Neil Armstrong and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin became the first men to walk on the moon on July 20, 1969. As astronauts of the Apollo 11 mission, Armstrong and Aldrin landed the lunar module Eagle on the moon’s surface and spent two and a half hours exploring and collecting samples for scientific study. Armstrong, the first to walk on the moon, famously spoke the words, “That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.” The following day, the Eagle redocked with the command module Columbia, which had been orbiting the moon, and safely splashed down in the Pacific Ocean on July 24.