Everyone's gone to the Moon: Just what did Neil Armstrong say

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When, on 20 July 1969, Apollo 11 landed on the Moon and Neil Armstrong became the first human to step on to the Lunar surface, what exactly did he say Think you know Was it, 'That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind' or 'That's one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind'

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Q. Never thought about it. What's the difference

A. The missing article makes a huge difference. A statement that was intended to juxtapose the humble action of one man with a monumental achievement of all men instead became a contradictory phrase that contrasted a small step by mankind to a large step by mankind.

Still, we all understand what he really meant, and at the time it was widely reported that he'd said 'man' rather than 'a man'. Armstrong himself has been ambivalent about his statement, preferring to infer, though not state categorically, that he said the latter - after all, it would be kind of hard to admit that after you'd travelled a quarter million miles you fluffed your big line - and most reference sources have gone along with this version of the story.

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Q. What's the official story

A. In a history of the flight - Where No Man Has Gone Before: A History of Apollo Lunar Exploration Missions, by William David Compton - we are told: 'After the crew had returned to Houston, press representatives repeatedly asked what Armstrong had actually said. The Apollo news centre at MSC issued the following release on July 30, 1969: "Armstrong said that his words when he first stepped on the moon were: That's one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind not That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind as originally transcribed."'

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And there is a theory which arose - possibly put about by NASA - which suggests that Armstrong hadn't messed up his line and that static obscured the missing 'a' during its transmission from the Moon's surface. This face-saving explanation is somewhat dubious, as there isn't really any pause between the words 'for' and 'man' where an 'a' could possibly have been inserted, and Armstrong clearly does pause between his phrases as if he realised he'd blown the first one but decides to carry on anyway.

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Q. What does Armstrong say about it

A. He's willing to concede he may have mumbled, which kind of gets him off the hook. In a 1971 interview Armstrong was asked if the 'a' had been lost in transmission, as per the theory above. His reply was the annoyingly vague, 'we'll never know'. What we do know is that it was to a degree scripted, though whether by Armstrong or a NASA copywriting team is not clear.

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Q. So it wasn't exactly a spontaneous outburst of emotion, then

A. Not exactly. The following appears in a transcript of the post-flight press conference on August 12, 1969:

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Reporter: I'd like to ask Neil Armstrong when he began to think of what he would say when he put his foot down on the lunar surface and how long he pondered this statement about a small step for man, gigantic leap for mankind.

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Armstrong: Yes, I did think about it. It was not extemporaneous, neither was it planned. It evolved during the conduct of the flight and I decided what the words would be while we were on the lunar surface just prior to leaving the LM.

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Q. If this is such a conundrum, why hasn't anyone studied the original tapes

A. Oh, but they have.

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Q. And what did they find

A. Nothing that conclusive, unfortunately. The film director Al Reinert found the original quarter-inch audiotape used to record Armstrong's words in a Fort Worth warehouse. Using a digital synthesiser to clean up the radio static so they could use it on the sound track of the film For All Mankind, Reinert hoped to be able to answer the question once and for all. However, what he found was that 'cleaning it up does not truly answer the question. He did not clearly say "a man". But there's definitely a beat there. It's open to interpretation - maybe he was in the middle of a step when he said it...I'm prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt.'

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Q. It all smacks of the stuff of conspiracy theories. Capricorn One anybody

A. The fake mission to Mars film Who's to say whether NASA is above faking things and covering up - and some people claim to have listened to tapes more recently in which the 'a' can distinctly be heard Still, whatever Armstrong said, either rendering ranks as up there with the most memorable quotations anybody has come up with in the last 50 years, and any of the estimated half billion people who watched it on TV all those years ago is unlikely to forget it - whichever version they think they heard.

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By Simon Smith