Modern Vespa

Anybody like me who was a kid 40 years ago will probably never forget what it was like when man first landed on the moon on July 20th 1969. I had posters of all the Apollo astronauts on my bedroom wall and these guys were my first heroes.

A website has now been set up by the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library to allow people to experience the Apollo 11 mission in real time, 40 years after the event. Kids today have absolutely no idea what it was like to live through this and my own 18 year old son really has no interest in it (deep sigh).

Here's a link though if you are like me and still remember it actually happening in front of your eyes. I will be following it every day following the "launch" of Apollo 11. Right now the countdown is at T Minus 21 hours and 45 minutes to lift-off.

We Choose the Moon.org

I to remember this day.

Paul

I've seen Movie Sets before...

Reminds me of that Milk Board commercial about cheese a few years ago. It just showed a nighttime scene of a tree with a full moon behind it and captions that went something like this...

For hundreds of years, man believed the moon was made of cheese.

Nearly 40 years ago, we landed on the moon and discovered it was made of rock.

We haven't been back since.

"Was the people who lived there very friendly or was they scared of you?"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hTKedyQQkZQ

I think they still are my heroes.

I like to use this site to see when the Space Station is flying overhead - it looks like a very bright star moving quickly across the sky - and I tend to give them a little wave and wish them good luck. It's well worth doing this with kids (if they can stay up late enough) as it gives them a sense of wonder to be able to see a space craft from their backyard - obviously you need moderately clear skies.

Mike

Dear old Mom grew up near the Kennedy Space Center and is a total space nut. Count ~9 months forward and you get my birthday...

I remember seeing the apollo 11 capsule in the air and space museum and thought 'they went to the moon in this'. A lot of people dont appreciate how primative space technology was in that time period. Hell even the first space shuttle had only the most rudamentary computer system onboard

I remember being glued to the TV as a kid. I also am a space nut or cadet as my friends like to call me I have seen a shuttle launch.had a meteorite go past my house as a kid,have a telescope and also have Starry Night program on the computer Your so right when you look at what they went up in and what they have now Oh and i also love Tang alert

I was standing knee deep in the ocean at Cocoa Beach snapping pix with an instamatic camera. As a kid, I really did not grasp the significance until I was much older. I was literally blown away when the thundering sound of lift off arrived 10 seconds or so after lift-off. I believe my paternal grandparents went to their graves, thinking the whole thing was just a TV show.

I was still in the womb when they landed on the Moon and have been a huge fan of space exploration my whole life.

I had just had my first kid when I heard this Billy Bragg song for the first time.

The Space Race is Over

When I was young I told my mum
I'm going to walk on the Moon someday
Armstrong and Aldrin spoke to me
From Houston and Cape Kennedy
And I watched the Eagle landing
On a night when the Moon was full
And as it tugged at the tides, I knew deep inside
I too could feel its pull
I lay in my bed and dreamed I walked
On the Sea of Tranquillity
I knew that someday soon we'd all sail to the moon
On the high tide of technology
But the dreams have all been taken
And the window seats taken too
And 2001 has almost come and gone
What am I supposed to do?
Now that the space race is over
It's been and it's gone and I'll never get to the moon
Because the space race is over
And I can't help but feel we've all grown up too soon
Now my dreams have all been shattered
And my wings are tattered too
And I can still fly but not half as high
As once I wanted to
Now that the space race is over
It's been and it's gone and I'll never get to the moon
Because the space race is over
And I can't help but feel we've all grown up too soon
My son and I stand beneath the great night sky
And gaze up in wonder
I tell him the tale of Apollo And he says
Why did they ever go?
It may look like some empty gesture
To go all that way just to come back
But don't offer me a place out in cyberspace
Cos where in the hell's that at?
Now that the space race is over
It's been and it's gone and I'll never get out of my room
Because the space race is over
And I can't help but feel we're all just going nowhere

Sorry for the "cut and paste"....

I was 11 and a certified space program nut. It was Sunday night, the EVA not to happen until after (ready?) my bedtime! Yes, my mother demanded I go to bed, despite my "They're making history up there!" objections. So I smuggled the 12" B&W Zenith portable into my bedroom, and watched the moonwalk lying on my belly with my chin in my hands.

Woodstock was happening at the same time as the Apollo 11 flight. I remember seeing news coverage from Woodstock. The reporter asks this hippy kid what he thinks of the moon landing. The hippy says "I don't think of it." What I felt, if put into words, would have been, "You worthless piece of $h!t." It was the first time in my life I felt contempt.

I was a space nut as a kid too. Unfortunately during this particular event I was out on the playground playing strike out with my buddies and didn't see it.

It's amazing how times have changed.

A ten year goal was set to land a man on the moon and come home safely and it was met.

Nowadays it took longer than that to get digital converter boxes ready and they are still sorting it out.

I have always stood in awe of that generation.

Back then I spent my summers at our cabin on Kalamalka Lake near Vernon, BC. We had no electricity, running water or plumbing - BUT we did have a transistor radio! I vividly remember that day, Mom, Dad, my brother and myself huddled around the radio listening. The silence of the world was deafening as the broadcast crackled through the speaker.

A few years ago my brother and I were looking through the log book we used to record our daily adventures in. When we got to that day the memories were just as real as day it happened. Pure magic.


Dave

To this day it stands as history's greatest engineering feat. A triumph of the human reasoning mind.

Cool link, thanks for posting

I watched the ISS zoom past last night.

Thanks for posting this topic. I was only very young but I do remember all the talk and having it explained to me. I also got a rocket ship for Christmas that year 8)
I still didn't think Armstrong, Aldrin and Colins were as clever or as cool as the Tracy Brothers (Thunderbirds Are Go!!)

Like everyone, we were glued to a TV set. We were actually out shopping w/ my mother, trip took longer than expected, so we all headed to the
TV section of the Dept store. The store actually made an announcemet over the PA system, that it was happening. I think everyone in the store made a beeline to that dept.

BTW: a lot of people think the money spent on that and other space projects was money wasted. They should look around at many of the things they take for granted today. Major advances in computers, cameras
communications, medicines, food have come from adapting things for space travel. Many good, some still up for discussion.

"We should spend it here on earth." they would say.
Where else did they think we were spending it?

I rem my dad waking me up to watch it on tv and then him taking me outside to look at the moon, he even let me look through a telescope to see if i could see them on the moon!! God i had a happy childhood ,thanks DAD xo