Jim Lovell Quotations

There are people who make things happen, there are people who watch things happen, and there are people who wonder what happened. To be successful, you need to be a person who makes things happen.

We do not realize what we have on Earth until we leave it.

Be thankful for problems. If they were less difficult, someone with less ability might have your job.

I was only a hero by default. The flights were few and far between. There weren't that many astronauts. The moon flights were so interesting and exciting.

The lunar flights give you a correct perception of our existence. You look back at Earth from the moon, and you can put your thumb up to the window and hide the Earth behind your thumb. Everything youve ever known is behind your thumb, and that blue-and-white ball is orbiting a rather normal star, tucked away on the outer edge of a galaxy.

The moon is essentially gray, no color; looks like plaster of Paris or sort of a grayish beach sand.

Boys like either dinosaurs or airplanes. I was very much an airplane boy.

I didn't go into the NASA program to pick up rocks or to go the moon or anything else. I went in there because I was a military officer, and that was the next notch in my profession.

I was born a year after Lindbergh made his historic trip across the Atlantic. Boys like either dinosaurs or airplanes. I was very much an airplane boy.

I would suspect strongly that over a period of time, if we put our mind to going to Mars, it will be a consortium of several countries.

The fascination to go into space has existed for hundreds of years. But as we do things and they're successful, people get bored.

We hadn't seen any rats or evidence of rats until the school district started the eradication program, and then we started to see evidence of the rats moving across the fence line.

The training in those days was rather ad hoc because the people running NASA were basically engineers,

Back in those days, going to the moon, geology was important, ... But how do we train pilots to be geologists? We concentrated on observing, not the analytical parts of the rocks.

That training really helped us on the second time around, ... It was one of those acts of fate.

Al was a very confident person, and he contributed a lot to the (space) program,

A lot of stuff, we had to learn ourselves. Training became some school work in those areas we were not familiar with, like orbital mechanics, the extensive gyroscopic systems for control of the vehicle.

Instead of starting the eradication on the outskirts and forcing the rats in they bombed the garden and moved them out of the area and forced them here. I understand the pressure they were under to take care of the rats and open the school but they didn't consider anything else besides their own problem.

I didnt go into the NASA program to pick up rocks or to go the moon or anything else. I went in there because I was a military officer, and that was the next notch in my profession.

For most of the time carrier aviation is more challenging than flying in a spacecraft

The Moon is essentially gray - no color - looks like plaster of paris - soft of gray sand.

The Earth from here is a grand oasis in the big vastness of space.

Err Houston, we've had a problem. [pause] We've had a main B bus undervolt.

I never thought I didn't have a card to play.

It looks to me, looking out the hatch, that we are venting something. We are venting something into the-into the space.

The real friends of the space voyager are the stars. Their friendly, familiar patterns are constant companions, unchanging, out there.

Houston, we've had a problem here

Please be informed, there is a Santa Claus.

The vast loneliness is awe-inspiring and it makes you realize just what you have back there on Earth.

Well, Frank, my thoughts are very similar. The vast loneliness up here at the moon is awe-inspiring, and it makes you realize what you have back there on earth. The earth from here is a grand oasis in the big vastness of space.

You need to be a person who makes things happen.

We learned a lot about the Moon, but what we really learned was about the Earth. The fact that just from the distance of the Moon you can put your thumb up and you can hide the Earth behind your thumb. Everything that you've ever known, your loved ones, your business, the problems of the Earth itself-all behind your thumb. And how insignificant we really all are, but then how fortunate we are to have this body and to be able to enjoy loving here amongst the beauty of the Earth itself.

When I circled the moon and looked back at Earth, my outlook on life and my viewpoint of Earth changed... Earth is a spaceship, just like Apollo - and just like Apollo, the crew must learn to live and work together. We must learn to manage the resources of this world with new imagination.