Getting older has the advantage of still being among the living. OTOH, the longer you live the more death of loved ones you have to bear. Today was one of those as we put one of my wife’s family to rest.
And tonight I see one of the greatest Americans has passed away, Astronaut Frank Borman, commander of the first Apollo mission to the moon, circling the moon ten times.
And this in 1968, 55 years ago.
RIP Astronaut Borman
The famous Earthrise from the Apollo 8 mission:
Man, slowly but surely we’re losing ALL the heroes and icons of my youth. Terrible thing, getting old.
Yea, sad as hell it is.
One of the things most people don’t realize is just how much the cold war battles meant to men like Commander Borman.
“My main concern in this whole flight was to get there ahead of the Russians and get home. That was a significant achievement in my eyes,” Borman explained at a Chicago appearance in 2017.
There were Cold Warriors, and I along with many others spent a significant amount of time studying how to beat back the tide of communism.
https://apnews.com/article/astronaut-frank-borman-died-at-95-ed5eb4edf26a4076a2fef6cc31881aff
Hattip to insty for the AP link
Borman, like all of those his age, grew up as early teens during WW2, wondering if there older brothers would ever come home, wondering if their older sisters husbands would ever come home, wondering if the war would be over before they too would be called to the front. It had a profound effect on them, they lost the normal teenage years.
My Dad was one. Older brother in the pacific aboard a destroyer, older sister’s husband in Europe in the Army, soon to lie about his age and go a year early. My Mom was one, older brother in the Army, D-day. She told me once that on the morning of Dec 8 1941 her small NC town was empty of any boys 18 or older, all gone to enlist, not to be seen again for four+ years, if ever.