When Apollo 11 landed on the moon in July 1969, Eva Abreu was a young child living in Edison and does not remember much about the event. But what she does recall about that night was that her father was not at home.
PHOTOS COURTESY OF EVA ABREU Pictured is Guy Wong, who worked on parts of Apollo 11, which landed on the moon on July 20, 1969. His daughter, Eva Abreu, recently wrote a book, “Reaching for the Moon and the Stars: The Legacy and Influence of the Apollo Generation.” “At that time, my father was a young electronics lab technician working at Taft Electro-Systems, which was a small engineering firm located off Route 1 in Edison,” Abreu explained. “He was responsible for testing a remote sensor part which was manufactured by the company, which ended up being used on the Apollo 11 mission.”
Abreu’s father, Guy Wong, ended up going down to Cape Canaveral for the launch of the shuttle.
“At the time, I remember being sad that he was going away on an overnight trip, but when he got back, he showed us the pictures of the lunar module, the rocket blasting off, and the crowds, which was pretty exciting to see.”
Former Edison resident Eva Abreu’s (l) book about the Apollo mission is scheduled for limited release next week. Almost 40 years later, Abreu decided to undertake a project that would highlight not only her father’s work, but would have accounts from those who wanted to share their thoughts and recollections from the event.
“Reaching for the Moon and the Stars: The Legacy and Influence of the Apollo Generation” is a book that commemorates the 40th anniversary of the Apollo space mission and the day that man landed on the moon. The book will be released on, of course, July 20.
“I’ve had this idea in me for
long time, and I think with the anniversary approaching, I felt like this was the right time to pull it all together. I always wanted to write a book or series of books.”
Whereas a book of such magnitude would take many authors months if not years to compose, Abreu’s 100-page work was done in mere weeks.
“The idea popped into my head on June 14, 2009, to be exact,” Abreu said. “I thought that this would be a great thing to have done right around the time of the anniversary.”
Easier said than done, though. With only limited time to complete the project, she applied her knowledge of making connections through networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook to help jumpstart things. Also along the way, she connected with Apollo experts and enthusiasts from around the world who wanted to share their experiences of what they knew of the mission.
Abreu said the feedback was more than she had anticipated. The first release will be “limited” [“only about 200 copies”] and the majority of those who know about the book thus far have found out through word of mouth.
“If things do go well, I would like to eventually see the book make it to Barnes & Noble and Amazon.com. I also envision a situation where the information that I have not used on this go-round, I can use it in a second or third volume, and maybe I can even delve into a children’s edition, or an audio CD, a documentary — things of that nature.
“The children’s edition could really be a nice thing,” Abreu said. “Kids can learn and maybe ask their parents about the space program or technology, science, engineering.”
As for her own recollections of that amazing night 40 years ago, Abreu, 46, really can’t remember much.
“I think I was sleeping when it took off from Florida. I know that on the replays it was black and white,” Abreu recalled.
She said that about 15 people’s stories of the event are in her book.
“Some of these people in the book said that when they watched the mission on television, it really helped to shape their lives and even influenced them in such a way that they went on to become involved in career areas such as technology, science or astronomy,” Abreu said.
“Reaching for the Moon and the Stars: The Legacy and Influence of the Apollo Generation” is available at www.evaabreu.com. To be included in future editions of the publication, call 1-877-708-0884.