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Author
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Topic: What's your earliest space-related memory?
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mikepf
Member Posts: 441
From: San Jose, California, USA
Registered: Mar 2002
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posted 06-09-2006 02:35 PM
   
Something jogged my memory the other day and I can recall several times while in elementary school when we were assembled in the cafeteria to watch what must have been Gemini launches on TV. I wish I could remember details as to which flights they were, but I can't. My earliest datable (but very vague)space memory is the Apollo 1 fire (I was 9 years old). I was just curious what was your first space memories are. |
MarylandSpace
Member Posts: 1336
From:
Registered: Aug 2002
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posted 06-09-2006 02:58 PM
October 4, 1957 (I had to look up the date again)... Was a 7-year old coming out of a cub scout meeting in South Plainfield, NJ and the cub leader said the "Russians" had launched a satellite called Sputnik.And we asked, "What's a satellite?" |
Gilbert
Member Posts: 1328
From: Carrollton, GA USA
Registered: Jan 2003
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posted 06-09-2006 03:30 PM
I remember my parents talking to my aunt and uncle about Sputnik while they played Rook. I'll never forget their conversation. |
icarkie
Member Posts: 618
From: BURTON ON TRENT /England
Registered: Nov 2002
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posted 06-09-2006 03:55 PM
As a 6 year old listening on the news to the Apollo 8 crew read from the Bible at Christmas 68. |
Naraht
Member Posts: 232
From: Oxford, UK
Registered: Mar 2006
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posted 06-09-2006 04:36 PM
The first space news that I remember clearly is the problems with the Hubble Space Telescope. I'm sure that I was aware of shuttle missions before that, but I don't recall anything particularly notable, despite the fact that I had a keen interest in astronomy. What can I say, I grew up during a slow period for space exploration...I probably would remember Challenger, but my mother made sure that we didn't watch the news for a few days afterwards, since she was worried that I'd be too upset. |
tegwilym
Member Posts: 2331
From: Sturgeon Bay, WI
Registered: Jan 2000
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posted 06-09-2006 04:42 PM
Hmmm...for me it must have been sometime in the early 70's watching one of the moon landings. I just remember sitting on my "blankie" in my jammies in front of the TV watching the astronauts bouncing around on our old and sometimes finicky (but ultra modern!) color TV.When I was a kid, I hated getting new clothes and wouldn't wear them. My mom came up with the bright idea and put "moon" in front of the item of clothing. When she told me to put on my "moon coat" or "moon boots" I wouldn't hesitate to get dressed for the EVA outdoors. Hehe!  |
apollo11lem5
Member Posts: 528
From: Seminole, Florida, United States
Registered: May 2000
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posted 06-09-2006 04:52 PM
My very first memory that "started it all" for me was seeing a TV advertisement for what was then a new movie "Forbidden Planet" which became a classic. I was 6 and my Dad was afraid the movie would scare me. That was the genesis of my interest in space! |
micropooz
Member Posts: 1512
From: Washington, DC, USA
Registered: Apr 2003
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posted 06-09-2006 05:07 PM
I was only 5 and only marginally interested in space when Shepard and Grissom went up. The TV coverage of their flights only occupied the morning. When Glenn flew, the TV coverage went into the afternoon and pre-empted my afternoon cartoons. Boy was I torqued off!The space bug didn't really bite until Cooper's flight. |
RMH
Member Posts: 577
From: Ohio
Registered: Mar 2001
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posted 06-10-2006 08:00 AM
The launching of the first Space Shuttle was the first event that I remember clearly. I can vaguely remember the Vikings visit to Mars. |
SpaceDust
Member Posts: 115
From: Louisville, Ky USA
Registered: Mar 2006
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posted 06-10-2006 09:50 AM
My first memories go back to John Glenn's first flight in 1962. I remember coming home from school and watching it on TV. The CBS network used an oscilloscopence to show Glenn's voice when he talked. Since TV was not possible from the spacecraft or the recovery area as of that time, this made for "BIG TIME" TV viewing. I find it hard to believe now that we were glued to the set to watch a line bounce up and down on the screen. In black and white no less. |
kyra
Member Posts: 583
From: Louisville CO US
Registered: Aug 2003
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posted 06-10-2006 10:19 AM
I can recall early reports on the "Columbia" having problems with a computer. At the time I didn't even know what a computer was. Then I recall TV scenes of the landing of the black-nosed white bird in the shimmering heat...I didn't even understand why at the time it was big news ! In fact, at the time I thought it was actually a tad boring. Little did I know two years later by STS-6 I would be fairly interested ! By STS-7 even more. |
SpaceCat
Member Posts: 151
From: Florida, US
Registered: May 2006
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posted 06-10-2006 11:38 AM
