NOVA; To the Moon; Interview with Steve Bales, former NASA engineer and flight controller, part 1 of 3

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This record is featured in “To the Moon Interviews.” This record is featured in “GBH Archives Open Vault.”
Series
NOVA
Episode
To the Moon
Raw Footage
Interview with Steve Bales, former NASA engineer and flight controller, part 1 of 3
Producing Organization
WGBH Educational Foundation
Contributing Organization
WGBH (Boston, Massachusetts)
AAPB ID
cpb-aacip-15-r785h7d727
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Description
Program Description
This remarkably crafted program covers the full range of participants in the Apollo project, from the scientists and engineers who promoted bold ideas about the nature of the Moon and how to get there, to the young geologists who chose the landing sites and helped train the crews, to the astronauts who actually went - not once or twice, but six times, each to a more demanding and interesting location on the Moon's surface. "To The Moon" includes unprecedented footage, rare interviews, and presents a magnificent overview of the history of man and the Moon. To the Moon aired as NOVA episode 2610 in 1999.
Raw Footage Description
Steve Bales, former NASA engineer and flight controller, is interviewed about working in Mission Control. He explains why he got excited about the moon, and how he came to work for NASA in Houston. Bales describes the environment in Mission Control as very youthful (he recounts a President Nixon's 1968 visit, when he asked "where are all the old people?"), and as a place where everybody was very passionate about their work. Bales discusses the Gemini program's accomplishment of getting men in space for a longer duration and figuring out rendezvous, and ends with a description of the computing and coding being done at NASA at the time, which was all done using limited numbers of words and was all hand-coded.
Created Date
1998
Asset type
Raw Footage
Genres
Interview
Topics
History
Technology
Science
Subjects
American History; Gemini; apollo; moon; Space; astronaut
Media type
Moving Image
Duration
00:10:12
Embed Code
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Credits
Interviewee: Bales, Steve, 1942-
Producing Organization: WGBH Educational Foundation
AAPB Contributor Holdings
WGBH
Identifier: cpb-aacip-201c62df37f (Filename)
Format: Digital Betacam
Generation: Original
Duration: 0:10:13
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Citations
Chicago: “NOVA; To the Moon; Interview with Steve Bales, former NASA engineer and flight controller, part 1 of 3 ,” 1998, WGBH, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC, accessed August 14, 2025, http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-15-r785h7d727.
MLA: “NOVA; To the Moon; Interview with Steve Bales, former NASA engineer and flight controller, part 1 of 3 .” 1998. WGBH, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Web. August 14, 2025. <http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-15-r785h7d727>.
APA: NOVA; To the Moon; Interview with Steve Bales, former NASA engineer and flight controller, part 1 of 3 . Boston, MA: WGBH, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Retrieved from http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-15-r785h7d727