Contested Global Visions: One-World, Whole-Earth, and the Apollo Space Photographs

Author(s): Denis Cosgrove

Source: Annals of the Association of American Geographers, Vol. 84, No. 2 (Jun., 1994), pp.
270-294
Published by: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. on behalf of the Association of American Geographers
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 Contested Global Visions: One-World,
Whole-Earth, and the Apollo Space
Photographs
Denis Cosgrove

Department of Geography, Royal Holloway, University of London, Egham, Surrey

A t 05:33 Eastern Standard Time on De- nocratic goals and universalist rhetoric of Mod-
cember 7, 1972, one of the three United ernism, the project's most enduring legacy is a
States astronauts aboard the spaceship collection of images whose meanings are con-
Apollo 17 on its coast towards the Moon shot tested in post-colonial and postmodernist dis-
a sequence of eleven color photographs of courses. In order to analyze and contextualize
Earth with a handheld Hasselblad camera. these Apollo images, I bring to bear the in-
Twelve hours after the spacecraft's splashdown tertextual approach developed in contempo-
on Christmas Eve, the film sequence was de- rary cultural analysis, here applied to the pri-
veloped at the Manned Space Center in Hous- mary object of geographical representation:
ton. Doug Ward, National Aeronautics and the surface of the Earth. The photographs are
Space Administration's (NASA) Director of interpreted by reference to various texts, some
Public Affairs, examined the printed sequence
with a view to issuing part of the mission's
three- to four-thousand frame photographic re-
cord for the waiting press. One of the images-

I2
number AS1 7-148-22727 taken at some 21,750
nautical miles from the Earth (Figure 1)-caught
his photojournalist's eye.1 It captured, center-
frame and with perfect resolution, the full ter-
racqueous disk without a solar shadow or "ter-
minator." The whole Earth, geography's
principal object of study, had been photo-
graphed by a human eyewitness.
My intention here is to examine that photo-
graphic image, 22727, together with an earlier
and equally familiar Apollo photograph of Earth
rising over a lunar landscape, Earthrise (Fig-
ure 2), with the intention of placing them in
the cultural and historical context of Western
global images and imaginings. I shall argue that
representations of the globe and the whole
Earth in the twentieth century have drawn
upon and reconstituted a repertoire of sacred
and secular, colonial and imperial meanings,
and that these representations have played an
Figure 1. The Whole Earth (NASA AS17-148-
especially significant role in the self-repre- 22727). Apollo 17 photograph of Earth from space,
sentation of the post-war United States and its December 1972.
geo-cultural mission. While the Apollo lunar
project signified the achievement of the tech-

Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 84(2), 1994, pp. 270-294

? Copyright 1994 by Association of American Geographers
Published by Blackwell Publishers, 238 Main Street, Cambridge, MA 02142, and 108 Cowley Road, Oxford, OX4 1JF, UK.

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 Contested Global Visions 271

Figure 2. Earthrise (NASA AS8-14-2383). Apollo 8 photograph of Earth taken from lunar orbit, December 1968.

written about them, others referring less di- Seeing the Globe
rectly to imagined and actual views and repre-
sentations of the globe but providing context Seeing the Earth whole is critical to the imagi-
for Apollo readings. native reception of the space images and to the
The Apollo Earth photographs, though re- totalizing socio-environmental discourses of
ceiving very limited formal attention within ge- One-world and Whole-earth to which they
ography, have been widely used as cover illus- have become so closely attached. To be sure,
trations for texts and journals (for example, in images of the globe from a distance sufficient
Geography, the journal of the Geographical As- for viewers to grasp its totality long predate the
sociation in Britain). They have been enor- Apollo photographs of the 1960s. Indeed, an
mously significant however in altering the Apollonian perspective is implicit in Ptolemeic
shape of the contemporary geographical imagi- cartography's positioning of the observer at
nation. This essay thus contributes to the grow- sufficient distance to see the spherical Earth.
ing interest in the histories of geographical The fifteenth-century rediscovery of this mode
knowledge, in which geography as a formal of terrestrial mapping marks the beginnings of
academic discipline is merely one element European Modernity.2 An epigram celebrating
(Driver 1992; Livingstone 1992). And by exam- Abraham Ortelius' Teatrum Orbis Terrarum
ining terms that are so closely associated with (1570) portrays the editor of the first systematic
the Apollo images (One-world and Whole- world atlas as Apollo owing to his ability imagi-
earth), we provide perspective also on geog- natively to circle so high above the world that
raphy's engagement in contemporary cultural the entire stage of human life was opened to
debate. his, and the reader's, eye. Since the time of

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272 Cosgrove
Ortelius and Mercator, atlases have conven-
tionally opened with a world map, in Renais-
sance terms a speculum or mirror for the Euro-
pean eye. And by linking the cartographic rep-
resentation of the Earth to its history as re-
counted in the Judeo-Christian tradition
(Rabasa 1985), the first modern cartographers
joined graphical syntheses of European global
knowledge in the first century of the European
imperium with a universalizing Christian cos-
mology and planetary geo-strategic dis-
courses-all of which prefigures the production
and early reception of the Apollo space images
(Jacob 1992).
Of course, the use of the sphere as an im-
perial emblem predates the Renaissance. From
the period of Constantine (A.D. 324-337), the
sphere is interwoven into the discourses of
Christendom and Empire. A favored medieval
representation depicts Christ holding or stand-
ing on the tripartite terrarum orbis. The geo-
metrical perfection of the sphere renders it a
suitable symbol of divinity, and Christian neo-
platonists often exploited the microcosm-mac-
rocosm implications of the congruent shapes Figure 3. Pietro Longhi's The Geography Lesson.
of the human eye and the terrestrial globe, Fondazione Querini Stampalia, Venice.
especially as represented by Ptolemy (Cos-
grove 1993). It is a short step thence to seeing
as the foundation of knowledge and power,
and to the gaze-distanced, objective, and
penetrating-as symbolically mastering, mascu- tween imaginings and Modernity. In 1665
line, and modern.3 The habits of simultane- members of the newly-founded Royal Society
ously gazing upon the world and mastering it in London heard a paper entitled "Monsieur
are increasingly synonymous in the lavishly Auzout's Speculations of the Changes, Likely
decorated globes, atlases and world maps that to be Discovered in the Earth and the Moon,
were designed to satisfy the visual lusts of Ba- by Their Respective Inhabitants," that drew on
roque princes. A case in point is Vincenzo the findings of the new physics to describe
Coronelli's design of celestial and terrestrial how our planet might look to an extraterrestrial
globes for Louis XIV at Marly. In addition to (Philosophical Transactions 1665). Two centu-
being the largest ever produced, his globes are ries later, at the moment of Europe's final drive
inscribed with the pattern of the heavens at the for terrestrial hegemony, Philip Gilbert Hamil-
moment of the Sun King's nativity and with ton imagined the Archangel Raphael's perspec-
decorative legends on the terrestrial sphere tive of Earth as he flew towards the terrestrial
that narrate the radiant spread of his faith and paradise bearing God's message to Adam.
power across the globe. By the eighteenth cen- Hamilton's description prefigures photograph
tury, the intellectual mastery of globes, their 22727 with uncanny accuracy:
celestial pattern, and their evermore detailed
It would first become visible as a mere point of
terrestrial outline of continents and seas was an light, then as a remote planet appears to us; after
accomplishment expected of the educated that it would shine and dazzle us; then we should
European bourgeoisie, male and female alike begin to see its geography as we do that of the
(Figure 3). moon; at last when we came within three terres-
trial diameters, or about twenty thousand miles
Imaginative writers were equally fascinated
[almost exactly the distance of 22727], we should
by the view of the whole Earth from space. distinguish white icy poles, the vast blue oceans,
Two examples suffice to illustrate this link be- the continents as large islands glistening like gold

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 Contested Global Visions 273
in the sunshine, and the bright silver wandering
fields of clouds. (quoted in Newhall 1969:12)

In Hamilton's time, photography as a new g 2 * ja 0 ,, A~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~.. . . ......

