Neil Armstrong opens up for biography

updated 9:59 a.m. ET Dec. 5, 2005

CINCINNATI - Neil Armstrong was 38 when he uttered the words that have been both a blessing and a curse to him.

“That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind,” Armstrong said as his foot touched the moon’s surface on July 20, 1969.

On his return, he and Buzz Aldrin, the second moon walker on that Apollo 11 flight, went on a 45-day, around-the-world tour as NASA ambassadors. Since then, Armstrong has been largely silent, declining interviews and shunning publicity.

Historian Douglas Brinkley calls him “our nation’s most bashful Galahad.”

Author James Hansen has opened the door to Armstrong’s life a little wider with “First Man: The Life of Neil A. Armstrong.” He recorded more than 50 hours of interviews with Armstrong and talked with about 125 family members, friends and associates.

Armstrong, 75, had rejected numerous requests to write his biography. The astronaut who once called himself a “nerdy engineer” finally accepted a proposal from Hansen, a history professor at Auburn University and a former NASA historian who talks his language.

Hansen said his plan for the book and his credentials helped him earn Armstrong’s trust.

“He can elaborate at length on technical issues,” Hansen said. “When it comes to issues that are more involving personalities or human relationships, that’s never been a great focus even from the time he was a boy.”

Friends were given OK to talk
Hansen said Armstrong quietly spread the word that it was OK for friends and associates to talk freely; that Armstrong read drafts of the book but did not demand approval rights; that he and Armstrong drew up a contract without involving lawyers; and that Armstrong will not personally benefit from the book.

Armstrong’s share of profits will go to his alma mater, Purdue University, for a space program archive.

Hansen pitched the project to Armstrong in 1999. Interviews began in 2001, and the book went on sale Oct. 18. Publisher Simon & Schuster said that more than 113,000 copies are in print.

“Readers have been eager to learn more about Neil Armstrong for years,” said associate publisher Aileen Boyle. “As soon as the manuscript was complete, we published it as soon as possible.”

Armstrong has never felt comfortable with his celebrity, generated by a moon walk seen by a worldwide television audience estimated at 1 billion.

“Friends and colleagues, all of a sudden, looked at us, treated us slightly differently than they had months or years before when we were working together,” he told “60 Minutes” in a recent interview. “I never quite understood that.”

Although CBS and Simon & Schuster, both owned by Viacom, encouraged Armstrong to do the interview, he agreed to it only as a favor to the author, Hansen said. A spokeswoman for the publisher said Armstrong is refusing all other requests.

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