The book is a photo book cum journal of the events that transpired from the inception of the plans to go to the moon to the planned space race between America and Russia (Bizony, 2009) to the actual landing on the moon. With then "President John F. Kennedy's pledge to land a man on the moon "before the decade is out" [this promise] was fulfilled when Apollo 11's lunar module Eagle landed" (Bizony, 2009) on the moon.
What further sealed the desire to build is President Kennedy's question to Vice President Lyndon Johnson: "Do we have a chance of beating the Soviets by putting a laboratory in space, or by a trip around the moon, or by a rocket to land on the moon? Is there any other space program which promises dramatic results in which we could win?" (Bizony, 2009). Without these words, the Apollo 11's landing on the moon in July 1969 would not have been possible. Thus, the will not be a historical event to commemorate.
The photos in the book appeared mostly blurry which could be attributed to the fact that those who took the pictures were not professional photographers, but real astronauts whose main goal was to document the event and take pictures of various lunar objects and the space. Nevertheless, these imperfect shots are what make the photos more real as if "communicating" more information than what books actually contain.
The other half of the book contains a series of essays about the mission, more detailed information about the space race that was the reason why America pushed for the lunar landing, and plans of going back to the moon. The question that reverberates is whether it is possible to go back to the moon. Although the look of the spacecraft Apollo11 is not anywhere compared with modern spaceships, during the time it was built, it was already considered revolutionary and ahead of its time.
One striking comparison that Bizony made was how rockets and cathedrals were alike (20) in the sense that both pushed the limits of technological advancement during the time these were initiated. In addition, long after they were introduced to humanity, both rockets and cathedrals still receive the same adulation they received in the past.
Going through each page of the book is a reminder to the reader that the effort of building such spacecrafts is very much a human endeavor and that people have always been fascinated with the universe and outer space. This curiosity of the unknown is what keeps man building and innovating. And regardless of when it all began, the insatiable thirst for discovering has always been present.
Works Cited
Bizony, Piers. One Giant Leap: Apollo 11 Remembered. Minneapolis: Zenith Press, 2009. Print.
