“As Neil Armstrong climbed down the ladder to a new—yet incredibly old—world, over 400,000 men and women symbolically descended with him. The men and women in government service, in industrial complexes, and in a network of universities who had made this incredible feat a reality.”
Opening with the historic lunar landing in July, this report then backtracks a bit to go over all that came together to make this moment possible. After a short overview of the lunar mission, attention is turned to post-mission briefing of the astronauts and the scientific evaluation of the samples returned from the Moon. “One thing was obvious,” the narrator states at the end of this section, “Apollo 11 was only the beginning. More missions are needed.” It is at this point the film recaps preparations for the Apollo 12 and 13 missions. We observe the Lunar Rover vehicle and the last Saturn V launch vehicles built for the Apollo program. The film concludes with a look at recommendations of the Space Task Group, the goal of which is to propose the direction the space program should take upon the completion of Apollo. Among their recommendations: a manned mission to Mars before the end of the century. After all that NASA accomplished since their first manned space flight in 1961, it is hard to criticize them for their optimism.
Date Released: 1969
File #: MSC-70-529
Produced By: NASA/MSC
Program Duration: 16:10
Media: 16mm Film
Reel Length: 598 ft
Audio: Optical, Variable Area
Film Stock: Ektachrome
Film Stock Edge Code Date: 1969