Posts: 297
From: N.Ireland.
Registered: Jul 2002

Posts: 1067
From: Leawood, Kansas USA
Registered: Oct 2003

Posts: 1376
From: ridgefield, ct
Registered: May 2002

posted 04-17-2004 05:53 PM               

---

"Dedication and commitment to yourself, your family, your country and your life's goals is not to be taken lightly. They will ensure that you remain your own person and be the one who determines the path you will travel. You can be a leader or a follower in any field, anywhere. A leader sets his own pace and direction and attracts others to follow. A follower is merely one of the pack, doing what his 'friends' do with little regard for how it will affect his life. Living for today, spending all you make and associating with the wrong crowd can get you into big trouble and strip you of the valuable rewards life has to offer."

This was in a letter written by Walt Cunningham to my nephew, Logan Kennedy. Good advice, all around.

Posts: 19
From: Los Angeles, CA
Registered: Feb 2004

Posts: 48
From: Burlington, Ontario, Canada
Registered: Jul 2001

Posts: 3386
From: Netherlands
Registered: Nov 2001

posted 06-16-2004 10:24 AM               

---

On Apollo 10, after the first undocking of two spacecraft in lunar orbit:

John Young, remaining alone in command module Charlie Brown: "You'll never know how big this thing is when there ain't nobody in here but one guy."

Gene Cernan in the lunar module Snoopy: "You'll never know how small it looks when you're as far away as we are."

Posts: 441
From: San Jose, California, USA
Registered: Mar 2002

Posts: 260
From: UK
Registered: Jun 2004

Posts: 1778
From: Dunfermline, Fife, Scotland
Registered: May 2004

Posts: 109
From: Chester, Cheshire, UK
Registered: May 2004

Posts: 63
From: Franklin, TN 37027
Registered: Dec 2007

posted 12-24-2007 10:56 PM               

---

We risk great peril if we kill off this spirit of adventure, for we cannot predict how and in what seemingly unrelated fields it will manifest itself. A nation that loses its forward thrust is in danger, and one of the most effective ways to retain that thrust is to keep exploring possibilities. The sense of exploration is intimately bound up with human resolve, and for a nation to believe that it is still committed to a forward motion is to ensure its continuance.
- James A. Michener, author, 1979

Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson, cited in In the Shadow of the Moon

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
- Arthur C. Clarke, author, cited in Into that Silent Sea

Buy why, some say, the moon? Why choose this as our goal? And they may as well ask why climb the highest mountain?
- President John F. Kennedy

Posts: 1306
From: Staten Island, NY
Registered: Jun 2007

Posts: 685
From: Lee's summit, MO
Registered: Jan 2005

Posts: 383
From: McLean, VA, USA
Registered: Feb 2004

Posts: 4437
From: Sierra Vista, Arizona
Registered: Nov 1999

posted 12-25-2007 07:41 PM               

---

"Every civilization in the universe must go through a nuclear crisis. Those that don't make it destroy themselves. Those that do make it end up cavorting all over the universe."

Physicist Ted Taylor, quoted by John McPhee in
The Curve of Binding Energy, 1974

Posts: 111
From: Cullman, AL
Registered: Dec 2007

posted 12-25-2007 11:18 PM               

---

"That may have been a small step for Neil, but it was a long one for me"... Pete Conrad

"all of this was built by the lowest bidder"... Alan Shepard

Posts: 6210
From: Geneva, Switzerland
Registered: May 2006

Posts: 399
From: Whyalla South Australia
Registered: Mar 2007

Posts: 2331
From: Sturgeon Bay, WI
Registered: Jan 2000

posted 12-26-2007 11:41 AM               

---

Kinda scary quotes....

"Yow, what happened here? We had everything in the world drop out." "I'm not sure we got hit by lightning." "Fuel cell lights and AC bus light, fuel cell disconnect, AC bus overload one and two, main bus A and B out." -- Pete Conrad Apollo 12

"_____ go at throttle up" -- Any flight after Challenger.

"We is down among 'em, Charlie!" -- Gene Cernan Apollo 10

(gestures) I love the video of John Young dancing down the stairs, looking at Columbia and shaking his fists in excitement!

"......." -- Walter Cronkite after moon landing.

Posts: 432
From: Orange, California USA
Registered: Sep 2006

posted 12-26-2007 12:13 PM               

---

Walter Cronkite on Apollo 11 launch:

"Wow - what a moment. Man on the way to the moon." as the Saturn 5 rolled and pitched over.

Posts: 191
From: Florida USA
Registered: Aug 2003

posted 12-26-2007 01:15 PM               

---

"I salute -- from my space helmet -- the Range Rats, the unsung heroes of the space race to the future."

...Buzz Aldrin, giving credit to those men and women working at the ground tracking stations around the world.

