First Ever Moon Landing was Imminent - TV Guide adapted

My neighbour has these epic garage sales every few months. This morning: Bag of leather; 1883 Singer sewing machine; Two footballs; Cheap pocket watches; Old pennies; a medal; Tools etc… cheap entertainment.

The loot included a TV guide from July 1969… not rare and better copies are available, but this was easy pickings.

Enjoy the photos. Someone will want to see the cheap watches. The gold plated one keeps time, and feels cheap. Nice engraving though. The pennies are not worth well…a pretty penny. The old sewing machine was completely seized up. I have it working almost perfectly.

#39 brings back some memories. I used to read these Hitchcock books all the time when I was younger. I remember one called “More stories not for the nervous”...😀

Here is the order form. You can use your CHARGEX account.

You have to be well over 60 now to remember living the leadup to the moon landing during the 60's, there was real interest from the public in the progress NASA made with the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo programs to land men on the moon. Lots of controversy, too, because of the cost, the Vietnam war and political issues of the day in the US. But you could always count on Walter Cronkite and Huntley-Brinkley being there to lead the coverage, on our fuzzy B&W televisions.

Love seeing this!

I'm afraid I can well remember most of the space race. I was 12 in summer of '69 and had always enjoyed following space stuff. Perhaps my parents encouraged it.

Yeah Evitzee, we didn't get a color TV until 1971. Mg grandparents and an old maid great aunt had color TVs years before we did at my house.

My dad was in Vietnam, I turned 12 in August. My mom said "we're getting a color TV for the moon landing" and there was no going back. First time we saw The Wizard of Oz, holy crap!

Cronkite wrote in that TV guide about what unusual words his twelve year old son knew. Cronkite had a son the same age as us. Never knew that. Wonder what he's doing now. I could search the internet, but in the spirit of 1969, I'll just keep wondering and hope to meet someone at a party one day who says, "hey, random fact, did you know Cronkite had a son and he is.... "

Book em Danno!

Wow! What a time capsule! Watched the landing on TV at swim practice as I recall!

What the show did not go back 100 years. Still things come close.

The disney brothers were part of Farnsworth's TV startup in the 1920s. It is said the first TV transmission was Micky Mouse between San Francisco and Redwood city. Why Mickey has some interesting attributes in copyright history.

The first disney TV shows were advertising promos for Peter pan and Alice done for NBC. D and Sarnoff did not really get along since Sarnoff stole the tech from Farnsworth (and indirectly from Disney.) Disney help start ABC in 1954 to fund the park. By 1960 they swiched to NBC for the color stuff. I think Sarnoff was dead by then. The brothers complained ABC was stuffing too many adverts in the programs they were making for ABC. Ironically they also made a lot of the animated ads in the 1950s. Which were parodied in the films. Notably 101 dalmations. Critics would complain that future generations would not get the jokes.

"Disneyland" (actually the Wonderful world of color.) Had no ads from other companies. The adverts were all promotions of disney films or related media. Eventually Disney and ABC merged back together. I have the laserdisks of the 1950s NBC specials (with advertisments.) The sponsor was CocaCola. They were puff pieces. I notice Disney+ only has a few episodes. A lot of the material in the old clip shows featured stuff from Song of the South.

I still have the Laserdisk of that. These were for the Japaneese market, but widley available. Disney laserdisks sold for 100 bucks each. I still have them. Big boxed sets with lots of liner notes. Now basically worthless. Sometime I should see if the player still works. I leave it plugged in on standby. I know people at the Makerspace 3D print some of the gears and things to keep such devices alive. Might have to source a new timing belt as these are often the first thing to go.


We got a Color TV around 1967 or so. My dad was going to a high school re union. I think we got to Reno and he said he would rather have a Color TV. Disney was one of the few programs in color. PBS was the last network to go color.

CBS was actually the first, with something called CBS color. This used mechanical spinning disk filters. I saw a demo. The screen was about 3 inches. Sarnoff came up with NTSC and changed the standard.

There was also a short lived series in the 1970s called "The mouse factory." This showed parts of Vicory through air power. They also showed some of the recently rediscovered shorts from the 1920s. D+ did put some Oswald up (which have proto mickeys.) They were able to claw back some of this before the universal copyrights expired. Last I checked the "Man in space episodes were on D+." The colors on this look off as B&W sets and production used weird colors what would have high contrast. These were also released on DVD.

My cousin got married on July 20th 1969. So we were all gathered around a small B&W TV for the moon landing. I said if we were at home it should be in color. I think the later missions were. If you have not seen the film titled "The Dish" it is quite a treat especially for people who like things from down under. It comically tells the story how the transmission came about. Sheep and all.

What I do remember was since there was a delay after landing before the exit. The room was crowded. I went outside my grandparents house. The moon was half full and setting in the west. An image I will never forget

I remember Bonanza on Sunday night was one of the early color shows. There weren't a lot for the first few years, it was pretty rare.

@Dogart1983 and @sheepdoll aka Sheep Dog made me post this watch…

A Sunday rabbit hole. Maybe @TLIGuy or @SpeedyPhill have more info or thoughts on this?
Only Aldrin wore his Speedmaster on the Apollo 11 Moonwalk. Neil left his in the LEM as a back up and since they had a broken timer already…Aldrin wore the watch on his right wrist (Omega got that wrong in their early adverts as @Speedyphil) likes to point out. Armstrong wore the camera. The magazine illustration made before the landing is spookily accurate with only one watch and the watch correctly on the right wrist… but worn by the mission commander based on the camera and not Aldrin. How can all this have been predicted?
Well the everything was rehearsed and tested so many times, that was a key reason for the successes … and the huge costs. Photo credit NASA and https://www.tumblr.com/moonwatchuniverse @SpeedyPhill . The first training picture below is a dead ringer for the illustration (and also no watch worn). The third captures the pose for the other astronaut with the sample collector. Does that cast doubt on the Armstrong story from the landing? Well not really. There are plenty of photos showing Aldrin with a watch on his right wrist in training… but the same for Armstrong. The camera also swaps between them a few times. For sure the final mission was set for a watch to be worn on the right wrist and one assumes also that the commander would operate the camera. Aldrin I think had the better experience and reputation for working in low gravity, so it is interesting to think how work tasks and the famous first steps were allocated, every step was planned for sure.
Who drew the amazing illustration (thanks @Duracuir1 for the credits page picture) it looks like this guy, Norman Adams = https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Adams_(American_artist) I wonder how he got that gig and how many pictures he made. Perhaps the family have a nice set of NASA training photos in the loft and some amazing original artworks (or perhaps they are on display somewhere?)
There is also a famous UK artist called Norman Adams just to confuse things a bit more ;0)
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