Magnificent Desolation (9 page)

I
F MY HOMECOMING
in Montclair was a dream come true, the next big event on our schedule was the nightmare every public speaker dreads. On Tuesday, September 16, 1969, we traveled to Washington, D.C., to speak at a joint session of Congress. It was simultaneously one of the greatest privileges and one of the most terrifying experiences of
my life. By now I’d given dozens of speeches, and had stood in front of huge crowds of cheering well-wishers, so it wasn’t stage fright that caused my apprehension, but the majesty of it all, standing in the U.S. House of Representatives as the Vice President and members of both the House and the Senate filed into the cavernous and stately room. Members of the President’s cabinet, ambassadors, and high-ranking government officials from other countries were on hand as well. I fretted over that speech more than any of them. In putting that speech together, I drew from every source I could find, even political cartoons and caricatures.

It was a relatively short speech in which I wanted to recognize the tremendous commitment it took on the part of our government and the hundreds of thousands of people all across our country working together to get us to the moon, while laying out a vision for the future. I told the joint session of Congress, “This should give all of us hope and inspiration to overcome some of the more difficult problems here on Earth. The Apollo lesson is that national goals can be met where there is a strong enough will to do so.” The audience responded with a rousing and gratifying ovation.

T
HE DAY PRIOR
to appearing before Congress, the Washington, D.C., post office hosted Neil, Mike, and me for the unveiling of a special postage stamp commemorating the mission of
Apollo 11
and our landing on the moon. That sounded exciting enough, until the new stamp was revealed and, under a drawing of Neil stepping off the
Eagle
onto the lunar surface, the caption read,
FIRST MAN ON THE MOON.
I smiled rather weakly when I first saw the stamp, though it was a bittersweet honor. I didn’t even dare to think what Mike must have thought, but it seemed to me that something referring to “first men” would have been more accurate and more appropriate. As it was, our being there felt like we were backup singers for Elvis.

I wasn’t upset about the stamp; it just felt odd, especially when the post office asked Neil, Mike, and me to sign a large number of first-edition
sheets of stamps that would then be sold. I thought,
Why would you want me to sign this if you didn’t think it important to include Mike and me somehow?
But we dutifully signed a large stack of first-day issues, because, after all, that’s what American heroes do.

If I was mildly disappointed by the post office’s callous exclusion, my father was furious. He set about on a one-man crusade to get the stamp caption changed to “First Men on the Moon.” He even spent some time picketing in front of the White House, but his efforts proved more a source of amusement for the media than an encouragement for including Mike and me in the honor. I just shrugged. What was done was done.

N
EIL’S FAMOUS WORDS
upon our landing set the theme for our worldwide goodwill tour to be known as “Operation Giant Step.” We stopped first at Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, a rather odd place to begin a world tour. It was the fall of 1969, and student protests were common on American campuses. Some young people were bitter and angry over the war in Vietnam; others had their own agendas. Nevertheless, I would never have imagined that as Mike, Neil, and I approached the auditorium, we’d be pelted by a barrage of eggs and tomatoes. Fortunately the students were lousy shots and none of us were hit, but I felt sad that these young people could be so disgruntled with America. Rather than being proud of us for going to the moon, they chided us for wasting so much money while wars and famine plagued parts of the Earth. This was a different America than the one to which my father and the heroes of World War II came home.

We were on the world tour for forty-five days. During that time we visited twenty-three countries, as well as the Vatican, and were received by twenty heads of state, including presidents, kings and queens, and prime ministers. To each we presented a replica of the plaque we left on the moon, which stated,
WE CAME IN PEACE FOR ALL MANKIND.
Everywhere
we traveled, throngs of people swarmed the streets in an effort to see us. It was truly a heartwarming experience, but after a while we began to feel a bit like circus animals on display. We greeted several million people in twenty-seven cities directly, and many millions more through television, radio, and the press. And of course there were the obligatory speeches that Neil, Mike, and I had given so many times now that we could almost stand in for each other.

Nevertheless, the predominant feeling we had from people all around the world was one of warmth and friendliness, even in some of the countries that were not necessarily as pro–United States as we would have liked. The trip was inspiring and exhausting.

