This is a moment that will live in history books forever, July 21, 1969. It was the day several hundred thousand of us had dreamed of, and planned for, and worked for. It was seven years since President John F. Kennedy gave us the historic challenge, September 12, 1962. Well, we accepted that impossible (at the time) challenge and made John Kennedy's dream, the one we all shared, come true.

I have painted Neil Armstrong lifting his left foot from the Moon's dusty surface. He, and we, can see the first human footprint placed anywhere in our vast universe other than on our tiny planet Earth. It was so difficult to get here, to this world of "magnificent desolation", as his crewmate, Buzz Aldrin would say a short time later.

There will be many other first footprints in our future. First footprint on Mars, first footprint on an asteroid, first on a moon of Jupiter, and first on a planet around a star different from our Sun. But none so future changing as this one in July of 1969.

- Alan Bean