history tv, only on c-span3. setting upe they are the flag now. this is houston, radio check, over. roger, houston, loud and clear. buzz.er, announcer: all weekend american history tv marks the 50th anniversary of the apollo 11 moon landing. thet the -- we learn about role this played in the apollo program. >> why choose this as our goal, and they mail -- may well ask why climb the highest mountains? why 35 years ago, fly the

atlantic? ,why does rice play texas? we choose to go to the moon. we choose to go to the moon. [applause] we choose to go to the moon and do the other things, not because they are easy, because they are hard. because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one we intend to win -- and the others, too. [applause] >> in the early president john 1960's, kennedy said we want to galvanize our country to do something very bold, and it was the space race. we wanted to do something bold to beat the russians. let's beat the russians by sending humans to the moon and

returning us safely before the end of the 1960's. as the country is starting to think about going to the moon, one of the questions we had was, how do you know where you are going? if you travel to a foreign country, you take a nap with you to figure out where you are going. if you travel to a foreign world you better have a map so you do not hit the side of a rock or run into a crater or something like that. that was a critical part of preparing to go to the moon. we are inside the historic clark 24 inch refracting telescope dome of lowell observatory. this was established in 1894, before arizona was even a state. here, heirst came out had grown up out east, came from a wealthy family, got interested in astronomy, and realized if he was going to build an observatory back east, it was

not ideal because it was the 1890's, you had the proliferation of electric lights that were shining on the skies and making it more difficult to see stars and planets and such. so what he decided to do was go to the american southwest. he sent an assistant out here, andrew douglas, to map sites around the territory, and they chose flagstaff. flagstaff has very dark skies, and was at a higher elevation, 7000 feet. the higher the elevation, the less air you have to look through. the less distortion. the air is like a swimming pool. when you open your eyes in a swimming pool everything is kind , of fuzzy because the water is bending that light -- air does the same thing. so the more air you look through the more distorted stars are going to look through. there are higher elevations, the dark side, great location. -- dark skies, a great location. when you drive around, up on mars hill, where lowell observatory is located, you see

the dome of the telescope standing 40 feet tall, like a birthday cake on top of the hill. he decided to set up his observatory in 1894, and had this telescope built, a 24 inch diameter, 32 foot refracting telescope. that means it uses lenses instead of mirrors to collect the light. he built this in 1896 and it was used in mexico for about one year, then brought back here in 1897 and has been here ever since. this is really a classic instrument, classic part of scientific history, american history, cultural history, and the first evidence of the expanding nature of the universe was collected using instruments on this telescope. pluto, although it was not discovered with this telescope, it was important in that search and study after discovery as well. there has been a lot of great research with this over the last several decades.

it is not used for research anymore, but we use it for education outreach. the last major research done with this was mapping the moon, and that was a unique thing that was done with this. it really captures our imagination, especially as we are approaching the 50th anniversary of the first manned mission to the moon. apollo eight flew to the moon in december 1968, and neil armstrong and buzz aldrin took the first steps on the moon in 1969, july. all those astronauts and everyone who walked on the moon, everyone who traveled to the moon trained here in flagstaff. they learned geology, tested instruments, learned about reading maps. that is something that was important and done here at the observatory with this telescope. the bad thing, the critical things lowell was involved with was prepareding to go to the moon. but then they were also involved

in another way, in 1962, the second group of astronauts were named. you had the mercury seven that flew up and did the mercury flight, just showing we could get up into space. alan shepard was the first american in space. he was there for 15 minutes and came back down. in 1962, this second group came along. when they came on, jean heemaker in flagstaff, talked to nasa and some other scientists and said, if we are going to plan to send people to the moon, we should do more than just plan the flight and come -- plant the flag and come back. we should do science. what a better way to learn about the origins of our planet and who we are then by studying another body in the solar system, similar to ours, kind of our partner, as it were. in january 1963, the next nine astronauts, the second group that included neil armstrong,

frank borman and others, they came out here on a very cold day, flew into flagstaff airport planes, in case one crashed, not all the astronauts would have perished. they flew in and these guys were rock stars. they were met by the mayor, they were met by cheering fans wanting autographs, but then they went to a meteor crater. if you are going to go to the moon and do geology around this pockmarked, cratered area of the moon, why not study and prepare for that in the best preserved impact crater there is, which is meteor crater, right down the road from where we are at lowell observatory. they went to meteor crater to see what an actual impact crater looks like, and then they went to lowell observatory to study the mapping and see how these features are depicted on maps. because they will be have to be able to read these maps and relate what they are seeing on

the maps to the real features. at night, after dinner, the group broke up into three. each group went with some folks -- some of them stayed here at the observatory with this telescope, some went to northern arizona university and their telescope, and the other went to the naval observatory's flagstaff station, located about four miles from here. in those three groups using three different telescopes, the astronauts each looked through the telescopes to see the moon and where they would be going. in one day, they could see what an actual impact crater looks like, how impact craters are depicted on the map, and what the moon's impact craters actually look like. so the upside is that first trip was very successful. nasa realized the value of training the astronauts to do geology and all the future groups of astronauts that went to the moon came here to flagstaff to train.

we are now out in the field, and we are several miles from downtown flagstaff, and not far far from that crater that erected tens of thousands of years ago. this field is made from cinders from that explosion. nasa realized they wanted another place to train, something that was even more accurate or the lunar surface for the craters. in 1968, the usgs, based on an image of the moon, created this crater field. they looked at this image from lunar orbiter and dug holes with backhoes, filled them with explosives to create different sized craters, and it was 400 plus craters that were made out here. they set the charges, blew it

up, and a cataclysmic explosion of cinders blew up in the air. they took some photos and realized it was really effective and it really did look like the craters on the moon in terms of not the exact geology, but thets and the layout. . 1972 they came here for training. for the earlier missions before they came out here to practice carrying. they describe the rocks and surveyed the landscape. on later missions when they developed the rovers for the last three missions they brought them out here and practiced writing them. today this area is protected and it has a fence around it. this is national forest land. there is a field they created that is a mile away in the

recreation area. created after this was and we can see this nice crater. a little bit of a nice rim going around it. one, we arelargest on the north corner of the field. a lot of other craters around here that we can see. it is a neat thing that anyone can come out here and see. our observatory was founded by an amateur. he got interested in doing astronomy and put his money where his mouth was. the astronomer who discovered pluto was in an -- was an amateur astronomer. he lived on a farm in kansas and looked at the sky. , all trainedld

whileomers -- professional astronomers are making great discoveries that inspire us astronomy is in the realm of not just as -- not just professionals. if you have an interest you can do a lot with it. just look up and you can be excited about it. nasa's jetweek visit propulsion laboratory in pasadena, california to hear about its history and the contributions they have made to space exploration. a place that we actually call the center of the universe. it might come across as egotistical. this is the original mission control for jbl. here at