patsyterrell

I grew up with Walter Cronkite. From the time I can remember he was there every night. He retired when I was studying journalism in college. We all watched his last broadcast. It was a milestone.

A couple of years later, some friends were in Florida on spring break and bumped into him. They came back to school with stories of how wonderful he was - charming, pleasant and encouraging to those budding journalists. It's always great to learn one of your icons is worthy of your hero-worship.

Cronkite's defining moments as an anchor were when JFK died, when we landed on the moon, and when he was one of the reasons we left Vietnam. I was too young to remember JFK's death but have seen that footage many times. I was still young enough at the moon landing that I don't remember that specific moment with Cronkite, but have seen it replayed many times. I was too young to understand Vietnam and all that it meant.

But, I remember Walter Cronkite. And I always will.
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bigpaulyb

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patsyterrell

We had a good turn out and I was thankful because I had spent most of my time working on those sorts of things.

He was at a reception and then spoke to a large group. Afterwards he signed books and other items for folks.

It was a good day/night, but a long one for me. I went to work about 7:30 that morning and by the time the day was done and a few of us had gotten some food it was after midnight.But a lot was accomplished.

Yesterday morning was Coffee at the Cosmosphere. Chris does this every month on the third Thursday. There's a different topic each time, and they show artifacts that illustrate the story. People get a chance to come up afterwards and look at them up close.

Yesterday's topic was the Apollo 11 Moon Landing, because the 40th anniversary of them landing is on Monday. They launched on the 16th, so it was perfect timing for the regular Thursday event.

bigpaulyb

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davidkevin

chuckvideo

By July 16th, 1969, I was a veteran of watching so many launches that I knew the last hour of news coverage of the night before (midnight-1 a.m.) and the first two hours of the morning coverage (5-7 a.m.) would tell me nothing I didn't already know (in the last hour before midnight they had broadcast the third repeat of the day of an explanatory clip of how the spacesuit diapers functioned), so I went to bed at midnight and set my alarm clock for seven.

At 6:58 my eyes s*p*r*a*n*g open from the first of only two times in my entire life that my internal clock has awakened me with such precision. I deactivated my external alarm before it could buzz, went into the living room to turn on the big hunk-of-furniture color t.v., then got a bowl & spoon, milk, and Cheerios and sat down in front of it, prepared for for what I knew was going to be a flawless launch.

Some events are just microcosms of perfection. That morning was one of them.