For those Americans who are old enough, there were three events for which everyone remembers exactly where they were – JFK’s assassination, the explosion of the space shuttle Challenger, and Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin stepping onto the moon.
Memories of the moonwalk are exactly what the producers of a new documentary – “In The Shadow of The Moon” – hope to stir up when their film opens in Denver on Sept. 28.
The documentary about NASA’s Apollo missions to the moon is unique in that it is a sort of reunion for eight of the nine living astronauts who walked on the moon.
Only Neil Armstrong, the first to step on the lunar surface, declined to be filmed, having been forced by celebrity into a very private life.
The film has no narration, only archival footage from NASA, some of which has never been seen before. The astronauts, all in their 70s now, speak directly to the audience, staring right into the camera.
“It was very enlightening for us to hear the other guys’ memories, to listen to them reminisce,” said Aldrin, 77, in a telephone interview. “We were all brought back to those times from very different perspectives. I suspect many people who watch the film will be also.”
It was a time when the United States dominated the space race in a way that made Americans proud of their country, a time when no challenge was too difficult, according to the producers. President Kennedy showed leadership when he issued the challenge in 1961 to land on the moon within the decade.
NASA succeeded not only beyond expectations but ahead of schedule, sending nine spacecraft with 27 men to the moon, 12 of whom walked on the lunar surface. Of those 12, Pete Conrad, Jim Irwin and Alan Shepard have since died.
Aldrin flew into space twice and with Armstrong onboard piloted the first spacecraft to land on the moon on July 20, 1969. Although he retired from NASA two years later and the Air Force a year after that, Aldrin always remained a fierce advocate of space travel.
Aldrin sees the future in space growing away from orbiting space stations and focusing on planetary exploration.
“The real objective is getting someone to Mars,” he said. “There’s quite a lot of interest in robotic exploration, looking for subsurface water that may support life. But it may require humans to really verify it.”
Recently, he noted, “the Russians said they will put a man on Mars by 2035. I think we can give them a good race for that.
“While President Bush was campaigning, he said at NASA headquarters that we would complete the space station by 2010, develop new spacecraft by 2015 and return to the moon by 2020. That would be the interim step to Mars.”
Aldrin advocates bypassing space stations and getting directly to other planets.
“We really need to fold up this program, gradually complete our obligations in the space station and focus on exploration,” said Aldrin, who says he still keeps a pair of skis ready at his son’s house in Denver.
Aldrin served one year at Lowry Air Force Base as an F-86 jet fighter pilot and another as an aide at the Air Force Academy, near Colorado Springs.
Staff writer Mike McPhee can be reached at mmcphee@denverpost.com or 303-954-1409.
