Apollo 11 35th Anniversary

Tom Sheehan

Houston Track

Greetings on the 35th Anniversary of the Apollo 11 Landing on the Moon.

To Honeysuckle Creek, Tidbinbilla, Parkes and NASCOM veterans, families, friends, dignitaries, space enthusiasts and Australians in general whom so enthusiastically supported mankind’s first visit to an extra-terrestrial body. Thank you.

I’ve enjoyed the last several months of mutual reminiscing, file searching, exchanging of data and general comradeship with Mike Dinn, John Saxon, Hamish Lindsay, Colin Mackellar and others. If it had not been for Mike’s contact with Ed Fendell and Bob Legler, who passed your request on to The Instrumentation Support Team – Old Timers (IST-OT) group, I certainly would not have been involved in this activity. Also, I might not have become aware of Hamish’s book “Tracking Apollo to the Moon” or the movie “The Dish”. And that would have been a great personal loss.

During my career, I made at least four trips to Australia. My April 1971 visit (with others) to Carnarvon, Honeysuckle Creek and Tidbinbilla prior to Apollo 15 was far and away the most memorable. Yes, together we had achieved not one, but three landings and helped bring the Apollo 13 crew home safely. But the “J” missions were going to be something else. There were already two active ALSEP’s on the moon and there would be more active RF links on each of these missions than the network was designed to handle. Your knowledgeable, professional & diplomatic station personnel helped us to plan and then execute the support of these very productive missions.

I hope that you have a wonderful anniversary celebration. I also hope to make a personal visit to Australia in the future and look forward to seeing many of you then.

Again, THANK YOU.

Tom Sheehan

Apollo 11, Houston Track

Stan Lebar

Apollo 11 TV Camera
Leader

[You] who were at Honeysuckle should particularly enjoy celebrating
this unique moment in history where the world stood still and held
their breath as the first human being stepped onto a celestial body
other then earth...

... remembering how that small group at a ground station in Australia
was a key player in bringing the television imagery of the first steps
on the moon and the exploration of a strange and fascinating landscape.
Enjoy the moment! ...

Some thirty-five years ago I was cognizant of the fact that if, for any
reason, there was to be no television regardless if the fault was the
camera or some fault in the transmission of the signal, I would be
called upon to go before the world on television to try to explain the
failure. I was always confident that the camera would survive the
flight to the moon and operate as specified. But since I wasn't in
control of the transmission links, I harbored nightmares about that
unknown.

I've learned since that those who handled that part of the Apollo task
were as dedicated as I was to assure that the signal would be received,
processed and transmitted and received by the television viewing public
throughout the world.

Thank everyone on my behalf for what they accomplished on that fateful
day to make us all proud and also for allowing me to avoid living the
nightmare that I had agonized over during the many years prior to
seeing that very first video signal from the moon in Houston on July
20, 1969.

Sincerely,

Stan Lebar