Back In The Day

Back In The Day

Sunday July 20, 1969,  a warm summers evening, I was working the night shift in the pressroom at the 43rd street printing plant at The New York Times.

As scheduled, the presses started rolling around 9:30 P.M. The first two men to land on the Moon were getting ready to take their historic "walk".  As you can see in the picture, the Headline reads, Men Land On Moon.  Note in the upper right you can see "City Edition"  That's the "Early" edition.

When they were getting for the walk, the order to "Stop The Presses" came and all 12 presses came to a halt.

That was only about an hour into the city edition run.  Our "lunch" was scheduled for 11:30 P.M. and so I had about 90 minutes instead of the usual 30 minutes.  I decided to take a little walk and get some fresh air.  Outside around Times Square, it's always busy with people, and someone told me that over at Rockefeller Center they had a giant screen set up to watch the first steps of men walking on the Moon.

So I went over and saw the event.  Now remember, back then we didn't have cell phones, text messaging etc., so the newspaper was king.

Back to the press room, Neil Armstrong had taken his historic, That's One Small Step For Man", "One Giant Leap for Mankind"

Now the Headline read, "Man Walks On Moon".

Stop the presses again, Buzz Aldrin also walks on the surface of the Moon.

So now the Headline reads, "Men Walk On Moon", note that in the upper right you will see "Late City Edition"

So, I saved all three page one for that July 21, 1969 edition and made a photograph of it here.  click here.

Below is low resolution for display only.