NASA astronaut,
Brig. Gen. Charles M. Duke Jr.,
one of 12 men in the world
who walked on the Moon.

ormer NASA astronaut Brig. Gen. Charles Duke Jr. is one of 12 men who walked on the Moon. That walk was important, but it only lasted three days. His walk with the Lord will be eternal. He’s walked that path with his wife, Dotty, for 31 blessed years.

Steps to the Moon

Charlie’s journey to the Moon began with a childhood desire to serve his country, partially prompted by his father’s World War II Navy duty.

Charlie and his twin brother, Bill, were born in Charlotte, N.C., in 1935, but the family later moved to Lancaster, S.C. Intent on attending the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis, Charlie spent his junior and senior years of high school at Admiral Farragut Academy, a boarding/prep school.

While at the Naval Academy, he volunteered for the U.S. Air Force. He was on his way to Germany to join a fighter interceptor squadron in 1959 when NASA selected the first group of Mercury astronauts. Although he was too young and wasn’t qualified, he thought it would be a fun job.

Astronaut Charles M. Duke Jr., Apollo 16 Lunar Module pilot. Photo credit: NASA.

The military later sent him to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for a master’s degree in aeronautics and astronautics. Two things made his first year difficult. He was spending a lot of time courting Dorothy “Dotty” Meade Claiborne, whom he would marry in June 1963, and the classes were harder than he’d expected. The outcome was probation, but he pulled through with a good tutor.

He had an opportunity for a connection with Apollo when he began working with the instrumentation lab at MIT for his master’s thesis. MIT had the contract to build the guidance and navigation system for Apollo, and they needed someone with pilot skills to fly the simulator. While working with the lab, Charlie met several astronauts, which further convinced him they had great jobs.

Charlie’s desire to get back into the cockpit led him to volunteer for the Aerospace Research Pilot School after graduating from MIT. His acceptance took him and Dotty to Edwards Air Force Base in the hot, barren California desert. Working under Gen. Chuck Yeager, Charlie thought he’d died and gone to Heaven, but Dotty “cried for three months.”

When Charlie graduated in the summer of 1965, NASA already had four groups of astronauts. He thought there wasn’t much luck for him to get to the Moon; but a few months later, he read that NASA needed more astronauts. He applied and was accepted.

Astronaut Charles M. Duke Jr. and his wife, Dorothy, at Apollo 16 launch pad. Photo credit: NASA.

Charlie found out NASA had selected him for the astronaut program when Deke Slayton called him to congratulate him and ask him to report to Houston on May 1, 1966.

It was an exciting time, but Apollo got off to a tragic start, when, on Jan. 27, 1967, a fire on the pad at Cape Kennedy took the lives of the Apollo 1 prime crew. Because of that accident, NASA would need to completely redesign the Apollo command module spacecraft. Charlie was part of an emergency egress-working group to solve that problem.

A year later, Charlie became part of the support crew for Apollo 10. His help in developing lunar module activation and checkout procedures resulted in a Mission Control job as CAPCOM (capsule communicator).

That experience led to Apollo 11’s Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin requesting that Charlie be on their support crew. Charlie was on CAPCOM duty when they made their historic landing on the Moon on July 20, 1969, making him the first person to communicate with someone on the Moon.

Shortly after that mission was complete, NASA scheduled Charlie for the back-up crew of Apollo 13, but he came down with the German measles a week before launch and was sent home. Two days after launch, an electrical fault caused an explosion in a service module oxygen tank. That explosion also damaged the other oxygen tank. The command module remained fully functional on its own batteries and oxygen tank, but they were sufficient only for the last hours of the mission during re-entry and landing.

“Everything was running out: oxygen, electric power, water,” Charlie recalls. “Their lunar module was made for two guys for a maximum of two or three days. But there were three people, for 99 hours.”

