I have the advantage of having lived through the moon missions and some of my peers, as a child, had parents and family friends working on Apollo, my own Dad a major player in a minor role.

To the generation after my own, the man on the moon missions "just happened" as if out of the blue—just something the news media reported. Ah! But many lives were involved of real people, not actors.

For my generation… we were connected to the whole process of it. We were aware of the steps and stages, the failures and the successes progressing toward the goal-- and not just from the news, but from the dinner table, hearing about Dad's business trip to "Houston." There were stories of his co-workers as well. His co-workers would sit on our porch and I would listen to them chat. All a performance for an elementary school kid that few would suspect would know as many technical details as I did?

Representing a major contractor, one day, one of my Dad’s associates at NASA brought a stack of film canisters to a meeting. Afterward, he handed them to my father telling him that they were films used internally but he might find them interesting. It changed my life, and I was just a kid.

From that point, my Dad always returned from his NASA trips with a new stack of films for us to watch together. He brought notebooks of data for me to pore over. I soaked up everything my Dad told me about his work and everything I was given to read. On vacation, my Dad took me through Mission Control in Clear Lake several times, and on one occasion, to Huntsville, and to the Cape.

I was about to post a picture I took of Apollo 12 and 13, both inside the Vertical Assembly Building (where I got to inside and toured—you may bow, reverently ;-) ) but realized I would lose copyright by posting here.

Here is a lesser one I'll share:



So, I’ll stop there and ask:

I knew some of the computer technicians who worked on the project. So who were the programmers who fed false data to those technicians so as to fool them as they monitored the systems? Because the men I knew have no doubt that the landings were real. I could be wrong, but I do not believe an IBM 360 was capable of being “hacked” in 1969— and they weren’t easy machines to hide!

The "proof" that so many look for needed no proof to those who were connected to the program in time, and in our relations. These were people who came out of the aerospace industry—known for their expertise—not actors and not stupid.

Twenty years later, chatting with a stranger on a plane who recognizes my last name and asks "Is your father, so-and-so?"
"Yes. You knew him?"
"Yeah. I was on the NASA systems during the moon landings..." and the stories fly-- some of which I had already heard from my Dad. That stuff doesn't come out of a hoax. They make up stories to remember to share with a chance encounter with a child of a co-worker twenty years later? Just in case they ever bump into him?

Life does not work that way. It seems to me that hoaxes of the scale being imagined by some can only be believed by persons without sufficient life experience upon which to test what is real and amazing from what is hoax.

As a child of nine, I fly to Huntsville with my Dad just after Apollo 11 returned. I am one of three kids in an auditorium full of adult professionals—VIPs, all connected to manned moon missions. The lecturer is Wernher von Braun. He is done with the Saturn project—he designs and fixes designs—but since it worked, he was moving on. His lecture was about what was next. He shows slides of a reusable winged vehicle that would become the Shuttle.

Now if the project was a hoax, what are the odds that these professionals (my Dad, friends of his-- people I knew) would bother? My Dad and his buddy, a very famous man, were so proud of their work, they brought their kids. Lucky me! Or would you have me believe my Dad just pretended to be proud—a man whose IQ blew through the top and whose good character was (and is) legendary?

What are the odds that von Braun would behave as if done, and ready to move to the next project?

Unless you intend to tell me that I am in a scenario like the Truman Show and everyone in my life was, and remains, merely an actor perpetuating a hoax, then reality is as I know it to be—and, therefore, we went to the moon.

sounds all warm and fuzzy and i'm sure with the feelings that you feel about it, you surely wouldn't want to believe that your dad was involved, even if it was unwittingly, in something that never actually came to fruition...i'm sure that would be devastating to you....but, strong emotions about a particular subject are a very nice way to not be very open minded about a situation...in conclusion, while very warm and heart felt, it didn't provide me any proof of your claim......

