The Politics Of The Moon Landings Part I

Returning guest Teasel Muir-Harmony, Curator of the Apollo program at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, joins host Sean Mobley for a Q&A about her book Operation Moonglow: A Political History of Project Apollo. In this first of a two-part series, Teasel sets the stage and talks about the wider global context within which the US space program operated. We discussed the American politicians who encouraged and shaped panic around Sputnik and the space race, the importance of symbolism in a lot of the images and actions the astronauts took both on the moon and here on Earth, and how racism was a national security risk which the space program was partially designed to counter. 

Teasel Muir-Harmony’s new book Operation Moonglow: A Political History of Project Apollo, is for sale in The Museum of Flight’s online store. Your purchase will support the Museum’s mission. Find it here: https://www.museumofflightstore.org/operation-moonglow.html 

Hear Teasel in person at a virtual public program hosted by The Museum of Flight on Thursday, June 3rd. More information is on our calendar here: https://www.museumofflight.org/Plan-Your-Visit/Calendar-of-Events/6367/operation-moonglow  

Check out Teasel’s previous appearance on the podcast, that time discussing the around-the-world tour the Apollo 11 astronauts completed upon returning to the US, here: https://blog.museumofflight.org/flightdeck/back-to-earth-the-apollo-11-astronauts-tour-after-the-moon-landing 

You can also hear the conversation with Geoff Nunn, the Museum’s adjunct curator for Space History, about preserving future space history here: https://blog.museumofflight.org/flightdeck/preserving-the-future-history-of-space.  

Teasel also recommended the book Cold War Civil Rights: Race and the Image of American Democracy for those who want to learn more about how discrimination in the US posed a risk to American global interests in the mid-20th century. Locals to The Museum of Flight can get the book from the King County Library System here: https://kcls.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S82C163403. It’s also for sale online at the Pacific Northwest independent bookstore Powell’s here: https://www.powells.com/book/cold-war-civil-rights-race-the-image-of-american-democracy-9780691152431.  

You can become a donor and support the podcast and The Museum of Flight at this link. 

Visit the Museum’s Apollo Exhibit on your next trip to immerse yourself in more history and culture from the space race. Check our website for guidelines before your visit: https://museumofflight.org/  

Credits

Producer: Sean Mobley 

Webmaster: Layne Benofsky 

Social Media Specialist: Tori Hunt