When We Left Earth: The NASA Missions

May 5, 1961, Astronaut Alan B. Shepard Jr. pilots the Freedom 7 capsule to become the first American in space. Covering 300 miles and lasting just 15 minutes, this suborbital flight etched Shepard's name in our collective minds.

On February 20, 1962, Astronaut John Glenn pilots the Friendship 7 and becomes the first American to orbit the Earth. Relive launch footage from Cape Canaveral, including the exhilarating moments of re-entry, landing and recovery.

On December 15, 1965, NASA achieves a rendezvous in Earth orbit with two piloted spacecraft. Gemini 7, with Command Pilot Frank F. Borman II and Pilot James A. Lovell Jr., already in space for more than 10 days, meets with Gemini 6, guided by Command Pilot Walter M. Schirra and Pilot Thomas P. Stafford.

NASA selects seven men to become the first astronauts. They're all test pilots, prepared to risk their lives. No one has ever survived a vertical launch on top of a rocket, but it's the only way they know to put an astronaut into earth orbit. NASA and America's first astronauts, the Mercury Seven, are on a journey into the unknown. Six of the men ride into space, each launch taking NASA further forward in their quest to conquer space.

Nine new astronauts arrive at NASA - their mission, to test all the procedures required to land men on the moon and bring them safely back to earth. Each Gemini mission launches two men into space, leading to some of NASA's greatest moments - Ed White's spacewalk, the first orbital rendezvous of Gemini 6 and 7, and Neil Armstrong's first space docking.

The Apollo program is set to achieve the ultimate prize of the Space Race, landing men on the moon. But a fire breaks out in the pressurized capsule of Apollo 1, resulting in the deaths of three beloved astronauts. However, NASA rebounds, launching men into deep space and landing Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on the moon.