On Christmas Eve 1968, at the end of one of the most painful years in American history, Apollo 8 astronauts Frank Borman, Jim Lovell, and Bill Anders became the first humans to orbit another world. Borman later said they were told they would have the largest audience that had ever listened to a human voice, and NASA’s only instruction was to do something appropriate. So while the camera showed pictures of the moon and the Earth, the three men took turns reading the first verses of Genesis: “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.” They closed by wishing a merry Christmas to everyone on the good Earth.
