingraham" wrote in message ... Thirty-four years ago today, On July 20, 1969, Commander Armstrong and fellow astronaut Edwin Aldrin successfully touched down on the lunar surface. As Armstrong became the first person to step the Moon's surface, he spoke the unforgettable phrase, "That's one small step for man; one giant leap for mankind". There has always been some controversy over whether he meant to say "a man" or just "man". He and Aldrin explored the Moon's surface for 2.5 hours. Armstrong was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in recognition of his accomplishments and his contributions to the space program. Susan and I were living in Columbia, Missouri then, where I was finishing my degree in journalism. We were riveted to our black-and-white TV through the entire process, from the separation of the Lunar Lander, through the hair-raising last moments of the landing (they had only 30 seconds of fuel left), the long six hours before Neil Armstrong exited the spacecraft, and then the breathtaking first step onto the moon. Less than two months after that momentous day, on September 9, 1969, the U.S. Post Office had issued a large pictorial stamp showing Armstrong's first step onto the lunar surface: http://www.ingraham.ca/bob/stepmoon.jpg. Edwin Aldrin and Neil Armstrong spent several hours on the moon before blasting back into space to rendevous with Michael Collins, who was obiting the moon as commander of Apollo 11. Collins must have had the lonliest job in the world during those hours. And if the Lunar Module had malfunctioned on the moon's surface, Armstgrong and Aldrin would have been more surely marooned than anyone in history. Rescue would have been impossible. There is a small personal chapter in the saga of the moon landing. Before we were married, Susan had a summer job in the typing pool at Ryan Aeronautical in San Diego. Ryan (the company that had designed and built Lindbergh's Spirit of St. Louis) had the contract to design the landing legs for what was then called the Lunar Excursion Module, or LEM. Some public relations type, or perhaps a politician, decided that the "Excursion" part of the name had to go, and Susan's job that summer consisted primarily of whiting out the words "Lunar Excursion Module" and "LEM" on engineering documents and typing in the words "Lunar Module" and "LM," a job that could be done with a few keystrokes today. She says that she used an electric typewriter with in interchangeable "type ball," probably an IBM selectric. One of the balls was used for engineering symbols. In any event, my wife helped get Neil Armstrong on the moon! :^) |
#4
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Neil Armstrong got the best of the bureaucrats who wanted to change Lunar
Excursion Module to just Lunar Module. Listen to the tape -- when he climbed down the ladder he first stepped on the footpad. When he was ready to make that historic first step into moondust, he said to Mission control "I'm going to step off the LEM now." Armstrong's first words from the surface of the moon weren't scripted by NASA, they was his own words. Regardless of what he may have actually said, clearly he meant to say "...A man...." Think it over -- the sentence doesn't make sense if you leave out the "a." |
#5
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On Sun, 20 Jul 2003 23:30:49 GMT, Bob Ingraham
wrote: From: "David F." Newsgroups: rec.collecting.stamps.discuss Date: Sun, 20 Jul 2003 21:28:24 +0100 Subject: Moon landing anniversary Thirty-four years ago today, On July 20, 1969, Commander Armstrong and fellow astronaut Edwin Aldrin successfully touched down on the lunar surface. As Armstrong became the first person to step the Moon's surface, he spoke the unforgettable phrase, "That's one small step for man; one giant leap for mankind". There has always been some controversy over whether he meant to say "a man" or just "man".snip A great reminder of those pioneering days - and I remember it so well! As a boy of almost 13 (oops - the truth is out!) I spent every spare moment watching those fuzzy monochrome images. I even recorded every word on an old valve reel-to-reel tape recorder (no Videos then!). As for the USA Stamp (nice!) issued on 09/09/1969...... How did they know it was my 13th. Birthday? David ~{ 8-) A wonderful, nostalgic film about the first lunar landing, from an Australian point of view, is The Dish. To quote from Amazon.com, "it's a true story about the small group of men working at a satellite dish in a remote section of Australia who, in July 1969, played a major part in helping to transmit the first live images of a man walking on the moon." It's got some good science in it, including a snafu that nearly resulted in us *not* seeing live images of the first moonwalk. There are some great comedic moments too. All in all, it lives up to what I have come to expect from Australian films, all of which Hollywood should emulate. Maybe there are bad Aussie films, but I haven't yet seen one. The Dish is readily available in video rental places here in Vancouver, in both DVD and VHS. Stick around. If you look, you can find plenty of Aussie plot / filmed movies that are the dregs. Tracy Barber |
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