HUTCHINSON, Kan. — Few who heard it can ever forget John F. Kennedy’s speech that announced the U.S. was going to the moon before the end of the 1960s.

But the space race started long before then, when Dwight Eisenhower was president. That’s the subject of Thursday’s Coffee at the Cosmo at the Cosmosphere. Tim Rives with the Eisenhower Library and Museum in Abilene talks about the start of the space race, which came with the launch of the Soviet satellite Sputnik:

 

Rives says Eisenhower had to find a balance when it came to the U.S. involvement in the space program because there were actually two very different avenues that were being taken:

 

Despite the incredible fame and triumph that occurred with the United States landing on the moon in 1969, the former president was not all that supportive of the Apollo program:

 

As always, Coffee at the Cosmo begins at 9 a.m. and is free and open to the public.