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| 50 year anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon Landing! July 20, 1969-July 20, 2019 
INCREDIBLE.That's the only word I can use to describe the accomplishment of the NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) Mission to the Moon! In the 1960's President Kennedy declared America would land a man on the moon by the end of the decade.The plan to land a man on the moon, let alone by 1970, sounded like such a fairy tale.
Trying to achieve such a goal sounded foolish given we had nothing to go on about space and rockets and lunar landers and even if a human being could live in the environs of outer space. Everything was just one big fat question mark. Only brilliant, courageous, determined, hard-working men and women could pull it off. AND they did! For all of us! We couldn't take our eyes off our TV's watching NASA's every planned step that would land us on the moon.
Frances "Poppy" Northcutt was a part of the team on that mission to the moon in the 1960's. As the first woman engineer to work in NASA's Mission Control, her job was to calculate the return-to-Earth trajectories. In the video below, Poppy talks about how the simulations with the astronauts in the capsule located in the building, not in space, tested everyone with training exercises. She was actually surprised at how well the actual Apollo 11flight went after having worked through so many possibilities of failure.
The moon landing is one of the most significant events in the 20th century and one that brought all Americans together cheering for the amazing outcome of Neil Armstrong actually climbing down the 3.5 foot long ladder to leave his footprint on the moon's surface. Next, astronaut Buzz Aldrin joined him on the ground and planted the American flag.
VIDEO:
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Friday, July 19, 2019
50TH Anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon Landing, Trailblazer: Poppy Northcutt
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