http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/08/25/us-usa-neilarmstrong-idUSBRE87O0B020120825


I remember staying up late as a 15-year-old to watch the landing, July 20, 1969, on TV in my Richardson, Texas, home, just outside Dallas.

I remember how stark and black-and-white and grainy the images were being broadcast, in a crackly way, from the lunar surface.

I remember when the Apollo 11 crew returned to Earth how they were immediately quarantined to check for any possible foreign matter brought back with them from the moon that might be dangerous to them or others.

I also recall that my family took this amazing event in human history rather matter-of-factly, with no cheering or real, deep emotion that stood out to me. Maybe they were looking for those ancient Mormon moonmen, 6 feet tall and dressed like Quakers, that early LDS church leaders claimed actually lived there. Now, for Mormons, that would have been exciting.



Edited 12 time(s). Last edit at 08/25/2012 03:59PM by steve benson.

It's amazing to me how many news stories break on RFM for me.

Was he a Quaker also???

That was a bad decade for mormons:


actually getting to the moon after prophet said we won't

finding out there weren't quakers on the moon

Book of Abraham Papyrus found in museum


Probably a mix of cog dis and american pride for them.


Armstrong was the man! so sad to lose a legend.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/25/2012 06:30PM by smithscars.

I was 11 yesrs old, and living in England, could hardly stay awake. I was sitting on the floor leaning against the sofa and remember sliding down till I was almost lay flat on the carpet. It didnt impress me too much, but then again nothing much does when I'm really sleepy.

I was 16 and being raised agnostic.

My Dad made sure I was right there watching. He told me how important it was(about 600 times lol) Watershed moment.
He made sure to stress it was educated learned men who had done this, not some crack pot money grubbing religion looking for gods in the air... Ha, he was great in some ways. Even pedophiles have their moments I suppose.

Yes, black and white grainy moving pictures!

We continued to watch it over and over again, each time we could.

ty Steve!

I was in the LTM (MTC now?) when they landed on the moon. They did bring a TV in and let us watch it. So grainy but so amazing. I really only half believed it was happening.

I wish I knew someone else who was there then.

I watched the moonwalk on a 12" black and white TV with my TBM father in our apartment in Manhattan. I think he was expecting to see Jesus at any moment, but there was just a blurry Neil Armstrong bouncing along on moondust.

A year later, I renounced religion altogether, much to my father's dismay. Science 1, Mormonism 0.

We're on the MOON!

After that, it seemed anything was possible.

I remember looking down from the pre-existence to that particular soundstage where Neil Armstrong and others were being directed by Satan to hoax the moon landing in order to discredit the words of the prophets.

A view from the pre- existence ... lmao

I wasn't alive then, but he is one of my idols.

He set the bar high, and I do hope we follow his lead in the near future.

I loved his self-deprecating style in the public eye. This was not a man that rubbed his accomplishments in people's faces.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/25/2012 05:11PM by archytas.

That was the last night I ever peed my bed.

and was watching it in my bedroom in NY. It went on for hours. My parents yelled at me to go to bed at 3:00 AM'ish, but all I wanted to do was watch man walk on the moon.

"For the Eagle has landed
Tell your children when
Time won't drive us down to dust again."

Rest in Peace, you truly world hero.

I was only five years old at the time,ut still have vague memories of that summer. My family had rented an old wooden shore house in Ocean City New Jersey. Watched the event on my mother's old Philco portable, on which everything was black and white and grainy. My brother and I pretended we were astronauts for the rest of the summer, the outdoor shower shed becoming our "space capsule" and the beach a reasonable facsimile of the moon. Was promised then that by the time I was a grown-up, there would be a moon colony, and rocketships making regular trips there--still waiting.

I was 10 years old. We were watching the event on our old little black and white TV. The coverage was black and white anyway, so it wouldn't have mattered.

As I watched the first step on the moon happening, I stepped out on the patio, where I could still see the TV. I looked up at the Moon, back at the TV, up at the Moon, etc., marveling at the fact that where were people walking around up there at that very moment.

I'll never forget it. Sometimes I share that moment with young people, because they didn't get to see that amazing moment. Their eyes are always wide with wonder, even though they're surrounded by technology that didn't exist when I was their age.

It makes me angry on the behalf of those men who risked their lives to go there when people try to claim that it never happened.

It was a hot July night in Southern California and I sat with my dad in the darkness of the house, watching history being made. I remember peering at grainy black and white images, while waiting for Neil Armstrong to emerge from the lunar landing module and take his historic first step on the surface of the moon.

I was 10 years old during and my cognitive abilities were rapidly developing. I was starting to grasp complex ideas, like the fact that human beings were sophisticated and advanced enough to land a man on the moon. It's still a wonderful, awe-inspiring memory for me.

I agree with Stray Mutt that the summer of 1969 was an exciting time for the world and especially for America. Anything was possible. But, there was a lot of tumult, too. The Vietnam war was at its height and the university and street protests shown on the news every night were unsettling. Yet, there still seemed to be a lot of optimism in the air.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/26/2012 01:14AM by nwguy.

I found it disturbing that Buzz Aldrin received communion on the lunar surface

Why?

