Charles Duke

Charles Moss Duke Jr. (born October 3, 1935) is an American former astronaut, United States Air Force (USAF) officer and test pilot.

Charles Moss Duke Jr. was born in Charlotte, North Carolina, on October 3, 1935, the son of Charles Moss Duke, an insurance salesman, and his wife Willie Catherine Waters, who worked as a buyer for Best & Co. He was followed six minutes later by his identical twin brother William Waters (Bill) Duke.

His mother traced her ancestry back to Colonel Philemon Waters, who fought in the American Revolutionary War.

After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, brought the United States into World War II, his father volunteered to join the Navy, and was assigned to Naval Air Station North Island in California.

The family moved to California to join him, but after a year he was shipped out to the South Pacific, and Willie took the boys to Johnston, South Carolina, where her mother lived.

His father returned from the South Pacific in 1944, and was stationed at Naval Air Station Daytona Beach, so the family moved there.

In 1946, after the war ended, they settled in Lancaster, South Carolina, where his father sold insurance, and his mother ran a dress shop.

Duke was active in the Boy Scouts of America and earned its highest rank, Eagle Scout in 1946.

He attended Lancaster High School.

Duke decided that he would like to pursue a military career.

Since his father had served in the Navy, he wanted to go to the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland.

As a first step, Duke went to see his local congressman, James P. Richards, who lived in Lancaster.

Richards said that he would be pleased to give Duke his nomination, as a local boy.

Richards advised Duke that he would still need to pass the entrance examination, and recommended that he attend a military prep school.

Duke and his parents accepted this advice, and chose the Admiral Farragut Academy in St. Petersburg, Florida, for his final two years of schooling.

A sister, Elizabeth (Betsy), was born in 1949.

As a boy, Duke and his brother Bill made model aircraft.

A congenital heart defect caused Bill to drop out of strenuous sports, and eventually inspired him to pursue a career in medicine, but golf was a sport that they enjoyed together.

After completion of this training, Duke served three years as a fighter pilot with the 526th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron at Ramstein Air Base in West Germany.

He graduated from Farragut as valedictorian and president of the senior class in 1953.

A 1957 graduate of the United States Naval Academy, Duke joined the USAF and completed advanced flight training on the F-86 Sabre at Moody Air Force Base in Georgia, where he was a distinguished graduate.

Duke sat the examination for Annapolis in the middle of his senior year, and soon after received a letter informing him that he had passed, and had been accepted into the class of 1957.

The Lancaster News ran his picture on the front page along with the announcement of his acceptance.

After graduating from the Aerospace Research Pilot School in September 1965, he stayed on as an instructor teaching control systems and flying in the F-101 Voodoo, F-104 Starfighter, and T-33 Shooting Star.

In April 1966, Duke was one of nineteen men selected for NASA's fifth astronaut group. In 1969, he was a member of the astronaut support crew for Apollo 10.

He served as CAPCOM for Apollo 11, the first crewed landing on the Moon.

His distinctive Southern drawl became familiar to audiences around the world, as the voice of Mission Control concerned by the long landing that almost expended all of the Lunar Module Eagle descent stage's propellant.

Duke's first words to the Apollo 11 crew on the surface of the Moon were "Roger, Twank...Tranquility, we copy you on the ground. You got a bunch of guys about to turn blue. We're breathing again. Thanks a lot!"

Duke was backup lunar module pilot on Apollo 13.

Shortly before the mission, he caught rubella (German measles) from a friend's child and inadvertently exposed the prime crew to the disease.

As Ken Mattingly had no natural immunity to the disease, he was replaced as command module pilot by Jack Swigert.

Mattingly was reassigned as command module pilot of Duke's flight, Apollo 16.

On this mission, Duke and John Young landed at the Descartes Highlands, and conducted three extravehicular activities (EVAs).

He served as backup lunar module pilot for Apollo 17.

As Lunar Module pilot of Apollo 16 in 1972, he became the 10th and youngest person to walk on the Moon, at age 36 years and 201 days.

Duke retired from NASA on January 1, 1976.

Following his retirement from NASA, Duke entered the Air Force Reserve and served as a mobilization augmentee to the Commander, USAF Basic Military Training Center, and to the Commander, USAF Recruiting Service.

He graduated from the Industrial College of the Armed Forces in 1978.

He was promoted to brigadier general in 1979, and retired in June 1986.

He has logged 4,147 hours' flying time, of which 3,632 hours were in jet aircraft, and 265 hours were in space, including 21 hours and 38 minutes of EVA.