The moon has always had a special place in human imagination. We first imagined it a god. When we finally started seeing it as a place, we have dreamed of going there. On Monday, we celebrate the 31st anniversary of that greatest of all technological achievements.
Most people think that an American craft first landed on the moon.
The first spacecraft to have that honor was Russian. Its name was Luna 9, not Apollo 11. The Russians had nothing close to the financial support or complex technology that led to America's manned lunar landing three years later. During the previous few years, both the Americans and Russians had solved the daunting navigational problems necessary to get their rockets to the moon. They had flown by and, in the case of America's Ranger spacecraft, even landed on the moon.