First Americans on the Moon (1677)

Humans have always been fascinated by the moon. For centuries we have tracked the passage of time by watching the moon change shape – from new moon to crescent to full moon and back again. We have marvelled at man-in-the-moon shadows that lunar cliffs cast over flat plains.

During the 1950s and 1960s the United States and the Soviet Union raced to get to the moon. Soviet rockets got there first, but the U.S. Apollo program landed the first human there.

On July 20, 1969, at 10:56 p. m., American astronaut Neil Armstrong, 240,000 miles from earth, gave a brief statement before stepping of the Eagle landing module and onto the moon. Back on earth, close to a billion people were listening. A moment later, Armstrong put his left foot into the powdery lunar surface, took a few steps, and humanity walked on the moon.

Another astronaut, Edwin Aldrin, joined him a few minutes later, and together they took photographs of the terrain, planted a U.S. flag, ran a few simple scientific tests, and spoke with U.S. President Richard M. Nixon. By early the next morning, both astronauts were back in the lunar module and the hatch was closed. They slept that night on the surface of the moon, and at 1:54 p. m. on July 21, the Eagle began its ascent back to the Apollo 11 command module. Among the items left on the surface of the moon was a plaque that read: "Here men from the planet Earth first set foot on the Moon – July 1969 A. D – We came in peace for all mankind." Later that afternoon, Aldrin and Armstrong successfully docked with the command module, which was piloted by a third astronaut, Michael Collins. On July 24, the three men returned to earth, safely splashing down in the Pacific Ocean.

Two decades later the U.S. space agency NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) launched another mission to the moon from Cape Canaveral. It was a small space craft called Lunar Prospector tucked in the rocket's nose. It carried no astronauts, spent one year orbiting the moon and mapped the deeply cratered surface.