Today's American Minute:
"One small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind," were the words uttered this day, July 20, 1969, by Neil Armstrong, as he became the first man to walk on the moon.He, along with Colonel Aldrin, had landed their lunar module, the Eagle, and spent a total of 21 hours and 37 minutes on the moon's surface, before redocking with the command ship Columbia. Addressing a joint session of Congress, September of 1969, Commander Neil Armstrong stated:
"To those of you who have advocated looking high we owe our sincere gratitude, for you have granted us the opportunity to see some of the grandest views of the Creator."
No one disputes Sputnik's startling October 1957 vault having shaken American aeronautics from its stupor. But was the flight to the moon a product of national competition, of pride? On Flag Day three years before the Russian ascent President Eisenhower affirmed by pen his country's debt to natural law; human dignity accorded by a God denied in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. Nearly six years later President Kennedy promised in word liberty's assets and yield to "assure the survival and success" of the democratic experiment. That promise was kept in deed, the Eagle's moonfall observed with colors and Scripture. This contest was indeed a very old one — and the free world would not let history record as a triumph of man the work of his bane.