201950th Anniversary Man On The Moon - First Day Cover

On July 20th, 1969, the world anxiously followed with great support as Neil A. Armstrong and Edwin E. Aldrin Jr took their first steps on the surface of the Moon.
This year will mark 50 years since the historical landing - a breakthrough for mankind that is acclaimed throughout the world.
At the height of the Cold War, President John F Kennedy addressed the United Sates Congress declaring a national goal of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to Earth. Winning the Space Race would ascertain the United States as the superior power beyond economic or military terms. The newly-formed National Aeronautics and Space Administration, NASA, launched its third human spaceflight programme called Project Apollo which ran from 1961 to 1972. After years of work and the valuable knowledge gained from the subsequent Apollo missions, Apollo 11 was ready to make history.

Apollo 11 was launched from the Kennedy Space Center on July 16th, 1969, carrying astronauts Neil A. Armstrong, Michael Collins and Edwin E. Aldrin Jr to the Moon. The spacecraft had three primary segments, the upper segment named Columbia, the service module and the lower landing segment called Eagle. In preparation for landing, Aldrin and Armstrong entered Eagle while Collins stayed in Columbia in orbit around the Moon. Overcoming some technical hitches, astronauts Aldrin and Armstrong successfully landed Eagle on the moon on July 20th, 1969 and when Armstrong stepped on the lunar surface, he uttered what would become one of history's most famous one-liners. - "That's one small step for (a) man, one giant leap for mankind". The scientific and cultural significance of the Apollo 11 mission inspired generations that followed.
The design of the miniature sheet is by Aidan Cassar and is an artistic rendition of a Moon landing as it would or could appear in the present day. It does not seek to replicate the actual 1969 historical event .