mode of representation was being pressed into

the service of cartography. Aerial photographs
taken from balloons and kites offered a new
mode of representation by the early twentieth
century. In the same years, polar expeditions
were completing the European project of
global exploration and mapping begun a half-
millennium earlier (Fogg 1990; Katz and Kirby
1991). Accurate cartographic representation of
g / I'd, \ j~~~~/
the vast polar regions was not to be achieved,
however, by Earth-bound observers. It was
powered flight and airplane cameras during the
inter-war years that first provided cartogra-
phers with accurate data on Antarctica. Al-
though reiterating the power of seeing, aerial
photographs did not offer a global view; rather
they reinforced the particularizing qualities of
the conventional topographic map. Only the
highest flying balloons in the 1930s achieved
sufficient altitude to convey even an impres-
sion of the Earth's curvature. The photographic
image of the whole Earth thus awaited space
rocketry in the period following World War II.
From the earliest American experiments with
captured German V2 rockets, cameras at-
Figure 4. Jacopo de Barbari's Apollo and Diana. Ve-
tached to these new sources of power offered
netian early sixteenth-century engraving showing the
an ever-wider perspective on the Earth's sur- Greek God Apollo standing above the terrestrial
face. The cultural relations between photogra- globe which turns along the zodiacal band below his
phy, cartography, and air power in the twenti- feet. Courtesy of The British Library.

eth century are central therefore to an under-

standing of the Apollo images and the interpre-
tative ambiguities that have attended them. I
shall return to these issues following a resume
of the production and content of the Apollo was short-lived. Apollo 17 was the last in a
space images. series of American-manned flights to the
Moon. Indeed the two expeditions planned to
follow it had already been cancelled before its
launch. The entire period of the Apollo space
The Apollo Program and Earth program thus spanned little more than a dec-
Photography ade from its inception in 1961. Apollo 8, the
first to escape Earth orbit and encircle the
The Apollo space program was aptly named. Moon, returned during Christmas 1968 with
Greek Apollo combined the strength and Earthrise. With it came the earliest eyewitness
beauty of male youth with the severe purity of pictures taken from sufficient distance to cap-
reason. As a sun god he circled the Earth, his ture the whole terracqueous globe, albeit as a
dispassionate vision encompassing the pathetic partial and shadowed disk suspended over the
doings of mortals (Figure 4). On the shoulders lunar landscape (Figure 2). Earthrise was the
of similarly youthful male heroes, NASA's Sat- subject of immediate commentary and specu-
urn rockets carried the imaginative vision of a lation about a reformed view of the world. But
modern superpower beyond the confines of soon after the objective of a lunar landing was
Earth. The program's appeal, while spectacular, achieved in 1969, public interest and official

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274 Cosgrove
support for the Apollo program waned rapidly. NASA officials debated the use of satellites in
Since 1972, NASA has confined astronautical photographing Earth resources (Com pton
activities to Earth orbit. Two photographs, 1989; Mack 1990; Wilhelms 1993), Earth ob-
Earthrise and 22727, define therefore a histori- servation was of relatively minor significance
cal moment in which the curtain opened on throughout. During preparations for the Apollo
the theater of the world and the human eye 8 launch, however, NASA focused consider-
pretended to Apollo's heritage. able attention on photographic plans. These
Oddly enough, the only major American plans competed for the astronauts' time and
newspaper to carry 22727 was The Chicago attention with a wide range of other demands.
Tribune in its edition of Sunday, December 24, The mission's aim-to establish possible lunar
1972, while the National Geographic magazine landing sites-required high-resolution photog-
failed to reproduce the image in its lavishly raphy and, because selection depended in part
illustrated 1973 summary of "mankind's great- on the astronauts' judgments of site quality, us-
est adventure" (Grosvenor 1973). Under the age of a handheld camera in addition to auto-
headline "One Last View of Earth", the Tribune matic work (NASA 077-66 1968).
noted presciently that not only was this "the Apollo 8 carried two 70mm and nine 16mm
first time the full Earth has been photo- magazines for Hasselblad handheld cameras to
graphed," but that it might also be the last. be used for lunar, Saturn IVB rocket, and Earth
What neither journalists nor other commenta- photography (NASA 070-36 1968; also NASA
tors anticipated, however, was the enormous MSC-NA-69 1969:13-1,4). Calculations of shut-
popularity of this image. As an icon of the ter speed (1/250 seconds), exposure, scene
Earth, 22727 would largely replace the cartog- geometry and albedo effects, and film sensitiv-
rapher's globe with its delineation of lands and ity were determined by the exigencies of the
seas on a graticule of latitude and longitude. lunar surface rather than Earth photography
The fact that both Earthrise and 22727 are in (NASA MSC-PA-R-69-1 1969:4-3). The Final
the public domain4 accounts, in part, for their Photographic and TV Operations Plan for
ubiquitous reproduction as advertising and Apollo 8 ranked photographic objectives un-
publicity copy. But that does not tell us why der two categories: Category A listed "Opera-
these images have become such powerful and tion Objectives" that were largely concerned
ambiguous icons, their meaning apparently with the lunar surface and the performance of
malleable enough for deployment in behalf of the Saturn rocket. The thirteen Category B ob-
diverse and often opposing ideological posi- jectives were headed by "long distance Earth
tions. More than any other images, Earthrise still photography," including weather and ter-
and Photo 22727 now serve as visual signifiers rain analysis with global coverage, horizon and
for the terms Whole-earth and One-world, es- high atmosphere studies, and "Earth terminator
pecially in American culture.5 Yet when we studies." Near the bottom of the list, item B12
reflect on the status that these two photo- allocated just 60 of the 335 available frames to
graphs have achieved over the past twenty "Crew observations," that is, still-camera pho-
years, the lack of critical attention accorded to tography in order "to provide documentary
them is remarkable.6 Writings about them have evidence of visually observed phenomena,
paid little attention to their pictorial form and features to be selected by the crew" (NASA
content; they have assumed instead that the 077-66 1968). In later missions, these photo-
pictures are so familiar that they do not require graphs would be referred to as "targets of op-
reproduction. Nor have critics reflected on the portunity." Ironically, if Earth photography was
historical and geographical contexts in which almost an afterthought in mission planning, it
these images were initially produced, later re- was these low-priority targets of opportunity
produced, and eventually textualized. that would yield some of the most enduring
The justifications for the Apollo program images of the entire Apollo program.
were primarily scientific and technical. The
program was seen as offering opportunities for
scientific and engineering studies of spacecraft Earthrise
performance, human responses, astronomical
phenomena and, above all, the lunar surface Apollo 8 produced the photograph of a par-
itself (Roland 1985; Rudney 1970). Although tially shadowed Earth rising over the lunar sur-

