We’re of the generation which grew up through the economic chaos and social turmoil of the Great Depression; then, later, left to watch as our parents and other kinfolk were sent off into the bloody whirlpool of WWII…to become our – Greatest Generation -. They were all indeed the grand heroes of our youth, while we who were left at home did our chores, kept up with our school homework, and minded our manners, all the while dreaming of the glories we would someday accomplish, just like them.

At that time, one of the strongest role models and motivators to do so was a weekly radio show called – Jack Armstrong-The All-American Boy! – which just about every boy in America, who could beg, borrow, or even steal a radio so they could listen to it, followed that show with religious zealotry, gobbling up his weekly adventures and daring deeds as avidly as they did their – Wheaties – the product of the show’s sponsors. And Neil Armstrong… probably fed on both as much as the rest of us did.

But then, most of us quietly went about the business of growing up, dutifully performing the mundane tasks of daily living, as we had been so carefully taught to do. That is, focused on family, enterprise and work, service, etc., all with little thought about any possible fame or fortune we might acquire from whatever achievements we might accomplish. Showboating was not in our vocabularies, which is perhaps why some ultimately called us –The Silent Generation-.

Of course, many of our generation did achieve fame, and even fortune. Neil Armstrong was one of those, so we of his generation can share great pride in having been contemporaries to one of those All-American Boys….who got to frolic on the Moon!