All Stories

As we approach the 50th anniversary of humankind’s first steps on the Moon, our ability to reflect on those events is thanks in part to how the moment was shared with people around the world. The Apollo 11 mission was not the first time television signals returned from the orbit of the Moon, but the landing in July 1969 was by far the most important to get just right.

"When I was a kid – maybe 5 or 6 – I remember my dad calling me into the living room and sitting me down in front of our almost comically tiny black-and-white TV screen."

In honor of Fourth of July, we explore artifacts in our collection with American flags.

Bob Gilruth, more than anyone else, created the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo programs and the Houston center that managed them.

Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin was the first astronaut to receive a degree of Doctor of Science (Sc.D). We explore his thesis on “Line-of-Sight Guidance Techniques for Manned Orbital Rendezvous.”

Abraham Silverstein (1908-2001), created and named the Apollo program and, most critically, pushed the adoption of liquid hydrogen as a rocket fuel for the boosters that launched Apollo. 

In 2019, we commemorate several transatlantic firsts, including the 100^th anniversaries of the first transatlantic flight by the Navy NC-4 in May and the first nonstop transatlantic flight by John Alcock and Arthur Brown. June 28 marks the 80^th anniversary of the inaugural Pan American Airways transatlantic passenger flight in 1939. For William John Eck, it was a voyage for which he had waited eight long years. Finally, he was “Passenger Number One”!

To celebrate the 50th anniversary of the first Moon landing, AirSpace examines what we knew then, what we know now, and what mysteries of lunar science still remain.

We explore Smithsonian aeronautics historian Paul Garber's list of thirteen most important aircraft of all time, circa the 1950s.

What music would you take along on a quarter-million mile road trip?