The Apollo Years 2

Giant Leaps

...........The chariot for Apollo had been built, and the path was cleared for a landing on the moon. As the huge Saturn-V rockets were prepared for flight, their operators were being readied and primed. Even despite a horrible tragedy on the first scheduled Apollo mission, the plan went forward and landed the first humans on the moon. A landmark occurrence of immeasurable importance, this was the greatest trophy of the Space Age, and a remarkable cause for elation by not only the Americans, but the entire world.

...........The first scheduled Apollo mission ended in disaster, and nearly spelled doom for the entire program. During a routine training exercise, the three pilots of the Apollo 204 command module were caught in a blazing inferno of pure oxygen fire (Crouch, 72). This was a dire moment in the history of the American space program, as the three terrified men were trapped inside and burned alive. With a new and difficult hurdle to overcome, NASA strained under pressure, but under the excellent leadership of administrator James Webb, a team of investigators was assembled and the problem was narrowed down. Of the original 8,000 potential problems accessed, the team made 1,341 alterations in the design of the Apollo vessels (Crouch, 73). Delaying the launch of the first Apollo mission by only about two years, the team of scientists made a remarkable comeback from what could have been a dehabilitating setback. The lives of those three men would not be lost in vain.

Apollo 8 made a picture perfect launch on December 21, 1968.

...........The first successful Apollo moon mission, the Apollo 8, would send back never before seen pictures of the Earth rising above the lunar horizon. On December 21, 1968 the first moon mission was launched with flying colors. Without the lunar landing module ready yet, the first three moon men would not walk the surface, but their success was no less extraordinary. On Christmas Eve of that year they radioed back an inspiring message, with an image of the tiny earth floating in a desolate black void. Reading from the book of genesis, the Astronauts relayed a powerful image of this fragile planet and a message to all the people of "the good earth." It was a moment of rapture and victory for the American space program rivaled only by the next mission to the moon (Crouch, 78).

...........To crown the achievements of scientific humanity and effectively bring the conjecturing of the ancients in a full circle, the astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin of the Apollo 11 finally achieved what was never even believable before; the moonwalk. These men descended to the lunar surface as the first human aliens, celestial wanderers not only in mind but also in body. That day of July 20, 1969 when the two men departed from their comrade, Michael Collins’ command module to the lunar surface, would be marked by one universally recognized statement. As Armstrong climbed from the ladder of his "tranquility base" on the moon he proclaimed "That’s one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind." Indeed it was.

On Christmas eve of 1968 the Apollo 8 astronauts sent back a revelatory image of the Earth, tiny and blue in a sea of utter desolation. Never again would humanity look at itself in quite the same regard.

Victory for Humanity

...........From the baby steps of the Greeks to the strides of the Renaissance men, never had such a leap been made. But the chariot of Apollo wheeled from the myths of antiquity to the sciences of modernity. The events that led man to the threshold of space had no defined beginning. Stretching back to the dawn of critical thought, humanity has been striving for a greater goal, an extension of our knowledge and observation to ever-higher plateaus. It was a challenge beyond all others, and one that we all participated in. The events and people that led us into space were unique and spectacular, but the driving force and chief concern in the extension of our exploratory frontiers has always been a united commonality between riders of the spaceship Earth. A common pursuit of that imperceptible truth that lay just out of reach. A common need for that intangible security that is found just beyond the next impasse. It was indeed competition, and sometimes hatred that pushed men closer to space than ever before. But behind that competition was an overwhelming need to know more, see more, and be more---than ever before. It is an unquenchable thirst and an unreachable goal. But we pursue it vicariously, vigorously and with the highest of aspirations. That is a victory in itself.