No Dream Is Too High

PHOTO GALLERY

My handsome family. Top, left to right: A young man named Buzz; my mother, Marion; my father, Edwin, Sr. Bottom: My sisters, Maddy and Fay Ann.

We have spent summers at the New Jersey shore my whole life. I still go there to see my extended family to this day. This photo was probably taken in 1934.

I’ve always been curious about how things work. Even as a young boy—here I am at six years old—I loved to explore and was always looking for a new adventure.

Strong women helped shape me, especially my mother (in the middle) and my two sisters, Maddy and Fay Ann.

I was only 17 years old when I was accepted into the United States Military Academy at West Point. Here I am, a young plebe, proudly wearing my uniform.

In the dedication of my MIT doctoral thesis, written in 1963, I expressed a hope that my work could help in the future of the space program. My dreams were more than realized.

In November 1966, Jim Lovell and I flew Gemini 12, the last of the Gemini missions. We orbited Earth for four days, during which I completed three tethered space walks, the first of their kind.

I snapped this photo of myself during one of my Gemini 12 space walks. Little did I know, I was pioneering the art of the selfie in 1966!

Neil Armstrong took this iconic photo of me on the Moon during our Apollo 11 mission in July 1969. I think he was a pretty good photographer, as this picture was quite spontaneous.

I took very few photos on the Moon, because Neil had the camera while I set up the experiments. My son Andy finds it ironic: I never take photos, but one of the few I took has become a historic one!

My bootprint on the Moon looked lonely, so I took another one with my boot in the frame.

My travel voucher to the Moon and back; I was reimbursed $33.31 for a rental car to get to the Kennedy Space Center in time for the launch.

Scuba diving is my favorite thing to do on this planet.

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My son Andy took this photo of me hitching a ride on a whale shark in June 2010 during a dive we did near the Galápagos Islands to celebrate my 80th birthday.

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My Mission Control Director, Christina Korp, keeps me in line, but we also have a lot of fun together. Here we are at Nova Spacefest in Tucson, Arizona, on April 1, 2012.

I love how curious kids are. Whenever my Mascot #1, Brielle Korp, wants to know how something works, I’m happy to show her.

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I have always wanted to go faster and higher, so of course I went (with Christina and my Mascot #2, Logan Korp) to visit the Burj Khalifa in Dubai—the tallest building in the world, with more than 160 stories.

As soon as I got this T-shirt from Christina, I knew it was my new call sign: Get Your Ass to Mars!

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I have always admired Stephen Hawking, and I am proud that we have become friends. Here I visited him at his home in Cambridge, United Kingdom, in March 2015.

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I showed my model of Phobos, one of the Mars moons, to President Obama at the Kennedy Space Center in 2010, and he thought I was trying to give it to him. He almost walked away with it!

I gave testimony to Senator Ted Cruz during a Senate hearing on commercializing space in March 2015. I try to bug Congress to invest in space as much as possible in between my busy travels.

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I enjoyed my part on The Simpsons, but I’m especially proud that I made it as one of the show’s top 25 guest stars; and I got my own figurine!

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Lady Liberty is always a welcome sight whenever I get to New York City—especially by helicopter.

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At Stonehenge in March 2015 I decided to send a message to the cosmos.

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