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 Contested Global Visions 275
face (Figure 2). The shot was a sensation, de- the words of Buckminster Fuller, the Earth ap-
spite the fact that full-Earth images from me- pears to float in "x-trillions of time years of
chanical cameras predated the Apollo 8 mis- nothingness (whose incredible depths appear
sion by two years. In 1966 Lunar Orbiter I, an to us as pure no-light, a quality of blackness
unmanned lunar vehicle, sent back a full-Earth never before experienced)" (Fuller 1969:37).
photograph that had been processed in space By no stretch of the imagination could we call
and electronically recomposed back on the Earthrise a cartographic image; it is however
ground; and in July 1967 a color photograph intensely geographical, drawing on powerful
of the full earthly disk was received from a conventions of cosmographic and choro-
United States Navy Dodge satellite. These im- graphic representation in the Western geo-
ages were not widely publicized, however, be- graphical imagination (Cosgrove 1984) and
cause their quality was poor. Earthrise was, by opening it to the range of interpretations dis-
contrast, witnessed by a mass television audi- cussed below.
ence prior to the publication of this stunning
still-color photograph. Given the appeal of
Earthrise, the formal aspects of its composition 22727
are worthy of more detailed examination.
The still photograph (AS8-14-2383) is tripar- Despite the sensation which attended publi-
tite in composition. A section of the lunar sur- cation of Earthrise, NASA's photographic plans
face "grounds" the image; it is light grey in for Apollo 17 assigned no greater priority to
color, dusty in texture, and the outlines of cra- Earth photography than for Apollo 8 or any of
ters are visible from color contrast. This portion the intervening manned space shots. In Sep-
of the photograph occupies some 25 percent tember 1972, three months before the launch
of the frame and contains an uninterrupted ho- of Apollo 17, NASA received a review of crew-
rizon line sloping gently from left to right. The operated photography during the Apollo pro-
rest of the image consists of the deep black of gram (NASA TN D-6972 1972). The extremely
unexposed film enshrouding the semicircle of detailed plans for photographic procedures left
Earth slightly right of center. The Earth is com- little room for initiative on the part of the as-
posed of swirls of white against a blue back- tronauts. Among the major constraints were:
ground in the color print or black in the mono- exposure times in the absence of light-diffusing
chrome. Patches of brown at the lower edge, atmosphere; insufficient time to determine op-
where the clear definition of the upper arc timal settings and vantage points; and weight
gives way to the haze of the terminator line, limits on the number and variety of lenses and
are scarcely traceable on the monochrome. film. While other constraints such as spacecraft
They can, with close attention, be recognized roll, sight-lines, angles and elevation of targets,
on the color print as the western edge of the and planetary and terminator rise and set times
African continent. The sloping horizon and po- could be met by pre-computing and pre-flight
sition of the Earth give the picture a directional simulation, photography's relatively low prior-
sense, while the orientation of the planet on ity generally meant that the opportunities for a
an east-west axis, the swirling pattern of cloud, comprehensive and high-quality photographic
and the shading of the land mass into darkness record were consistently sub-optimal through-
all suggest its revolution. out the program.
The most striking aspect of the photograph Given these constraints and the loss of a
is its inversion of an intensely familiar repre- number of frames on the Apollo 17 mission
sentational theme: a nocturnal landscape illu- owing to the failure of the film-forwarding mo-
minated by a half-moon. But here the "land- tor on the Hasselblad, it is remarkable that
scape" element is the inorganic moon while 22727 is as fine an image as it is unique. The
color is reserved to the cool oceanic and at- mission's plan called for photographic se-
mospheric earth. A secondary challenge to fa- quences of lunar earthshine photographs to be
miliar assumptions is the lack of any other illu- taken during the trans-lunar coast (TLC), but
mination-the night sky is bereft of stars. Com- other shots were "targets of opportunity." The
bined with the deathly lunar surface the pho- sequence of eleven Earth photographs
tograph suggests the complete isolation of (22725-22735), taken after a shot of the falling
terrestrial life in a black, sepulchral universe. In away of the final stage of the Saturn V rocket,

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276 Cosgrove

Figue 5.Cnatpin
FiguefAol 17 po gr hicteuneso
5 Cotactprit o . c Nig272.Suc:N
, JS.. SJ

varied in quality because of problems of expo- Summit in 1992 (Figure 6). All of this suggests
sure and framing (Figure 5). The Preliminary that the formal qualities of the image out-
Science Report following the mission paid little weighed its cartographic content. To be sure,
attention to these Earth photographs. It repro- examination of the image's composition and
duced Photo 22727 accompanied by a bland content suggests a density and an aesthetic
caption: "For the first time on an Apollo mis- harmony that are remarkable in a photograph
sion, the Antarctic icecap was visible during taken almost at whim. Undoubtedly these ar-
the Apollo 17 TLC. This full disk view encom- tistic qualities have played a significant, if little
passes much of the South Atlantic Ocean, vir- noted, role in the photograph's dissemination
tually all the Indian Ocean, Antarctica, Africa, a and reception.
part of Asia, and, on the horizon, Indonesia 22727 locates a perfectly circular Earth image
and the western edge of Australia" (NASA SP- within a square frame. When the terrestrial disk
330 1973:4-9). is centered by minor cropping of the original
The popular response was, by contrast, shot, the image attains the mandala form of
rather more enthusiastic. Indeed the very ubiq- circle and square whose completeness and
uity of 22727, endlessly reproduced on post- geometrical unity are familiar from the cross-
cards, lapel buttons, flags, calendars, political cultural history of cosmic images and which
manifestos, commercial advertisements, and Carl Jung (1959) regarded as a key archetype.
tee-shirts (Gaarb 1985), serves to deflect close This may account, in part, for the quasi-mantric
scrutiny of the image's content. In some cases status of the image among Whole-earth enthu-
its reproducers have unconsciously and unob- siasts. As in Earthrise, the surrounding space is
servedly reversed the image as, for example, a deep black void. The floating Earth seems to
when BBC TV News used 22727 as the logo merge into nothingness, an impression that is
for their week-long coverage of the Rio Earth conveyed by the faint edging haziness of its

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 Contested Global Visions 277

*' i : ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~it

Figure 7. Analysis of geometry of 22727 showing

the pattern of square, circles, arcs and triangle.

Figure 6. Attractive Detached Residence. Poster

published by Friends of the Earth, London. Courtesy Horn of Africa and Arabian desert peninsula
of Friends of the Earth. are clearly etched. Patches of white clouds
wreathe the rest of the Earth, save for the
dense mass of the Antarctic continent whose
outline is readily apparent.
Since the photograph orients the globe ac-
outline, that is produced by the globe's encir- cording to the cardinal points, the warm
cling belt of atmosphere, and that is delineated browns of the cloud-free Sahara at the top
most clearly against the land mass at the top (north) are perfectly balanced by the cold
left. Within the circular frame are secondary white of the icy Antarctic mass on the lower
and more complex geometrical shapes: a major (southern) edge. A broadly circular area of
triangle of land, a series of arcs dividing the disk ocean defined by the coast of Mozambique,
into bands, and a number of minor circles giv- the island of Madagascar and the northern
ing weight to the lower part (Figure 7). These edge of the densest cloud mass, provides a
downward curving arcs together with the central focus to the design. Given the time of
atmospheric haze, the cloud forms, and the year, close to the winter solstice, and the tra-
colors produce a watery image of almost tearful jectory of the spaceship, the east-west diame-
intensity. ter of the global disk lies almost exactly along
The dominant colors are blue, white, and the Tropic of Capricorn, while the equatorial
brown. The brown and blue are easily recog- line is identifiable by the broken cloud cover
nizable to anyone familiar with the conven- of the Intertropical Convergence Zone. The
tional world map as the land masses of Africa largest visible oceanic area lies east of Africa in
and the Arabian Peninsula and the South At- the western part of the Indian Ocean whose
lantic and Indian Oceans, respectively. The de- high productivity renders it intensely blue on a
sert and savannah regions of Africa and Arabia, photographic plate. Any monotony of marine
Earth's largest cloud-free region, occupy the tones is relieved, however, by the pattern of
frame. The Gulf of Aden and the Red Sea cut clouds in the southern oceans: a series of swirl-
a deep gash into the patch of ocher so that the ing sickle shapes formed by depressions pass-

