The image, taken by Neil Armstrong, shows Buzz Aldrin standing on the lunar surface in his white spacesuit, visor down, reflecting the landscape and Armstrong himself in the gold visor. It’s one of the most reproduced images in history and has become a defining visual symbol of the entire Space Race and the Apollo program.
Armstrong and Aldrin landed the Lunar Module Eagle in the Sea of Tranquility while Michael Collins orbited above in the Command Module Columbia. Armstrong was first to step onto the surface, delivering his famous “one small step” line, with Aldrin following about 19 minutes later. The two spent roughly two and a half hours outside the module, collecting samples, taking photographs, and setting up scientific instruments, including a seismometer and a retroreflector for laser-ranging experiments still used today.
Interestingly, there are very few clear photos of Armstrong himself on the Moon, since he carried the camera for most of the moonwalk — meaning Aldrin, as the more-photographed astronaut, became the visual face of the “man on the Moon” image in a lot of popular memory, even though Armstrong was first.
The mission fulfilled President Kennedy’s 1961 goal of landing a man on the Moon before the decade was out, and remains one of the most celebrated achievements in human history, watched by an estimated 600 million people worldwide at the time.