Armstrong symbolized best of U.S.
Updated 9:23 pm, Monday, August 27, 2012
Like many people, Neil Armstrong had a lofty goal.
What set him apart is that his achievement towered above the vision that inspired it.
Armstrong reached the moon.
Today, more than 40 years later, the accomplishment seems as monumental as it did back then, as iconic and transcendent.
“One small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind,” he said.
As the commander of the Apollo 11 spacecraft, Armstrong was the first human to set foot on the moon — a mission that symbolized U.S. superiority in the space race between the U.S. and the Soviet Union.
Landing near the southwestern shore of the Sea of Tranquility, he radioed NASA headquarters in Houston.
“The Eagle has landed,” he said.
It would be easy to say that his moonwalk was part of a quieter, simpler time, a time when people looked to the future with glowing optimism. But the truth is far different. The mission capped a turbulent decade of protests and riots and deaths in the street.
And yet the mission seemed to pull the nation — and, indeed, the world — together. It was one of those rare moments that illustrated the enormous heights to which humans can soar, both literally and metaphorically. Armstrong was a risk-taker, and he would inspire a generation of risk-takers.
“I think we're going to the moon because it's in the nature of the human being to face challenges,” Norman Mailer quoted Armstrong as saying in his 1970 book “Of a Fire on the Moon.”
Ironically, Armstrong was a quiet, self-effacing man who shunned the spotlight his grand achievement cast on him. It was an achievement that seems all the grander in retrospect. The space mission has diminished in significance over the years, despite the recent photos taken by the Mars Rover.
Armstrong died on Saturday. He had undergone bypass surgery near his home in Cincinnati. He was 82.