Well said:"

Life does not work that way. It seems to me that hoaxes of the scale being imagined by some can only be believed by persons without sufficient life experience upon which to test what is real and amazing from what is hoax. "

Govt programs no matter how covert are staffed by real people who eat and sleep and want weekends off and eventually retire and go on to other things.

great story and thanks for sharing the pic.
my best friend's dad was on the apollo missions as well. his stories are similar of dad coming home at night and talking about work that day, benchmarks, etc.
he fed his family doing that job for many years. if it was faked, it would have caught on.

years ago i had an astronomy professor whose story was very much like yours. i admired him and felt he was the smartest teacher i had ever had. at the time, i had read very little about the alleged moon landing hoax, but i had read enough to ask my professor about the event. he, of course, discredited the hoax claims as ridiculous, citing many things many OS supporters cite, including the scale of deception it would take to pull off the hoax.

today i wish i could again ask him some questions about this event. for one, how could anyone endure the amount of radiation in the van allen belt, especially considering the amount of time it would take to go through it (it's somewhere around 20,000 miles wide, right?). that seems odd to me.

also, i would ask him again why nobody had gone back to the moon in the 40+ years since. at the time i remember him telling me that nobody had been back to the moon because it is costly to go to the moon and there wasn't significant enough reason to go back as we had presumably gained all the knowledge we needed, that humanity needed, from our trips in the 60s and 70s. i would ask him why modern astronauts can't get past 400 miles from the earth without encountering effects from the radiation in the van allen belt some 600 miles away from them.

i thank you for your account. i still am completely unsure what i believe about this event and i appreciate all the sincere info i can get.

I was an adult (19 years old), and in the Navy, when man first set foot on the moon. Having lived and breathed the heady atmosphere of American know-how of that time; the extreme exaltation and the heartbreaking tragedies of the astronauts; the excitement of the news coverage of every launch and recovery--back when the "MSM" meant "Uncle" Walter Cronkite--no one can tell me we didn't send men to the moon. And brought them all back alive.

Now I'm just an old guy wishing someone would *finally* get some high-def photos of the landing sites, so we can at last get some closure on this. And shut these annoying little ---- up!

thanks for your story

i like hearing that side from the kids of people who worked there


i wish more people would share .. but everyone on that oh they might discover who i am band wagon lol


thats a nice picture ... wish you would upload more i bet you got some real goodies don't ya ?



hey how about a secret audio recording of you and pops having a conversation ?


but you gotta get him wasted and bring it up as matter of fact .. and just ask hiim random questions and maybe play it for us .... no editing lol


and if your father has passed away then im sorry

AHUH Yeup!
If they can stage something like pearl harbour, or other false flags that people accept as reasons d etre even though these same things have been proven hoaxes ....Duh they can suck us into the moon landing concept too.
Suppose they had to stage the landings in a studio because they really couldnt get the tv signal too clearly from the moon?
And two guys in space suits cavort around the arizona desert and a sound stage to give the public their thrill.....propaganda.
While the reality was far cruder and fraught with danger for the crews.

Well find out soon now, Space X is getting into orbit and who knows what after that?
Private industry may succeed where govt didnt.We need more commercialisation of earth orbit factories and labs which could do wonders with such an absolute vacuum, and whieghtlessness to boot.
What industrial engineer wouldnt be in heaven with just those two advantages?

Originally posted by godWhisperer
...
today i wish i could again ask him some questions about this event. for one, how could anyone endure the amount of radiation in the van allen belt, especially considering the amount of time it would take to go through it (it's somewhere around 20,000 miles wide, right?). that seems odd to me.

You conveniently forget that you don't have to ask your old professor when you have the internet. I found as many valid and well-founded answers to this in a matter of seconds as I could read in a matter of days. (There are these things called search engines, see....)

I was in high school at the time, and I must say it would have had to be an unbelievably vast operation for it to be a hoax. Simply unimaginable. I've really only run into one thing that truly disturbs me about it, and I haven't heard any of the "hoaxers" mention it (though some may have).

I read that all the still shots they took while walking around on the moon were taken with a standard, off-the-shelf, high quality German made chemical film camera. I just don't see how any photographic chemicals could have withstood the temperatures, several hundred degrees in the sunlight, minus several hundred in the shade. And then there's the question of all the radiation flying around in the absence of an atmosphere that the exposures would have been subjected to.

Can anyone explain this? It would certainly ease my mind! I keep thinking about how hot the competition was between the US and the USSR back then, and it leaves me with a strange feeling that maybe things indeed weren't what they seemed. But I REALLY want to believe...

