And The Moon Be Still As Bright

Countdown for Blastoff. X-5, 4, 3, 2, X-1, Fire. From the far horizons of the unknown come transcribed tales of new dimensions in time and space. These are stories of the future.

Adventures in which you'll live in a million could be years on a thousand maybe worlds. The National Broadcasting Company in cooperation with Street and Smith, publishers of astounding science fiction presents... Heck, heck, heck, heck, heck, heck, minus, minus, minus, minus, minus, minus, minus, minus, one, one, one, one.

Tonight, the Ray Bradbury story entitled, and the moon be still as bright. The first three expeditions for Mars left Earth in a mushroom of flame, arked through the atmosphere, and finally dwindled of tiny specks in the big eye of the Mt. Palomar telescope.

And then were lost to sight forever. The pre-arranged landing signals flashed back to Earth, and then the radios went dead. One after the other ships had disappeared and were never heard from again. But still the rockets came.

The fourth expedition emerged from the silent gulfs of space. Angle down toward the floating red disk of Mars. Down into an orbit as the order came to land. The last blast of the bowjets broke red against the blue desert sands.

The ship slid to a halt at the edge of a vast city that reflected the icy glare of the moonlight. for a while, all was still. All right, Park Hill, open the airlock. I said...

Fresh air! Hey, it's cold out here! Who cares we got here? I thought I'd never hit solid ground again. Hey, how about a fire, Captain Wildy? It's freezing. Later, we have work to do. Oh, smell that air.