July 20th

On this day - July 20th 1969 - Apollo 11 lands on the moon 

Apollo 11 was the first manned spacecraft to land on the moon. The flight had started in Florida on July 16th and was the 5th manned mission from NASA. Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong were  the two first people to land on the moon, although the moon-walk wasn't done until 6 hours later, and therefore the next day. Aldrin and Armstrong stayed for 21 and a half hour on the lunar surface. They collected 21.5 kg of moon-material and brought it back to earth for research.

April 16th

On this day - 16 April 1972 - Apollo 16 launched

On April 16th 1972 Apollo 16 launched from Kennedy Space Center. Apollo 16 was the tenth manned mission in the Apollo space program and the fifth to land on the moon. The mission was crewed by commander John W. Young, commander Thomas K. Mattingly II and pilot Charles M. Duke, Jr. Mattingly was supposed to join the Apollo 13 launch, but he contracted measles and was replaced three days before the launch. Young and Duke spent 71 hours on the moon. The mission returned with almost a 100 kg of lunar samples. Apollo 16 returned to earth on April 27th spending a total of 11 days and almost two hours in space. 

February 5th

On this day - February 5th 1971 - The Apollo 14 mission landed on the moon 

Commander Alan Shepard, commander Module Pilot Stuart Roosa, and  Lunar Module Pilot Edgar Mitchell launched on their nine-day mission on January 31, 1971. When they landed on the moon it was the third moon landing. The Apollo mission series placed man on the moon six times and Apollo 17 is the last time there have been people on the Moon. Shepard and Mitchell made their decent in the original target for Apollo 13 who aborted its mission. The lessons learned by Apollo 13 caused Apollo 14 to be changed to not repeat the accident.  During their mission they collected 42.80 Kg of Moon rocks. Shepard even made time for hitting two golf balls with a makeshift club. Mitchell and Shepard spent 33.5 hours on the Moon. Commander Roosa never sat foot on the Moon, he stayed behind doing experiments and took photos.  When the mission returned to Earth they landed in the Pacific Ocean on February 9th.

Alan Shepard next to the American Flagg 

December 11th

On this day – 11^th December 1972 – The last Apollo mission landed on the moon

Apollo 17 left earth on December 7^th and landed on the moon for a three day stay on the 11^th December 1972. This was the last of the Apollo missions and also the last manned moon expedition. It was also the longest moon stay for any of the Apollo missions. No human being have been to the moon, or to the low earth orbit, ever since. Apollo 11 was the first to land on the moon in 1969, thereafter followed Apollo 12 (1969), Apollo 14 (1971), Apollo 15 (1971) and Apollo 16 (1972). A total of 24 U.S astronauts have been to the moon, and 12 of those have walked on it.

The Apollo 17 expedition crew consisted of three members, Cernan, Evans and Schmitt, who returned safely to the earth on December 19^th. Evans conducted a 1 hour and 7 minutes spacewalk on their return trip, but the return went without any significant happenings. On December 7th, took the crew the famous "Blue Marble" picture of the earth (see below). The crew landed in the Pacific Ocean, only 6.4 km (4.0 miles) from the rescue boat, and a helicopter picked them up shortly after. And with that, the history of the US moon-missions came to its end. 

The "Blue marble" picture from the mission

November 14

On this day – 14^th November 1969 – Apollo 12 was launched

Apollo 12 was the second manned spacecraft to land upon the moon. Its crew consisted of six members and the spacecraft was launched 4 months after the first moon landing. Apollo 12was the first to bring a colour television camera to the moon, but transmission was lost after one of the crew members ruined the camera by pointing it towards the sun. The commanders Conrad’s first words when landing was “Whoopie! Man, that may have been a small one for Neil, but that’s a long one for me”, so that he could win a bet with a reporter. The mission lasted until November 24^th when they successfully returned to earth.