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278 Cosgrove
ing from west to east and giving the impression clothe itself anew in the natural hues of water,
of rotational dynamism. This impression is fur- earth, and the softest veils of atmosphere.
ther emphasized-and the picture rendered
three-dimensional-by the equatorial arc of
broken clouds. Thus, when these composi-
Modernist Global Images and
tional elements are taken as a whole, photo-
graph 22727 is readily correlated with modern Visions
cartographic representations of the world.
At the upper edge of the photograph, the While the formal qualities of Earthrise and
eastern part of the Mediterranean Sea is just 22727 and the narrow context of their origin
discernible. To Western eyes this is the "oldest" in the Apollo space program served to increase
part of the world, cartographic center of the cultural significance of the photographic
Ptolemy's ecumene. Or, as an American com- images, these factors fall short of a full account.
mentator speaking about an earlier space pho- Critical interpretation requires us to delve fur-
tograph put it, "much of our commonly taught ther by examining the broader aspects of Mod-
history centers around that little sea, a mere ern culture in which the images were ad-
patch in the hemisphere, which once seemed dressed. In this section, I return to twentieth-
to its inhabitants the whole world" (quoted in century interrelations between photography,
Nicks 1970:3). At the base of 22727, mean- the aerial vision, global representations, and
while, is Antarctica, the "youngest" part of the geopolitics as they played themselves out
known world, "globalised" under the Treaty of within Modernist discourse, especially in the
1959. Between lies Africa. Although now United States. This approach more directly ad-
widely regarded as the birthplace of mankind, dresses the cultural assumptions that engaged
Africa has been seen as the "dark" continent interpretations of the Apollo Earth images, both
in conventional Western imagination and it has initially and in the ensuing quarter century.
been consistently diminished in Eurocentric I have already noted photography's role in
cartographic practice (Rabasa 1985:14, foot- completing the planetary cartographic project
note 6; Driver 1992). 22727, by contrast, gives entrained during the European Renaissance.
Africa an unaccustomed centrality in the rep- The influence of photography in structuring
resentation of the world. Indeed the South the Western geographical imagination is only
dominates the image to the exclusion of now beginning to receive the critical attention
Europe, the Americas, and Australasia. it deserves. Photography's close relations with
For Western observers, the image 22727 landscape painting in the era of the diorama
challenges received notions of continental and the American conquest of the West have
scale by exaggerating precisely those regions- been noted often enough (Galassi 1981;
Africa, the southern oceans, Antarctica-that, Daniels 1993), but photography played an
through the cartographer's choice of map pro- equally significant role in imperialist repre-
jections, normally appear so small on world sentations of the cultural Other within the late
maps, and so correspondingly insignificant in nineteenth-century discourses of European sci-
Western geographical consciousness. Above ences such as anthropology and geography
all, the picture lacks both the coordinating sys- (Harraway 1991; Ryan 1994). That same period
tem of the graticule and text. In the first in- also marks the origin of photography's power-
stance, the graticule has been so taken for ful claim to mimetic truth, a claim only success-
granted in cartographic representation since fully challenged during the past two decades
the Renaissance that we register only sublimi- (Bolton 1989; Shapiro 1988). Bureaucratic and
nally its organizing lattice. In the second, plac- judicial acceptance of photography as docu-
ing names on the world map has been such an mentary and legal evidence in the 1890s fos-
important cartographic expression of European tered the assumption that the camera cannot
knowledge-power that their absence from lie (Tagg 1988). The photograph implied a hu-
22727 constitutes a radical challenge to the man eye behind the camera and thus a "wit-
Modern geographical imagination. Freed of ness" whose image testified to the veracity of
graticule, names, and human boundaries, the recorded event. The significance of the
22727 represents an earth liberated from cul- eyewitness in establishing the truth of images
tural constrictions and apparently at liberty to resurfaced in the history of space photography

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 Contested Global Visions 279
as well: John Glenn's 1962 pictures of Earth, pian perspective was privileged, however.
shot with a 35mm camera, had much greater Only a "few"-Charles Lindberg in the United
public impact than the hundreds of terrestrial States, Balbo in Italy-were mythologized as
images taken by automatic cameras and sen- modern Apollos, youthful gods whose mis-
sors-and the same applies to the Whole-earth sions took them above and beyond the mun-
images discussed here, also predated by auto- dane life of earthbound mortals and gave them
matically generated photographs.7 The claim a uniquely modern vision. The romance and
that Earthrise and 22727 offered the first pic- power attached to the aerial view at this time
tures of the Earth "as it really is" depended are menacingly apparent in the opening scenes
upon this armature of assumptions that de- of Leni Riefenstahl's Nazi propaganda movie,
fended the objectivity of the photographic im- Triumph of the Will, in which an airborne cam-
age. era follows the Fuhrer's plane through the
clouds, providing our's and Hitler's mastering
gaze with quasi-cartographic glimpses of the
The Airman's Vision German landscape below.
The romantic association of (generally male)
However, the Apollo images emerge from a youth, power, and will with the Apollonian
history that is much more specific than that of perspective offered by air flight allowed for an
photography in general. This history deals with heroic construction that attributed the airman
the intimate relations between the camera and with distinctively Modern qualities of scientific
aerial flight and with the status attributed to the objectivity, technical mastery, global vision
eyewitness behind the aerial camera, the air- and, ultimately, mission. The last of these terms
man himself, that developed during the course has been closely associated, of course, with
of the twentieth century. The revolutionary the interlocking discourses of religious conver-
perspective afforded by the aerial view of the sion and military rule that have long structured
Earth encouraged balloon photography from the imperial imagination in the West.8 These
the earliest days of the new medium and that attributes were further reinforced by the aerial
view also appealed to the Modernist imagina- engagements of World War II (Gruffudd 1991)
tion in the interwar years. This appeal was es- and later informed the selection and public
pecially strong in those nations-Italy, Ger- personae of American astronauts throughout
many, and the United States-that most enthu- the space race in the 1960s. As Michael Smith
siastically adopted Modernism's futuristic aes- (1983) has pointed out, the alliance of technol-
thetic. The Italian Futurist painter Marinetti, for ogy and gender loomed prominently in the
example, proclaimed the aerial view as the ar- representation of early American astronauts (all
tistic perspective of the future; and in 1928, the of them test pilots) as "helmsmen." Time por-
National Geographic published a series of arti- trayed John Glenn as "a latter day Apollo" and
cles on geography from the air. These articles Alan Shepard as the new Lindberg; and the
celebrated, among other things, the achieve- ubiquitous use of "mission" resonates through
ment of the "Italian Argonauts," the long-dis- the entire Apollo program.
tance pilots organized by the Fascist air ace,
geopolitical strategist, and later governor of It-
aly's Libyan empire, Italo Balbo (Dreikhausen Global Airlines
1985; Segre 1987; Atkinson 1993).
The airborne camera simultaneously realized Rapid development of commercial jet air-
geography's mission-to provide accurate de- planes and the falling real cost of air travel in
scription of the entire global surface-as it bore the post-war years enabled growing numbers
witness to a new perspective on that surface: of Americans and Europeans to experience the
"the airman's vision" which served as the foun- aerial perspective. By the late 1950s, the DC8
dation of twentieth-century geopolitical and Boeing 707 were bringing long-distance
thought that would, in turn, influence some of flight within the range of business and recrea-
the earliest commentaries on the Apollo pho- tional travelers in the rich countries of the
tographs. "The airplane," in Antoine de St. Exu- world. By the early 1970s, wide-bodied
pery's words, "has unveiled for us the true face "jumbo" jets, the Boeing 747 for example, fur-
of the earth" (Bunkse 1990). The pilot's Olym- ther reduced the cost of air travel; and, flying

