On the 50th anniversary of the apollo 11 moon landing todays washington journal in conjunction with American History tv will focus on this historic event and its influence on modern spaceflight. For the next three hours we are live from the national air and space museum where we will talk about apollo 11 with historian command michael and you. You can let us know our impressions if you watched the mainline. If you want to talk about the day 2027488000 and for all others, 2027488001. You can post your thoughts and impressions of the anniversary and do the same on our Facebook Page facebook. Com cspan. Our show will be based hear from the national air and space museum. A couple of facts of the anniversary of the apollo 11 mission. It was near limestone, buzz aldrin and michael the team for that day. For lunch for lunch took pl. , july 16th at 9 32 in the morning. The moon landing on july 20 july 1969 4 17 in the afternoon. The first step at about 10 50 6 pm on july 20, buzz aldrin would follow along 20 minutes later. That mission when they left the moon in 1969 and returning to earth on july 24 on july 24, 1969. We will talk about the historical significance, what it means for spaceflight today and as we hear from historians and astronauts and the like we will hear from you as well and you can let us know these impressions. Again, if you watched the moon landing 2027488000, and 202 7488001. For all others this morning. We want to let you know this program is being done in conjunction with our colleagues at American History tv. Cspan3 on the weekends turns into that channel with historical programming, interviews, lectures and the like and they have a way of talking to you about the 50th anniversary. If you want to share your impressions on their specific facebook, thats cspan history at facebook cspan history facebook. Com. You can talk about the mission and participate on twitter. Theres a polling question there and all weekend long we will give you programming specifically related to apollo 11. You can watch that on cspan3. Go to our website at www. C span. Org and if you go to the website page you can find out all the programming they have planned and the other information for you specifically not only about apollo 11 but other programming they have is well. Another interesting fact when it comes to the mission, the things they carried on apollo 11, the astronauts and science experiments and things of the like but some of the other things they carried as well. A plaque commemorating the landing was on one of the arms of the lunar module. That plaque would eventually stay behind on the surface of the moon carrying two large American Flags and also flags of certain nations. As you see pictures of them walking on the moon that came courtesy of a Television Camera that went on board the module as well as other things. We will talk about those things in the course of the morning. But to hear primarily from you during this three hours. Not too far away from the national air and space museum but they are hosting us this morning as well. Jack in rhode island starts us off on impressions for those who watched the moon landing. Thanks for giving us a call. Go ahead thank you and im showing my age because i did watch it with my father who is a little bit older. Hes no longer here. Its not really publicized because its not medically correct, the key people that got us to the moon where the tech illogical geniuses that were germans. Von brown led the product project and then there was rudolph, and then there were a lot of key engineers and scientists from operation paperclip. They were german scientists and german engineers that the Us Government let in after world war ii because they wanted their expertise in rocket engineering. Germany for that history and background for the time that you watched it, what are your impressions of the mission itself . Extremely successful. Absolutely amazing and it was because primarily of those men but also those astronauts were absolutely amazing. Their bravery was astounding and i have to admit im a little proud myself because my ancestry is german. A couple of them were and maybe they did that to protect themselves, but lets hear from martha in Virginia Beach. You are next up. Go ahead i wanted to thank you all for covering this from the very beginning. My husbands cousin was in charge of that unfortunate accident where they burned before they even got out of space. A lot of pressure was put on them to hurry up, we have to beat the russians. I think in hindsight maybe there were some corners that were cut and they just jumped into the thing too soon. Ive been fascinated are you talking about the events of apollo one . Yes. But there was a gentleman on there the other day talking about that from the beginning to this point. So thank you for taking my call, have a good day. Before you go, what specific memory do you have about the landing itself or the mission itself . My mother and i were fascinated with it. She died in 1976 but we set up there at night and watched it go on. And my husband had to go to sleep because he had to go to work the next day. I worked as a Research Chemist and have always been fascinated and science of any kind. Thats martha in Virginia Beach again giving her impressions of the moon landing. 