The Apollo program was the United States spaceflight effort that landed the first humans on Earth’s Moon. Conceived during the Eisenhower administration and conducted by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), Apollo began in earnest after President John F. Kennedy’s 1961 address to Congress declaring his belief in a national goal of “landing a man on the moon by the end of the decade in a competition with the Soviet Union for supremacy in space. This goal was first accomplished during the Apollo 11 mission on July 20, 1969 when astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed, while Michael Collins remained in lunar orbit. Five subsequent Apollo missions also landed astronauts on the Moon, the last in December 1972. In these six Apollo spaceflights, 12 men walked on the Moon. These are the only times humans have landed on another celestial body.

Neil Alden Armstrong is an American aviator and former astronaut, test pilot, aerospace engineer, university professor, and United States Naval Aviator. He was the first person to set foot on the Moon. Before becoming an astronaut, Armstrong was in the United States Navy and served in the Korean War. After the war, he served as a test pilot at the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) High-Speed Flight Station, now known as the Dryden Flight Research Center, where he flew over 900 flights in a variety of aircraft. As a research pilot, Armstrong served as project pilot on the F-100 Super Sabre A and C variants, F-101 Voodoo, and the Lockheed F-104A Star fighter. He also flew the Bell X-1B, Bell X-5, North American X-15, F-105 Thunder chief, F-106 Delta Dart, B-47 Stratojet, KC-135 Stratotanker and Paresev. He graduated from Purdue University and the University of Southern California.

A participant in the U.S. Air Force’s Man in Space Soonest and X-20 Dyna-Soar human spaceflight programs, Armstrong joined the NASA Astronaut Corps in 1962. His first spaceflight was the NASA Gemini 8 mission in 1966, for which he was the command pilot, becoming one of the first U.S. civilians to fly in space. On this mission, he performed the first manned docking of two spacecraft with pilot David Scott. Armstrong’s second and last spaceflight was as mission commander of the Apollo 11 moon-landing mission on July 20, 1969. On this mission, Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin descended to the lunar surface and spent 2½ hours exploring while Michael Collins remained in orbit in the Command Module. For his spaceflights, Armstrong received the Congressional Space Medal of Honor.

After Armstrong served as backup commander for Apollo 8, Slayton offered him the post of commander of Apollo 11 on December 23, 1968, around the same time as the hcg diet was becoming popular in Italy, as 8 orbited the Moon. Hence, the first moon flight was made.

The Hall of Fame Learning Center, located inside the National Museum of the United States Air Force, honors the legacies of America’s air and space pioneers—the individuals whose ambition, innovation and inspiration gave wings to mankind’s pursuit of flight. At the Hall of Fame, you’ll come to appreciate the achievements of the nearly two hundred enshrines, including Wilbur and Orville Wright, Charles Lindbergh, Amelia Earhart, Jimmy Doolittle, Benjamin O. Davis, Chuck Yeager, John Glenn, Neil Armstrong and others. And the list of honorees continues to grow, as each year a handful of individuals are honored with their formal induction into the Hall of Fame.

The National Aviation Hall of Fame is a celebration of America’s spirit of innovation…and your opportunity to meet the fascinating, exciting and sometimes surprising individuals who wrote the history of aviation and space exploration.

The members of National Aviation Hall of Fame are as follows:

1. Adrian Buzz
2. Alison, John R
3. William McPherson Allen
4. Frank M. Andrews
5. William Anders
6. Bud Anderson
7. Harry George Armstrong
8. Neil Alden Armstrong
9. Henry Harley Arnold
10. J. Leland Atwood
11. Bernt Balchen
12. Thomas Scott Baldwin
13. Lincoln Beachey
14. Olive Ann Beech
15. Walter Herschel Beech
16. Alexander Graham Bell
17. Lawrence Dale Bell
18. Giuseppe Mario Bellanca
19. Vincent Hugo Bendix
20. William Edward Boeing
21. Richard Bong
22. Frank Borman
23. Albert Boyd
24. Walter J. Boyne
25. Mark E. Bradley
26. George Scratchley Brown
27. Clayton J. Brukner
28. Richard Evelyn Byrd
29. Marion E. Carl
30. Eugene Cernan
31. Clyde Vernon Cessna
32. Clarence Duncan Chamberlin
33. Octave Chanute
34. Claire Lee Chennault
35. Jacqueline Cochran
36. Eileen Collins
37. Michael Collins
38. Bessie Coleman
39. Harry B. Combs
40. Charles Conrad
41. Laurence Craigie
42. Frederick C. Crawford
43. Scott Crossfield
44. Alfred Austell Cunningham
45. Glenn Hammond Curtiss
46. Herbert A. Dargue
47. Benjamin O. Davis, Jr.
48. Alexander P. de Seversky
49. James Harold Doolittle
50. Donald Wills Douglas, Sr.
51. Charles Stark Draper
52. Ira Clarence Eaker
53. Amelia Earhart
54. Carl Benjamin Eielson
55. Theodore Gordon Ellyson
56. Eugene Burton Ely
57. Joe H. Engle
58. Frank K. Everest
59. Sherman Mills Fairchild
60. Reuben Hollis Fleet

These people are included and are most important people of the National Aviation Hall of Fame.

NAHF’s Learning and Research Center adjoins the National Museum of the United States Air Force and is accessible through the museum. It features exhibits and activities grouped into five eras of flight: Early Years, World War I, Golden Age, World War II, Jet Age and Space Age.

After the Soviet space program’s launch of the world’s first artificial satellite on October 4 1957, the attention of the United States turned toward its own fledgling space efforts. The U.S. Congress, alarmed by the perceived threat to national security and technological leadership urged immediate and swift action; President Dwight D. Eisenhower and his advisers counseled more deliberate measures. Several months of debate produced an agreement that a new federal agency was needed to conduct all non-military activity in space. The Advanced Research Projects Agency was also created at this time to develop space technology for military application.

