Apollo's Moon Shot

It began with the Soviet satellite Sputnik beeping over America’s skies in 1957 and entered overdrive with President Kennedy’s challenge in 1961 to reach the moon by the end of the decade. The early days of the Space Race were full of urgency, uncertainty, huge risks, and even bigger rewards. Witness NASA’s first team of astronauts endure a crash course in space travel, presented through rare archival footage, interviews, and objects on display and in the vaults of the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum.

The two-person Gemini missions teach American astronauts to walk in space, but tragedy strikes the first manned Apollo mission when a capsule catches fire, revealing the true cost of space flight.

Three critical Apollo missions in 1968 and 1969 put NASA back on track to land a man on the Moon by the end of the decade.

The historic Apollo 11 mission, as told through rare archival footage, astronaut interviews and artifacts on display at Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum.

The world celebrates the first Moon landing in July 1969, and President Richard Nixon rides the wave of global enthusiasm to achieve foreign policy goals; NASA's brightest minds set their sights on a new target: cutting-edge science.

A look at the final Apollo missions and the impact they had on science and future space explorations.