UPDATE: As a boy of 11 years old, I watched much of this in utter awe as many of you did on that Sunday in July, 1969. It is well worth watching again. I get choked up just watching.
America has just lost its most heroic son. I’m sad. It is doubly sad that America’s manned space program is also dead.
This poem, a favorite of pilots worldwide, seems the most appropriate:
High Flight
Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds – and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of – wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there
I’ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long delirious, burning blue,
I’ve topped the windswept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew –
And, while with silent lifting mind I’ve trod
The high untresspassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.
– Pilot Officer Gillespie Magee, No 412 squadron, RCAF, Killed 11 December 1941
Neil Armstrong, the astronaut who became first to walk on the moon as commander of Apollo 11, has died. He was 82 years old.
He was born in the small town of Wapakoneta, Ohio, on Aug. 5, 1930.
On July 20, 1969, half a billion people — a sixth of the world’s population at the time — watched a ghostly black-and-white television image as Armstrong backed down the ladder of the lunar landing ship Eagle, planted his left foot on the moon’s surface, and said, “That’s one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind.”
Twenty minutes later his crewmate, Buzz Aldrin, joined him, and the world watched as the men spent the next two hours bounding around in the moon’s light gravity, taking rock samples, setting up experiments, and taking now-iconic photographs.
more; here: http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/neil-armstrong-man-moon-dead/story?id=12325140#.UDkpQqAnBio
UPDATE: Andrew Revkin has an interesting backstory on the space race that I think is worth reading here: http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/08/25/the-cold-war-push-behind-neil-armstrongs-one-small-step/
Apollo flights at the time were inspiration to many youngsters to get into science. RIP
One would be hard pressed to ignore the decline in technological capability that once put men on the moon and now has trouble getting them into orbit while the defense budget against no threat in particular keeps ballooning bigger and bigger every year. One is also starkly reminded that heroes such as Mr. Armstrong live modest lives on a pension while the self-congratulatory “Masters of the Universe” gorge on the economy again that they’ve so recently wrecked without any repercussions whatsoever while offering no accomplishments worthy of even a decent burial.
Memories of July 1969 from the NASA archives
Apollo 11 Mission History
Apollo 11 Images & Text
The world has lost a most dignified man, RIP Neil Armstrong.
I rarely use the word “hero”, but Neil Armstrong was a true hero. I was 9 years old and watched the landing on a black & white TV set here in Norway. I will never forget it.
Thank you, RIP.
Cometh the hour, cometh the man.
I was too young to remember Apollo 11 but remember watching Apollo 17 on the TV with my Dad. Having watched the astronauts on the moon for a few minutes he took me outside to look at the moon and he said,”Isn’t it amazing son, there are men walking on the moon right now.” The sheer magic of that moment has never left me and still makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand up when I think of it. In fact, my admiration for what Neil Armstrong and all of NASA achieved has only grown as I have learned what they achieved through the application of true science and engineering.
Farewell, Neil.
From “Man in the Moon” to “Man on the Moon” in one small step is no small feat.
May the Gods be with you.
Have just read on the BBC website that President Obama has paid tribute to Neil Armstrong on his twitter feed. I hope that isn’t what he thinks a real hero deserves by way of tribute. The President should address the nation in recognition of the passing of someone who is likely to be one of the most enduringly famous Americans ever.
Yep.
Neil Armstrong was a keeper. Brave in that real quiet way of real heroes. Some of his colleagues went on to pursue other agenda’s but Neil just kept on being Neil.
Luv the scene from Apollo 13. Neil and the others have gone around to support the families of the Apollo 13 crew. Jim Lovells’ grandma says “If that thing were a washing machine, My Jimmy could land it” And Neil Armstrong is just portrayed as a damn fine guy supporting someones grandma. Real hero stuff.
Years ago there was the ‘good luck Mr Gonski’ meme that went the rounds on the Internet. I so hope that story was true! The very best of our Gods have feet of clay. It is their transendance of the ordinary that makes them special.
Vaya Con Dios Neil.
You were always the First.
Carsten Arnholm, Norway says:
“Thank you, RIP.”
Yep, thats the point. The real heroes always do.
Crispin in Waterloo says:
“This week we lost 2 Armstrong heroes: Lance and Neil. How different their epitaphs will be.”
Sorry Crispin. Lance rode a push-bike. Neil rode the zephyr. Nolo contedere
We are who we are – by where we have been.
Drake, Raleigh, Magellan, Columbus, ARMSTRONG, etc. One of the earliest breaks from traditional financing of risk-adventure-science traditionally proposed financing by discovery of gold silver and spices. “The Eagle has landed” – not for gold but for the a new precious commodity – engineering discovery. Tasked 5 years earlier probability of failure might have been high.
Point of memory – 20 feet from entering a detached shop at my parents home, the radio inside on (perpetually except non-occupancy night) and those words The Eagle Has Landed. In my life an early Hero, Neil Armstrong.