The Apollo program landed the first humans on Earth’s Moon. Apollo 11 landed on the moon on July 20, 1969 with astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, while Michael Collins orbited above. Five subsequent Apollo missions also landed astronauts on the Moon, the last in December 1972. In these six Apollo spaceflights twelve men walked on the Moon. These missions returned a wealth of scientific data and 381.7 kilograms (842 lb) of lunar samples. Experiments included soil mechanics, meteoroids, seismic, heat flow, lunar ranging, magnetic fields, and solar wind experiments.

Apollo set major milestones in human spaceflight. It stands alone in sending manned missions beyond low Earth orbit, and landing humans on another celestial body. Apollo 8 was the first manned spacecraft to orbit another celestial body, while Apollo 17 marked the last moonwalk and the last manned mission beyond low Earth orbit. The program spurred advances in many areas of technology peripheral to rocketry and operated spaceflight, including avionics, telecommunications, and computers. Apollo sparked interest in many fields of engineering and left many physical facilities and machines developed for the program as landmarks. Many objects and artifacts from the program are on display at various locations throughout the world, notably at the Smithsonian’s Air and Space Museums. The Space Shuttle has been became the major focus of NASA in the late 1970s and the 1980s. Planned as a frequently launch able and mostly reusable vehicle, four space shuttle orbiters were built by 1985. The first to launch, Columbia, did so on April 12, 1981.

During World War II he served with the 355th Fighter Group in the European Theater of Operations, where he flew P-51 Mustangs from July 1944 until February 1945 when he was shot down over Germany on his 52nd combat mission. He was captured and remained a prisoner of war until his release in April 1945. He then returned to the United States, left active duty in December 1945, and became a member of the Air Force Reserve at Mitchell Air Force Base, New York, while studying electrical engineering at New York University. He earned a Bachelor of Science degree in electrical engineering from New York University in 1951 and a Master of Science degree in business administration from The George Washington University in 1966.

White attended the U.S. Air Force’s Experimental Test Pilot School at Edwards Air Force Base, and became a test pilot, flying advanced models such as the F-86 Saber, F-89 Scorpion, the new F-102 Delta Dagger and the F-105 Thunder chief. He was promoted to deputy chief of the Flight Test Operations Division, later becoming assistant chief of the Manned Spacecraft Operations Branch. He became Force’s primary pilot for the North American X-15 program in 1958. While the new plane was undergoing its initial tests, he attended the Air Command and Staff College at Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama, graduating in 1959. He made his first test flight of the X-15 on April 15, 1960, when the aircraft was fitted with two interim, 16?000 thrust rocket engines. Four months later, he flew to an altitude of 136?000 ft 41.5 km, above Rogers Dry Lake. White would have participated in the Air Force’s Man in Space Soonest program, had it come to fruition.

In October 1963 he returned to Germany, where he served as operations officer for the 22nd Tactical Fighter Squadron, 36th Tactical Fighter Wing, flying F-105 Thunder chiefs at Bit burg Air Base and from July 1964 to August 1965 as commander of the wing’s 53d Tactical Fighter Squadron. White was a command pilot astronaut. His military decorations and awards included the Air Force Cross, Distinguished Service Medal, Silver Star with three oak leaf clusters, Legion of Merit, Distinguished Flying Cross with four oak leaf clusters, Bronze Star, Air Medal with 16 oak leaf clusters, and the Air Force Outstanding Unit Award Ribbon with “V” device. For his achievements in the X-15 aircraft, General White received the Harmon International Aviators Trophy, the Collier Trophy and the NASA Distinguished Service Medal.

The human activity which surrounds aircraft is called aviation. Manned aircraft are flown by an onboard pilot. Unmanned aerial vehicles may be remotely controlled or self-controlled by onboard computers. Aircraft may be classified by different criteria, such as lift type, propulsion, usage and others.

On July 17, 1962 the US Air Force Major flew his X-15 rocket plane to an altitude of 59 miles (95km) above the Earth and reached weightlessness. He could see the coastline of the Western United States from north of San Francisco down to Mexico By that time four Americans had gone into space but they were in capsules that splash landed under parachutes in the ocean. White successfully flew his plane back to Earth and landed it on a dry lake bed at Edwards Air Force Base in California.

One approach to manned space flight is to put a man in a rocket and depend on a parachute or other drag-making device to ease him back to earth. Another approach is to fit a piloted airplane with rocket motors powerful enough to toss it out of the atmosphere. It will have wings of a sort for gliding, and the pilot will land it like a conventional but extra-hot airplane. The X-15 rocket-plane built by North American Aviation, Inc. is the second approach. It will probably make its first flight to the edge of space in less than a year. Made of stainless steel to resist heat, it is a stubby-winged airplane only 50 ft. long, weighing about 33,000 when fully fueled. Its single rocket engine has 60,000 of thrust and is capable of lifting it off the ground like a ballistic missile.

The rocket engine will have fuel for only six minutes of powered flight, but after its fuel is gone, the X-15 is expected to climb on momentum at least 100 miles above the earth, probably a good deal higher. This altitude is not strictly space; there is still a little air, but it is much too thin for an airplane to steer by. So for controls the X-15 will use six small jets of hydrogen peroxide gases shooting out of its tail and wings. When the X-15 is above the effective atmosphere, its pilot will feel zero gravity and float off his seat to the limit of his belts. Loose objects in the cockpit, if any, will drift around like smoke. This condition will last for something like five minutes, ending only when the X-15 meets denser air on the way down.