There are few days in a person’s life where they know exactly where they were and what they were doing on a day 50 years earlier. Today is one such day for me, though my memory of that day is very limited. I was in Cape Canaveral, Florida to watch Apollo 11 launch itself into history. Most of my memory is being told stories about that day.

We had gotten tickets to sit in the grandstands at the launch. I have no idea how we got the tickets, but I’ve seen the ticket stubs so I know it happened. My mom woke us up quite early to get there and my dad was none too pleased about it at the time. I’m glad she persisted so we could be there to witness history when the rocket took flight at 8:32am.

If your memory of Apollo 11 is vague, an excellent documentary by the name of Apollo 11 was recently released. None of documentary is re-creation, it uses original film and audio from 1969. If you can overlook the fashion of the day, you might think it was just recorded. It really gives you a great look at every aspect of the mission from preparation to launch to stepping onto to the moon to landing.

Given the 50th anniversary of the launch today, you’ll likely be hearing a lot about this historic event. Another big anniversary will be on July 20 as that is when Neil Armstrong took his small step onto the moon surface. I’m enjoying all the looks back at the initial trip to the moon as it helps me understand what I saw those many years ago. I just remember it better now!

Photo by History in HD