Neil Armstrong

American astronaut and lunar explorer (1930–2012)

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Momentum9.1
Global rank#89
United States rank#27
Academics rank#11
Wikipedia218.3K

Lived 1930–2012, aged 82United States

United States AcademicsAcademic

Wikipedia
175 languages
Cross-language footprint
Global rank
#89
Fame.am leaderboard
Era
1930–2012
Aged 82
Known for
Apollo 13
1995

Summary

Updated 2026-08-31

The first human to set foot on the Moon, commander of Apollo 11 in 1969. His step and twelve words were broadcast live to half a billion people — the moment the Space Race became history.

Biography

About

Armstrong grew up near Wapakoneta, Ohio, studied aeronautical engineering at Purdue on a Navy scholarship, and flew combat missions in Korea from the USS Essex. After the war he became a test pilot at Edwards Air Force Base, flying the X-15 seven times and Century Series fighters. Selected by NASA in 1962, he commanded Gemini 8 in 1966 and performed the first spacecraft docking before a thruster malfunction forced an abort. On July 20, 1969, he and Buzz Aldrin landed on the Moon; the next day they spent two and a half hours outside the lunar module while Michael Collins orbited above. Armstron…

Voice

In their own words

Sourced, dated quotes from Neil Armstrong

Neil Armstrong

saidAug 2007

The exciting part for me, as a pilot, was the landing on the moon. That was the time that we had achieved the national goal of putting Americans on the moon.

— Interview at The New Space Race (August 2007)

Neil Armstrong

said11 Jul 1999

I am comfortable with my level of public discourse.

— Declining to be interviewed for a magazine article, quoted in "Armstrong's Code" by Kathy Sawyer in Washington Post Magazine (11 July 1999)

Neil Armstrong

said1975

I remember on the trip home on Apollo 11 it suddenly struck me that that tiny pea, pretty and blue, was the Earth.

— As quoted in The People's Almanac (1975) by David Wallechinsky and Irving Wallace, p. 675

Neil Armstrong

said1971

Through books you will meet poets and novelists whose creations will fire your imagination.

— Letter to the children of Troy, Michigan on the opening of its Public Library (1971), in Why Libraries Matter: Letters to the Children of

Neil Armstrong

said1970

I'm quite certain that we'll have such [lunar] bases in our lifetime, somewhat like the Antarctic stations and similar scientific outposts, continually manned.

— BBC interview (1970)

via Wikiquote · CC BY-SA

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