Heroes

I was saddened to hear of the death of Neil Armstrong this mornig. I was born before men landed on the Moon but wasn’t old enough to remember the night of the Apollo XI landing or to initially appreciate the enormity of what Armstrong and NASA had achieved. I grew up when men went into space and landed on the Moon almost as a routine thing:  it was what mankind did and what we were striving for (at least that and tempting nuclear annihilation) so it just seemed like the way things were.  I was, however, old enough to remember men actually being on the Moon and can distinctly remember walking through the local swing-park and being told that there were men standing on the Moon at that very moment. I looked long and hard at the bright disc in the sky and strained my eyes desperately trying to see them. However, I grew to appreciate that this was one of the most remarkable achievements of all time and even had a picture on my bedroom wall of Neil Armstrong standing on the lunar surface.

It is almost 40 years since men last went to the Moon. It’s difficult to say when they will go back but I suspect that if they do they will most likely be Chinese rather than American or Russian adventurers. However, Neil Armstrong and his fellow astronauts (and cosmonauts, for that matter) were a huge inspiration for me and my generation. I even once applied for a job as an astronaut – I didn’t get very far but, oddly enough, the woman who was selected now works with my brother at the National  Physical Laboratory. I never had the chance to meet Neil Armstrong. Despite being one of the most famous men on the planet he was also a very private individual but he still had time for people. One of my work colleagues did meet him whilst over in America a few years ago and he was more than happy for them to pose for a photograph with him.

I’m interested to see who the heroes to today’s children are. There doesn’t seem to be the same ambition of wanting to be an astronaut or explorer. I think many children seem more impressed with the latest Apple consumer electronics gadget than rocket science. It would be easy to dismiss modern idols as being vacuous publicity seekers but I think the Olympics have shown that many children still aspire to be the Usain Bolts, Mo Farahs or Jessica Ennises of this world (or, in my own son’s case, the next Andy Murray). Outside of that, I think there are still individuals who inspire the best in young people – it’s just that the frontiers that are being pushed are somewhat closer to home.

Of course this still didn’t stop some halfwit on the BBC commenting on the tired old Apollo landing conspiracy theorists. I thought they had rather disappeared back into the woodwork now that modern telescopes had been able to show the landing sites in quite some detail. However, there are still a few people who insist it never happened. A few years ago Buzz Aldrin actually punched someone in the face for hectoring him about this. Maybe, it’s not the most politically correct thing to do but I’m sure we have all wanted to deck a wanton idiot at times.