Charlie Duke Signed “10th Man to Walk on the Moon” Photograph.

DUKE, Charlie.

Item Number: 142784

Rare large format glossy color photograph of Apollo 16 Lunar Module Pilot Charlie Duke; the 10th man to walk on the lunar surface. Signed by Duke in gold ink, “‘I’m proud to be an American, I’ll tell you! What a program and what a place and what an experience!’ Charlie Duke, Apollo 16 LMP, 10th Man to Walk on the Moon, April 21, 1972.” In fine condition. The photograph measures 16 inches by 20 inches.

As Lunar Module pilot of Apollo 16 in 1972, Charles Duke became the tenth and youngest person to walk on the Moon, at age 36 years and 201 days. In April 1966, Duke was one of nineteen men selected for NASA's fifth group of astronauts. In 1969, he was a member of the astronaut support crew for Apollo 10. He served as CAPCOM for Apollo 11, the first crewed landing on the Moon. His distinctive Southern drawl became familiar to audiences around the world, as the voice of a Mission Control made nervous by a long landing that almost expended all of the Lunar Module Eagle descent stage's propellant. Duke's first words to the Apollo 11 crew on the surface of the Moon were flustered, "Roger, Twank...Tranquility, we copy you on the ground. You got a bunch of guys about to turn blue. We're breathing again. Thanks a lot!"