Author: theLogBook.com

September 1969: Thanks to the lopsided but miraculously survivable landing, and later successful return, of Apollo 11, NASA is still in the business of going to the moon, but when the CIA obtains blueprints for a Soviet lunar military base, the stakes get higher. Wernher von Braun and the rest of NASA have new marching orders from President Nixon to do whatever is necessary to beat the Soviet Union to this goal, beginning with Apollo 12. von Braun ridicules the idea; Apollo is meant to be a civilian scientific endeavor in his eyes. This doesn’t sit well with Nixon, however, and in Washington the wheels begin turning to oust von Braun from his very secure seat at NASA. One person who becomes key to this plan is grounded astronaut Ed Baldwin, but when invited to offer public testimony before Congress, Baldwin takes responsibility for sticking to Apollo 10’s non-landing flight plan, and then resigns from NASA to rejoin the Navy. And when von Braun is invited to testify, he is ambushed with accusations that he had full knowledge that Jewish slave laborers were worked to death to build his V2 rockets during World War II. The launch of Apollo 12 is moved up from December to September 1969, but the Soviets launch another lunar mission of their own just before Apollo 12’s liftoff, again upstaging NASA – this time by putting the first woman on the moon.

written by Matt Wolpert & Ben Nedivi
directed by Seth Gordon
music by Jeff Russo

Cast: Joel Kinnaman (Edward Baldwin), Michael Dorman (Gordo Stevens), Sarah Jones (Tracy Stevens), Shantel VanSanten (Karen Baldwin), Jodi Balfour (Ellen Waverly), Wrenn Schmidt (Margo Madison), Chris Bauer (Deke Slayton), Colm Feore (Wernher von Braun), Eric Ladin (Gene Kranz), Michael J. Harney (Jack Broadstreet), Saul Rubinek (Rep. Charles Sandman), Dan Donohue (Thomas Paine), Arturo Del Puerto (Octavio Rosales), Olivia Trujillo (Aleida Rosales), Ben Begley (Charlie Duke), Meghan Leathers (Pam Horton), Jeff Branson (Neil Armstrong), Chris Agos (Buzz Aldrin), Ryan Kennedy (Michael Collins), Noah Harpster (Bill Strausser), Nick Toren (Tim “Bird Dog” McKiernan), Daniel Scott Robbins (Hank Poppen), David Andrews (Admiral Scott Uken), Nick Wechsler (Fred), Steven Pritchard (Pete Conrad), Spencer Garrett (Roger Scott), Teya Patt (Emma), Teddy Blum (young Shane Baldwin), Jason Scott David (young Daniel Stevens), William Lee Holler (young Jimmy Stevens), Shaw Jones (Capcom), Jeffrey Muller (Del), Max Barsness (Tommy), Jason Denuszek (Magazine Photographer), Rita Khrabrovitsky (Anastasia Belikova), Rachel Rosenbloom (Doris), Jessica Amlee (Ginger), Krystal Torres (Cata), Janelle Froehlich (Pauline), Laura Long (Trish)

Notes: Though it provides a very dramatic visual, the non-remote-controlled television camera attached to Eagle‘s descent stage could not have panned, tilted, or otherwise followed the ascent stage of the lunar module without someone still being on the ground to control it, nor could it have been detached to offer a wide-angle view of Eagle itself. Remote-controlled cameras capable of following the ascent stage up weren’t part of any Apollo mission’s standard equipment until the later missions equipped with lunar rovers (Apollo 15, 16, 17).

LogBook entry by Earl Green

January 1970: With the Soviets having put a woman on the moon with their second lunar landing, the White House orders NASA to make it a priority to do the same. 20 women are selected as astronaut candidates: some already experienced pilots, some already working for NASA, some of them previously considered during NASA’s brief period of testing women as potential Mercury astronauts. One of the more controversial choices is Tracy Stevens, wife of Apollo 15 astronaut Gordo Stevens and herself a pilot with light aircraft experience, though she hasn’t flown since getting married and starting a family. But for political and PR purposes, Tracy has “most favored nation” status among the candidates, something which earns the scorn of the other women selected when she keeps making the cut despite scoring the lowest. When one of NASA’s Lunar Orbiter satellites detects ice in a crater – an ingredient for long-term stays on the moon, including the lunar base Nixon is demanding.

written by Nichole Beattie
directed by Allen Coulter
music by Jeff Russo

Cast: Joel Kinnaman (Edward Baldwin), Michael Dorman (Gordo Stevens), Sarah Jones (Tracy Stevens), Shantel VanSanten (Karen Baldwin), Jodi Balfour (Ellen Waverly), Wrenn Schmidt (Margo Madison), Chris Bauer (Deke Slayton), Sonya Walger (Molly Cobb), Eric Ladin (Gene Kranz), Michael J. Harney (Jack Broadstreet), Dan Donohue (Thomas Paine), Krys Marshall (Danielle Poole), Cass Buggé (Patty Doyle), Nate Corddry (Larry Wilson), Brian Stepanek (Shorty Powers), Spencer Garrett (Roger Scott), Teya Patt (Emma), Teddy Blum (young Shane Baldwin), Jason Scott David (young Daniel Stevens), Benjamin Seay (Ray Schumer), Dan Warner (General Arthur Weber), Devin McCarthy (Janice), Kate Rodman (Megan), Leia Hurst (Barbara), Benjamin Burton (Murph), Nick Echols (Chaddie)

Notes: The incident in which Neil Armstrong had to punch out of the lunar landing research vehicle (nicknamed the “flying bedstead”) because it was about to crash was real and well-documented. Ironically, while water ice has been detected in shaded craters on the lunar surface, the first such detection took place when samples returned by the Soviet Luna 24 lander, launched in 1976, were analyzed on Earth. Confirmation of that find can be credited to NASA instruments which were carried to the moon on India’s Chandrayaan-1 probe in 2009. Given the fictitious hunt for a suitable spot for a lunar military base that is part of this series’ alternate-history plotline, it’s likely that in such a circumstance, the real Lunar Orbiter program – which scouted suitable Apollo landing sites in the span of just over a year between 1966 and ’67 – would have been extended beyond five orbiters.

LogBook entry by Earl Green