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280 Cosgrove
at altitudes up to 45,000 feet, they offered ex- New Yorkers as was the Daily Planet to readers
tended views of the Earth's surface to ordinary of Marvel Comics' Superman. In the same dec-
families in the West. The Olympian perspective ade, the American Bible Society and the Chris-
on the Earth which just thirty years earlier had tian Science Publishing House in Boston, both
been the privilege of a small number of cultural dedicated to world-wide evangelism, commis-
heroes was now becoming commonplace. Al- sioned large globes (50 inches and 30 feet re-
though the slow-moving panorama visible spectively) to signify the geographical scope of
from the window of a jet is not recognizable their "mission." The links between the globe
cartographically unless we are already ac- and Modernism in the 1930s were strength-
quainted with a regional map of the area, air ened also by usage of the globe as a logo by
travel has familiarized nonetheless large num- Hollywood movie studios, while the identifica-
bers with the synoptic, high-altitude gaze over tion of the globe with Modernist culture re-
the Earth and enabled many others to share ceived its ultimate imprimatur with the con-
vicariously the astronaut's perspective on our struction of a hollow globe, 13.5 feet in diame-
planet. But even these experiences did not fully ter, for the Museum of Modern Art in New
prepare people for the global views provided York which the public was invited to enter to
by Earthrise and 22727. view the world from a central stage (Fisher and
Whatever the role of the post-war airline Muller 1944). The post-war period continued
corporations in elevating the image of the the theme: the central structure of the New
globe to a more central place in American cul- York World's Fair in 1964/65, the vast
tural consciousness, America's fascination with Unisphere, consisted of an open global frame
the globe as a symbol of modernity was al- formed by the graticule to which relief maps of
ready apparent in the period between the the continents were attached, while Disney-
World Wars. Earlier I referred to the long his- world's 17-story silver geosphere, "Spaceship
tory of using globes as an emblem of empire. Earth," traced the history of communications.
The vast globes constructed in the late nine- International airlines in the post-war years
teenth century consciously signified the uni- were likewise captivated by globes and world
versalist claims of European imperialism, maps as visual descriptors of their commercial
whether commercial, as in their emblematic activities. Not only did globes graphically dem-
usage in Universal Exhibitions in the 1890s, or onstrate the scope of their route systems, they
spiritual, as in their popularity among Christian conveyed also a sense of scale and impor-
missionary societies.9 Similarly, the use of tance, regardless of the density of the route
globes on colonial postage stamps signified a network. Thus the globe, together with the
world unified by postal and telegraph commu- national flag, became a favored logo for air-
nications. And technical advances early in this lines. During the 1 940s and 1 950s, the first truly
century-advances that permitted accurate in- international airlines, predominantly American,
scription of the entire pattern of land and sea erected gigantic globes as decorative and dec-
areas on the globe's surface-further enhanced larative statements at their head offices. Pan
the globe's appeal as an icon of progress for American for example, commissioned a globe
institutions and corporations, sacred or secular, 10 feet in diameter and 1:4 million in scale for
that claimed worldwide links. its Miami office. In the late 1950s, Trans World
The media, communications, and transpor- Airways (TWA) established an "air-world" edu-
tation were obviously attracted to the emblem- cation department with the declared aim of
atic significance of the globe. Newspapers, es- increasing passenger traffic by removing the
pecially in North America, used the words fear of flying and making Americans air-
"dworld" and "globe" in their titles and con- minded. Addressing the first International
structed globes in or on their buildings (Do- Globe Conference in Vienna in 1962, Trans
mosh 1989). In the 1930s, a revolving alumi- World's chief officer, Paul L. Dengler, described
num globe, measuring 12 feet in diameter and one of its programs which carried selected uni-
weighing 2 tons (at a scale of 1:3,480,000), was versity education majors to Europe on a "flying
mounted on the top of the New York News' seminar." Lectures were delivered in front of a
building. It became one of the landmarks of large globe illuminated from within and carry-
New York's Modernist skyline, as familiar to ing the letters TWA. The seminar's theme, "air-

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 Contested Global Visions 281
mindedness," invoked a vision of global citi- cism and uniting the diverse peoples of the
zenship that would overcome American isola- world into one nation (e pluribus unum).
tionism and provincialism and induce under- "The idea of one world," wrote Freidrich
standing of "the consequences of the daily Tenbruch in tracing the emergence of "one
shrinking process of time and space on our worldism" as a totalizing discourse informing
globe." "Of course," continued Dengler, "you America's post-war sense of mission, "could
should remain good patriots of your own na- only spring from the ground of Christendom"
tion . .. but at the same time you must try to (Tenbruch 1990:198). Given that versions of
think globally . . . Let yourself be convinced Islam also have universalist proselytizing aspi-
that we are, all of us, in the same boat, for rations (as does Marxism), Tenbruch's claim
better or worse, whether you like it or not" may perhaps more accurately be made for
(Dengler 1962:94). Judeo-Christian monotheism rather than Chris-
Dengler's emphasis on the threat of the A- tendom alone. The United States, nonetheless,
bomb and total war as the compelling reasons has been the heir to a universalizing culture
for TWA's initiative imparted a significance well that is embodied in the Enlightenment princi-
beyond commercial promotion; and his termi- ples of its constitutional philosophy. Appropri-
nology anticipated language and terms that ately therefore, the globe has served as the
would be used later in connection with the graphic motif for American empire, and it has
Apollo photographs: "our globe, formerly the been deployed not only by American corpo-
image of a mysticism and unknown remote- rations and missionary groups, but also by
ness, shrinks before our eyes to a tiny apple" American-sponsored international agencies
(Dengler 1962:95). like the United Nations. But in one key respect,
this totalizing iconography was different. The
globe was newly-and subtly-interpreted as a
sign of spatial and social incorporation rather
Textualizing Apollo's
than of direct imperial domination.
Whole-Earth Images The Apollo space program was inextricably
linked to this American sense of planetary im-
The post-war years witnessed both the dis- perial mission (McDougall 1985; Logsdon
memberment of the European empires and the 1970). Lyndon Johnson, speaking in the debate
full panoply of America's global power. Replac- which led to NASA's establishment in 1958,
ing European dominion while retaining so proclaimed: "The Roman Empire controlled the
many of the old continent's sacred and secular world because it could build roads .. . the Brit-
cultural assumptions, the United States inher- ish Empire was dominant because it had ships.
ited the European mission civilatrice. A combi- In the air age we were powerful because we
nation of commercial acumen and a universal- had airplanes. Now the Communists have es-
ist vision projected the American way as the tablished a foothold in outer space." While
model of enlightened civic virtue to which all competition with the Soviet Union certainly
the world's peoples should naturally aspire. resonated in John F. Kennedy's May 1961 ad-
America's own constitutional principles and its dress to Congress committing the nation "to
deep ideological opposition to the one remain- achieving the goal, before this decade is out,
ing territorial empire, the USSR, denied the of landing a man on the moon and returning
United States traditional forms of imperial him safely to the earth," the dominant rhetoric
domination in territorial acquisition. The Ameri- of Apollo spoke of an incorporative vision of
can empire required a new structure and a global human mission rather than of dominion
new language of imperium (McDougall 1985). or territorial control; and as such, that rhetoric
The structure was economic, based on Amer- was unremarkably consonant with much of
ica's total domination of immediate post-war post-war American foreign policy. Imperial ex-
industrial production and international trade; pansion, henceforth, was to be directed
the language was triumphal, and predicated on peacefully beyond the Earth for the benefit of
American democracy as a universalist model "all mankind" rather than into the territories of
that, in the eyes of many in the establishment, other human cultures.
had proven its moral virtue by defeating fas- Apollo 8 was launched on December 21,

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282 Cosgrove
1968, and returned to Earth on December 27.
Peace in the Universe, Good Will Toward Men'
Its spectacular success in escaping Earth orbit,
coasting to the Moon, orbiting it and returning
to a safe splashdown gained added impact
from the fact that the journey spanned the
Christmas holiday. Not only did this timing
maximize a global television audience made
possible by recently established satellite links,
but it also ensured the harnessing of the vari-
ous associations of Christmas, both sacred and
secular, with the mission's representation.10 A
new star was in the heavens, with a message
of peace and goodwill to all mankind. The
news media capitalized on these poetic oppor-
tunities to align traditional Christian universal-
ism to the American vision of global harmony
already articulated by Dengler, among others.
As NASA's news clippings file reveals, Ameri-
can newspapers exploited the sacred mean-
ings of Christmas as a time of rebirth, harmony
and peace in stressing the venture's pan-hu-
man themes (Figure 8).
While American patriotism was evident in
American news coverage, the patriotic theme
was largely subordinated to a humanist rhetoric Figure 8. Peace in the Universe. Cartoon by Pley-
of peace and harmony, influenced perhaps by cher, Times-Picayune, New Orleans, December 24,
the reports of heavy American casualties sus- 1968. Courtesy of Times-Picayune.
tained in Vietnam. The three astronauts them-
selves-Frank Borman, James Lovell, and Wil-
liam Anders-reinforced the religious theme by
transmitting on Christmas morning an un-
scheduled reading of the cosmogonic narrative get a concept that maybe this is really one world
and why the hell can't we learn to live together
from the Book of Genesis, a selection that un- like decent people. (Borman, quoted in
knowingly echoed Renaissance cosmogra- Newsweek, December 23, 1968)
phers who related the cartographic image of
These responses to the Apollo 8 mission re-
the world to the Christian narration of its crea-
focused the public mind, shifting its attention
tion (Rabasa 1985:6). In his commentaries to
from the project's official objective (a Moon
Mission Control during the ten lunar orbits,
landing) toward the astronauts' view of their
Lovell compared the Moon's dead surface, "es-
"home planet." This was dramatically rein-
sentially gray, with almost no color . . . much
forced with publication of Earthrise two days
like plaster of Paris or a grayish beach sand,"
after splashdown.
with the appearance of a living Earth, visible as
a bright silver ball to television viewers and as
a swirl of blues, browns, and whites to the
astronauts: "a grand oasis in the big vastness of Riders on the Earth
space." Frank Borman's response to this view
of Earthrise once again echoed, albeit with less The cultural reception of Earthrise owed
grace, Seneca's words in Abraham Ortelius's much to certain texts written during and im-
world atlas: "Is this that pinpoint which is di- mediately after the mission. These drew upon
vided by sword and fire among so many na- and reinforced the interlocking discourses that
tions? How ridiculous are the boundaries of I have outlined and that prepared the ground
mortals." In Borman's rendering: for the ensuing reception of 22727. Perhaps
the most significant of these texts was a short
When you're finally up at the moon looking back
at earth, all those differences and nationalistic traits essay written by the American poet Archibald
are pretty well going to blend and you're going to MacLeish and published in The New York

