Who said these words? To what could be considered the very first question on the quiz show, “Who wants to be a millionaire”, pat comes everybody’s response, “Neil Armstrong, of course, Commander of Apollo 11 lunar module!” Correct… uttered by the first man ever who stepped on the Moon on July 20, 1969, right after setting foot on the celestial planet. These words are famous, as they were televised and heard by millions.
Now here’s something I read when I opened my mail box this afternoon. The email begins by referring to this momentous landing and the famous words, but then goes on as follows:
Just before he re-entered the lander, Armstrong made the enigmatic remark, ‘Good Luck, Mr. Gorsky.’ Many people at NASA thought it was a casual remark concerning some rival soviet cosmonaut. However, upon checking, there was no Gorsky – neither in the Russian, nor in the American space programs.
Over the years many people questioned Armstrong as to what the ”Good Luck, Mr. Gorsky“ statement meant, but Armstrong always just smiled. On July 5, 1995, in Tampa bay, Florida, while answering questions following a speech, a reporter brought up the 26-year-old question to Armstrong. This time he finally responded. Mr. Gorsky had died, so Neil Armstrong felt he could answer the question. In 1938 when he was a kid in a small Midwest town, he was playing baseball with a friend in the backyard. His friend hit the ball, which landed in his neighbor’s yard by the bedroom windows. His neighbors were Mr. And Mrs. Gorsky. As he leaned down to pick up the ball, young Armstrong heard Mrs. Gorsky shouting at Mr. Gorsky, “Sex, you want sex! You’ll get sex when the kid next door walks on the moon!”
Okay, okay, everyone, I didn’t make this up. Apparently, this little anecdote’s been in circulation for over a decade, though I just received it today, and here I am sharing it with you. Well, although it sounded like an authentic story, I wasn’t quite sure, so I looked it up. As expected, turns out it’s a joke. In fact, Neil Armstrong had first heard the anecdote in ’95 – delivered as a joke by Buddy Hackett, a comedian in California. Well, well… now, I’m not joking about that little piece of trivia. But, hey, truly, if any of you are interested in listening to the transcripts (just so you don’t have to take my word for it), check out the Apollo 11 Lunar Surface Journal on a Nasa web page. That’s one small step… from fictional to factual, from legendary tales to actual voices.
Words-n-Motion 