2027488000. If you have specific memories of that time and you want to relate those, its 202748 8001. Mark in the bronx new york on our line for others. Go ahead. I was in the navy at the time and we were in vietnam. I was in the uss boston 700 feet 28,000 and i was on this signal bridge where we did flashing lights and signal flags. When the word came from the bridge it was during the day there and when it came from the bridge, the call goes out that says stand by your bag, the signal bag with all of the flags in it. Once the messages brought to the leading petty officer the call is signal in the air at which point george who is a petty officer at the time hooked up the flags that read usa man on moon and then we hoisted it up to the yard arm. At the same time the captains gig was dropped over the side with a photographer who took pictures of this ship with the flags up. That was it. Thats what we did. What was the reaction for those on board . Do you remember anything specific about that . It was on the signal bridge so it was just three of us. I dont know what was happening down below. We had 1200 men on this ship so i really couldnt answer that. I couldnt tell you. Some of the footage you will remember for those of you who watched not only in the United States specifically but worldwide, people in other countries and react to it as well. If you go to nasa and use the footage you will see various images and pictures of people watching all over the world as this one event that took place in space became the fascination of the whole world. We will go to robert in baton rouge louisiana. Good morning. Good morning. I was 18 years old and saw it on tv like most people. Amazing. It is still impressive today. I have a younger son who cant really appreciate it as much as i tried to tell him about it but im a big pan of fan of apollo 50. What i have in my hand for those who collect coins the United States mint produced a commemorative coin for the 50th landing and theres a historic picture where a Neil Armstrong was taking a picture with buzz aldrin and when the film came out it showed a picture of Neil Armstrong standing. You see the lunar module if im correct on that. But anyway for those of you who collect coins the United States mint had these. They are beautiful collectors but on the back side of the coin itself it shows the 1st foot print. Its unbelievably beautiful and it was pressed by the mid. I wish everyone could see this thing but like most people i ran outside and looked at the moon to see if i could see them landing. I assume a lot of people did that. It still stays with me today, one of those moments that grab you. Did you watch it with family and friends all by yourself . I watched it with my mother and father who passed away when i was a child. My two brothers were there and i guess like everybody else we were glued to the tv when it would come back and forth. Walter cronkite was unbelievably great in his narrative. It still sits with me today. My brothers and i were just sitting there of course holding our breath like everyone else who is watching it and watching Walter Cronkite take his glasses off and just smile. This great event. One small step for man one giant leap for mankind. As the years go by, this may go down in history but id like to think that it will go down as something that people will truly be able to go back in the past and be there. Luckily we have film of it and everything. Kudos to everyone who is part of this thing especially the people who built it. The engineers. Thats robert in baton rouge and he talked about Walter Cronkite you remember. For those of you who watched on that day it was Walter Cronkite delivering the updates on the mission and had a model of the lunar module one himself that was provided to him, and used that to demonstrate what was going on with various parts of the flight. Again these are historical images you can find online and nasa as we tell the story of this 50th anniversary of the apollo 11 mission. You can post on our Facebook Page, you can also post on the American HistoryFacebook Page as well. Dont forget that American History tv, cspan3 turns into American History tv on the weekends. You can see a weekend of programming not only thats interesting today but other fulllength features. Go to our website for more information on that. I believe this is mark from the bronx. I believe ive taken that one so lets go to david in chicago. David in chicago watched the moon landing. I did watch the moon landing. I was just a kid, just started gradeschool and i remember it well but i want to talk about the fact that it took about 400,000 americans just about american born and educated to put to the moon. There were about 100 scientist but this was americanmade and american born talent. Right now there is a bill going to the senate that would further entrench workers into a labor force. When we think about what to put a man on the moon and back this was all before the labor dump started into our to elegy sect is. So when you think about the moon mission i want everyone to remind your senators and your congressman that we did these two major epics. Winning the cold war, putting a man on the moon and back before all of this cheap labor dumping started in the late 80s. When it comes to apollo 11 itself were you one of those during the time when the mission was announced and it was going on, were you a big supporter of the mission or did you have skepticism . Let me tell you something. My father worked on the intro integral check elegies of a defense contractor that provided the position to trajectory technologies that sent a man to the moon and back and for the multiple deterrence. This is my family. My father worked so many hours overtime during the 1960s and even paid triple time back then on holidays. Working on christmas or thanksgiving to meet a deadline because it was such a rush to meet these before the end of the decade. They paid triple time. Companies dont do that anymore. They dont care of their take care of their people like that. Thats david in chicago calling to talk about the work aspects of apollo 11 and the man to manpower that to base to make it happen. Its one a variety of things you can talk about during the course of our morning. When it comes to things that were taken from the moon you will remember that part of the purpose