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 Contested Global Visions 283
Times on Christmas Day, December 25, 1968, event rapidly turned the gaze away from the
as the astronauts circled the Moon. Riders on objective of discovery and toward the meaning
the Earth was reproduced and quoted approv- of the terrestrial globe. James Dickey's widely
ingly in the American press in the days that quoted celebratory verse, which first appeared
followed as well as in writings on space pho- in Life Magazine in early August, 1969, is
tography of Earth in many years to come. Ac- clearly influenced by the Earthrise photograph.
companied by a color center-fold reproduction Dickey's verse makes the Earth the principal
of Earthrise, it was quoted again in the May focus of attention for the lunar walkers, and he
1969 National Geographic coverage of the binds their perspective with the traditional
Apollo 8 mission (National Geographic 1969). gaze of landscape aesthetics by referencing
MacLeish's essay opened with a summary one of the best-known landscape poems in the
comment on the history of Western cosmol- English language:
ogy: "Men's conception of themselves has al-
ways depended on their notions of the earth." ... The Human Planet trembles in
The displacement of humanity by Copernican its black
and Newtonian science from the center of a Sky with what we do. I can see it hanging in the
divinely-planned creation, he noted, has made god-gold only
Brother of your face. We are this World: we are
us "helpless victims . . . of force" on a small,
The only men. What hope is there at home
wet, spinning planet. In the few hours of In the azure of breath, or here with the stone
Apollo's lunar orbits, he claimed, the concep- Dead secret? My massive clothes bubble around
tion had altered irrevocably once again: me
Crackling with static and Gray's
For the first time in all of time men have seen the Elegy helplessly coming
earth: seen it not as continents or oceans from the From my heart, and I say I think something
little distance of a hundred miles or two or three, From high school I remember now
but seen it from the depths of space; seen it whole Fades the glimmering landscape from the sight and
and round and beautiful and small. (New York all the air
Times, December 25, 1968) A solemn stillness holds. Earth glimmers
And in its air-color a solemn stillness holds
Such an image of Earth, said MacLeish, would It. 0 brother! Earth-faced god! Apollo!
remake our image of humankind, now neither (Dickey 1969)
grand actors at the center of creation nor help-
less victims off its margins, but in true propor-
While Gray had gazed upon a moonlit
tion with the planet: churchyard and contemplated human mortality
To see the earth as it truly is, small and blue and in the community of an English village, Dickey's
beautiful in that eternal silence in which it floats, is astronauts raise their eyes towards a Moon-like
to see ourselves as riders on the earth together, Earth from the cold lunar landscape and con-
brothers on that bright loveliness in the eternal
cold-brothers who know now that they are truly
template brotherhood in a global village. From
brothers. (New York Times December 25, 1968) their perspective, the appearance of divine
Apollo attaches itself to the Earth rather than to
MacLeish's words dramatically underline themselves or to their flimsy chariot.
Modernist beliefs in the mimetic truth of pho- In his own celebration of the Moon landing,
tography, the power of the synoptic gaze MacLeish followed a similar theme, inspired
(which his language clearly regarded as gen- also by the image of Earthrise. Although awed
dered male), and equally, one-worldism, that by the promethean achievement in touching
is, the claims of American missionary ideology,
the Moon, he turns immediately from its life-
of which this image stands as empirical proof. less surface to the rising Earth:
As NASA's Current News clippings file on the
Apollo project ceaselessly reveals, the Ameri-
Over us, more beautiful than the moon, a
can press reproduced MacLeish's final para-
moon, a wonder to us, unattainable,
graph with remarkable consistency, while its a longing past the reach of longing,
cadences echoed in the captions which a light beyond our light, our lives-perhaps
henceforth textualized Earth photography from a meaning to us ...
space. 0 a meaning!
over us on these silent beaches the bright
Apollo 11's lunar landing in July 1969 natu-
earth,
rally focused attention on the Moon rather presence among us
than the Earth. However, the poetics of the (MacLeish 1969)

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284 Cosgrove
Spacewalkers it. It was a sense that resonated oddly with the
contrapuntal response of proponents of pro-
MacLeish's and Dickey's verse responds gressive one-worldism and Christian mission.
imaginatively to the photographic images re- These divergent ways of interpreting the im-
turned from space in terms of Earth-bound, age of a floating Earth at the turn of the 1 970s
landscape conventions. The astronauts' com- capture at once the Modernist technological
ments, however, put a different gloss on these faith that had launched the Apollo project ten
images. Their words draw upon an alternative years earlier and the gnawing sense of mistrust
and more intimate tradition of environmental in that faith that was increasingly apparent in
relations between humanity and its terrestrial the closing years of the 1 960s. Spaceship Earth,
home, which I here refer to as Whole-earth for example, was a term originated by another
(Glacken 1967). In an interview given soon af- arch-progressive and Modernist thinker, Buck-
ter the Apollo 8 mission, William Anders, who minster Fuller. By entitling his late-1969 essay
shot the Earthrise photograph, described his "Vertical is to Live-Horizontal is to Die," Fuller
experience at the time. The capsule was re- conveys the spirit of progress that he saw as
turning from the lunar shadow after the first embodied in the space project. His conclusion,
orbit of the Moon. The three astronauts were while acknowledging the limitations imposed
acutely conscious of being literally on the dark by Earth's isolation in an organically dead
side of the lunar landscape, beyond any pos- space, draws upon a series of engineering
sible contact with Earth, utterly isolated in the metaphors to underwrite a sense of techno-
blackness of space: logical optimism: "our space-vehicle Earth and
its life-energy-giving Sun and tide-pumping
The Earth looked so tiny in the heavens that there
were times during the Apollo 8 mission when I had Moon can provide ample sustenance and
trouble finding it. If you can imagine yourself in a power for all humanity's needs" (Fuller
darkened room with only one visible object, a 1969:88). But such optimism was increasingly
small blue-green sphere about the size of a Christ- less secure. In the three years that had elapsed
mas-tree ornament, then you can begin to grasp
what the Earth looks like from space. I think that
between the Moon landing and the final
all of us subconsciously think that the Earth is flat Apollo mission that produced 22727, the cul-
or at least almost infinite. Let me assure you that, tural currency of the Modernist notion of pro-
rather than a massive giant, it should be thought gress through technology had been devalued,
of as the fragile Christmas-tree ball which we
as indeed had faith in America's global mission.
should handle with care. (quoted in Nicks 1970:14)
Once the objective of a Moon landing had
Although Anders' words rework the sig- been achieved, public interest returned rapidly
nificance of the coincidence between Christ- to terrestrial matters. As one recent writer ob-
mas and the timing of the flight, their meaning serves, the four years that separate Earthrise
extends beyond reference to universal peace from 22727, 1968-1972, mark the era of the
and human goodwill derived from its historic "prophets of doom," when a spate of gloomy
religious associations to embrace the more futurologies heralded the global environment
secular, rooted, and domestic interpretation of movement (McCormick 1989).
American popular culture (McGreevy 1990). Press commentary on the final Apollo launch
The Christmas tree, of course, is more domes- consistently weighed the costs of the mission,
tic than sacred, more evocative of images of as against its human benefits, and found them
home and family than of church and faith. The too high. Time captured the dramatic change
ornament suggests a child's innocent excite- in mood. In 1968, Time's editors heralded the
ment, while the concluding statement insists Apollo 8 crew as "men of the year" against a
on fragility and the possibility of irreparable backdrop of the Earthrise photograph and the
damage by childish clumsiness. The metaphor simple caption "Dawn." The award was "not
can, of course, have the opposite effect of that merely for the dazzling technology of their
intended: it can trivialize Earth, making it a achievement, but for the larger view of our
mere plaything. Whichever way we choose to planet and the fundamental unity of man"
understand his metaphor, Anders invokes an (Time 1968). On the return of Apollo 17, things
association that is more local and homely and had changed. In December 1972, Time pub-
less visual, a more tactile sense of feeling and lished a retrospective essay that regarded the
holding the Earth rather than of simply seeing night launch as "a triumph of spectacle" or-

