President Richard Nixon had an alternate speech ready to give to Americans had the Apollo 11 journey to the moon been unable to return.
Had Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin been stranded on the moon, Nixon would have called the widows of the men and delivered the speech, the Sunday Express reported. The astronauts, who did successfully land on the moon, would have been memorialized with a funeral similar to the one the Navy uses for sailors lost at sea.
“Fate has ordained that the men who went to the Moon to explore in peace will stay on the Moon to rest in peace,