From the archives: Apollo 11 moon landing leaves Walter Cronkite "speechless"

This is the perfect counterpoint to Cronkite delivering the news of JFK's death. That was Cronkite struggling to hold back tears of sadness, representing the nation's grief. Here is Cronkite trying to hold back the joy, representing the nation's happiness, and both times he has to take off his glasses.

54 years later and this still gives me goosebumps like it did that night.

If those Moon landing skeptics want to see what animation and special effects were capable of in 1969, well, there it is.

I do so miss those old news anchors. True professionals.

Neil sent me a Letter when I became an Eagle Scout. Still have it. Showed it to him when I went to the 25th Anniversary. Had the rest of the crew sign it.

I love how the decent talk was so casual. “That’s a slow speed for space flight” “It sure is”

The era of human achievement peaked that day. Still gives me goose bumps 55 years after.

I remember my grandmother saying, “I didn’t think I’d see it in my lifetime.” I was 6. We had Star Trek, and Lost in Space and other things, and I thought, don’t we do this all the time?

God I wish we had people like Cronkite today, he was phenomenal.

The peak of America's greatness. Perhaps the peak of humanity's greatness.

Wally Schirra’s commentary was great. He said little but he said it all.

No joke, that CBS simulation setup was great.

My mom worked for McDonnel Douglas in Cocoa and was selected as part of the group that would work for NASA, assemble and solder the circuit boards that went into the landing modules and capsules in the Apollo program. I was 12 years old when she woke my sister and I in the middle of the night to watch this on TV. I knew it was important but, it wasn't until I got older that I truly understood how important. It makes me smile inside to know that although she is gone, some of her work is still sitting there on the moon.

The Apollo 11 Moon Landing was such an astonishing achievement, it's quite understandable that many today are unable to actually accept that it happened ! And that mission was followed by five more (Apollo 12 14 15 16 and 17) Apollo 13 failed to complete it's mission and was a near fatal event for the crew.

I remember my grandma was angry when they kept replaying the moon landing, and cancelled her Bonanza show. She liked little Joe 😂😂😂

In this moment, these men were so proud to be Americans. So proud of the accomplishment. Such a great moment in history. I wish we could recapture the sentiment.

Happy 54th Anniversary on the moon landing. I was only two when this happened. My mom said that they were watching this with me and thought it was amazing on having to witness this historic moment in space exploration. This is way before live cam were put on board the spacecrafts . I do remember later on in the Apollo missions like one of the astronauts golfing on the moon. That was pretty awesome to see. I'm so looking forward to see Artemis II(?) making another historic landing on the moon,.

I love watching stuff like this. One of the few times America truly came together for a goal that changed history.

I was 11 years old back then. I am an old man now and we still have not been back. I hope I live long enough to see the return and then to Mars.

I'm old enough to remember the Moon landing and even watched it on CBS. I remember Walter Cronkite and Wally Shira tearing up exactly as seen here. This is the exact clip of that moment. What didn't come out until later is that the landing wasn't as perfect as it sounds here. As the LEM came close to the surface, Neil Armstrong realized they were coming close to landing on a big bolder and he had to take the controls to shift the LEM away at an angle to avoid smashing onto it. As he did so, he only had a few seconds left of fuel for the landing and the low-fuel warning light had gone on. What people forget is what a joyous moment this was not only for Mankind but for the US in particular. This landing for one happy moment helped the nation forget that the Vietnam War was raging and the US was losing scores of soldiers each day at this point. By 1969, the US was mired in the war against North Vietnam. During the same period as the Moon landing and all the previously successful US space launches, I remember having to watch each night on the 6 o'clock news -- on all three major channels in those days, America year before social media, having basically three major TV news outlets CBS, NBC, and ABC -- the nightly scrolling of the American war dead by name and rank each night at the end of the 6 o'clock news. After seeing the lists of dead for the day, I'd start my homework for the next day's classes. Nixon had become president and inherited a quagmire from Lyndon Johnson. He was committed to extricating the US from the war "peace with honor," but he was actually expanding it as negotiating leverage against the North by invading Cambodia and intensifying the B52 bombings of Hanoi and Haiphong until a peace conference was finally agreed to be convened among the US, North Vietnam, the Viet Cong, and South Vietnam in Paris. And even then, the parties haggled over the shape of the table until all sides could agree that no side was minimized by the seating (round). All this while Mankind and America was landing on the Moon.