One of my favorite Cape Canaveral photos ...
62 years ago today, the U.S. launched the first American into space, Alan Shepard.
The launch was delayed, so Wernher von Braun left the blockhouse to go for a walk.
If you visit the blockhouse today, it's a small museum. There's a big photo in the entrance of von Braun, wearing sunglasses, leaning over the launch control panels. Why is he wearing sunglasses?! This picture is the answer. He'd gone out for a stroll.
You can stand in the blockhouse doorway today and see exactly where von Braun was that morning. It's hardly changed.
As a photographer, I also admire whomever took the photo. The photographer must have noticed von Braun was missing from the blockhouse. He went looking for him and found von Braun pacing outside. He took the photo from the blockhouse door.
I stood in that doorway many times recreating that moment in my mind.
Here's a clip from a 1961 NASA documentary about the Freedom 7 launch 62 years ago today, the start of America's human spaceflight program.
A note about the video documentary ...
Two Cape buildings were running the mission. The blockhouse at the pad, "Launch Control," was responsible for launching the rocket.
"Mission Control" was elsewhere on the Cape. They ran the mission.
That continues to this day. NASA has a Mission Control in Houston for the #ISS, but a separate one for #Artemis.
#SpaceX has two launch controls -- one for Pad 40, one for Pad 39A -- but their mission control is in Hawthorne CA.