Neil Alden Armstrong
On July 20, 1969, Neil Armstrong stepped onto the lunar surface, becoming the first person to walk on the Moon. He said, ‘That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind. The Apollo 11 mission achieved President Kennedy’s goal and proved US victory in the Space Race. He also flew Gemini 8 in 1966, performing the first docking of two spacecraft, and later taught aerospace engineering at the University of Cincinnati.
Neil Armstrong by the numbers — life, work, and family.
The relatives of Neil Armstrong — parents, partners, children, and siblings.
Neil Armstrong — early life, career, personal life, and legacy.
August 5, 1930, marked the birth of Neil Armstrong in Wapakoneta, Ohio, to Viola Louise Engel and Stephen Koenig Armstrong. His father worked as an auditor for the Ohio state government, leading the family to move frequently. Armstrong’s fascination with flight began early—he built model airplanes and took his first airplane ride at age six. He earned his pilot’s license at 16, before ever getting a driver’s license.
During the Korean War, Armstrong served as a naval aviator flying the Grumman F9F Panther from the USS Essex. In September 1951, an anti-aircraft cable damaged his aircraft, forcing him to bail out. After the war, he became a test pilot at the NACA High-Speed Flight Station, flying the North American X-15 seven times. In 1962, he joined NASA’s second astronaut group. His first spaceflight was Gemini 8 in March 1966. He performed the first docking of two spacecraft with pilot David Scott, but a stuck thruster forced an abort. His second and final spaceflight was Apollo 11 in July 1969. He and Buzz Aldrin landed on the Moon while Michael Collins orbited above. Armstrong’s first step onto the lunar surface was broadcast live to an estimated 530 million viewers.
Armstrong married Janet Shearon on January 28, 1956; they had three children: Rick, Karen, and Mark. Karen died of a brain tumor in 1961. The couple divorced in 1994. That same year, he married Carol Held Knight, who remained his wife until his death in 2012. Retiring from NASA in 1971, he taught aerospace engineering at the University of Cincinnati until 1979. He also served on the Apollo 13 accident investigation and the Rogers Commission for the Challenger disaster. In 1979, he severed his ring finger in a tractor accident and had it reattached.
Neil Armstrong’s first step on the Moon on July 20, 1969, stands as one of humanity’s greatest achievements. He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Richard Nixon in 1969, the Congressional Space Medal of Honor from President Jimmy Carter in 1978, and the Congressional Gold Medal in 2009 alongside his Apollo 11 crewmates. A crater on the Moon is named after him, and his words are etched in history. Armstrong’s humility and dedication to exploration have inspired scientists and astronauts since his first steps. He is remembered for that first step on July 20, 1969.
Browse the complete filmography of Neil Armstrong — every film, TV show, and documentary credit, ranked by popularity.
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Neil Armstrong's bibliography — every authored, edited, and co-written book, ranked by edition count.
Every award, honor, and recognition received by Neil Armstrong — Grammys, hall-of-fame inductions, civic honors, lifetime achievements.
A wall of memorable lines from Neil Armstrong — lyrics, interviews, and off-the-cuff remarks captured over a lifetime.
It Suddenly Struck Me That That Tiny Pea, Pretty and Blue, Was the Earth. I Put up My Thumb and Shut One Eye, and My Thumb Blotted Out the Planet Earth. I Didn’t Feel Like a Giant. I Felt Very, Very Small.
Yeah, I Wasn’t Chosen to Be First. I Was Just Chosen to Command That Flight. Circumstance Put Me in That Particular Role. That Wasn’t Planned by Anyone.
The Important Achievement of Apollo Was Demonstrating That Humanity Is Not Forever Chained to This Planet and Our Visions Go Rather Further Than That and Our Opportunities Are Unlimited.
In My Mind, the Important Thing Was That We Got Four Aluminum Legs Safely Down on the Surface of the Moon While We Were Still Inside the Craft. to Me, There Wasn’t a Lot of Difference Between Having Ten Feet of Leg Between the Bottom of the Spacecraft in Which We Were Standing and the Surface of the Moon, and Having One Inch of Neoprene Rubber or Plastic on the Bottom of Our Boots Touching the Lunar Surface.
I Am, and Ever Will Be, a White Socks, Pocket Protector, Nerdy Engineer, Born Under the Second Law of Thermodynamics, Steeped in Steam Tables, in Love with Free Body Diagrams, Transformed by Laplace and Propelled by Compressible Flow.
Little-known facts about Neil Armstrong — origins, oddities, and behind-the-scenes details from a public life.
A plaque was planted on the lunar surface by Armstrong and Aldrin on July 20, 1969, bearing the message: Here men from the planet Earth first set foot upon the Moon, July 1969 AD. We came in peace for all mankind.
In 1979, while working on his farm in Lebanon, Ohio, Armstrong jumped off a grain tractor and his wedding ring was caught in the wheel, severing his ring finger. He calmly collected the finger, packed it in ice, and had it reattached by micro surgeons at the Jewish Hospital in Louisville, Kentucky.
NASA realized after Apollo 11 returned that they had no good pictures of the first man on the Moon. Buzz Aldrin later said: As the sequence of lunar operations evolved, Neil had the camera most of the time, and the majority of pictures taken on the Moon that include an astronaut are of me.
A crater on the Moon is named Armstrong after him.
He stopped signing autographs in 1994 after finding that many of his signatures were sold for significant amounts and forgeries circulated. He responded with a form letter stating he had stopped signing.
For the record, it was Neil Armstrong’s left foot that first made contact with the surface of the moon.
On July 20, 1969, at 10:56 pm EDT, he stepped down from the Lunar Excursion Module Eagle and became the first man to set foot on the moon.
Armstrong, Aldrin, and Collins were awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for Television at 7021 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood, California.
Armstrong was a NASA astronaut selected in the second group. He flew jets during the Korean War, flew the X-15 rocket plane, and on Gemini 8 in 1966 performed the first docking of a manned vehicle with an Agena target vehicle.
In 2005, Armstrong became embroiled in a legal dispute with his barber, Marx Sizemore, who allegedly sold his hair clippings for $3,000 without consent. The barber donated the proceeds to a charity of Armstrong’s choice.
He had three children: Rick Armstrong born 1957, Karen Armstrong 1959-1961, and Mark Armstrong born 1963.
On a 1962 episode of I’ve Got a Secret, Armstrong’s parents appeared as contestants, their secret being that their son had just become an astronaut.
He was the son of Viola Louise Engel and Stephen Koenig Armstrong, with German, Scots-Irish, English, Scottish, and Welsh ancestry.
The first man to walk on the Moon also holds the record for the greatest distance between a space mission’s target landing area and its actual landing: Gemini 8 came down near Okinawa instead of the Caribbean, a distance of at least 8,500 miles.
He was an honorary member of the American Society of Cinematographers ASC.
He was a brother of Phi Delta Theta fraternity.
Inducted into the National Aviation Hall of Fame.
Inducted into the United States Astronaut Hall of Fame.
Inducted into the Ohio Veterans Hall of Fame.
He was portrayed by Ryan Gosling in the 2018 film First Man.
Inducted into the International Aerospace Hall of Fame.
Inducted into the International Space Hall of Fame.
He was cremated at Neptune Society in Cincinnati, Ohio, and his widow sprinkled his ashes into the Atlantic Ocean.
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