21 December 1968: Apollo 8 lifted off from Florida's Kennedy Space Center, carrying Commander Frank Borman, Command Module Pilot Jim Lovell, & Lunar Module Pilot Bill Anders aboard a Command & Service Module atop a Saturn V rocket; the night before liftoff, the trio were visited by Brigadier & Mrs. Charles Lindburgh; Apollo 8 was the first human spaceflight beyond low Earth orbit.
Commentary: The Apollo program was the subject of a multi-part "Explorers' Club" series some years hence, but with the fiftieth anniversary of Apollo 11 this past summer, I decided to revisit that epochal mission with a three-part series, detailing the launch, the first Moonwalk, & the safe return of the three heroic astronauts. When the fiftieth anniversary of Apollo 12 rolled around this fall, I decided to similarly fête each of the subsequent missions. I then kicked myself for having overlooked the fiftieth anniversaries of Apollo 7, Apollo 8, Apollo 9, & Apollo 10. Mea culpa. We shall be observing the fifty-plus-th anniversary of each mission as it rolls around.
Bonus! Moonshot Songs o' the Day: Apollo 8
The Phenomenauts, "Rocket Roll" from Re-Entry (Mike Papa Whiskey)
&
National Aeronautics & Space Administration, "Apollo 8 Excerpt 1" from The Apollo Missions (Mike Papa Whiskey)
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