One Giant Influence
Fifty Years
Well… here we are, fifty years after Neil and Buzz landed on the Moon. Fifty years after that “One Small Step…”
There are so many celebrations. So many memories. So many recreations, parties, movies, television specials, etc.
What’s this, then?
It’s a recognition of that “…One Giant Leap” as a seminal moment and influence on the life of a then-five-year-old boy.
I was five years old when Apollo 11 launched in 1969. Like almost everyone around the world, I was totally locked into the space program. The culture of the late 60s was very diverse, but there was a HUGE space-influence in popular television, cartoons (Roger Ramjet was my favorite), music, and even aspects of home, art, and automobile design!
When Eagle landed and “Houston, Tranquility Base here…” was spoken from the lunar surface, I was wearing this spacesuit and helmet, thinking because I had it on, I was there too!
Being able to stay up late that night (it was past my usual bedtime, after all) to watch Neil come down the ladder and take that first “small step” was life-changing. Little did I know how big that “one giant leap” would prove in my life, but it set forth a love of space, of science, and of technology.
I built plastic model spaceships, both real and imagined. I memorized every episode of Star Trek. I read everything I could get my hands on about space exploration. My bookshelf was full of histories and photo books of rockets and space travel.
The bravery of the early astronauts was my inspiration. The people at NASA, in Mission Control and at the Cape, helping the astronauts on their journeys were my childhood heroes! I flew along with Mike Mars in his fictional adventures. I created my own along the way.
It was the “One Giant Influence” that focused my little brain in such a way that there was almost no way that I’d ever do anything other than work at NASA on the space program.
Fortunately, that’s exactly what happened.
How did it influence you?
It doesn’t matter if you saw it live or not, the first lunar landing has impacted people for the last 50 years. Tell me about it below!
It was (and still is) ten days before my birthday. Then I was turning 17. Everything that had been broadcast in the UK until then I had avidly sat through, when I could, and recorded it on reel to reel magnetic audio tape. But now it was finally here – men were going to the moon again and this time there was no hanging around taking photos, no low-flying to test systems and navigation.
This time they were actually going to land. Time to pluck up courage and request an appointment to see my headmaster. (Getting an appointment to see a Principal at County High School was a big deal in those days – unless you’d done something to warrant him seeing you and then it was an even bigger deal!)
I showed him my hand written logs, explained the mission I had been on to record history in the making and requested the day off school to allow me to sit up all night recording man’s descent, landing and subsequent first footsteps on our moon. I came away with a hand written note authorising me to miss school so that I might finish my own mission. I immediately set about planning supplies (both consumable by me and my hungry tape recorder), sufficient to see me through the UK day and night whilst I recorded the final stages of the first manned moon landing.
If Neil and Buzz were actually going to do it while Mike (I was on first name terms with them by then) circled above then I wasn’t going to leave them on their own for any longer than it took me to visit the washroom and return (and that didn’t happen often!) Thousands of people in the USofA and around the world watching their backs every millisecond was one thing but without me there they were at risk and I was NOT going to let them down any more than I had the crews of Apollos 7, 8, 9 or 10.
All sorts of wild speculation was being thrown around in the media such as sinking without trace in bottomless lunar dust, landing on the side of a crater and toppling in so that return to lunar orbit became impossible plus many, many other imaginative ways of meeting their doom. It scared the hell out of me what they were letting themselves in for. There were so many simple things that could cause an aborted mission or worse, a loss of crew. I’d run of of gas with a friend once – I knew the difficulties they faced!
But they overcame all the issues. Guys on the ground watched them, encouraged them and told them what they needed to know using the breadth of their own skills and knowledge to get the job done. I was hooked on spaceflight for life but even more than that I was taken with the ability of men like those to use their skill and ability, master their emotions and fly to the moon and back, bringing samples of it with them.
The Apollo era was such a magnificent time for all of mankind for so many different reasons – some just struggled to see it then.
I still have those tapes. I would have to visit a museum to find equipment capable of playing them and even then I would almost certainly find they were degraded too much to reveal what they had encoded on them. But I’m keeping them – I know what they contain.
I have subsequently visited the hallowed rooms, more than once, where many, many guys sat monitoring, guarding, planning the safe execution of the missions involving those intrepid Apollo astronauts and I have touched moon rock.
Thank you Roger, Matt and everybody who helped me realise my dream.
What an amazing memory, John. I know you and I have talked about it before, but it’s fantastic to see and read it. Thank you for sharing!
I wasn’t born yet for Apollo 11 but I grew up with those memories. I had lots of rocket models and toys as a little boy and dreamed of being an astronaut. I never worked on the space program but I’ve always loved it. I still do. This is a great time for memories and I love reading all of them!
Hi David – it was an influential moment for you!
Greetings from Thailand! I love NASA and am very happy about the Apollo landings. I love reading about it!
Hi Somchai! Thank you and hello from Texas!
I was born a few years too late but I love watching all of these great celebrations! Did you see the Apollo rocket projected on the Washington monument?
Hi Tim – YES, but only video clips! I can’t wait to see the full show with the launch sequence projected on the Monument!
And now I have the video – see here: https://balettie.com/apollo-50-go-for-the-moon/
Awesome!
🙂 Thanks Cady!