Posts: 399
From: Whyalla South Australia
Registered: Mar 2007

posted 12-26-2007 08:17 PM               

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Nessa:
"A mind is not a vessel to be filled, but a fire to be lighted" Plutarch

---

Plutarch of Chaeronea (46-c.122) Great Quote from so far back but still a good space quote.

Posts: 2176
From: West Jordan, Utah USA
Registered: Dec 1999

Posts: 111
From: Cullman, AL
Registered: Dec 2007

Posts: 399
From: Whyalla South Australia
Registered: Mar 2007

Posts: 73
From: San Antonio TX
Registered: Mar 2006

Posts: 379
From: Yadkinville, NC
Registered: Jun 2000

Posts: 2031
From: Sydney, Australia
Registered: Sep 2003

posted 12-28-2007 02:39 AM               

---

"It's human nature to stretch, to go, to see, to understand. Exploration is not a choice really - it's an imperative."

Michael Collins, Apollo 11 CMP

Posts: 1255
From: Boston, MA
Registered: Jul 2003

posted 12-28-2007 07:19 AM               

---

"Oh, I hope not!"

Jose Jimenez

Posts:
From:
Registered:

posted 12-28-2007 07:40 AM               

---

This one from Al Drew made me laugh

"In the words of the famous philosopher Larry The Cable Guy, 'Git her done!'"

Posts: 1287
From: Atlanta, Georgia, USA
Registered: Jun 2000

Posts: 1012
From: Denver, CO USA
Registered: Oct 2002

Posts:
From:
Registered:

posted 07-29-2010 12:15 AM               

---

Although this thread is old, I'd like to thank everybody that contributed ideas here about great space quotes. I'm (slowly) compiling lists and notes and threads like this into a somewhat coherent collection. While not really ready for prime time, it's growing online at spacequotations.com. If anybody has ideas, comments, additions, or corrections please let me know.

Thanks again, and I look forward to reading more space history quotes right here.

Posts: 2454
From: U.K.
Registered: Jul 2009

posted 07-29-2010 06:24 AM               

---

"If those scientists are so smart, why do they count backwards?" Robert Orben

"Living on Earth may be expensive, but it includes an annual free trip round the sun." Ashleigh Brilliant

"Only two things are infinite - the universe and human stupidity and I'm not sure about the former." Albert Einstein

"Space isn't remote at all. It's only an hour's drive away if your car could go straight upwards." Fred Hoyle

"The Chinese just put a man in space. They didn't use a rocket - they stood on each other's shoulders and passed him up." Al Murray

"The surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere in the universe is that it has never tried to contact us." Bill Watterson

"Scientists have discovered a noise made just prior to the Big Bang that sounds something like 'oops'." Cully Abrell

Posts: 1234
From:
Registered: Apr 2008

posted 07-29-2010 10:11 AM               

---

"Eddie Tower, Columbia's with you on final for 23, we'll get the gear in the flare."

- A little known joke by Joe Engle on the Edwards AFB control tower guys as he was on approach during STS-2. When asked about the strange transmission post-flight, he replied,

"Huh? I didn't hear anything...I was kind of busy at the time!"

Posts: 1966
From: Atlanta, GA
Registered: Feb 2007

posted 07-29-2010 10:19 AM               

---

Another from Ed White during his Gemini IV spacewalk: "I feel red, white and blue all over".

Gary Milgrom
http://www.spacegary.com

Posts: 691
From: Monticello, KY USA
Registered: Mar 2007

posted 07-29-2010 10:24 AM               

---

One of my favorites comes from Mike Collins, moments before undocking:

"You cats take it easy on the lunar surface. If I hear you huffing and puffing, I'm going to start bitching at you."

Another one, a little less gritty :
Suddenly, from behind the rim of the moon, in long, slow-motion moments of immense majesty, there emerges a sparkling blue and white jewel, a light, delicate sky-blue sphere laced with slowly swirling veils of white, rising gradually like a small pearl in a thick sea of black mystery. It takes more than a moment to fully realize this is Earth . . . home.
- Ed Mitchell

Posts: 1336
From:
Registered: Aug 2002

posted 07-29-2010 10:58 AM               

---

This is a fun topic to revisit. I enjoyed all the responses.

I don't know what the words were, but I always enjoyed hearing the reacquisition of signal from the Apollo spacecraft when they reappeared from behind the Moon.

Posts: 1751
From: Killingly, CT
Registered: Mar 2002

Posts: 2331
From: Sturgeon Bay, WI
Registered: Jan 2000

posted 07-29-2010 03:47 PM               

---

I was thinking of a new quote, but found my response from a while back and still had the same favorites.

I did think of another one that I like, kind of fitting these days since US manned flight is in question now -

"As I stand out here in the wonders of the unknown at Hadley, I sort of realize there's a fundamental truth to our nature, Man must explore... and this is exploration at its greatest." -David Scott