I was six when Neal Armstrong became the first man to walk on the moon. I was 10 when Gene Cernan became the last.

Between July 20, 1969, and December 14, 1972, exactly 12 human beings landed and walked on earth’s moon.

The first words said on the moon were from Armstrong when he uttered, “That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.” Cernan’s parting words were, “We leave as we came, and God willing, as we shall return, with peace and hope for all mankind.”

I don’t think either Armstrong or Cernan thought it would be over five decades before another person would return. But that’s what happened. No person has left the earth’s orbit since 1972. American astronauts will return to moon trips soon. More on that in a moment.

I recall my parents letting my sister and me stay up late to watch the lunar landing. Nixon was the president, and Winthrop Rockefeller was the Governor of the Great State of Arkansas.

In our small, red-brick house on Beech Street in Ashdown, Arkansas, I tried to stay awake (10 p.m. is light years after 8 p.m. when you’re a little kid) as the grainy, black-and-white video went all the way from the moon to our RCA console TV.

My father kept saying what a big deal this was. My sister kept saying, “I’m sleepy.”

I was too, but I stayed awake for it. I’m glad I did.

There are certain things that happen that everyone knows where they were when it happened. JFK’s assassination, Nixon’s resignation, the Challenger explosion, 911, and of course, the moon landing.

For some reason, the fact that American astronauts are returning to first, a moon orbit trip in April of 2026, and then an actual landing in 2027 or 2028, doesn’t make the same waves today as it did in 1969.

You hear little about it.

So, to bring to light what is deserving of being in the spotlight, let’s talk about Artemis.

Why is the next moon mission called Artemis? In Greek Mythology, Artemis is the twin sister of Apollo. Calling it Artemis is a nod to the Apollo Missions.

The goals of Artemis start with landing people on the moon again; building a long-term human presence; and use the moon as a stepping stone for future missions to Mars.

This is a big deal.

There will be four on the Artemis II (Artemis I was unmanned and flew around the moon in 2022). Reid Wiseman will command, Victor Glover will serve as pilot, Christina Koch is a mission specialist, and Jeremy Hansen is a mission specialist from the Canadian Space Agency.

If these four had been scheduled for the Apollo Mission in 1969, we would have all known their names way ahead of time. But most people are unaware that America is even returning to the moon.

When Neal Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins were on board to be the first crew to walk on the moon (Collins stayed behind in orbit waiting for the other two, so he did not walk on the moon), they were rock stars.

They were rock stars that were bigger than rock stars. Heck, I had a poster of them on my bedroom wall for a long time afterwards. So did a lot of other kids.

After they came back from the moon, they received a ticker tape parade, and constant media coverage. There was astronaut mania. Everything they did was followed, and the world was interested.

There were astronaut G.I. Joe dolls. Astronaut TV show appearances. They made vinyl records that contained nothing more than astronauts talking to each other and to NASA’s Mission Control. I had one and listened to it. That’s how fascinated everyone was with the space program.

Today, everyone’s head is in a phone or some other electronic device. That said, shouldn’t we be seeing more coverage about Americans going back to the moon?

Of the 12 men who walked on the moon, only four are left: Buzz Aldrin of Apollo 11, David Scott from Apollo 15, Charles Duke from Apollo 16, and Harrison Schmitt from Apollo 17.

Aldrin was part of the first mission, and Schmitt was part of the last. I’m glad that they’ll possibly be here for Artemis and can watch the new crew the same way we watched them.

Well, not the same way. No longer do most of us watch television on an RCA Console TV that weighs as much as a Delta 88. We have different ways of watching things now. Including our cell phones.

It’s worth noting that the average cell phone has 1-10 million times more computing power than the Apollo 11 Program. In 1969, computing power was impressive for its time, but primitive today.

Imagine what might have happened and where we’d be by now if funding for the space program had continued on the path after the Apollo Missions. Maybe what happens soon will make the next astronauts become the rock stars they deserve to be.

 

© 2026 John Moore

John’s, “Puns for Groan People” and two volumes about growing up in the South called, “Write of Passage,” are available at TheCountryWriter.com. John would like to hear from you at John@TheCountryWriter.com.