US #5399-5400 – 2019 stamps honoring the 50th anniversary of the Moon Landing The Eagle was released into orbit around the Moon, and NASA scientists later assumed that it crashed to the surface after a few months. The Eagle docked with the Columbia, where fellow astronaut Michael Collins had been waiting. Item #AC1 – Commemorative First Day Postcard With NASA’s Official Apollo 11 Photo And Moon Landing Cancel In future lunar landings, the flag was placed no closer than 100 feet from the modules, so as not to repeat that mistake. US #2842 – Express Mail stamp honoring the 25th anniversary of the Moon Landingįollowing their rest, Armstrong and Aldrin blasted off from the Moon’s surface – unfortunately toppling the American flag they had planted. Luna 15 crashed into the Moon, likely on the side of a mountain. It was the third attempt by the Soviets to collect lunar soil, and the third failure. As the US astronauts slept, Luna 15 began its descent to the Moon’s surface. US #C76 – Classic First Day Cover with Moon Landing cancellationīut this was the era of the Space Race, and the Soviet Union had launched an unmanned spacecraft three days before the Apollo 11 mission took off.
Armstrong and Aldrin then took a much-deserved rest. Scientists had been concerned that the dust might ignite when it came in contact with oxygen when the module re-pressurized, but luckily, that wasn’t the case. Armstrong described it as wet ashes and Aldrin said it was like “the smell in the air after a firecracker has gone off.” It was the smell of the Moon dust. When taking off their spacesuits they noticed a strange smell in the air. After about two-and-a-half hours, they returned to the landing module. They took photographs, collected rock, and dust samples and set out equipment to transmit readings. They first had to get used to walking around on the Moon. One of them included planting the American flag. The Moonwalk wasn’t just symbolic – Armstrong and Aldrin had several tasks to perform. US #2419 – Colorano Silk Cachet First Day Cover EDT, Armstrong set his left foot down upon the surface of the Moon and called it, “…one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind.” Fellow astronaut Buzz Aldrin joined Armstrong on the surface and described the scene as “magnificent desolation.” Back on Earth, the world watched through a live television feed. They had originally planned a five-hour sleep period, but it was decided they would be too excited to sleep. This was blacked out of the broadcast due to an ongoing lawsuit filed against NASA concerning the crew of the Apollo 8 mission reading from the Book of Genesis.Īfter the landing was completed, the crew began preparations for the Moonwalk. After the landing, Aldrin requested everyone “…to pause for a moment and contemplate the events of the past few hours and to give thanks in his or her own way.” US #3188c – Neil Armstrong’s footprint on the Moon.Īldrin, who was an elder in his church, then proceeded to receive Communion from a kit prepared for him by his pastor. The landing module touched down in a place called “West Crater,” which was scattered with boulders. Four days later, on July 20, 1969, their Eagle lunar module approached the Moon. US #2841 was issued for the 25th anniversary of the Moon landing.Īfter thousands of hours of work over eight years, NASA launched Apollo 11 on July 16, 1969. Hundreds of thousands of scientists and engineers joined together to achieve something many thought was impossible. NASA scientists didn’t know what they’d need to accomplish the goal, but they stepped up to the challenge. There were no rockets, spacesuits, or computers capable of the task. At the time, the US space program wasn’t prepared for such an undertaking. Kennedy to push NASA to place a man on the Moon before the end of the decade. Success continued for the Soviets during the next few years, prompting President John F. US #2419 was issued on the 20th anniversary of the Moon landing. At the time of launch, Sputnik was no bigger than a basketball.
However, because the Americans were attempting to launch their own satellite, the decision was made to scale back the design considerably. Originally, Sputnik was intended to be a massive, thousand-pound satellite. The space race began 12 years earlier, on October 4, 1957, when the Soviet Union used rocket technology developed by the Germans in World War II to launch Sputnik, the world’s first artificial satellite. On July 20, 1969, the US effectively won the Space Race when Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed the Eagle lunar module on the Moon’s surface. US #C76 was the first jumbo-sized US commemorative.
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