History of Space Exploration

NASA Budget Cuts Could Hit Johnson Space Center (First No Shuttle, Now This?)

In recent years, NASA has been hit pretty hard, and another hit may be coming. We're a long ways off from the days when JFK told the nation that the United States would put a man on the moon, and in recent years, what with the Great Recession, space exploration seems to have taken a backseat. Hell, ... More >>

Grace Kelly, Super Guppies & Men Who Shouldn't Wear Cowboy Hats: Great Old Photos Of NASA's 50 Years In Houston

Arcadia Publishing is a company specializing in affordable picture-filled books on local history across the country. They've done books on such Houston institutions as the downtown Foley's, and now they've tackled the institution-alist Houston institution of all, NASA. See Also: - "Tatooine" Disco ... More >>

Here Are Five Awesome/Crazy Theories About The Shining from Room 237

Five Awesome Yuri Gagarin Paintings The City Of Houston Should Have Received

This week Mayor Annise Parker accepted on behalf of the city some artwork commemorating the 50the anniversary of the flights of Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin and the U.S.A.'s John Glenn. (Gagarin, of course, was the first human in space; Glenn the first American.) The donations will be displayed i ... More >>

RIP Neil Armstrong: Songs For The First Man On The Moon

This weekend was marred by the death of the first man on the moon, Apollo astronaut Neil Armstrong, who passed away on Saturday at the age of 82. The trio of Armstrong, Michael Collins, and Buzz Aldrin made up the Apollo 11 crew that set foot on the moon on July 20, 1969. The space race of the '60 ... More >>

Neil Armstrong, First Man on the Moon, Dead at 82: No, the Korean War Ace & Icy Test Pilot Did Not Tell a Blow-Job Joke on the Moon

Sad news for NASA and its Houston family, as word has come down that the first man on our moon has died today. Armstrong was 82. Breaking News and NBC News reported the news over Twitter around 2 p.m. Saturday afternoon Houston time. NASA has its own obit up now, too. Armstrong was a part of the ... More >>

Infographic: Dark Side of the Moon Landing

Friday is the 33rd anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing, best known as the city of Houston's one shining historical moment as the first word spoken from the surface. Somewhere in London, the landing must have stirred something else in the four members of Pink Floyd -- soon to release Ummagumma ... More >>

Is Minute Maid Park (Finally) Going To Lose Tal's Hill?

There were basically two people who love Tal's Hill, the gimmicky hill in Minute Maid Park's centerfield, and one of them was named Tal. The other was former owner Drayton McLane, who installed the hill, which has no other reason for existence, because his buddy Tal Smith remembered some old ballpa ... More >>

50 Years On: The Smithsonian's Five Weirdest Items from John Glenn's Flight

Fifty years ago John Glenn became the first American into orbit, an important first step on the way to the moon. You can search the Smithsonian's archives for Friendship 7 items, and some of them are, well, odd. Like these five: 5. Mark Dixon's blanket Who's Mark Dixon? Just some kid from Michigan ... More >>

Skylab IV Splashed Down on This Day: Five Things the Most Complaining Space Crew Ever Bitched About

Skylab IV: Not happy campers​Skylab IV splashed down on this day in 1974, ending the last mission to America's first space station. They were glad to get home. The crew of Skylab IV -- William Pogue, Gerald Carr and Edward Gibson -- became famous for the sheer amount of complaining they did. ... More >>

The Fall of Sputnik: 6 Songs for a Satellite

On this day in 1958 Sputnik 1, the first artificial satellite to be put into orbit, fell to Earth after completing 1,440 orbits. The launch of Sputnik was seen as a major blow to the American quest for space superiority, and a significant step forward in the space race by the Soviet Union. In the ... More >>

The Holy Grail Of A Neil Armstrong Autograph: One Man's Quest

No, he won't sign it​Which living person has the world's most sought-after autograph? Neil Armstrong, first man on the moon. A Houstonian has written a book about it. Anthony Pizzatola is a vice-president of the Universal Autograph Collector's Club and he's written Neil Armstrong: The Quest F ... More >>

The Five Astronaut Autobiographies Everyone Should Read

Riding Rockets: Raunchy, raucous and funny.​Astronaut autobiographies can be a very mixed bag. On the one hand, that should be surprising given the harrowing, thrilling life-and-death stories which are inherent; on the other hand, the authors are generally not very good writers. And even if t ... More >>

Comment of the Day: If Twitter, Google and Social Media Were Around During the First Moon Walk

​We have some great commenters here on Hair Balls, and it's time we paid some damn attention to them. So we'll be highlighting a Comment of the Day each morning, from the previous day's work. Maybe two comments, even. This will all be determined by a highly rigorous scientific formula involv ... More >>

The Moon Landing 42 Years On: Five Odd Facts (Includes Urine, Wine and a Petty Refusal To Take Photos)

The flag: Better than a solar-wind experiment that just looks like a flag​Wednesday marks the 42nd anniversary of man landing on the moon. One small step, and all that. It's an odd anniversary, the 42nd, so here are five odd facts about the mission. 5. Buzz Aldrin, First Man To Piss On The M ... More >>

State Senator Mario Gallegos Says HISD's Apollo 20 Contracts May Be Unethical

Mario Gallegos goes after Terry Grier again.​State Senator Mario Gallegos, a persistent critic of Houston school superintendent Terry Grier's Apollo 20 pilot program, has asked the Texas Education Agency to audit the contracts involved in it. He says there are ethical questions involving HISD ... More >>

Jethro Tull in Space: No Aqualung, Though

In honor of the 50th anniversary of Yuri Gagarin's historic spaceflight, current space station astronaut and noted flute player Cady Coleman joined in an earth-orbit duet with Jethro Tull founder Ian Anderson.

