Nixon Phones the Moon
July 21st is the anniversary of the first time man walked on the moon (unless you're a skeptic and believe that the whole thing was shot in a studio.) On July 21, 1969, some 41 years ago today, Astronaut Neil Armstrong became the first man to walk on the moon, uttering those famous words "that's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind!"
While Armstrong and fellow crew member Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin were walking on the surface of the moon, Mission Control in Houston patched through a phone call from President Richard M. Nixon. After the astronauts planted a U.S. flag on the lunar surface, they spoke with Nixon through a telephone-radio transmission. Nixon referred to the call as "the most historic phone call ever made from the White House."
Following is a YouTube video of that historic call:
In the 2008 documentary "When We Left Earth: The NASA Missions", Astronaut Frank Borman, who was serving as a NASA liason to the White House at the time, said that Nixon had a long speech prepared to read during the phone call, but Borman convinced Nixon to keep his words brief, out of respect of the lunar landing being President John Kennedy's legacy. (An earlier journal entry in this community about this can be found here (called JFK Reaches for the Moon). Given the animosity that existed between Nixon and Kennedy, it is quite surprising that he agreed to do so.
Nixon visited the Apollo 11 astronauts when they returned to earth. He spoke to them on the recovery ship, the USS Hornet on July 24th. He told the astronauts: "As a result of what you've done, the world has never been closer together before." The astronauts were in quarantine at the time.
Years later it was revealed that Nixon had a contingent speech written to be given in the event the Lunar Module had failed to lift off from the lunar surface, which would have resulted in Armstrong's and Aldrin's deaths. On August 13, 1969, the astronauts exited quarantine. Parades were held in their honor in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles on the same day. That evening in Los Angeles there was an official State Dinner at the Century Plaza Hotel to celebrate Apollo 11, attended by Members of Congress, 44 Governors, Supreme Court Chief Justice Earl Warren, and ambassadors from 83 nations. President Nixon and Vice President Spiro T. Agnew honored each astronaut with a presentation of the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
While Armstrong and fellow crew member Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin were walking on the surface of the moon, Mission Control in Houston patched through a phone call from President Richard M. Nixon. After the astronauts planted a U.S. flag on the lunar surface, they spoke with Nixon through a telephone-radio transmission. Nixon referred to the call as "the most historic phone call ever made from the White House."
Following is a YouTube video of that historic call:
In the 2008 documentary "When We Left Earth: The NASA Missions", Astronaut Frank Borman, who was serving as a NASA liason to the White House at the time, said that Nixon had a long speech prepared to read during the phone call, but Borman convinced Nixon to keep his words brief, out of respect of the lunar landing being President John Kennedy's legacy. (An earlier journal entry in this community about this can be found here (called JFK Reaches for the Moon). Given the animosity that existed between Nixon and Kennedy, it is quite surprising that he agreed to do so.
Nixon visited the Apollo 11 astronauts when they returned to earth. He spoke to them on the recovery ship, the USS Hornet on July 24th. He told the astronauts: "As a result of what you've done, the world has never been closer together before." The astronauts were in quarantine at the time.
Years later it was revealed that Nixon had a contingent speech written to be given in the event the Lunar Module had failed to lift off from the lunar surface, which would have resulted in Armstrong's and Aldrin's deaths. On August 13, 1969, the astronauts exited quarantine. Parades were held in their honor in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles on the same day. That evening in Los Angeles there was an official State Dinner at the Century Plaza Hotel to celebrate Apollo 11, attended by Members of Congress, 44 Governors, Supreme Court Chief Justice Earl Warren, and ambassadors from 83 nations. President Nixon and Vice President Spiro T. Agnew honored each astronaut with a presentation of the Presidential Medal of Freedom.