Lookout Landing links to a great diagram from NASA that superimposes the first moon walk onto a baesball diamond.

I was nine at the time, watching baseball regularly for the first time, and very excited about the race to the moon. I was too young to know what happened with the Mercury missions, but I remember watching the launch of the first manned Gemini mission, and at age four I was hooked. I watched every launch from then on, and followed all the special reports. The three networks covered the space program constantly back then, often cutting into shows to report on a space walk or a rendezvous. When the Apollo missions started carrying television cameras, the coverage increased even more.

Starting in the fall of 1968, the launches came fast and furious, every two or three months. Apollo eight circled the moon on Christmas, 1968. Apollo nine tested the LM in earth orbit in early March. Apollo ten tested the LM in lunar orbit, then in July the big mission launched. I remember the thrill that went through me when Apollo eleven lifted off. NBC did not go off the air with the mission all day Sunday and into Monday while they were on the moon. The walk was scheduled for the middle of the night in the eastern US, but they moved it up to 10:30 pm in case something went wrong and they had to leave. So there I was with my family, watching ghostly images from the lunar surface as Neil Armstrong came down the ladder and stepped on the surface. I stayed up later than I ever did before to watch the whole thing.

As my wife pointed out, while Armstrong got the glory for being the first man on the moon, all the pictures on the surface are of Buzz Aldrin, since Neil was the photographer. This is my favorite picture from the mission, Aldrin standing on the surface, the LM, Armstrong and the flag reflected in his visor. They really went where no man had gone before.