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I was 5 and there was no way I was going to miss Neil & Buzz setting man's first steps on the Moon. Was about 11PM EDT when the blurry video hit the old black & white TV.

Captain Ned is 49 years old.

It's not like it is a big secret; he's stated his age elsewhere on these forums. He's younger than me (but not by much).

I think we had just upgraded to color at that point, but the feed was B&W anyway!

I think we had just upgraded to color at that point, but the feed was B&W anyway!

Yeah, everyone now remembers the Hasselblad pictures in all the high definition glory.

At the time it was more like watching a movie of a deep sea diver across the alley through the neighbors frosted window in a blizzard.

It was exciting, but pretty darn fuzzy.

I was 8, and I remember seeing it... Amazing still...

We really are wealthy people, to be complaining now that we didn't have HDMI back then.

The moon landing was a fake! It was all a government conspiracy! It actually took place on a sound stage.













...Just kidding.

Back then, no-one thought to save the high quality recordings.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2009/07/ ... MK20090716
http://history.nasa.gov/alsj/a11/video11.html

Sargent Duck wrote:

The moon landing was a fake! It was all a government conspiracy! It actually took place on a sound stage.

I was looking at the game/sim Lunar Flight on Steam a couple days ago and one of the user comments said the game was faked because the shadows weren't right.

I was a busboy at an ice cream parlor restaurant and the manager had a small BW tv in his office. I took my break and watched the landing (so did much of the staff - fortunately it was early and we weren't busy.)

As Michael Crichton said in Timeline, who would have believed that we would put a man on the moon and then stop?

As Michael Crichton said in Timeline, who would have believed that we would put a man on the moon and then stop?

Yeah, and the last Pyramid was built when?

Some things you do, and then ask: Is the ROI really there for this type of project?

Yeah, I know all about the ancillary technology...I used to sell fused Silica from a guy that got in business from the space program...

However, with mounting TRILLION dollar debts, you need to start somewhere.

I was just over 6 months old at the time, yes that makes me 44, so I don't remember the first landing but I have vague recollections of the last few. My Father got me out of bed to watch a few launches and subsequent landings in color. I followed the space program all through my childhood.

The virtual ending of America's space program was one of the biggest mistakes made in my opinion. Just go do a search for all the inventions that came out of the space program you will see why. Other than in war time there are no other events that lead to such scientific discoveries or advances in our technology. Instead of Federally funded bridges to no where or studies of cow farts we could have had a base on the moon mining ores and Helium3 for nuclear fusion reactors to replace the few Fission reactors still in use. We might have even figured out how to make solar power satellites to beam power down to earth. There has never been another government program that returned so much knowledge and advancement for the tax money invested.

Khali wrote:

There has never been another government program that returned so much knowledge and advancement for the tax money invested.

That is arguable, I would have to say the war research has actually returned more (particularly WWII). That would include the space program itself.

Just go do a search for all the inventions that came out of the space program you will see why.

Yeah, I guess you missed the part where I mentioned that I work with high tech materials.

The question of cost /benefit still remains.

You can easily structure government to reward research (current tax credits)

Getting back tens to hundreds of trillions(estimated cost to get to mars) ROI is another thing entirely.

Competing investment returns need to be weighed. Power grid, transportation infrastructure, secure food supply for the next billion people added to the worlds population in the next 10 years...avoiding war over energy, water, food...not having a total world economic collapse from 30 Trillion in unsecured debt...

Little things like this might take priority over space exploration for the sake of saving you did it.

As good an excuse as any to play some Kerbal Space Program.

I've been playing with KSP for the past day, off and on. I had a rocket design with which I was pleased (having successfully accelerated a Kerman astronaut to more than 9 km/s, sending him on a one-way journey of intersteller exploration). I made a couple of minor tweaks, and now I can't get the radial stage separation to work any more. I gave up and re-designed things with 3 vertically stacked stages instead of stacking fuel tanks over the central engine. 10 km/s.

just brew it! wrote:

It's not like it is a big secret; he's stated his age elsewhere on these forums. He's younger than me (but not by much).

I think we had just upgraded to color at that point, but the feed was B&W anyway!

You had upgraded to color 44 years ago ?

Funfact about India: Till 1987 (I was 5 at that time) if you had a TV (Which we had and was B&W) at home the entire neighborhood would come to your house to watch the movie (At that time - India had only one channel, movie would be shown once a week and the channel would be only live for 6 hours/per day, if i remember correctly.)

Jigar wrote:

You had upgraded to color 44 years ago ?

Yup. I also remember the periodic trips with my dad to buy replacement vacuum tubes every time that TV stopped working. It used so many tubes it seemed like at least one of them was always burning out. Take the back off, pull all the tubes, put 'em in a brown paper bag, go down to the Radio Shack, use the self-serve tube tester to figure out which ones were bad, buy replacements, put everything back together. Lather, rinse, repeat every few months.

just brew it! wrote:

go down to the Radio Shack, use the self-serve tube tester to figure out which ones were bad

There's a phrase that very few here can relate to. Tube testers were pretty much gone by the time I hit double digits.

Captain Ned wrote:

just brew it! wrote:

go down to the Radio Shack, use the self-serve tube tester to figure out which ones were bad

There's a phrase that very few here can relate to. Tube testers were pretty much gone by the time I hit double digits.

Something else that is pretty hard to imagine these days is how TVs and other electronics were put together back in the day. I remember taking apart our old B&W TV... everything was hand soldered. Rat's nest of wires and components everywhere.

Cow jumped moon seven times followed by the shark. That's history for you.

just brew it! wrote:

Captain Ned wrote:

just brew it! wrote:

go down to the Radio Shack, use the self-serve tube tester to figure out which ones were bad

There's a phrase that very few here can relate to. Tube testers were pretty much gone by the time I hit double digits.

Something else that is pretty hard to imagine these days is how TVs and other electronics were put together back in the day. I remember taking apart our old B&W TV... everything was hand soldered. Rat's nest of wires and components everywhere.

I've repaired my share of vintage stereo receivers. We're talking 1970s-vintage and semi-automated manufacturing, but on some of the high-end stuff the wiring looms are still pretty fearsome.

Jigar wrote:

Funfact about India: Till 1987 (I was 5 at that time) if you had a TV (Which we had and was B&W) at home the entire neighborhood would come to your house to watch the movie (At that time - India had only one channel, movie would be shown once a week and the channel would be only live for 6 hours/per day, if i remember correctly.)

I think if we limited our television watching, humans would begin to actually take action and regain some long-lost control over their lives. And we wouldn't put up with politicians' crap.

What's that saying about the masses (or idle masses?) being placated by their food and entertainment?

well, we keep getting more and more political.

But all I can say is

Bread and circus.

Bread and circus.