Buzz Aldrin

Space dreams, 40 years after the Moon

The grainy footage still makes me gasp with astonishment.

The famous black-and-white images of a spindly lunar module setting down on the Moon on July 20th, 1969, represent the improbable trajectory from dream to the reality that was Apollo 11.

It leaves one wondering, even today: How did humans travel so far, in so frail a ship, through such a still, stark void?

An estimated 600 million people watched the live television broadcast of astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walking on the Moon that day.

They huddled around flickering TV sets in living rooms and public squares, in offices and schoolrooms. 

I was 12 in 1969, but the memory is vivid.

I remember being allowed to stay up late for the occasion, and the cheering and excitement.

For a kid, it was a marvel to think that “we” - humanity, not just America - had achieved the seemingly impossible.