JFK's Moonshot: The Impossible Space Race Goal

1961 at the height of the cold war between the United States and the Soviet Union, cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first man in space. Just weeks later, the United States launched its first astronaut, Alan Shepard. — Oxygen go. All systems are go. He was welcomed home as a hero. But President John F. Kennedy knew that if the United States was to overtake the Soviet space program, it needed a bolder mission. I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal before this decade is out of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the Earth. As Kennedy addressed Congress, the United States had just 15 minutes of human spaceflight experience. No one knew if a moon landing was even possible, let alone in just 9 years. It would be an unprecedented engineering and scientific undertaking marked by heroism and tragedy.