One Giant Leap

On July 20, 1969, the spacecraft Eagle landed on the Moon, changing history forever. It was the culmination of a chain of events put in motion by the launch of Sputnik by the Soviets in 1957. Now, fifty years later, we commemorate this incredible milestone in the course of Human Events.

For those of us old enough to have lived through the Space Race, the commemoration is a mixture of pride and nostalgia. We recall that putting a man on the Moon was a National mandate. The Moon or bust. From the Industrialized Optimism of the ’64 World’s Fair, to TV shows like Lost in Space, to comicbooks like Fantastic Four, the Space Program was very much a part of the zeitgeist of the time. In those days, the Future was Atomic, filled with flying cars and Moonbases. We were Americans. We could accomplish anything.

The Space Program has always had its detractors. “Why are we spending millions of dollars to send men into space, when people are starving or otherwise suffering, here on Earth,” was a common argument (proving that virtue signaling is not a new phenomenon). Fortunately, adults were still in charge back then, and so the Program proceeded.

The benefits and technological advancements from the Space Race are staggering. Microwave ovens, titanium, LEDs, remote medical monitors, freeze drying, portable computers, just to name a few. This tech was being created as they went along. The skill and nuts-and-bolts genius of those physicists, engineers and astronauts is mind blowing. They traveled to another world, across millions of miles of vacuum, Using sliderules! For all of you youngsters who have never used a sliderule and probably  don’t even know what it is, suffice it to say that they did the math in their heads. Pocket calculators didn’t exist, yet and computers were extremely primitive. Hell, Eagle’s onboard computer only had about 30 kilobytes of RAM.

I almost can’t describe what this day was like, fifty years ago. Literally, the World stopped and watched as Neil Armstrong stepped onto the Lunar surface and uttered “That’s one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind.” What humility. What grace. Armstrong was the first human being to set foot on another world. A lesser man would have made it about him. Armstrong acknowledged the Greater Than Himself.

It was a moment that Changed the World. In that instant, Humanity was no longer locked on this one planet. We could go as far as our drive, ambition and technology could carry us. Today, the Moon. Tomorrow, the Galaxy. We were Children of the Universe, now. Our horizons were as limitless as human potential. It was quite a time to be alive. We were the pinnacle of Human Civilization, and we knew it. It wasn’t to last.

Today, there are those who say it didn’t happen. That those of us who saw it with our own eyes, didn’t see what we saw, despite how massive the conspiracy would have to have been, and in fifty years, there have been no leaks.

 There’s also a trend to say that it was a Human achievement, not an American one. Except, that the Landing on the Moon was absolutely an American achievement. The Space Race was a Major Battle in the Cold War with the Soviet Union, and we won it decisively. We put a man on the Moon before them, and then did it five more times, plus one near-miss, just to prove that it wasn’t a fluke. See, the Space Race wasn’t JUST about putting a man on the Moon, it was about showing the World who’s way of doing things was better.

Was it the Soviets’ top-down, command-and-control Government and Economy, or was it our Representative Government and Free Market Economy? I can’t think of a better example than the Fisher Space Pen. When faced with the problem that ink won’t flow properly in zero-gee, America invested a few thousand dollars, and created a pen that would work in Space. The Soviet solution? Use a pencil.

On July 19, 2019, the New York Times went full Social Justice Weenie , by suggesting that the Soviet Union won the Space Race, because there were female Cosmonauts before there were female Astronauts. Anything to diminish America’s accomplishments. To the Left, Apollo 11 was Toxically Masculine. Done by men, for men.

Well, y’know what? I’m not having any of it. I’m proud of America. I’m proud of what we’ve accomplished. I’m proud of Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, Mike Collins, and all of the other American Heroes who braved the void, to plant our flag on another world. God Bless America, and America Bless God.