"First Man: The Life of Neil A. Armstrong" by James R. Hansen

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Copyright: 2005, (3rd Edition 2018)

ISBN: 978-1-9821-0316-3

I found First Man to be an extremely informative and engrossing biography of the astronaut and Apollo 11 commander Neil A. Armstrong. I can vividly remember sitting on the floor of our basement family room listening to a black & white television in July 1969 when the Moon Landing was broadcast on CBC (the only station we could get). I was fascinated then, and still am today. Hopefully someday humans will return to the Moon, and possibly venue further into space.

The book essentially details Armstrong's life from birth in 1930 to his death in 2012, and gives a very detailed examination of his career in the United States Navy, and has a test pilot prior to becoming an astronaut, his accomplishments in the Gemini, and the Apollo programs, and his life after returning to Earth.

Commander Armstrong was an extremely private individual, but one who was forced into the public eye due to the accomplishments of the crew of Apollo 11. It was quite evident throughout the book that he did not like all the public exposure, but he did his best to survive it. Unfortunately this did cause a great deal of stress in his life, and to his family.

The accomplishments of Michael Collins, Buzz Aldrin, and Neil Armstrong will go down in history as one of the greatest feats of engineering, courage, and dedication the world has ever seen. But without the 400,000 plus people at NASA and various other agencies and companies the accomplishments of these three men would not have been possible.

Prior to reading the book I did watch the movie, and found it to be equally as interesting, even though the director did take some liberties.

I would highly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in reading a well written and researched biography.