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 Contested Global Visions 285
chestrated by NASA to revive flagging public Whitman, his vision of America was predicated
interest. The result "may have been as much upon free space that granted "liberty a farm-
theatrical effect," the correspondent contin- yard wide" to a society characterized by the
ued, "as spiritual experience," a feature, paren- common decencies of good husbandry.
thetically, that we often associate with post- MacLeish's best-known poem, America was
modern cultural events.11 The tone of the essay Promises (1939), employs a similar meter and
was reflective and its theme humility. It cau- conveys the same sense of mission that he
tioned against claims of having conquered would use three decades later in his Voyage to
space and appealed instead for reshaping our the Moon:
attitudes toward "the tired Earth."
Although Apollo 17 returned with 22727, America was promises-to whom?
Jefferson knew:
that fact was inundated in a rising tide of self-
Declared it before God and before history:
questioning, about limits to growth and the Declares it still in the remembering tomb.
population explosion, about global pollution The promises were Man's: the land was his-
and poverty, about social injustice. A tired and Man endowed by his creator
battered America had begun the last pull-out
America is promises to
of troops from Vietnam, and Time's essay ac-
Take!
curately reflected the prevailing media re- America is promises to
sponse to the Apollo program and to the po- Us

litical pressures on NASA to bring the project To take them

Brutally
to a premature end. 22727 and Earthrise thus
With love but
sit ambiguously between two textual construc- Take them
tions: the progressive One-worldism of late (MacLeish 1939)
American Modernism and a Whole-earth en-
vironmentalism which, though historically The imperialist, masculine, and Christian di-
deep-rooted, is such a significant aspect of mensions of the American dream could hardly
postmodern culture (Cosgrove 1990; have been more unambiguously expressed.
Oelschlaeger 1991). Having argued strongly against isolationism in
While these two constructions stand in op- the immediate pre-war years, MacLeish's Rid-
position to one another, they emerge from a ers on the Earth offers a powerful restatement
common stock of cultural attitudes towards of his sense of global mission. Indeed, his 1968
America's geopolitical role. I have already theme was anticipated not only in America was
noted Archibald MacLeish's significant contri- Promises but even more clearly in his 1942
bution to early interpretations of the space essay The Image of Victory, published originally
photographs. Closer scrutiny of his essay for Atlantic Monthly, and later reproduced in a
places it even more firmly within the Modern- symposium that year on political geography.
ist geographical imagination. Among American This collection of papers on space and geopoli-
intellectuals, MacLeish was an appropriate tics, which included contributions from Isiah
choice as a commentator on the Apollo Bowman, Halford Mackinder, Ellsworth Hunt-
achievement. Born in 1892 and educated at ington, and Griffith Taylor, was intended to
Yale and Harvard, he was a member of the challenge the influence of German geopolitical
white, Anglo-Saxon, protestant, male elite science in American thought as well as to steer
whose domination of official American culture a course between American isolationism and
went largely unchallenged for the better part imperialism. As the editors put it:
of this century. A poet and playwrite, MacLeish
was closely associated with the Democratic es- we have seen the dangerous beginnings of an
tablishment, serving briefly in Franklin D. American geopolitics, with blueprints for an
American imperialism riding the waves of the fu-
Roosevelt's administration and preceding ture. It favors a disillusioned balance-of-power so-
Daniel Boorstin as Librarian of Congress. His lution on the basis of regional groupings, in prepa-
writings consistently celebrated a democratic ration of what the sponsors of such "realistic" plans

and expansionist, but scarcely polyvocal, vi- consider inevitable: the Third World War. The edi-
tors and writers of this book . . . agree that accep-
sion of American society, based upon the uni-
tance of the ideology and creed of geopolitics
versalist humanism of Tom Paine and the would be a dangerous step towards international
Founding Fathers. A twentieth-century Walt Fascism. (Weigert and Stefansson 1944:x)

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286 Cosgrove
MacLeish's contribution to this liberal goal tionism that MacLeish and his peers had
establishes a direct link between the textualiz- sought to reject. Through television reports
ing of Earthrise and the geopolitical discourses and pictures, many younger observers de-
surrounding the airman's view of the globe at tected a reality of violent oppression beneath
mid-century. The Image of Victory celebrates the universalist and humanist rhetoric of the
the airman as the model for the progress of American imperium. For them, the airman's in-
mankind, the man to whom the vision of the heritance was a B52 bomber wreaking indis-
global future is to be entrusted. Whoever wins criminate destruction on the fields and forests
the war, MacLeish claims, would win the future of Southeast Asia. For others, especially for
of the world, "its geography, its actual shape women, MacLeish's images of "men" "taking"
and meaning in mens' minds": America, and indeed the Earth, "brutally"
meant just that-and in the most violent ways.
Never in all their history have men been able truly
to conceive the world as one: a single sphere, a
They responded to an alternative repre-
globe having the qualities of a globe, a round earth sentation, less synoptic and distanced, articu-
in which all the directions eventually meet, in lated in the astronauts' own sensibilities. Con-
which there is no center because every point, or sider Michael Collins' very personal record of
none, is center-an equal earth which all men oc-
isolation as he circled the Moon's dark side,
cupy as equals. The airman's earth, if free men
make it, will be truly round: a globe in practice, the single occupant of the Command Module
not in theory. (MacLeish 1942:7) during the Apollo 11 landing: "I am alone now,
truly alone, and absolutely isolated from any
For MacLeish therefore, and for many who known life . . . I am it. If a count were taken,
thought like him, the Apollo project repre- the score would be three billion plus two on
sented the crowning achievement of an Ameri- the other side of the Moon, and one plus God
can mission begun in 1941, a mission which
only knows what on this side .. ." Then, as the
would be realized not in flag-waving national- Earth rose over the lunar horizon: '[It seemed]
ism but in mankind's universal destiny. The so small I could blot it out of the universe sim-
irony that the mission he celebrated was pow- ply by holding up my thumb . . . It suddenly
ered by a "cold" war between two "regional struck me that that tiny pea, pretty and blue,
groupings" seems to have been lost on was the earth . .. I didn't feel like a giant. I felt
MacLeish. The photographs that the American very, very small (quoted in Ferris 1984: 106).
astronauts brought back to Earth seemed, for Collins' emphasis on feeling rather than see-
him, dramatic confirmation of a universalist, ing, his recognition of limits to the power in-
implicitly Christian vision. That they were un- herent in the gaze which the technological
expected and unplanned, that they were taken miracle of his craft allowed him, his reflections
by men who saw the Earth as it really is, that on humility and the vulnerable fragility of the
they were eyewitnesses to global unity and the Earth, and his visions of intense localism, reso-
new age that he had forecast in 1942, power- nated with the sensibilities of earthbound en-
fully confirmed MacLeish's faith in America's vironmentalists such as Aldo Leopold, Fraser
promises. His commentary on Earthrise thus Darling, and Rachel Carson (Worster 1988).
drew upon and sought to confirm this deeply Seen from 200,000 miles, Earth showed no
embedded set of meanings. signs of brotherhood or common humanity,
nor even human agency. Man seemed no
more central to existence than any other crea-
One-World/Whole-Earth ture. In fact, what life there was seemed to
inhere in the planet as a lifeworld rather than
Archibald MacLeish was 76 when he wrote in some ordained hierarchy of creatures on its
Riders on the Earth. Like Buckminster Fuller, he surface.
represented a passing rather than a coming The astronauts' words articulated the sublim-
generation. Others, many of whom had known ity of the Apollo photographs, their graphic
only the post-war world of the Pax Americana, representation of the world as "a whole, ani-
interpreted the space images differently, read- mated and moved by inward forces" (Hum-
ing them through an alternative set of texts, boldt 1847:xviii), forces so balanced, intricate,
even unconsciously projecting onto them fea- and powerful that in their presence the only
tures of an American cultural tradition of isola- valid human responses were awe, wonder,

