Blog 105: The Once Silver Moon

Did you know the moon shone silver once? The sun's light was bounced off the grey dust that feeds the grass that gives it the emerald hue we see today. It must be ringing a bell now, you've heard an old man tell you that idly, maybe your father or his. It's easy to forget that life did not find itself on Earth's constant companion by the same means as it did on Earth itself. You'll have heard of N.A.S.A I'm sure? They were some of the first spacemen, sponsored by the American Government, desperate to beat the Russians in a petty publicity war known as The Space Race. The Russians had their early victories such as the probe Sputnik which only hastened the Americans on to set other records of their own. It was an American who set foot on the moon first, you must know that.

Even the grainy black and white footage in defunct  four by three ratio shows clearly enough that there was no sea of green grass on the satellite's surface when the astronaut took his first steps. The seeds of the all-encompassing lawn we see today were sown by his organisation three quarters of a century later to make their final mark on history. As a last act N.A.S.A coloured the moon green so their legacy could be seen by anyone who ever looked skyward at night. The effort was also the first and to date the most successful example of terraforming.

You might one day be lucky enough to stand on the green turf of the moon and look down upon the glimmering blue orb of Earth and if you do just think about how long Earth has looked as it does compared to how long there has been grass on the moon.