The crew shut down the command module and used the lunar module as a lifeboat for the return to Earth. NASA asked Charlie to return to Mission Control. For the next 35 hours, Charlie and fellow astronauts Gene Cernan and Joe Engle spent time in the simulator on vital procedures and developments that eventually got the men home safe.

The normal cycle had been for the back-up crew to rotate to prime every third flight. Charlie wasn’t disappointed when right after Apollo 13 his assignment to Apollo 16 was confirmed.

The prime of the Apollo 16 lunar landing mission. Left to right: Thomas K. Mattingly II, Command Module pilot; John W. Young, Commander; and Charles M. Duke Jr., Lunar Module pilot. Photo credit: NASA.

On the Moon

Nearly seven years later, on April 16, 1972, Charlie was aboard Apollo 16 when it launched, with a lunar landing date scheduled for April 20. The severe vibrations during liftoff surprised him, but he says that once they shut down the first stage, the flight was as smooth as glass.

They went into orbit head down, and once they jettisoned the boost protective cover, Charlie could see the deep blue of the Atlantic Ocean fading into the lighter blue of the atmosphere, and then the light blue fade to white and the white fade out into the blackness of space.

"He suspends the earth over nothing." (Job 26:7, Holy Bible). Photo credit: Apollo 16 crew.

They left Earth’s orbit over Australia. Charlie recalls seeing Earth 16,000 miles away and marveling at the beauty of the white snow and clouds, crystal blue oceans and brown landmasses. “That jewel was just hung in the blackness of space,” he says.

Charlie recalls that at the time, his reaction wasn’t spiritual. “It was just, ‘Wow. This is awesomely, breathtakingly beautiful,’” he says.

After becoming a believer in Jesus Christ, he came across Isaiah 40:22: “He sits enthroned above the circle of the earth ….” He says, “I didn’t see God, but I saw the circle of the Earth. It occurred to me that only 24 of us – the guys who went to the Moon on Apollo – have seen that.”

He also appreciated Job 26: 7: “… He suspends the earth over nothing.” He comments, “That’s exactly how it looks. The Earth is just suspended in the blackness of space.”

Viewing an Earthrise from the Moon. Photo credit: Apollo 16 crew.

Since the men went into orbit on the dark side of the Moon, they couldn’t initially see the surface. Later, both the sunrise and the sight of earthrise were dramatic. “Sunrise on the Moon is instant,” he recalls. “There’s no beginning glow with a horizon like on Earth.”

After a required rest period, Commander John Young and Charlie, lunar module pilot, got in the lunar module and powered up. When they were a couple of miles away from the command module, CM pilot TK Mattingly had to change his orbit and one of the control loops in the engine became inoperative. Mission Control initially told them to start planning to come home.

Devastated, they slowly started closing the gap. Charlie looked longingly down at the landing spot eight miles beneath him and thought of his two years of training and the 240,000 miles they’d traveled.

John and Charlie stood by for about four hours, while Mission Control tried to fix the problem. They were ecstatic when the issue was resolved, and they were able to begin descending to the lunar surface. As they got lower, blowing dust everywhere, they watched shadows getting bigger and bigger.

“It was like landing in a fog,” Charlie says.

Astronaut Charles M. Duke Jr., Lunar Module pilot, Apollo 16 mission, collects lunar samples at the Descartes landing site. (Photographer: Astronaut John W. Young) Photo credit: NASA.

The Lunar Roving Vehicle gets a high-speed workout by astronaut John W. Young in the "Grand Prix" run at the Descartes landing site. (Photographer: Astronaut Charles M. Duke Jr.). Photo credit: NASA.

Apollo 16 astronaut Charles M. Duke Jr. stands near the Lunar Roving Vehicle at Station 4 on the Moon. Note the angularity of the rocks in the area. (Photographer: Astronaut John W. Young) Photo credit: NASA.

When Charlie’s foot touched the Moon, making him the 10th man to have that privilege, he happily bounced around. After planting the flag and taking pictures, he took the Apollo Lunar Surface Experiments package out to the deployment site.

