Alan Shepard Jr. became the first American in space in 1961. His fifteen-minute mission showed that humans could survive a wild ride atop a rocket. In a speech to Congress just 20 days later, President John F. Kennedy declared "I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the Earth." This volume takes readers on the journey through the amazing successes and heartbreaking tragedies of astronauts trying to reach the moon, complete with NASA and historical photographs correlating with the stellar narrative.