Excellent thread. S&F

I love to read about actual accounts of the Apollo missions from those who were there.

To those who think the moon landings were faked, you should really try and get some "first hand" accounts from people who actually lived through the 60's. The scale of people involved in both the USA and Australia is far to large to be able to fake such events. Surely someone would have come forward in the last 40 years with solid evidence if it had actually been a hoax. Instead we only have crackpot theories with no basis beyond wild speculation coming from people seek to capitalise on gullibility.

Originally posted by Ex_CT2

Originally posted by godWhisperer
...
today i wish i could again ask him some questions about this event. for one, how could anyone endure the amount of radiation in the van allen belt, especially considering the amount of time it would take to go through it (it's somewhere around 20,000 miles wide, right?). that seems odd to me.

You conveniently forget that you don't have to ask your old professor when you have the internet. I found as many valid and well-founded answers to this in a matter of seconds as I could read in a matter of days. (There are these things called search engines, see....)

right. i used the anecdote more to imply that i wasn't a moon landing hoaxer or anything. why would you flame me? do you honestly believe i don't know what a search engine is? why do people so quickly resort to ad hominem crap assaults when they hear something they don't like?

i did the searches and it made me more curious. the most common theory is that it was a short time that they were in the belt, yet modern astronauts 600 miles away from the belt have problems with radiation. the official account is weak in its explanation of the belt thing. why will no other country (no other mission other than the apollos) send manned missions farther out than 400 miles? i think these are genuine points of interest for the apollo lore, regardless of if it happened or it didn't.

i am curious, i enjoy information from all sides of the issue. thanks again.

Originally posted by OccamAssassin
Excellent thread. S&F

I love to read about actual accounts of the Apollo missions from those who were there.

To those who think the moon landings were faked, you should really try and get some "first hand" accounts from people who actually lived through the 60's. The scale of people involved in both the USA and Australia is far to large to be able to fake such events. Surely someone would have come forward in the last 40 years with solid evidence if it had actually been a hoax. Instead we only have crackpot theories with no basis beyond wild speculation coming from people seek to capitalise on gullibility.

edit on 5/9/2011 by OccamAssassin because: (no reason given)

have you watched the videos of that young aussie guy that's debunking the moonlanding? what you guys aren't understanding is that it doesn't matter how fondly you remember those days your recollections of the butterflies in your stomach simply will not suffice as proof....i'm sorry

I personally believe man went to the moon,i am just not sure we have ever seen the exact footage of the event!

Originally posted by godWhisperer

Originally posted by Ex_CT2

Originally posted by godWhisperer
...
today i wish i could again ask him some questions about this event. for one, how could anyone endure the amount of radiation in the van allen belt, especially considering the amount of time it would take to go through it (it's somewhere around 20,000 miles wide, right?). that seems odd to me.

You conveniently forget that you don't have to ask your old professor when you have the internet. I found as many valid and well-founded answers to this in a matter of seconds as I could read in a matter of days. (There are these things called search engines, see....)

right. i used the anecdote more to imply that i wasn't a moon landing hoaxer or anything. why would you flame me? do you honestly believe i don't know what a search engine is? why do people so quickly resort to ad hominem crap assaults when they hear something they don't like?

i did the searches and it made me more curious. the most common theory is that it was a short time that they were in the belt, yet modern astronauts 600 miles away from the belt have problems with radiation. the official account is weak in its explanation of the belt thing. why will no other country (no other mission other than the apollos) send manned missions farther out than 400 miles? i think these are genuine points of interest for the apollo lore, regardless of if it happened or it didn't.

i am curious, i enjoy information from all sides of the issue. thanks again.

i can tell you as an electronics technician of 15 years that radiation, which is the same thing that we cook our foods with in the microwave, doesn't take too kindly to metals for one thing (tends to heat up pretty badly), it will play havoc with anything that requires a signal to work, it cooks meat from the inside out...and you definitely don't want to coat the ship with compact cd's because it will look like a lightning storm outside your window, have you ever put one in the microwave? whew, i wouldn't suggest it, unless you don't mind buying a new microwave possibly but it does look like a lightning storm in your microwave,