I have a ‘Special’ edition of ‘Time’ magazine published I believe in 1969, at least that is the date of the copyright caption printed at the bottom of the inside front cover. There is no date actually on the front cover. This special edition was devoted entirely to the Apollo 11 Moon landing with photographic backgrounds of the Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins plus a brief history of manned space flight.
I have assumed that NASA provided all the Apollo photos along with appropriate captions to ‘Time’ magazine. I have also assumed that the magazine had been proof-read in detail and checked by NASA. The point I am making is that the very first photo, which was spread over pages 1 (inside front cover) and 2 was that well publicised photo of an astronaut’s boot and its boot print in the moon dust. According to the caption the photo was taken by Neil Armstrong but NASA’s website attribute the photo to Buzz Aldrin!
This must have been one of the first magazines to be allowed to publish this historic event. Considering the professionalism of ‘Time’ magazine and that they must have worked closely with NASA how could such a huge error be made?

Jack

The inconsistency exists entirely in your assumptions. You assume that Life worked closely with NASA in preparing its report. Then when that premise comes up against the data, you question the data. The appropriate course of action here is to question the premise. It is abundantly clear who actually took the photo, and NASA has never wavered in the attribution. Therefore the notion that Life "must" have worked closely with NASA doesn't appear supportable.

If, on the other hand, you had some objective evidence of that collaboration, then there might be something there. But a premise founded not on evidence but instead on presumption, or some notion of it being "common sense" or "the natural thing to do", is not a strong premise.

The most parsimonious and plausible explanation for your inconsistency is that Life simply made a mistake.

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Clavius Moon Base

A very eloquent reply and is exactly what I expected. On the other hand NASA could have made the mistake! They have been pointed out before.

Your "Subject" line says "Life" magazine, your post says "Time" magazine. Which is it?

I would suspect "Life" since "Time" typically didn't have foldouts, plus per the description I recall that edition of "Life".

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Oh I think NASA knows who's foot it is. They are after all the ones who told Buzz to take the shot. LIFE on the other hand probably assumed it was Neil because everybody 'knows' he's the star and Buzz was just leaning on the LM, having a smoke while Neil did all the exploring. Just like everybody 'knows' John Glen was the first American in space.

How's that for ineloquent?

EDIT Oh and see this thread.

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Hmmm...

Would that be evidence that it's easy to mix up a name now and then?

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It could be NASA's mistake, but it's more likely to be Life's. Why? Simply because that's where the disconnect occurred.

We have to consider that NASA is composed of many people operating in many capacities. If a P.R. guy from NASA makes an honest mistake and says that's Armstrong's photo, we can cut him some slack. That's especially true when the material is relatively new. That's not the same class of error as saying NASA's photo analysts and mission planners made the mistake.

Most arguments of the form, "How could they have made such a mistake? There must be something afoot," have the straightforward rebuttal: they made a mistake; it happens; get over it.

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"Facts are stubborn things." --John Adams
Clavius Moon Base

Quite frankly I don't see what the big fuss is. NASA had lots of things to worry about in terms of getting both the astronauts and their scientific cargo home safely. After the return, there were lots of important details that had to be attended to so that scientific data was not lost. Personally, I really hope that whose footprint was in the picture was very low on the list of priorities.

Call me crazy, but the NASA guys did some pretty amazing things from Mercury through the moon landings. If the greatest confusion is over the owner of the boot that made the footprint, then I say,

"Well Done Heroes"


but then I am crazy...

I have seen some crazy misprints and typos in magazines and newspapers. My favorite has got to be the one that talked about the shoddy state of American schools. In the article "there" and "their" were mixed up several times.

I mean comeon, that is basic grammer. How could ANY editor miss something that basic. Answer: Large workloads, small bugets, small amounts of time to complete a project before it gets printed.

Just to emphasize your point: "come on" and "grammar." :wink:

I guess there was one item not accounted for in one of your "bugets". How can this happen? They're going to get in there because of their (and Murphy's) determination! :wink:

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To paraphrase a line from my old high school Chemistry teacher:

"Many things fall within the realm of possibility. What we need to consider is where they fall in the realm of probability."

FREDNURK,

Welcome to the board.

Could you tell me what, magazine, issue and page? I have a lot of those old magazines and would like to see that error.

Would NASA proof it or would a PR person supply input and leave it to Life to write/proof/print/distribute it?

Yes it was a big deal, but the time it'd take to proof read an article would have to be charged somewhere and while I don't know their budget control, I doubt NASA would have an "edit somebody else's for-profit news publication" line item.

It had already gone through the publication's editors once and even if NASA did proof it, it'd still go back through them and then likely to the typesetters so mistakes could still get introduced.

You know that if NASA did proof read this article, the HBs would be complaining that NASA was altering the facts.

Considering the number of publications worldwide that published Apollo-related articles in July and August 1969, I don't believe that NASA would have been actively involved in proofreading the Life article.

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"Facts are stubborn things." --John Adams
Clavius Moon Base

And why should they? They handed out press kits, gave interviews and handed out the photos. AFAIK, the LIFE-deal was with the astronauts, not with NASA. I'd say it would be very unusual if an article is proofread by the organization the article is about. A report about something that is partially classified or an interview has usually to be cleared, but that's not proofreading in the main sense.
There often seems to be the impression that everything that is published by or with or about NASA is 100% correct. People are working there. People make mistakes.

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"Flying in space is risky business, but just staying on this planet is risky business too." - John Young, astronaut

Having lived near the Johnson Space Center for 16 years now, I have seen the press consistently screw up. After reading a news article about something I worked on or someone I know, it is quite obvious that the reporter, as I use that term very loosely, didn’t do any research. Sometimes the story is so poorly researched that, I say to myself and others, that’s not the project I worked on, because everything is wrong.