Apollo 13 Launched 41 Years Ago: 5 Best Trivia Bits About the Film

Not only is failure not an option, it's not an accurate quote​Forty-one years ago Apollo 13 blasted off from the Kennedy Space Center, and things went swimmingly for a while. Last year we listed our favorite dweebiest nit-picks about the movie; this year let's look at some favorite pieces of ... More >>

Comment of the Day: Moon Missions Were Surrounded by UFOs, Dammit

​We have some great commenters here on Hair Balls, and it's time we paid some damn attention to them. So we'll be highlighting a Comment of the Day each morning, from the previous day's work. Maybe two comments, even. This will all be determined by a highly rigorous scientific formula involv ... More >>

Sputnik: The Shock of the Century

It’s an insider’s view at the race for space

SpaceCenter Houston's Rocket Park Fills In A Missing Piece

Photo via CollectSpaceThe Gemini-Titan, ready for refurbishing​Last week, with little fanfare, a truck rolled up to the Johnson Space Center with a unique cargo.It was a replica of a Gemini-Titan rocket with capsule, and it means SpaceCenter's Rocket Park will fill in a missing piece of JSC histor ... More >>

Apollo 13: Anatomy of a Failure

Fly me to the moon...oh, wait, we missed it!

You Think Today's NASA Mission Posters Are Lame?

Photos courtesy Bonhams​A while back, there was some general web guffawing over what was perceived as NASA's lame mission posters, which have trended towards spoofing popular movies. (We kinda liked them, actually.)Now we're getting a glance at how bad things used to be.On Tuesday -- the 40th anni ... More >>

Screen on the Green: Apollo 13

Houston, ah, we have a big ass problem

Houston 101: Neighborhood Of Astronauts

​Nowadays, being an astronaut just doesn't have the cachet it once did. But back in the 1960s, astronauts were celebrities, and an obscure neighborhood near Clear Lake was their Beverly Hills.Timber Cove was a development of what today would be considered smallish homes -- no McMansions here -- on ... More >>

Playing Neil Armstrong On The Screen: The "Jesus Curse," Redux

Photo by NASAIn the old days of Hollywood, they used to talk of "the Jesus Curse" -- any actor who played JC on screen was thereafter soomed to obscurity.Does the same thing happen to actors who play Neil Armstrong? There aren't as many Apollo 11 movies as you might expect, but the evidence still is ... More >>

Spacefest: 40th Anniversary of the Moon Landing

Houston, we have a celebration

Dawn of the Space Age

Web exclusive!

Five Best Apollo 11 Myths

Photo courtesy NASAA salute to Mr. JablonskiHey, guess what!! Monday brings the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon Landing!!Oh, you heard? Well, get ready to hear more -- this weekend and Monday will no doubt be a "One small step for man" marathon.Which is fine -- the moon mission was a crazy, a ... More >>

NASA Lets You Eavesdrop On Apollo 11's Private Conversations

NASA is continuing its information dump for the 40th anniversary of the moon landing; now they have put on the `net digital recordings of some of the private in-capsule conversations of the Apollo 11 astronauts."You're in a spacecraft, on a mission to land on the moon for the first time in history, ... More >>

"Moon FTW IRL!" -- Apollo 11, As If They Had Twitter Then

You know what sucked about the moon landing? They didn't Twitter it.If it's not on Twitter, we're not sure we can trust that it happened. Even if the headlines say otherwise.Now, however, the problem is solved, thanks to the John F. Kennedy Library in Boston.They've put together an impressive "reliv ... More >>

The Rockets, Joining The Pantheon Of Those Who Gave Up Surprising Momentum

Hey, how'd those Rockets do last night?!Oh.In case you missed it, Our Rockets (and by "Our," we mean "team we started cheering for a week ago"), got shellacked by the Lakers 118-78. Everyone had expected the injury-riddled Houston team to lose like that -- in Sunday's game, which they had won.That ... More >>

Houston, We Have A....Ah, Forget About It. How Jim Lovell's Kid Learned About His Dad's Adventures

Houstonians have always had a special place in their heart for Apollo 13, the Tom Hanks movie that chronicles the only moon mission that didn't make it.(And for the mission itself, of course, which unfortunately enough gave us the "Houston, we have a problem" cliche that leads to lots and lots of la ... More >>

“Creating Space City, USA”

“Houston…the Eagle has landed.”

Fly Me to the Moon

The newest 3-D animated film chronicles the first landing on the moon – from the point of view of a fly on the wall

Everybody in tha Chamber

Space Invaders

The Chron loves another convention

No Boosters Allowed

Flight directory Chris Kraft has a story to tell

Overblown and Underrated

So you know Houston's goats, heroes and high points? Think again.

The (Balding) Eagle Has Landed

Clint Eastwood's charming Space Cowboys tosses youth demographics out the cargo bay

The Harley Party

Texas Motorcycle Rights Association

Man in the Moon

Writer James Schefter

Retro Rocket

Sputnik-inspired October Sky runs hot and coal

Sputnik at Colonus

Moonstruck

Both corny and inspiring, Apollo 13 is about more than a space mission

The Write Stuff

Houston's Al Reinert spins a tale of his hometown for the big screen

Moon Shots

At the MFA, lunar imagery blurs the line between science and art