That last day before the moon landing

Do you remember July 19, 1969? Me neither.

On that date, Apollo 11 was approaching the moon. Ted Kennedy had an accident at Chappaquiddick that killed Mary Jo Kopehne. The Vietnam war was raging.

And, although NASA’s last four missions had been successful, we weren’t sure this landing  would work. Or even that the astronauts would return safely to earth.

Because, we still remembered the Apollo fire back in January 1967. And we remembered the Soviets beating us for nearly every first in space. This was the big one…the race that President Kennedy has declared…the race to the moon.

We heard that an unmanned Soviet spacecraft, called Luna 15, was approaching the moon. “What’s that all about?” some of us wondered.

To my mind, July 19th was the last day of the ordinary world, and—if all went well—July 20th would be the beginning of the future. As a kid reading science fiction, an actual moon landing would be a clear dividing point.

Well, the moon landing took place, and changed my view of the world (and that of millions of others) forever. Luna 15 crashed into the moon—something the Soviets tried to portray as completion of a successful mission. In fact, Luna 15 was an attempt to scoop up lunar soil and return to earth just before Apollo 11.

The next day, the future began. But the future has not be fulfilled. Werner von Braun promised us Mars and more. But America chose to abandon the high frontier and spent all the future decades with people just circling the earth.

True, our unmanned probes did some amazing things, and continue to do so. But the dreams of children have not been fulfilled. We wait to see if this generation will finally move ahead.