Astronauts Visit McMath-Pierce Solar Telescope

Some of the Apollo astronauts in the Control Room of the McMath-Pierce Solar Telescope (MMP) at Kitt Peak National Observatory (KPNO) in 1964. Left to right: Astronaut Donn Eiseie, Don Wilhelms (USGS), Spencer Titley (UA), Ray Zedekar (NASA), Astronaut Theodore Freeman, Astronaut Frank Borman, Astronaut Eugene Cernan, and Harold Masursky (USGS) (1964). Frank F. Borman II was the commander of Apollo 8, the first group of humans to lunar orbit. Eugene A. Cernan was the commander of Apollo 17 and the last human to the moon.

Throughout the 1960s, the following astronauts visited MMP: Buzz Aldrin, Dave Scott, Dick Gordon, Michael Collins, Roger B. Chaffee, Charlie Bassett, Alan Bean, Walter Cunningham, Rusty Schweickart, James A. McDivitt, Bill Anders, Elliot See, Thomas P. Safford, Walter Schirra, Gordon Cooper, Alan Shepard, Scott Carpenter, Edward H. White, Neil Armstrong, Charles Conrad, John Young, James Lovell, and Deke Slayton.