Astronaut James Lovell, the man who didn't walk on the Moon, has died

American astronaut James Lovell, who died on Thursday, August 7, at the age of 97, will forever be remembered as the man who didn't walk on the Moon. Of course, the saying applies to billions of Homo sapiens, but no one else deserves it more than he does. He is, in fact, the only Apollo astronaut to have twice traveled to our satellite without ever setting foot on it. The first time, because the mission didn't call for it; the second, because events decided otherwise.

James Lovell was born on March 25, 1928, in Cleveland, Ohio, the only son of a Czech mother and a Canadian father who died in a car accident in 1933. The family was in financial difficulty, but young Lovell was still able to study engineering at university thanks to a program offered by the U.S. Navy, which he joined. He became a Navy pilot and, by the mid-1950s, had made over 100 carrier landings. His next step was to become a test pilot in 1958, a position that was the natural stepping stone for future astronauts.

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