Today, I went to the Cradle of Aviation Museum in Garden City for the “Countdown to Apollo at 50’ exhibit and event. It was great to relive those great moments and to see many of the artifacts of that era. I have been thinking a lot about those day and that great day and yesterday I wrote the following remembrance.
Space exploration. Rockets. Space flight. The moon. These were some of the key buzz words to those growing up in my generation. Like many other kids especially boys, we had comic books, TV shows about cowboys, cops and doctors. From my earliest memories at 4 or 5, I learned that Superman came from another planet, Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers flew in space ships and fought evil in the Sunday comics. In 1957, America heard about Sputnik, the Russian satellite and that being our “enemies”, the US was accelerating our own space program. What we saw on Television and read in comics was now becoming real. As I entered First grade and began to learn to read, my parents were urged to take a Random House Beginner’s Book subscription to encourage reading. I was excited by the prospect. I had always tried to “read” comics from my Uncles’ Luncheonette/newsstand and the prospect of learning to read and actually understand what was happening in the text portions of those four color periodicals was something I couldn’t wait to explore. Among the first set of books were four Dr. Seuss classics, The Cat in the Hat, The Cat in the Hat Comes Back, Green Eggs and Ham, One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish, And You Will Go to the Moon. The first four were cute, brightly colored and stylized cartoon books with simple mostly rhythmic texts. The last was very different. It was more photo-realistic, with more advanced text that required parental and teacher help to read, but it was amazing. At the same time as I began to read, the NASA space program was accelerating as were my reading skills. I knew from the newspaper headlines and TV reporting on Huntley and Brinkley that 7 pilots had been chosen as our first astronauts with the first flight due to happen in December of 1960, then postponed five more times until May of 1961. The Russians had already put a man in space that April but it was underplayed in American media. Finally, on May 5th, 1961, Alan Shepard became the first US astronaut to make a flight into space. And so, sitting in Sister Columba’s first grade class of 40 kids, watched our classroom 19 " black and white TV waiting for the countdown. We were transfixed and cheered. We watched the whole event including all of the delays through the launch, splashdown and recovery. We cheered that launch like a sporting event. It was only a sub orbital flight but we didn’t know what that meant. We only knew it meant we put a man in space and the story of You Will Go To The Moon was coming true. I wore that book out. It was my favorite. I read it whenever I got the chance and certainly each time there was a Mercury or Gemini manned space launch.
Those programs became a fixture on mine and many kid’s calendar. The second sub orbital flight was manned by Gus Grissom but it was the amazing three orbits of John Glenn that cemented astronaut as hero. My dad went to his ticker tape parade in the Canyon of Heroes and brought me back a commemorative button which I still have.
This didn’t stop me from remaining a fan of the space program and all the Astronauts. Shepard, Grissom, Glenn along with Gordon Cooper; Wally Schirra, Deke Slayton, Scott Carpenter were the original Mercury 7 although Slayton never flew. The Gemini crews included Gus Grissom & cooper and Schirra from Mercury along with future Apollo Moon mission crew members, John Young, James McDivitt and Ed White with the first space walk, Richard Gordon, Pete Conrad, Tom Stafford, Frank Borman, David Scott, Gene Cernan, Jim Lovell, John Young & Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins. We all knew that the Gemini missions were trading for the impending moon landing missions. Space rendezvous, docking and endurance were just some of the goals.
Each mission was televised and heavily reported on. While I developed a following of other passions, The Beatles, James Bond, Batman and Star Trek I never lost interest in the Space Program. I had a subscription to the Doubleday Science Service, Science Program Series of booklets on Space Exploration. Some of them came with models of the Mercury, Gemini, Apollo Command Module and the Lunar Lander. They all stored in book shaped storage boxes to live on your bookshelf. I still have some of them. Considering the turmoils of the 60’s: the rise of youth culture, civil rights, riots and the Vietnam War, the Space Program was one area where we were all united. It was the one point of national pride that we could all share in, it gave us all hope for the future and for greater things to come. Of course, it was the Apollo program and its goal of moon landing that captured our collective attention. The setback of the disastrous launch pad fire of Apollo 1 that killed Astronauts Grissom, White and Chaffee shocked and saddened us and hit home how dangerous it all was. Thankfully, subsequent missions corrected the issues that caused the tragedy and set the program back on course culminating in the Christmas Eve transmission of Apollo 8 as it became the first manned mission to orbit the moon and return. Astronaut Anders’ photograph, “Earthrise”, still fills me with awe.
Now, 50 years later, we celebrate the first manned moon landing and the moon walk of Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin. Being from New Jersey, we were especially proud of local hero Aldrin from nearby Montclair. All news broadcasts, newspapers and magazines had extensive coverage of the launch and I remember how everyone I knew watched the launch. On the Sunday of the imminent landing, the priest in church had us pray for the safety and success of the crew and the mission. That night we traveled several towns to my Aunt’s to see the first moon walk. We went to my Aunt’s because she had a brand new 24” RCA color TV and we only a 19” Black and White. The joke was on us as I learned years later that the mission was only able to broadcast in Black and White but ABC reporters Peter Jennings and Jules Bergman looked better in color. Everyone ooh’d and ahh‘ d and remarked about how historic it was and something we would never forget. It was a thrilling day and like many others we saved editions of the papers that reported the historic event. I still have them.
Sitting near my grandfather, I had the realization that he had seen the invention of the electric light, automobile, airplane, and space exploration in his lifetime. I also knew that July 20th would always be a special memory in my life. It is still, indeed.
So, now 50 years later, it is still a special memory but I am saddened by the knowledge that many of the divisive things that separated us in 1969 are still with us and are maybe worse than ever. There was a lot of fear and loathing about politics back then but there were many more in government who believed in bipartisanship and compromise. I am further saddened by the regression in race relations and advancements that had been made and the incredible rise of racism and hatred that is being marshaled and weaponized by political forces to consolidate power for the benefit of the corporate elite at the expense of the very heart of democracy and the Constitution. In 1969, we were divided by an undeclared war, fear of other races etc but we had the Space Program to unite us. Sadly, there is no unifying element today and talk of Mars exploration and a ridiculous Space Force are attempts to echo the past but now motivated to promote the self aggrandizement of a soulless, bankrupt individual. The Democratic politicians need to unify quickly behind a strong message of hope that will appeal to all voters and that will lead this country away from the encroaching darkness that is destroying all this country stands for.