Watching "Flash Gordon" with my father and remembering him tellimg me that some day we would travel to the moon and the planets. He died a month after Sputnik launched, and about 13 years later I walked through the gates of the Cape to begin my first real job. |
WAWalsh
Member Posts: 809
From: Cortlandt Manor, NY
Registered: May 2000
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posted 06-11-2006 05:36 AM
Ed White's EVA |
Apollo-Soyuz
Member Posts: 1205
From: Shady Side, Md
Registered: Sep 2004
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posted 06-11-2006 06:28 AM
I remember watching John Glenn's MA-6 launch on a television in my 5th grade class. I was hooked. I did not start collecting space until 1972. |
randy
Member Posts: 2176
From: West Jordan, Utah USA
Registered: Dec 1999
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posted 06-11-2006 09:38 AM
I would have to say that my earliest space related memory is of John Glenn's flight. |
rocketJoe
Member Posts: 103
From: Huntsville, AL USA
Registered: Jul 2001
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posted 06-11-2006 07:50 PM
Apollo 17 spashdown. I remember my mom calling me in from playing outside to watch since (in her words) "this will be the last mission to the moon". 34 years later, still waiting for mom to be proved wrong... |
ejectr
Member Posts: 1751
From: Killingly, CT
Registered: Mar 2002
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posted 06-11-2006 09:40 PM
October 4, 1957 for me, also. I was watching the news at noon time on my parents first black and white TV and they announced that Sputnik was orbiting the earth.At 8 years of age, I'd never be the same. I was hooked on every word there after. |
Blackarrow
Member Posts: 3118
From: Belfast, United Kingdom
Registered: Feb 2002
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posted 06-12-2006 08:07 PM
Yuri Gagarin's flight. My father helped me to cut pictures out of the newspapers to glue into a scrap-book. I still have the pictures. I did the same for Alan Shepard's flight, and still have those cuttings too. I have vivid memories (but, strangely, no press cuttings) of John Glenn's flight. I vaguely remember Valentina Tereshkova's flight, and several Gemini missions. I can clearly remember coverage of Ranger 7 photographing the Moon and Surveyor 1 landing (I watched live coverage of the Surveyor landing on BBC TV before going to school). The Apollo fire was shocking enough to sadden a twelve-year-old. Then, in October 1968 I saw my first live space TV: coverage of the Apollo 7 recovery. The rest, as they say, is history..... |
sfurtaw
Member Posts: 104
From: Saginaw, MI USA
Registered: Feb 2004
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posted 06-13-2006 05:02 AM
As someone born in 1973, I have only seen the shuttle. I had an interest in space exploration at an early age, but my first distinct memory is getting up early enough after spending the night at my grandparents house to watch the launch of STS-1 with them. I've been hooked ever since! |
Peter S
Member Posts: 101
From: Toronto, Ontario , Canada
Registered: Jan 2006
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posted 06-13-2006 08:07 AM
Apollo 11, about 12 of us gathered around a TV in '69. We had been in the country for about 1 year, and it was a small black and white tv, horrible reception for virtually everything, but somehow, it was clear enough when Armstrong stepped off the LM. This is actually one of my earliest memories, and I can still recall several people crying, and I couldn't figure out why...But now, even reading about it, I still get emotional... |
Chris Dubbs
Member Posts: 145
From: Edinboro, PA USA
Registered: Nov 2004
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posted 06-13-2006 10:13 AM
As an early baby boomer, I remember all of the early satellite launches and standing in my backyard after twilight trying to see them. Sputnik 2, with the dog Laika inside, had the biggest impact on me. I formed a rocket club. You could buy rocket engines through the mail that looked like sticks of dynamite and developed up to 50 lbs of thrust. We built our own rockets and launched them with these engines, killing off a mouse in one attempt. By the time I reached 10th grade in 1961, space exploration had crept into the curriculum and they were teaching Russian, which I took. |
Scott
Member Posts: 3307
From: Houston, TX
Registered: May 2001
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posted 06-13-2006 11:25 AM
Staring up at Alan Bean's lunar spacesuit, encased in an isolated display underneath the dome of the Museum's Noble Planetarium at the Fort Worth Childrens Museum (now the Fort Worth Museum of Science & History) in 1971. I was 3 years old and attending Museum School there.Does anyone know where this suit is now? I have not been able to find its location referenced on the Web (even though the locations of almost all the other 12 suits are referenced) and I asked Mr. Bean once and he did not know either. Certainly one of the whizzes on cS knows its present location. |
Duke Of URL
Member Posts: 1316
From: Syracuse, NY
Registered: Jan 2005
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posted 06-13-2006 07:54 PM
We saw an Aurora Borealis hanging in the sky above our school building during 1957, when we were walking my brother to Cub Scouts.Man-made space was my Old Man showing us the ECHO satellite cross the sky. |
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