Apollo 11 - what were you doing

[High Desert]

I was eight that summer. For the launch I remember watching it at home. For the landing we were traveling, I remember listening to it on the radio in my dad's then new '69 Ford pickup.
An uncle of mine worked on the team at the Cape, so I was especially interested in it all. He had been telling us about the upcoming mission for quite a while before it happened.

[tonyj]

I remember our family watching, waiting--looking at that stationary camera view of the partial view of the lander and waiting for Neil to take that step outside. I was capturing the audio on my brother's Sony reel-to-reel tape recorder to record it for posterity (I was sure no one else was smart enough to think to capture the moment!). I must have turned the thing on and off several dozen times thinking from the newscaster's voice that the event was about to happen. Must've burned half a reel of tape before the event finally happened.

What a thrill it was when he finally set his footprint on the surface.

I must have listened to my recorded keepsake a dozen times or so the next day, inviting friends over to listen. We were a part of real history, if only as observers.

I have no idea where that tape is today. Such is the way with treasure.

[tonyj]

I just read the following in an AP news story about the original NASA videotapes:

"The original videos beamed to earth were stored on giant reels of tapes that each contained 15 minutes of video, along with 13 other channels of live data from the moon. In the 1970s and 1980s, NASA had a shortage of the tapes and erased about 200,000 of those tapes and reused them. That's apparently what happened to the famous moon landing footage."

Can you believe that? Some idiot erased the original NASA moon landing tapes? Unbelievable. Good thing the broadcast networks provided the redundancy.

It's a good thing I made my audio tape for a backup. If only I could 1) find it, and 2) find a reel-to-reel to play it back.

[caseydog]

I was in school, watching it on TV with all the other children.

I have that in common with Nitetimes -- I don't know at what point he went off the rails.

CD

[caseydog]

Photography trivia.

What cameras were taken to space on Apollo 11?

CD

[CAJUN LADY]

I was in camp watching it (13) with the group. I'll never forget the Challenger exploding...my dad died the day before.

[Spotman]

I was in Navy Boot Camp, peeling potatoes that night, and they let us off to go back to the barracks to stay up and watch it.

(D@m am I old)

[tearhead]

I remember it clearly. My parents had taken me to Glidden Lodge in Door, County, WI (we went almost every year for a week). It was a resort, but there was only one TV in the place, and everybody sat in the main lodge and watched.

Pat

[Dean in Eureka, CA]

I was twelve when they landed on the moon. I'm surprised some here say they were in school... Did Y'all have to go to summer school?
Like Larwyn, I don't recall what I was doing/did on the day they lifted off, but I sure remember when they landed.
My family was gathered around the TV to watch and I went out on the back porch a few times to look up at the moon.
Two profound things I kept thinking about were...
#1. There's really human beings up there right now!!! (While looking up at the moon)
#2. The whole entire world is watching this!!! (While watching the television)

As for the day the Challenger blew up... I was installing a huge plate glass window at the local Chevy dealer when Ralph McCarty, a salesman and personal friend, came outside and told me that the shuttle had just blew up.

I just read something about the moon landing I didn't know before...
We all know that Neil Armstrong was the first man to walk on the moon, but did you know that Buzz Aldrin was the first man to pee on the moon?
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/07/090716-moon-landing-buzz-aldrin-pee.html

[WarPony]

I was pooping in my diaper............. I was only 4 months old.

Jeff

[Larwyn]

When Challenger blew up, we were putting in a new substation in Lewisville Texas. One of the engineers brought a TV in just to watch the launch. We did all take a break to watch the launch.

[Dean in Eureka, CA]

Photography trivia.

What cameras were taken to space on Apollo 11?

CD

Hassleblad... Almost ended up buying one of the special moon editions.
(Kick myself in the butt now)

[Alfred]

The day the Challenger blew up, I was in college at the University of Florida and I was playing pinball in the student union building. They had the radio on and I could hear something had happened, but couldn't make it out over the noise of the arcade, so I went to another part of the Student Union Building where they had a TV, and all the students were gathered around. They kept showing the clip over and over, and I remember Peter Jennings had a model he was showing everybody what happened with the mock-up. I will never forget, just hung out there with everyone for about an hour, everyone in shock.

Al in Asheville

[lisasweetie]

I was spending a month that summer with my Aunt and Uncle and 5 cousins. I was 11 when they walked on the moon. My favorite memory is that the next day was my birthday (12) and it was pretty much a holiday, lol. Made it really easy to remember.....
I was working without access to a TV when the shuttle blew up. This was before the internet made it so easy to access live video (not like 9/11) so I had to wait till I got home to watch the video.

[HossHoffer]

Well, the old man was an aeronautical engineer and had worked for all the major space companies and NASA. From the time we were old enough to watch he would sit us in front of the tv to view the launches. He was quite proud of the Saturn V however by the time Apollo 11 was landing on the moon he had taken a sabbatical from engineering. On the day of the moon walk we were on our way to live in a new city and were staying in our old farmhouse in Mt. Carmel, Ut. We had to go next door to see it on our 80 year old neighbors grainy tv. He kept getting up and shouting, "Can you believe this, a man is on the moon!" while dad sat there beaming about his work on the Apollo project. By the time the shuttle blew up he was again working on rockets, this time for Hercules and was involved in the investigation of the booster rocket failure. He has stories of all the famous rocket scientists and test pilots but doesn't consider himself very important. Incidentally, he was stationed on Tinian during WW II with the B-29s and recalls the Enola Gay take off and land on her famous mission. Now you know why I have a tape recorder whenever I visit.

Hoss