Portrait Of An Astronaut

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 31987, 14 May 1969, Page 11

Portrait Of An Astronaut

(IV.Z.P.A.-Beuter—Ccpgright) HOUSTON (Texas) Neil Armstrong does not seem to be impressed by the fact he may well become the first man to set foot on the moon. Armstrong does not think people will remember his name, much less name cities and schools after ■ him. He discounts the possibility of becoming one of the most famous men in history. Armstrong, a civilian test pilot and technician, thinks

the flight of Apollo 11, during which he will attempt a lunar landing, is just a progression from all the other space flights—and that no-one will remember it as anything else. •‘lt isn’t me (that people will remember). Each flight will contribute to this. It is a progression of flights,” he said, in ah interview.

Armstrong, one of the few ' civilian astronauts, shares the ' common trait of his fellow ( astronauts—an almost total ' obsession with his job. He does not read unless it ' is connected with his work. He rarely listens to music. ' His only hobby is piloting a ; glider. Besides his family, flying is all. He learned to fly at the age of 16, and had his private pilot’s licence before a driver’s licence.

He makes frequent trips to the Air Force Museum near Dayton, Ohio, to study flight, to look at the old planes, and to pick up more information.

In public he seems shy and nervous. He keeps his hands together, almost clenched. Sometimes he appears to stutter or seem preoccupied.

He does not resent news conferences but seems to be thinking about other things during them, reporters at the Space Centre say.

Although he is a civilian in command of two Air Force Colonels, he is a stern commander, according to Mr Paul Haney, a public affairs officer. Armstrong was born in Wapakoneta, Ohio, on August 5, 1930, and was brought up there. He attended Purdue University in Indiana, Where he gained a degree in aeronautical engineering.

He did graduate work at the University of Southern California. He is married to his college sweetheart, Janet, and has two sons, aged 11 and six.

Armstrong was a Navy fighter pilot during the Korean War, and was once shot down.

In 1955, he joined the National Aeronautics and Space Agency’s Lewis research centre, and then became a pilot on the X-15 rocket plane which set new speed and altitude records on the fringes of outer space. He said later that when the Mercury space programme began, using missile boosters, he felt it was infringing on the X-15s prerogatives in the exploration of space. “We were already deeply involved in research toward space flight, and the Mercury project was a new bunch of people rapidly set up in a different location,” he said.