Off to the Moon

Cool story bro https://t.co/0HSgvygYI4 pic.twitter.com/lvwPG2YfQ8

— Chris Combs (iterative design enjoyer) (@DrChrisCombs) July 4, 2026

No shame in being an adolescent nation when we're still the only one to put A Man on the Moon:

With just eleven days to go until launch, Armstrong, Aldrin, and Collins spent the July 4 weekend at home, a last visit with their families before heading to the Cape. There had been precious little time off these past seven months; even their time at home was often claimed. A specialist would come by to give an informal briefing; evenings were spent holed up in the study with flight plans and training documents. Most of the time, though, they weren’t even home. 

Life’s July 4 issue, with the cover story, “Off to the Moon,” included the customary report from the home front—Armstrong fishing with his sons, baking homemade pizza, and playing piano duets with his wife, Jan; Collins trimming roses in the backyard; Aldrin taking his kids to AstroWorld—but the truth was, those things would never have happened if an outing with family hadn’t been a PR requirement. 

Since January, Slayton had tried to keep the press at a distance, simply because Armstrong’s crew had so much training to pack in. Even so, the men had made time for this or that reporter to come by the house and ask questions about their lives and their mission. Finally, Slayton gave in and agreed to a last press conference, and Armstrong’s crew spent most of Saturday, July 5, talking to the media. 

At this point, the men were well into their twenty-one-day pre-mission medical quarantine, and so on this summer afternoon they strolled onto the stage wearing hospital masks¹ and did not remove them until they had taken their places inside a plastic-enclosed booth. A few reporters grinned back at them from behind their own masks. One asked whether any precautions had been taken to prevent the men from catching germs from their own families. Collins answered, “My wife and children have signed a statement that they have no germs . . . . Seriously, there are no special precautions being taken.” 

But the journalists directed few questions to Collins; they were much more interested in his crewmates, and especially, his commander. For seven months now, Armstrong had been telling interviewers that he wished the press would convey that Apollo 11 was a massive group effort, that it was a mistake to focus on him, but he had not been successful. At the press conference one reporter suggested to him that, as the first man to set foot on the moon, he would be so famous that his personal life would cease to exist. He added, “Do you have any thoughts on this prospect?” 

“I suppose,” Armstrong said, smiling shyly, speaking in characteristically measured words, “if there is any recognizable disadvantage to being in the position I’m in then that’s it. I think that’s a fair trade.”

In other space news, I'm watching ID4:

Fingers crossed for today pic.twitter.com/OwYYEykhL4

— Terrible Maps (@TerribleMaps) July 4, 2026

In conclusion: Here men from the planet Earth first set foot upon the Moon July 1969, A.D. We came in peace for all mankind. 

1 - LOfuckingL. 

PS - The pic in that first tweet is Jim Irwin saluting during Apollo 15.