Mars is there, waiting to be reached.

If we can conquer space, we can conquer childhood hunger.

American greatness was elevated significantly after Sputnik.

You can tell I’m not too bashful about some of my feelings.

I grew up in a country that I thought was special. And it was.

When you’re in a spacecraft, you need to know what things you can touch and what things you shouldn’t touch!

What’s aero braking? That’s a way to use the gravity and upper atmosphere of Earth to sling shot a ship out either deeper into space, or slow it down to be ‘captured’ by Earth’s gravity.

The purpose of going to Mars is for humans to first begin to occupy, permanently, another planet in the solar system. The astronauts or pilgrims, whatever you might call them, are going to be very...

I think there would be no shortage of applicants to the government astronaut corps to be settlers on the planet Mars. And I think this would be very inspiring.

Is the destiny of the human species to sit back and play with our mouse and computer and imagine, fantasize?

I suggest that going to Mars means permanence on the planet – a mission by which we are building up a confidence level to become a two-planet species.

In Mars, we’ve been given a wonderful set of moons… where we can send continuous numbers of people.

Does it make sense for the U.S. to expend hundreds of billions of dollars to mount a new Apollo-style program to return to the moon? Or have we blazed that trail? Shouldn’t we help other...

There’s a historical milestone in the fact that our Apollo 11 landing on the moon took place a mere 66 years after the Wright Brothers’ first flight.

If we go back to the moon, we’re guaranteed second, maybe third place because while we are spending all that money, Russia has its eye on Mars. Landing people on the moon will be terribly...

Space tourism is a logical outgrowth of the adventure tourist market.

‘Anthony and the Magic Picture Frame’ tells it like it really was in America’s early space program – the adventure, the risks, and the rewards.

Somebody would think I was trying to get favored treatment because my ancestors had the name Moon. And that’s a joke.

My father’s an early aviator, and my first flight was with him at age two. Now, despite the fact that I got sick on the flight, I still enjoyed it, I believe.

America’s can-do spirit cast a warm glow across nations and cultures, generating more goodwill and support for our country’s ideals and causes than had otherwise been possible.

Nobody cares about the bronze or silver medals.

Astronauts are not superhuman. They lead ordinary lives and have varied personalities.

Absolutely the United States should lead in space, for the survival of the United States. It’s inspiring for the next generation. If we lose leadership, then we’ll be using Chinese capability to inspire Americans.

I inherited depression from my mother’s side of the family.

You are not going to change the minds of people who are looking for attention.

When the time comes to start building deep space transports and refueling rocket tankers, it will be the commercial industry that steps up, not another government-owned, government-managed enterprise.

For the future, primarily, we must educate people in science, engineering, technology and math.

Retain the vision for space exploration. If we turn our backs on the vision again, we’re going to have to live in a secondary position in human space flight for the rest of the century.

It’s time to open the space frontier to citizen explorers.

I think it’s inevitable that there will be Earthlings establishing a presence on Mars. And I would say that it would certainly take place by 2050 or shortly thereafter.

In space, you don’t get that much noise. Noise doesn’t propagate in a vacuum.

Growing up, I was fascinated with Buck Rogers’ airplanes. As I began to mature in World War II, it became jets and rocket planes. But it was always in the air.

Walking around on the moon was significantly easier than we’d thought it would be. There weren’t any balance problems, so you weren’t tumbling over.

We need to begin thinking about building permanence on the Red Planet, not just have voyagers do some experiments, plant a flag and claim success. Having them go there, repeat this, in my view, is...

Space travel for everyone is the next frontier in the human experience.

As a student, I wrote English reports on science fiction.

The big companies are the private industry. But they’re faced with a short-term need to show a profit in short-term.

My first biography written in ’73 was not ‘Journey To The Moon.’ It was ‘Return To Earth.’ Because for me, that was the more difficult task – disappointment.

Instead of planning the retirement of the Space Shuttle program, America should be preparing the shuttles for their next step in space: evolving, not shutting them down and laying off thousands of people.

We can’t start over and develop a Saturn 5-type vehicle from scratch.

Certainly, I’ve never wanted to live on past achievements.

Let’s not spend resources that we don’t need to be sending astronauts back to the moon. Let’s not spend expensive resources on bringing people who have reached Mars back again. Prepare them to become a...

I realize that my life is not the common ordinary person.

You can never tell when a commercial space venture will suddenly become viable.

When we can demonstrate that we can take off horizontally and put something into orbit, then we can begin to talk about increasing the amount of payload. But to say, ‘I’m going to do that...

Fighter pilots have ice in their veins. They don’t have emotions. They think, anticipate. They know that fear and other concerns cloud your mind from what’s going on and what you should be involved in.

There’s no doubt who was a leader in space after the Apollo Program. Nobody came close to us. And our education system, in science, technology, engineering and math, was at the top of the world....

Kids, help your parents if they don’t know how to use a smartphone.

I’m convinced that sending people to Mars is so expensive that if you go once and bring the people back and then go again and bring the people back, we’re eventually going to run out...

Like actors and writers who are on and off again in terms of employment, I had a very unstructured life.