About this design
This t-shirt admires the incredible adventure set-out & achieved by the Americans in the 1960's. The Apollo Program was such a great accomplishment, it was an amazing effort with so much achieved in such a short time.
In 1957 the Soviets launched Sputnik, and began the space race with the Americans, who, with various rocket failures and missed opportunities, was losing out. They were second at almost everything - 2nd to launch an object into orbit, 2nd to launch a man into space, 2nd to perform an EVA (spacewalk) etc. etc. Something needed to be done and fast. President Kennedy wanted to know what they could do, and do it first, before the Soviets. They needed something bold that would let the world know they were technologically on par, or better still, ahead of the Soviets. Kennedy's advisors suggested focusing their efforts to landing a man on the moon, So that is what he decided to work towards... you can't get much bolder than that!
I'm not sure if Kennedy ever realised the enormity of his request he gave to his country, "to land a man on the moon and return him safely to the Earth" (within 10 years!). It happened though, and the immense effort put into achieving that goal was unbelievable. 400,000 people, new technologies designed and training by the astronauts that would make most science fiction stories seem boring.
This particular design focuses on the amazing fact that less than 100 years before they landed on the moon, aircraft hadn't even been invented, even cars were a novelty and the thought of landing men on the moon was absolutely ludicrous. I have used a quote from one of my favourite astronauts, Charlie Duke (of Apollo 16) said that his father "was born shortly after the Wright Brothers" and he went on to say that his father could hardly believe what his son was doing and never really got his head around it. Wear this t-shirt to admire how far we have come in such a short time...