After deploying the experiments, they drove the Lunar Rover west to Plum Crater, did some geology and drove back.

When Charlie got off the car, he filmed John during a “Grand Prix” with a 16-milimeter movie camera. That would become the only footage of the whole rover on the Moon, since other footage came from a camera mounted on the car.

After their next rest period, the men headed south to Stone Mountain for their second extra-vehicular activity. As the vehicle bounced over Moon rocks and craters, Charlie navigated, gave Mission Control a travelogue and took pictures.

After 71 hours and 15 minutes on the lunar surface, the men prepared for their rendezvous with TK. Charlie’s space adventure was far from over. Two days before reentry, he and TK took a spacewalk.

Floating out, Charlie looked to the right and saw the Earth; 180,000 miles away, it was a sliver of blue and white. Turning, he looked over his left shoulder, and saw an enormous full Moon, 50,000 miles away.

“It was spectacular,” he says. “Except for the sun, everywhere else you looked was black. You’re in brilliant sunlight, so it’s not like blackness in a cave. You’re looking out into this infinite expanse, and all you see is this velvety black.”

The flight ended with a splashdown that was right on target. Charlie later returned to Houston for a reunion with family and friends and a big celebration, followed by a couple of weeks of debriefing.

He also had a chance to be part of Apollo 17, when he, John Young and Stu Roosa replaced the back-up crew. With the end of Apollo, Charlie had various jobs regarding the space shuttle, but he was frustrated and bored. “It’s tough to top landing on the Moon,” he says.

Charlie found that he still had the drive that took him to the Moon, and he didn’t know how he would channel it. “The shuttle just didn’t do that for me right away,” he says.

By the fall of 1975, Charlie had changed his focus. He says, “I took my eyes off the Moon and put them on money.”

He retired from NASA and headed for San Antonio, Texas, where he founded and became the president of the Orbit Corporation in 1976.

Dotty sets her eyes on heaven

While her husband was conquering the world, Dotty Duke was trying to find a purpose for her life. In her book, “From Sadness to Joy,” she tells about a courtship that ended as soon as they were married. From that point on, she struggled with the fact that Charlie focused on his career and had little time for her.

Over the years, her despair turned to depression, as she continued to hope that Charlie would one day put her first. Initially, Dotty didn’t think about divorce, since she was afraid the love she yearned for didn’t exist. Instead, while seeking fulfillment, she tried a career, church work, volunteering with the Head Start program, helping the needy and even marijuana.

Eventually believing there just wasn’t a purpose in life, her thoughts turned to divorce as well as suicide. “I was married to a famous man, had a nice home and healthy children, plenty of money, yet I had no hope,” she sums up her existence.

Astronaut Charles M. Duke Jr., Apollo 16 Lunar Module pilot, with lunar globe. Photo credit: NASA.

Charlie had navigated his career successfully without God, but he didn’t know what to do when his wife starting talking about ending it all.

“Our marriage was in the tank,” Charlie says. “We had two kids. Things were very grim at home.”

Then, Dotty’s life drastically changed. She had always been a churchgoer, and had even taught Sunday school, yet she doubted God’s existence. That changed in October 1975, when the Dukes attended a “spiritual renewal weekend” hosted by their church. As she listened to guests tell first-hand stories of how Jesus had made a difference in their lives, she yearned for what they had, including the love and joy she saw on their faces.

Dotty prayed, admitting to God that she didn’t know if he was real or if Jesus was the Son of God, but that she was tired of being in charge of her life. The next morning, she prayed again, promising to look only to God for fulfillment. As she continued to pray, God continued to answer them, until finally she could no longer doubt his existence.

“After she gave her heart to the Lord, I saw a remarkable transformation in her life over several months,” Charlie says. “She just kept committing more and more of her life to Jesus.”

Charlie faces a life-changing decision

Former astronaut, Charlie Duke.

