"In the beginning..." - 40 years later

This Christmas season is a special one in space history. It was 40 years ago, Christmas 1968, when Apollo 8 sent the first human beings to the Moon. They didn't land - the Lunar Modules weren't ready yet - but they made ten orbits and sent back the first TV transmission from another world. For the first time, people could see the entire Earth as a planet floating in space. They also read from the King James Bible on Christmas Eve.

There are lots of online commemorations you can check out if you're interested:

National Public Radio ran a story on Morning Edition that you can listen to here. There's also an online video bonus story.

David Livingston welcomed space historian Robert Zimmerman to Monday's edition of The Space Show, to talk about Apollo 8 and the Bible reading in particular. You can listen to that here.

Finally, NASA-TV is running Apollo 8 coverage all day today and tomorrow. You can check out the schedule here.

Merry Christmas, everybody!

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