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/26/2012 12:28PM by Dave the Atheist.

That is absolutely ridiculous, and the kind of torquemada-like atheistic thinking that kept me from calling myself an atheist for years. (I got better, by the way).

I was 16, on vacation with my parents. We saw it on the TV in the motel. I was amazed. I fit it into my LDS mindset.

My dad said, "We have advances like this when Heavenly Father decides we are ready for them."

I was a budding scientist at the time but didn't realize it. I was getting a glimpse of real power compared to pretend power.

Thanks, Neil, for the risks you took and the advancement in science it was for all of us.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/25/2012 11:38PM by dagny.

It was a hot august evening in Monrovia, CA as we watched the event unfold on our old 1948 Hoffman Television. The old TV was in a huge cabinet with doors and its tiny 12" screen was enough for us to see the grainy pictures of neil Armstrong standing on the Moon's surface. His famous speech crackled from the set's 12" speaker as we watched, utterly spellbound.

Later we walked outside and stared up towards the moon, marveling that there were MEN up there!

Very sad that he is gone. What a life!

Let the necrodunking begin !

I was a college student of 21....watched it non-stop for several days....still amazed....

Ron Burr

That was when we went to SS in the morning and then went back for Sacrament meeting in the late afternoon/early evening. We wanted to stay home and watch the moon landing and of course, we couldn't miss church. They started the meeting and we were told it would be shortened. We had opening song, announcments, sacrament and "you're dismissed." Could not believe it. I don't remember them ever cancelling Sac. Mtg. for anything else. We were telling my dad to drive faster to get home and then were glued to the TV.

I remember it so vividly! I was just a 14 y.o. girl and wondering what was wrong with my cousins because nobody wanted to stay awake and watch it, lol. I watched with my parents, aunts and uncles and remember feeling amazed that the moon was so far away and here we were seeing it. It spurred a life long love of space, astronomy and all things astronaut from that point on. It was a very powerful moment- so much so that as an adult I finally purchased my own telescope. Neil Armstrong was and is one of my heroes- he's the kind they don't make anymore.

BS, "they" make that kind every day. Seriously, why do you think those kind of "heroes" are only in the past?

We were out in the backyard (Orem) eating cake and ice cream and would periodically go inside to see the broadcast on TV. I sensed how important the event was, and, seeing as how it coincided with my birthday, I felt sure that I would be asked by the President to attend the welcome-home ceremony for the astronauts at the White House.
Later, that halloween my mom made space-suit costumes for me and my brother. We were Buzz and Neil, marching around at the school costume party. Just writing this made me want to cry.
Hell, I am crying.
We put a man on the moon. A man on the moon.

July 20, 1969 a late Sunday night. black and white Sylvania floor console tv at grandparents with aunts and uncles and many cousins present.

Godspeed Neil Armstrong.

If I beheld the sun when it shined, or the MOON WALKING in brightness; [Job 31:26].

P.S. The 3 were quarantined on the advice of Carl Sagan.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/26/2012 02:26AM by nonldsmichigander.

My neighborhood friends and I kept gazing up at the moon, trying to *see* something up there.
;o)

Does this mean he gets to keep his Tour de France titles, then?

No, seriously. The amount of kids confusing Lance Armstrong and Neil Armstrong this week is incredible.

My parents hadn't even met in 1969, so I obviously wasn't around. The first space related event that I remember is the Challenger. Watched that live in 4th grade. :(

Edited to add: kids confusing them on twitter and such.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/26/2012 02:34AM by lily.

My dad and I watched the moon that night in the backyard for a long time. Then we went in the house and saw the TV coverage. The USA has lost a true hero.

I was only six at the time and don't remember a thing (although my mother claims that I said I could SEE those men on the moon with my bare eyes). We do have a really great book called Moonshot about that flight (with diagrams of the spacecraft and everything) that I read to my grandsons on a regular basis. It makes me tear up when I read it because --- how awesome is it that men and women have actually traveled in space and set foot on non-terrestrial firmament?

I was outside with my grandmother in the evening, she lifted me up and sat me on top of the old flat-top milk-and-mail-box, pointed up to the moon and said "Look up at the moon! there's a man up there! Grand-dad said they would NEVER get a man on the moon"

Obviously Grand-dad, who died in 1958, was flat wrong. I guess that's one reason arguments from authority never really impressed me.

I wish my Grandmother could see the information we have at our fingertips these days. She would have loved it.

It was the "Good luck, Mr. Gorski" story, and alas, it turned out to be just a faith promoter...

It's still funny, however, and I actually hadn't given its veracity any thought until now...It ran something like this...

Everyone remembers Neil Armstrong's first words on the moon, but his second statement has left people puzzled for years... Armstrong is reported to have said, "Good luck, Mr. Gorski."

It wasn't until after Mr. Gorski's death that Armstrong told of overhearing a quarrel at a neighbor's house with a woman's loud voice.

"Oral sex!?! You want oral sex! You'll get oral sex when the kid next door walks on the moon."

Alas...

http://www.snopes.com/quotes/mrgorsky.asp

SLC
One of the watched-it-in-black-and-white crowd