Jul 4 1969
From The Space Library
NASA officials ordered technicians to repaint Saturn V 3rd stage (S-IVB ) after they discovered old coating had begun to peel. Thermal paint would help protect super-cold hydrogen fuels from sun's heat. Repainting of stage, scheduled to boost manned Apollo 11 spacecraft toward moon July 16, would not affect launch date. (AP, W Star, 7/5/69, A13)
At U.S. Embassy Independence Day Party in Moscow Apollo 8 Astronaut Frank Borman signed autographs with Cosmonauts Gherman S. Titov, Georgy T. Beregovoy, and Konstantin P. Feoktistov. Among 1,000 persons attending reception given by U.S. Ambassador Jacob D. Beam were Vasily V. Kuznetsov, U.S.S.R. First Deputy Foreign Minister, and Mikhail P. Georgadze, Secretary of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet. They were highest ranking Soviet officials to attend annual July 4 reception since 1964 attendance of Nikita S. Khrushchev as head of government and Communist Party. (Clarity, NYT, 7/5/69, 28; AP, B Sun, 7/5/69, A2)
Dr. Lee A. DuBridge, Presidential Science Adviser, addressed Independence Day celebration at Dearborn, Mich.: "For untold millions of years the human animal was chained to the earth. Sixty years ago he found a way of soaring into its atmosphere. Ten years ago he learned to break the chains of gravity and to soar out into space. This month the first man will set foot on another world. Later this month two spacecraft will reach Mars and send back new information about that Planet. Americans will have no reason to be ashamed of their nation on those days. Is it worth while? Is it worth while to lift the spirits of millions of human beings? If not, what else is worth while?" . Developing lunar landing technology was relatively easy. "The laws of nature which made it possible have been well known for a long time. The engineering skills required . . . were available and were brilliantly organized. Hundreds of thousands of Americans worked together to make this dream come true. They had faith and they had hope. "The problems of our cities and the other social problems which beset us are not all that easy. In this area human beings are not working together but are in conflict. We find that we do not yet know the cause of these troubles nor do we yet have the mechanisms for curing them. Hence we must study, we must experiment, we must try and we will often fail. . . . And we shall learn from our failures. (Text; CR, 7/29/69, E6415-7)
Analysis of lunar surface would provide key to earth's history by indicating whether moon's origin was catastrophic or noncatastrophic, Dr. H. Alfven and Dr. G. Arrhenius of Univ. of California at San Diego said in Science. Radiometric dating of igneous lunar rocks might provide information on time of their solidification. If catastrophic alternative was correct, rocks should date to less than 4.5 eons, minimum age of moon, and predominant age should be approximately 0.7 eon, with major surface and subsurface features less than 0.7 eon. If noncatastrophic alternative proved correct, predominant age of lunar rocks should exceed 4 eons, at least, since it was likely moon predated earth. (Science, 7/4/69, 11-7)
Japanese freighter had been hit by wreckage of Soviet spacecraft, Japanese diplomats reported to five Western delegations on legal subcommittee of U.N. Committee on Outer Space meeting in Geneva. June 5 damage to Dai Chi Chinei while outside territorial waters and near Siberian coast had previously been attributed to unidentified object. It was believed to be first authenticated case of terrestrial damage caused by falling space objects. (Hamilton, NYT, 7/5/69, 28)
“Off To The Moon” article in Life Magazine
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