We returned to the United States in time to attend the launch of
Apollo 12
at Kennedy Space Center, a lunar landing mission carrying Alan Bean, Pete Conrad, and Dick Gordon on a journey quite similar to ours. NASA thought it wise to call us home in case there was something we could contribute should there be trouble during Apollo 12, but it was also a precaution against bad publicity. If something went wrong, they didn’t want us halfway around the world, being asked pointed questions we would have no immediate way of answering. We really didn’t mind returning home for a few days. It was wonderful to sleep in our own beds, to celebrate Thanksgiving at home, and of course to see our children, whom we hadn’t seen now for several weeks.

It was also a thrill to watch the majestic Saturn V rocket thunder off the pad, carrying our friends and colleagues toward the moon, knowing more than they about the adventure they were about to experience.

President Nixon attended the launch, as well. We had recommended to the President that he watch this launch outdoors to better appreciate the impact of the sound and shock waves coming from the launch pad, rather than view it from inside Launch Control Center, where onlookers experience a mere rattling of the windows. But as it turned out, the liftoff of
Apollo 12
occurred during a thunderstorm, so the President was better off inside. Within the first minute, the rocket was struck by lightning, requiring the crew to quickly reboot
their systems. Unimpaired, the flight continued safely from there, and the Apollo 12 mission could not have been a better follow-up as mankind’s second moon landing.

All too soon, though, Neil, Mike, and I were heading to Canada, on the next leg of our own journey. I have to admit, going to the moon felt a lot easier than going around the world on the goodwill tour.

The world tour stretched from August 13 to November 5, with a few short breaks. In September we came back from the international portion of Operation Giant Step for a two-day “vacation.” I walked into my office and was greeted by huge mounds of mail everywhere. I could barely find my desk! The letters and cards came from around the world, from well-wishers, students, space aficionados, and of course, a plethora of school, corporate, and civic groups offering speaking invitations. Secretaries in the NASA mail room opened the mail and, whenever possible, answered it, but most needed a direct response from me. This mail was sent on to me and stacked in my office awaiting my return. I started working on the stacks of mail, answering a few, before I realized this was a bottomless pit. As I answered one letter, the secretary brought in several hundred more. While I greatly appreciated the congratulatory wishes, and the sincere interest on the part of the public, I lamented that I couldn’t do a better job of answering the many requests. I pictured a young boy a future rocket scientist, writing a letter with well-thought-out questions about the Apollo 11 mission, and then sending off his letter, checking the mailbox each day, and awaiting a response that likely would never come. I sure didn’t want to let that young man down, yet when I looked at the stacks of mail, I knew I couldn’t possibly keep up, either.

The traveling and speechmaking slowed down a bit over the Christmas holiday, but then resumed in early January 1970. Now, however, Neil, Mike, and I were often split up, one of us speaking at an event in California while another went to Iowa, and another to Georgia. The three of us continued crisscrossing the country for months, with most of the events scheduled by NASA, and a few of our own thrown in wherever we could fit them. Throughout 1969 and 1970,
Neil, Mike, and I served as unofficial space ambassadors traveling the country on NASA’s behalf.

After a while, I felt that NASA was taking advantage of our willingness to be cooperative. Certainly we were still employed by the space agency, and we were honored to represent America’s astronauts, but we were not public-relations guys. All we really wanted to do was get back to work. Even before going to the moon, we understood that there would be a fascination on the part of the public when we returned, and we were willing to deal with that, up to an extent. We realized that we were now regarded as public property, and we did our best to maintain as much of a sense of pre–Apollo 11 normalcy in our lives as possible. But for nearly two years NASA paraded us out in front of one group after another, on display as it were, to do our routine promoting space exploration, and especially reminding anyone with any influence of how important congressional funding was to the program.

A
FTER THE WORLD
tour, on November 5, 1969, the three of us wrote a formal letter to President Nixon, kind of a final report. In describing the residual impact of our mission, we said, “The predominant impression is the warmth and friendliness shown us as representatives of the American space program. Although the world recognizes the Apollo 11 mission as an outstanding American achievement, people everywhere felt that they too had participated in the event…. We believe that the people we met are also persuaded that the application of science and technology combined with the will to do so can produce solutions to the problems of men everywhere.” Along with the letter, we presented the President with a huge photo album chronicling the highlights from all of the countries we visited.