Veteran newsman Walter Cronkite, whose steady voice and calm presentation of facts took America through the assassination of a president and the first footsteps on the moon, has died at the age of 92, according to the New York Times.
From his tears at the tragic death of young President John F. Kennedy, who challenged America to go to the moon, to his tense but exuberant "oh boy" when Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin made history during Apollo 11 on July 20, 1969, "Uncle Walter" was a part of most American families. His coverage of key decades and events, including the Vietnam War, earned him not only multiple awards, but the respect and fondness of generations.
In 2006, NASA honored Cronkite with an Ambassador of Space Exploration award. He's the only person not a NASA astronaut or employee to receive the award. Cronkite was live on the air for 37 of the 40 hours of the Apollo 11 lunar landing. NASA noted:
From the beginning of America's manned space program to the age of the Space Shuttle, Cronkite anchored CBS Evening News. Already a veteran journalist before coming to network news, Cronkite anchored the launch of Apollo 11, shouting "go, baby, go" as it rocketed into space. His marathon, live coverage of the first moon landing brought the excitement and impact of the historic event into the homes of millions of Americans and observers around the world, spending 27 of the next 30 hours on the air.
In a 1996 interview with Kira Albin, Cronkite opined that "the whole period of the '60s changed a lot of us; there was never a decade like that in American history ... to have the decade capture one of the great accomplishments of this century: man landing on the moon. That will be the one event of the 20th century, despite all the other great scientific and technological innovations and inventions that came down the line, that will live in history 500 years from now ...
Shown above: Cronkite experimenting with what it would be like to walk on the moon. This 1968 NASA photo shows Cronkite trying out the Reduced Gravity Walking Simulator . The simulator was a series of cable-supported slings hanging from the Lunar Landing Research Facility designed to approximate lunar locomotion. Astronauts also used the device to practice.
Godspeed, Uncle Walter. You're forever a part of space exploration--and we'll miss you.
Here's Cronkite at work as Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin headed to touchdown on the moon in their Eagle spacecraft.
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