For a while, Charlie’s spiritual life didn’t change. He acknowledges that plenty of people had influenced him toward the Christian faith as he grew up, including his mother, twin brother and sister, as well as a host of relatives who were believers. At the age of 11, he and his brother were baptized. Throughout his life, he was a faithful church attendee who believed in God and respected him. “I knew who Jesus was, but I hadn’t surrendered control of my life to him,” he says.

Charlie sold his business in March 1978. The following month, a good friend invited him to a Bible study at T Bar M Tennis Ranch. He went reluctantly, but that meeting brought a transformation to his life.

A life-changing decision faced Charlie. Over the weekend, he found himself thinking about Jesus claiming to be the Son of God, and thought, “This is either true or the biggest lie ever perpetrated on humanity.”

Scriptures he’d heard when he was a child kept entering his mind. He decided he either needed to commit to believing in Jesus or stop playing church. That weekend, as they prepared to go home, Charlie told Dotty he knew that Jesus was the Son of God. Then, he prayed and turned his life over to the Lord.

Charlie and Dotty Duke.

Although he heard no bells or whistles and saw no angelic host or blinding lights, he knew he’d made the right decision. “I experienced peace,” he says.

Since he’d sold his business and wasn’t searching immediately for a new business opportunity, he began reading the Bible. The more he read, the more committed he became.

When the Lord spoke to him about being a better husband and loving his wife unconditionally, he asked God to forgive him for the past and to make him the husband God wanted him to be. Then, he went to Dotty and asked her forgiveness as well.

“She forgave me, and we began to pray together and talk about Scripture and try to live a life that would result in a wonderful marriage and relationship,” he explains. “It worked.”

Charlie soon realized that the Bible is “God’s manufacturer’s handbook.” He says, “It tells you how to live and how to be the person God wants you to be.”

Former astronaut Charles M. Duke Jr.'s family. From upper left: Maggie (granddaughter), Charles (son), Clayton (grandson), Beth (daughter-in-law), Chas (grandson), Haywood (grandson), Charlie. Middle row: Dotty (wife), Kyffin (grandson), Heidi (daughter-in-law). Front row: Sterling (granddaughter), Parker (grandson), Tom (son), Charlie (grandson).

He knew he would also have to change his relationship with his sons, Charles III and Thomas.

“Our kids were teenagers at the time,” he says. “I was a military drill instructor dad with an explosive temper. The Lord delivered me from that. As I began to love my boys and encourage them, they began to blossom into wonderful young men and they gave their hearts to the Lord. Now we’re trying to be good examples for our grandchildren and share our faith with them and lead them to the Lord.”

God also worked in Charlie’s heart in other areas.

“The Lord took away the love of money,” he states. “We just began to be convicted by the Holy Spirit. As we repented, God began to change our lives. It’s been a wonderful walk.”

Charlie and Dotty Duke have allowed God to use their testimonies for three decades. “The Lord’s opened a lot of doors all over the world to give us an opportunity to be a witness,” he says.

Most of those opportunities have been because of his Moonwalk. Although not all of Charlie’s talks focus on what God’s done in his life, even during motivational and space-related events, he seeks ways to share his faith.

Former astronaut, Charles M. Duke Jr. in his Kennedy Space Center suit.

“In those situations and venues, they usually have a question and answer session,” he says. “I ask the Lord to have somebody ask me a question, if he wants me to say a word or two about him.”

Charlie and Dotty speak together often, and she speaks for various women’s events.

“It’s really been wonderful the way God has used her story,” Charlie says. “She glows with the love of Jesus.”

The man who walked on the Moon doesn’t hesitate when he answers a question about his life’s greatest accomplishment. “To walk humbly before God,” says Charlie.

Charlie’s story is found on two DVDs: “Charlie Duke – Moonwalker,” which tells the story of Apollo 16, and “Walk on the Moon, Walk with Son,” which tells what topped his walk on the Moon. Charlie and Dotty Duke also co-wrote “Moonwalker,” Charlie’s biography.