Front pages tell a tale of more than the moon

By Eric Newton
Newseum


July 20, 1969 -- Apollo 11 lands in the Sea of Tranquility. Earthlings walk on the moon for the first time.

Does news get any bigger than this?

Editors across the Free World put the story on Page One. This story has it all: hard science, human drama, Cold War politics and the poetry of the heavens.

For many editors, the question becomes, "How big can we make the headline?"

The president of the United States calls this "the greatest week in the history of the world since the creation."

Yet a big piece of the world – Asia’s hard communist core of China, North Korea and North Vietnam – ignores the story.

That’s hard to imagine in these CNN-drenched days of live, around-the-clock coverage. But it really happened.

This summer the Newseum takes a look back at a great collection of front pages covering one of the most important stories of the century, the moon landing.

They tell us not just of a trip to the moon but something of those who told the tale.

Here are a few of my favorites:

For God and Country: The Courier-Post of Camden, New Jersey, runs the banner "WE SHINE ON THE MOON" and sub-heads "Americans Feel New Togetherness … Doomsayers Wrong … Moon Walk Just A Breeze." President John F. Kennedy, who pushed the U.S. would win the Space Race, would have been proud.

The Local Angle: The Wapakoneta Daily News of Ohio, the hometown newspaper of Apollo 11 commander Neil Armstrong, points out that humanity didn’t make history here. Their neighbor did. As the Page One banner puts it:

"NEIL STEPS ON THE MOON."

An Evil Empire?: China, practices flagrant censorship. Renmin Ribao of Beijing – along with virtually all other newspapers in communist China – fails to mention on its front page the first landing of humans on the moon. The government of the world’s most populous country does not want it to know about the moonwalk -- an event that 500 million people are watching live on TV.

Quote of the Century: The Brazilian newspaper O Estado de Sao Paulo prints Armstrong’s famous quote – "One small step for man … one giant leap for mankind" on the front page in nine languages.

U.S.-less: The communist editors of L’Humanite, of France call the moonwalk a "dream from the depths of time realized" but manage to keep the words "United States" off its front page.

A Big Idea: The Eugene Register-Guard of Oregon and Managing Editor William L.K. Wasmann call the landing "a triumph made possible by men of vision in every race and time." His front-page editorial continues: "If Sunday’s Moonwalk shows enough men the nobility man is capable of, then we may have hope for mankind yet."

Truth in TV: The Christian Science Monitor of Boston, Massachusetts, notes that to the world, "it seemed almost as astounding to them that a quarter-of-a-million miles away they could see what was happening as it was actually happening."

Assorted Prose: The Champaign-Urbana Courier of Illinois prints everything The Associated Press writes, including … astronauts plodded "heavily like tired old cops on a beat in Staten Island … ghostlike … loading rock boxes like the last pirates off an island with a load of gold" onto their landing craft, "a surrealistic crab."

Most Obvious Pun: The The Winnipeg Tribune Canada, the New York Post, the New York Daily News and dozens of other newspapers decide July 21, 1969 is not Monday but "Moonday."

Love Us or Leave Us: Says a headline in The Abilene Reporter-News of Texas about those who oppose spending billions on space when war, poverty, crime and urban unrest haunt America: "Dissenters Outnumbered."

Spin Control: Pravda of Moscow, the Soviet Union, manages to keep the moonwalk story at the bottom of the page while the top headline says, "Collectivism is the Feature of the New World People," whatever that means.

Now that’s graphic: Kronen Zeitung of Vienna, Austria, offers a guided tour of American space "armour," featuring even the most frequently asked spacesuit question: How do the astronauts "go to the bathroom"? Answer: In an internal pouch that empties through a valve (marked in the infographic by the newspaper’s artists as number nine).

Greatest Risk Award: The Evening Standard of London, prints an elaborate color moonwalk illustration on Sunday (before the moonwalk). The Standard goes on sale Monday (after the moonwalk) – and sales double to 1.2 million. "We bet on the Americans," says production director Dennis Griffiths. But what if the moonwalk hadn’t happened? "We don’t like to think about that."

Simulated Photo: Aktuelt of Denmark uses a clear, crisp and totally staged NASA simulation photo to demonstrate the moon landing without saying the photo is fake.

Early Y2K: On July 21, 1969, Diario de Noticias of Lisbon, Portugal, declares: "The 21^st Century starts today."

Weird Science: Gimbels celebrates the moment in an ad that says "we broke Newton’s law and the world saw with awe." What law was that, exactly?

Poetry In News: The New York Times prints "Voyage to the Moon" by poet Archibald MacLeish, who writes:

The special moon edition vanishes from newsracks, even with a press run increased by 75,000. Entrepreneurs sell the 10-cent newspaper for $1.

Tradition: The Wall Street Journal sticks to its guns and refusing to print a photograph of the moon landing, not even a week later.

The Penultimate Paragraph: Special recognition is due The Los Angeles Times for not doing anything to make this list.

News Judgment, 101: The Boston Globe forces itself to place the moon landing atop Page One, even though Massachusetts Sen. Edward M. Kennedy is charged on July 20 with leaving the scene of an accident for driving his car into a Chappaquiddick pond and killing 28-year-old Mary Jo Kopechne.

For a day, at least, heavenly conquest defeats earthly scandal.