 After they landed, how were the crewmen viewed by the general public?
Illustrated by WOOD My agent was the one who got me the job of going along to write up the first trip to Mars. "It'll be the biggest break a writer ever got," he told me, two days before blastoff. A you-are-there type of report? Trip time is supposed to take 260 days (that's one way), so we're aimed toward where Mars will be (had better be, or else). A pilot, co-pilot, navigator and biochemist. I've met all but the pilot (he's very busy today), and they seem friendly enough. Jones (that's the co-pilot; I didn't quite catch his first name) is scarlet-faced, barrel-chested and gives the general appearance of belonging under the spreading chestnut tree, not in a metal bullet flinging itself out into airless space. He keeps bent low over a welded-to-the-wall (they call it the bulkhead, for some reason or other) table, scratching away with a ballpoint pen on the maps, and now and then calling numbers over a microphone to the pilot. So far, he's still Captain Desmond to me. The inertial gravities didn't bother me so much as the gyroscopic spin they put on the ship so we have a sort of artificial gravity to hold us against the curved floor. October 2, 1960 Feeling much better today. He passed my room on the way to the galley (the kitchen) for a cup of dark brown coffee (they like it thick) and told me that we were almost past the Moon. October 3, 1960 Also, I am one of the first five men in the history of the world to see the opposite side of the Moon, with a bluish blurred crescent beyond it that Pat said was the Earth. The back of the Moon isn't much different from the front. Actually, he explained to me, the screen is supposed to keep the image of space locked into place no matter how much we spin. I told him I hoped it didn't mean we'd land on Mars upside down. I can't say I was too impressed with that 16 x 19 view of outer space. There's just no awesomeness to it, no sense of depth or immensity. Pat slept mostly all day in his compartment, and Jones sat and watched the screen revolve. April 1, 1961 I've skipped over the last 177 days or so, because there's nothing much new.
 with admiration
 with admiration  with curiosity  with fear  with disdain