of the mission was to take samples from the surface of the moon and those samples are still being that today. This is from the lunar and Planetary Institute telling us that 22 kg of material taken from the surface of the moon translates to about 50 rocks in total including lunar soil samples and the lunar and Planetary Institute tells us that 2 tubes of material from the surface of the moon was also taken from that. That is again some of the purposes of the mission and things taken and brought back to earth from the efforts of apollo 11. This is kristi from huntsville. Good morning. Good morning. I probably watched it but was only 10 years old and dont remember. But i do remember is i lived in huntsville where it all began and i used to hear the racket tests. It was amazing. I still hear rocket tests there on the arsenal. My good friend, her grandfather was a head of operation and i just feel proud living in Huntsville Alabama where it all began. Is huntsville still a major hub when it comes to space issues . I know you have a museum but how much work goes on to this day . Not as much space as it is army because its a Redstone Arsenal so its an army base as well as a Marshall Space Flight center. I worked for Lockheed Martin in the past but my dad was with ibm. We got transferred to huntsville in 1965 and reckitt testing was being done at that point. Rocket testing was being done at that point. And let me tell you it was earth shattering to hear them test but it was cool. As a kid it was very cool. Thats kristi from huntsville. Part of the efforts of johnson once president kennedy decided he wanted to send a man to the moon to put efforts across the United States to make that happen, primarily in the south and Huntsville Alabama being one of those major locations where the work of Apollo Missions would take place. You can still see some of the evidence there at the space museum. James in arlington texas, good morning. My dad was a Senior Engineer on the Apollo Program. He worked for north american aviation in southern california. He basically worked on anything from the launch escape towers to the first stage. How much did he talk about it . How much did he talk about it with you guys at home . Technically there are certain things he didnt talk about it at the same time such as when apollo 11, 8, 9, 10 for that matter, when they returned to earth we had a big event at the facility and the astronauts would be flowing in for ceremony. We would all see them be driven by us in an electric cart and then we would be allowed to look at the capsules which have been saved so we had what we call the pei de i room which had a lot of exhibits. People once a year would get a chance to see that well into the 80s in fact. I would see the modules and capsules, the mockup of the shuttle. When i was 10 years old i was taken to my father to the beach facility. I was wondering why we were going to see the beach and they had a big event for the delivery of the last second stage from saturn 5 so the opened up the doors on the Assembly Building seeing this massive second stage be rolled out. Its quite an impression on a 10yearold. Are you in the Science Field or anything related because of those influences . My sister and i both followed my father into engineering. I worked 11 years until 2009 in shuttle support and support for the International Space station. Originally i was a Mcdonnell Douglas employee but we got bought out by boeing. My sister started with north american, rockwell i should say, and the assets were brought out by boeing and she ended up working with me and still is working at this time but is about to retire. We did a recent polling question in conjunction with it sos, we looked at space issues. One of those things that were found at the top of the list with people, environmental efforts. Lower on the list efforts like going back to the moon and going back to mars. Do you still support this idea of manned spaceflight missions . We will talk to kathy next from imperial missouri. Good morning, thanks for taking my call. I was four years old. I remember it vividly. Everyone was riveted to the tv. I was allowed to stay at past bed time. I was worried when the astronaut went down the ladder that he would sink in like in quicksand. I. Explain to me that because the lander didnt sink in that the astronaut would be okay as well. Thats a vivid memory of yours. What else do you remember from it . I remember everyone being excited and thinking this is a great day and that we can do anything. Do you still think manned spaceflight should be a priority for the United States . Yes. I do. I think we should start by expanding either increasing the number or the size of our orbiting space station, establishing a colony on the moon and then going to mars like stair steps. Okay. Thats kristi in missouri. If you go to the website at www. Cspan. Org, that polling question on space issues, a lot of questions. Some about the work of nasa and the priorities that nasa should pursue, other information as well available to you when you go to our website at www. C span. Org. We are at the national air and space museum here in washington dc as we talk about the 50th anniversary of the apollo 11 mission. You are welcome to join us for this conversation. You can follow along on our twitter feed and follow along. After this program more programming on apollo 11 available when you go to c span3 American History tv. In virginia, george, hello you are on next. Good morning. I remember it very well. I was in norfolk for Naval Reserve duty and i heard it on the radio. When they announced it i got tears in my eyes. It was just an impressive thing. I was 28 years old at the time. Its part of history. I remember sputnik as well. Its a great time to be alive and participate. Do you think the historical signific