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http://www.zeiss.com/moon/promotion
This offer is valid 20/07/2019 – 20/09/2019 and applies only to selected lenses from the Batis, Touit and Loxia lens families. Purchases are limited
to one piece per lens type and per customer. Valid only for purchases from currently authorised and participating ZEISS specialist dealers and
from the ZEISS Web shop. ZEISS and participating dealers reserve the right to cancel this programme at any time, also when insuffi cient stocks
are available to sustain the programme.
Above:Thecrew
ofApollo 11 was
cordial,butnot
especiallyclose.
BuzzAldrin(right)
expectedtoleave
theLunarModule
(LMpronounced
‘Lem’)beforeNeil
Armstrong(left)
becauseGemini
commandershad
stayedonboard
whileco-pilots
madespacewalks.
Historiansstill
debatewhythe
decisionwasmade
forArmstrongto
exitApollo’sLMfirst
activities in space should be devoted
to peaceful purposes for the benefit
of all mankind.’ In other words,
NASA had no military objectives.
In its initial years of existence,
NASA was busy working on two
overlapping programs: the X-15
rocket-powered hypersonic research
aircraft (which ran from 1959 to
1968) and Project Mercury (1958
to 1963). Mercury was previously
the US Air Force’s ‘Man in Space
Soonest’ program, which had the
original objective of getting a
person into Earth orbit as soon
as possible. When the Soviet
cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin completed
a single Earth orbit on 12 April 1961
it meant the US had, once again,
failed to be first to achieve a key
space exploration landmark.
Photographic policy at NASA
Since its 1958 inception NASA had
taken great care to document its
activities in terms of recording
scientific data, but in its first three
years of existence it had no clear
plan for photography.
Science journalist Piers Bizony –
who co-authored and edited the
new book The NASA Archives:
60 Years in Space – explains,
‘Actually there wasn’t [any plan for
photography]. It was the astronauts
who decided to take cameras into
space, and they are the ones
who chose to experiment with a
Hasselblad. NASA went on to value
the pictorial side of its astronaut
missions, but this was more of a
discovery than a deliberate plan.’
It wasn’t until 1961 that the future
direction of NASA – and its
subsequent photographic policy
- got more clarity, thanks to three
key factors. First, James E Webb
was appointed as Administrator
of NASA in February 1961 – Webb
was to prove an inspired choice.
Second, in May 1961, US President
John F Kennedy made a request to
Congress to fund a program to
land a US man on the moon