Neil
Between my un-credited work on The Tick, unreleased margin art for The Power Twins, and articles posted under a pseudonym for conspiracy websites, I’ve written more about Neil Armstrong than any other single historical person.
Of all that writing, however, the first true statement I make publicly is that I am saddened to hear of his demise this weekend.
On the heels of doing a strip to commemorate Sally Ride, it seems inappropriate to reuse the artwork with new lettering so soon. Instead, here are some of the better lies I’ve told about this American Hero and Astronaut:
“Neil Armstrong was the second man on the moon. Buzz Aldrin, in fact, was first. [Everyone’s] seen the video of Neil descending the ladder on the Eagle. Who do you think was holding the camera?”
In an article about the “CIA Space Station” published in The Tick Circus Maximus: Update #1 (2003), I detailing some of the security problems with the effort to build a space station using iron mined on the moon. “In 1969 when a routine maintenance trip accidentally became public knowledge, wrench turner Neil Armstrong along with ditch digger Buzz Aldrin suddenly turned into national heroes by becoming the first men on the moon. While Aldrin was actually the first man on the moon, it was as a joyriding teenager fully fifty years earlier.” Yes, I know that makes Buzz Aldrin about 30 years older than he really is… nothing a little super serum can’t solve.
My favorite, and most honest lie, deals with the controversy and conspiracy surrounding whether or not the moon landings happened. I’ve offered that, the televised landing of Apollo 11 was, in fact, filmed on a sound stage. Of course, that sound stage was on the Moon.
Ernest Gruening, Governor of the Alaska Territory from 1939 to 1953 and U.S. Senator from 1958 to 1969, is a close second for amount we’ve written about a single historical person.
Most of what we said about him is true, or “historical fiction,” though. Gruening was an instrumental character appearing in The Tick Golden Age #3.