Neil Alden Armstrong was born on August 5, 1930 to Stephen Koenig Armstrong and Viola Louise Engel. He was born on his grandparents' farm in Auglaize County. He was of Scottish, Irish, and German ancestry and had two younger siblings; his younger sister June and younger brother Dean. Neil’s father, Stephen Armstrong worked as an auditor. From him Neil became for the Ohio State Government. The family lived in several communities like: Warren, Ravenna, Jefferson, Upper Sandusky and St. Mary's before the family decided to settle in Wapakoneta, which was Neil’s birthplace.

Neil Armstrong did a variety of difficult and dangerous things in his time as a test pilot and astronaut. By age 16, Armstrong had a student pilot's license, even before ghe got his driver's license. Armstrong's call-up from the Navy arrived on January 26, 1949, requiring him to report to Naval Air Station Pensacola for flight training at age 18. This lasted almost 18 months, during which he qualified for carrier landing aboard the USS Cabot and USS Wright. On August 16, 1950, two weeks after his 20th birthday, Armstrong was informed by letter that he was a fully qualified Naval Aviator.

On March 16, 1966, Armstrong flew his first space mission as command pilot of the Gemini 8, with David Scott. The purpose of that mission was the first space docking. He piloted the Gemini 8 rocket to a successful docking with an Agena craft already in orbit of the Earth. The docking went well, but when they orbited together, they started go out of control. He was able to undock the Gemini and use the retro rockets to regain control of his craft, but, the astronauts had to make an emergency landing in the Pacific Ocean.
On July 16, 1969, Armstrong, Michael Collins and Edwin Aldrin began their trip to the moon. Collins was the command module pilot and navigator for the mission. Aldrin, a systems expert, was the lunar module pilot and became the second man to walk on the moon. As commander of the Apollo 11, Armstrong piloted the lunar module to a safe landing on the moon's surface. On July 20, 1969, at 10:56 P.M., Neil Armstrong became the first man to walk on the moon. At that time he made his famous statement, "That's one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind." Armstrong and Aldrin spent about 2 and a-half hours walking on the moon, collecting samples, doing experiments and taking pictures. On July 24, the three men's space craft landed in the Pacific Ocean. They were picked up by the U.S.S. Hornet. When he resigned from NASA in 1971, he was a professor of Aerospace Engineering at the University