"I believe this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth. No single space project in this period will be more impressive to mankind, or more important for the long-range exploration of space, and none will be so difficult or expensive to accomplish."

President John F. Kennedy, speech to U.S. Congress, 5.25.1961

1610 - Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei made the first telescopic observation of the Moon 1959 - Soviet spacecraft Luna 2 reached the Moon, impacting near the crater Autolycus 1961 - President John F. Kennedy proposed a manned lunar program 1964 - ranger 7 produced the fist close-up TV pictures of the lunar surface 1966 - Luna 9 made the first soft landing on the Moon 1967 - Lunar Orbiter missions completed photographic mapping of the Moon (begun in 1966 1968 - Apollo 8 made the first manned flight to the Moon, circling it 10 times before returning to Earth 1969 - Apollo 11 mission made the first landing on the Moon and returned samples 1972 - Apollo 17 made the last manned landing of Apollo Program 1976 - Soviet Luna 24 returned the last sample of the Moon 1990 - Galileo spacecraft obtained multispectral images of the western limb and part of the far side of the Moon 1994 - Clementine mission conduted multispectral mapping of the Moon 2005 - The Robotic Lunar Exploration Program begins to take form, and the rest is history yet to be written....

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