Man on the moon

In 1965, the American space program
began to catch up with the Russians
at last. Edward White and James
McDivitt soared to the heavens in
the Gemini IV and stayed in space for
5 days. Astronaut White also left his
spacecraft and like the Russian cos-
monaut Leonow before him, was
able to float freely in space.
       Overall, the Gemini program
became a major turning point in the
race to the moon. It gave the Amer-
ican Space Agency, NASA, key
information about long-distance
spaceflight by multiple astronaut
teams, travelling together for a pro-
longed period of time. It also taught
them how to maneuver space craft in
close proximity, as in December of
1966, when Gemini VI and VII came
as close as 3 feet.
     Meanwhile, the ultimate objective
of the space race, the moon, also
came under close scrutiny. On June 2,
1966, the American space probe
"Surveyor 1" landed safely on the
surface of the moon. For the next 2
and a half months, it would transmit
more than 12,000 photographs to
earth.
     Just as the space program changed
from the Gemini to the three-man
Apollo spacecraft, disaster struck.
During a test on the ground, a sud-
den fire erupted in the Apollo 1 cap-
sule which killed the crew, Roger
Chaffee, Edward White and Mercury
veteran Virgil Grissom. It was the
first human fatality in the American
space program;  ironically, it occ-
urred on the ground, in front of
helpless mission engineers.
      Once more, Russia threatened to
beat the Americans to the moon. On
September 15, 1968, the Russian un-
manned probe "Sond 5" was the first
to fly across the dark and uncharted
back side of the moon.  But it was a
narrow victory, for only one month
later, the crew of Apollo 8 made its
famous Christmas orbit around the
moon. For the first time, human eyes
saw part of a celestial body not
visible from the earth.
     From this point on, the Apollo
program charged forward to reach
its final objective. Finally, on July 21,
1969, Neil Armstrong entered history
as the first man to set foot on the
moon.
     As Armstrong planted his foot in
the dust of the moon, the world
stopped and beheld its human emis-
sary, so far in space. It was as if for
one brief and shining moment, the
world became one, a community of
more than 500 million viewers,
touched by the fleeting images from
the moon.  As President John F.
Kennedy had said so many years be-
fore, when an American had yet to
soar into space:  here was a new
frontier, and at long last, it had been
breached.