John young astronaut interview

John Young has had moondust under his fingernails...

by Billy Watkins - June 1999

HOUSTON, Texas - John Young has had moondust under his fingernails.

He has stood on the moon, 236,000 miles away among rocks that are 4.6 billion years old, and looked at the Earth suspended in darkness.

He took three moonwalks, drove 16 miles in a moon buggy, and slept three nights on the lunar surface.

And yet he's hardly recognized in public.

"My wife can go to the grocery store, and they'll take her check with no problem," Young says.

Astronaut John Young is interviewed on NASA TV on July 20, , the 23rd anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing.

Astronaut John Young is interviewed on NASA TV on July 20, , the 23rd anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing.

Dedicated to the career of NASA astronaut John Watts Young - his biography and each of his missions, Gemini 3, Gemini 10, Apollo 10, Apollo

This interview with Gemini 3, Gemini 10, Apollo 10, Apollo 16, STS-1, and STS-9 astronaut John Young was conducted for the PBS Nova.

Young describes how he came to be part of the Apollo program, and describes training with Lee Silver, and talks about flying over the moon on Apollo Before.

An interview with the commander and pilot of the first space shuttle mission on the 25th anniversary.

"When I go, I have to show my driver's license, my credit card."

He laughs. "But that's OK. I didn't get into this to be famous. I got into it to do a job."

Had the pecking order fallen differently, Young might have been the first human to set foot upon the moon.

Instead, that honor fell to Neil Armstrong on July 20, 1969, and Young's turn came in April 1972 aboard Apollo 16. He was the ninth earthling to walk on the moon - a number that suits