Back in 1969 the laws concerning hitchhiking and sleeping on beaches were not as strict, and there were few “gated communities.” I had hitchhiked down to Wood’s Hole and taken a ferry out to Martha’s Vineyard, a sixteen-year-old fool with an interest in researching irresponsible relationships. Out on Martha’s Vineyard it seemed a giant party was going on, and also a movie was being filmed, and I somehow wound up at a party where all the ladies seemed to be wearing diamond necklaces and everyone was drinking more than was wise. People kept sauntering outside and looking at the moon, for the brave men were “on their way.” Inside someone wondered if “Teddy” was looking at the moon and thinking of his older brother, when he drove off the bridge the night before. (I had no idea what they were talking about.) A gorgeous second from the movie set was flirting with me. I felt way over my head and far from home, but the astronauts seemed much farther. People forget it took four days to get there. The launch was July 16, and the suspense was incredible, as the days passed.
I got home July 20, a sorry-looking and exhausted young man, and fell asleep on the livingroom couch. The next thing I knew I was being shaken, and woke to watch the amazing images in black and white on the TV screen.
Three weeks later was the Woodstock rock concert. (I hitchhiked the opposite direction that weekend, and it now seems I was one of the few people who wasn’t there.)
What a summer that was! America has been through a hard school since then, but I still feel the spirit lives.
Sputnik 1, Layka, Gagarin, John Glenn, Tereshkova and finally Armstrong all landmarks and science wonderment of my youth, time relentlessly moves on.
A sad day indeed. I missed the actual take-off of that mission. We’d all gathered in the school hall to see it, but some loon set off the fire alarm about a minute before the countdown. By the time we were allowed back inside they were well on their way. But like millions of other brits our family crowded around the TV in the early hours to watch the landing. Way past my normal bedtime but I didnt even need to ask if I could stay up.
As regards the conspiracy theorists I heard of an incident (possibly urban myth) where a journalist was handed a knuckle sandwich by one of the astronauts when asked for their opinion of the ‘fake’ theory some years later.
Anyone know if it was true? Either way…good answer.
Lets hope his passing prompts others to stand on the shoulders of this giant and follow the motto of the RAF …
per ardua ad astra
Through adversity to the stars
R.I.P. Neil Armstrong.
It is so easy to overlook the woeful computing power available at the time, your portable phone has more processing power than on board the Apollo flights.
We now need the courage (a small percentage of that of the spacemen will do) to ensure that we spread outwards into the solar system and beyond. If not, a small rock may well end the dreams of mankind forever.
I shall remember watching in the early morning hours ( in London) the thrilling event unfold before my eyes, once again RIP.
Steve T
i was 19 years old at the time, at a family reunion. I went to our car and listened to the radio broadcast of the landing That night when we got home, our family watched Armstrong and Aldrin step out of the lunar module and walk on the moon live. I had read plenty of science fiction as a teenager, some of it describing the first men on the moon. In NONE of those science fiction stories was the first landing done live on TV.
Before the actual landing, there was some speculation that part of the moon was covered in thick dust, which could be dangerous to walk on. Either because Armstrong and Aldrin were aware of those speculations and were being cautions’, or because it took a little time to adjust to lunar gravity. their first few steps were slow,, small, and tentative. In a few minutes they had
either eliminated their fears of falling through dust, or they had adjusted to lunar gravity- They began bouncing around in large leaps.
They say everyone remembers where they were when JFK was shot. Well, I have vivid recollections of Neil setting foot on the moon. Although only 15, I was allowed to stay up after midnight (my parents had gone to bed), and set about recording the historic event with the only device I had available – a camera. I don’t know what happened to those grainy black and white photos, banded with fuzzy white lines, but I will never forget the memory.
God bless you Neil Armstrong.
You should come away stunned by how small and frail these craft were … and the courage of the men who climbed into them to go into “outer space”.
Polkyb on August the 25th @ur momisugly 6:10 pm:
Hear Hear! An example of an American for whom I have nothing but admiration (like you Anthony). What an antidote to the rubbish coming out of Hollywood. It is very heartening to know that such people exist, even if we have suffered the loss of Neil Armstrong.
all of human-kind owes him a debt we can never repay R.I.P.
One other thing this quote from the book by Brian Shul on flying the SR-71.
fits Neil Armstrong, and the feeling of the intensity of high performance flight..
The cockpit was my office. It was a place where I experienced many emotions and learned many lessons. It was a place of work, but also a keeper of dreams.
It was a place of deadly serious encounters, yet there I discovered much about life. I learned about joy and sorrow, pride and humility, and fear, and overcoming fear. I saw much from that office that most people would never see. At times it terrified me, yet I could always feel at home there. It was my place, at that time in space, and the jet was mine for those moments. Though it was a place where I could quickly die, the cockpit was a place where I truly lived.
– Brian Shul, Sled Driver
RIP Neil Armstrong. A great explorer, and by all accounts a first class human being.
The moon just got a little colder and further away.
My hero, RIP.
His funeral should be a state funeral. If his family wishes of course, so that theworld may honor his achievements and inspire more.