‘One Small Step for Man:’ Apollo 11 And the 1st Moon Landing

september 04, 2012

Apollo 11 commander Neil Armstrong walks slowly away from the lunar module to explore the surface of the moon on July 20, 1969

MARIO RITTER: Welcome to EXPLORATIONS in VOA Special English. We continue our history of the American space program with the flight of Apollo Eleven. We also remember Neil Armstrong, the first man to set foot on the moon. He died on August twenty-fifth.

Today, Shirley Griffith and Steve Ember tell how America met its goal of placing astronauts on our only natural satellite by the end of the nineteen sixties.

(SOUND)

STEVE EMBER: A rocket launch countdown. A common sound in the nineteen sixties. But this was not just another launch. It was the beginning of a historic event. It was the countdown for Apollo Eleven -- the space flight that would carry men to the first landing on the moon.

(SOUND)

The ground shook at Cape Kennedy, Florida, the morning of July sixteenth, nineteen sixty-nine. The huge Saturn Five rocket moved slowly up into the sky. It rose perfectly. Someone on the launch crew spoke the words: "Good luck. And Godspeed."

In the spacecraft at the top of the speeding rocket were three American astronauts whose names soon would be known around the world: Neil Armstrong, Edwin Aldrin and Michael Collins.

Neil Armstrong was the commander of the spacecraft. He was a test pilot. He had flown earlier on one of the two-man Gemini space flights. Armstrong was a calm person, a man who talked very little.