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 Contested Global Visions 287
and humility. Here the sense of sight is subor- three decades hence, in the 1970s, that atti-
dinated to more visceral responses. Like the tude resurfaced as an alternative projection of
imperial reading of the globe, this vitalist inter- American culture, to the Whole-earth.
pretation of Earth has a long and distinguished Since the middle years of the 1 970s, the de-
historical pedigree (Livingstone 1992; Glacken mand for the Apollo photographs has been
1967), but for much of the twentieth century continuous and strong. In 1990 alone, 90 per-
it largely seems to have been suppressed in the cent of the photographic requests to the
geographical imagination, defeated by the em- Johnson Space Center were for 22727 and
piricist and technological imperatives of Mod- 1,280 copies were mailed (M. Gentry 1991,
ernism (but see Matless 1992a; 1992b). In the personal communication). Its public use con-
1960s, however, certain scientific develop- tinues to reflect the two readings identified
ments anticipated a vitalist revival. The schol- here. The post-war sense of One-world as
arly acceptance of plate tectonics and of his- America's salvational mission, though more
torical variation in global magnetic polarity sig- difficult to sustain in an era of American eco-
nalled new scientific perspectives on the Earth. nomic decline, the passing of the bipolar
These would gain enormous stimulus with the conflict that provided the ideological founda-
publication of James Lovelock's Gaia hypothe- tion for that mission, and some two decades
sis in the 1970s.12 of post-colonialist criticism, this global vision
In popular culture too, life on Earth was read has not entirely disappeared as a mastering
in new ways. Computer-based global invento- gaze. High-technology industries, largely con-
ries, made possible through the very agencies cerned with communication (computers, tele-
and technologies that an optimistic Modernism communications, media, and transportation),
had generated, seemed to reveal a nature that have dominated global economic trends over
had been scarred and brutalized by human the past decade, and for them 22727 serves as
activity rather than "improved" for a common an appropriate successor to the global corpo-
humanity, an Earth despoiled rather than rate symbols of the post-war years. They per-
adorned by human achievement. In the four sist in the One-world reading in which the
years between Earthrise and 22727, a spate of Apollo image signifies secular mastery of the
texts predicted environmental doomsday as a world through spatial control (Figure 9). By
consequence of global human activity: Paul contrast, for green environmental organiza-
Ehrlich's Population Bomb (1968), Barry Com- tions (alternative political parties, ecological
moner's The Closing Circle (1971), the Club of pressure groups, educational agencies),
Rome's Limits to Growth (1972), and Ehrlich Earthrise and 22727 represent a quasi-spiritual
and Ehrlich's Blueprint for Survival (1972). It interconnectedness and the vulnerability of
was their reading of the Earth as a unitary and terrestrial life. For them the Whole-earth read-
fragile organism that placed Earthrise on the ing signifies the necessity of planetary steward-
dustjacket of James Lovelock's text Gaia (1978), ship, best practiced from an insider's localist
and 22727 on the cover of The Whole Earth position. In Western culture both readings
Review. Testimony to the impact of the mes- originate in Genesis, the text that captioned the
sage conveyed by these texts was the celebra- first televised pictures of Earthrise. They con-
tion of the first "Earth Day" in the United States tinue to intersect today in the varied uses of
in 1970. the Apollo space images.
Emphasis on the loneliness of Earth in the Critical attention to the complex intertextu-
blackness of space, so powerfully represented ality of these images calls into question any
in 22727, drew upon a reading of America as neat separation of their associated readings,
old as William Bradford and the Puritan Fathers, and requires us to confront instead certain
of the New World as mankind's last best hope, shared features of One-world and Whole-earth
of a people cut off from the rest of life, required ideologies. Both are totalizing discourses that
to attend to their own redemption and to seek effectively ignore the geographical specificity
moral renewal within the confines of its sepa- of cartographic representation on 22727. Read
rate space (Worster 1988). It was an attitude cartographically, this representation is as par-
against which One-world advocates like tial, regional, and perspectival as any other
Dengler and MacLeish had struggled-and pre- (Harley 1992); it maps Africa and Antarctica.
vailed-in the early years of World War II. But But 22727 is best read conically and not car-

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288 Cosgrove

o-! _ \ B-~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~.... . i.... t., .?

-_ ,;~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~...;...... >.. ..(.e .. >

.~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~9 XCI VW (<$$s

Figure 9. One-world and high technology. Advertisment for TRW Engines Inc., Cincinnati using composite of
Earthrise and 22727 appearing in Fortune Magazine, April 23, 1990. ?TRW Inc., 1990.

tographically; it is iconic. Both interpretations far outside the bounds of Earth seemingly con-
insist on the globality of the image; both are stitute an unchallengeable vantage point.
inattentive to the specificity of their cultural and Some commentators have noted the master-
historical assumptions; and, in practice, both ing perspectives on the Apollo images, and
obscure local perspectives on the world in they have drawn on psychoanalytic and femi-
their claims to speak for a common humanity. nist theory to challenge their cultural author-
Each effectively exemplifies the Apollonian ity-albeit without examining the specificity of
urge to establish a transcendental, univocal, the photographs. Peter Bishop has sought to
and universally valid vantage point from which unravel the historical routes whereby the
to sketch a totalizing discourse. Each, in ap- Whole-earth image acquired its "present mas-
pealing to this image, proclaims a geographical sive coherence." He finds in it echoes of an
identity for a unitary world, although the archetype of unity for which an alienated West
Whole-earth reading opens the possibility of aches in the face of the immense voids of
non-visual appropriation and, thus perhaps, a space and time that Modern science has cre-
more Dionysian response. Fundamentally, the ated for humanity's fragmented psyche. "From
geographical imaginations that both readings evolutionary imaginings came images of hu-
articulate are obdurately Western and ethno- manity crushed beneath the burden of a re-
centric. In both cases, Earthrise and 22727 morseless continuity or negated into a state of
serve well. The apparent objectivity of the pho- despairing ennui by a limitless expanse of
tography and the positioning of the camera so space and time" (Bishop 1986:68). The picture

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 Contested Global Visions 289
of the earthly disk appears reassuring as an that the Apollo project represents a male fan-
image of universal holism, but the appearance tasy:
of this "calm oceanic metaphor" coincided,
It's natural the Boys should whoop it up for
Bishop notes, with a heightened sense of so huge a phallic triumph, an adventure
global crisis in the post-war era of nuclear de- it would not have occurred to women
terrence. All imaginings are attended by their to think worthwhile, . . .
shadow, and the shadow of the holistic Earth (W. H. Auden, quoted in Gaarb 1990:272)
is one of fragmentation:
The alternative Whole-earth interpretation of
The questions posed by a global imagining are in 22727, with its emphases on the "veiling" of
themselves shattering. They consistently fragment Earth in atmosphere, its fragility, and vulnerabil-
the comfort one might take in a premature holism
ity, might also be seen as gendering a vir-
... this image was born simultaneously with one
of its own doom ... These murmurings are the gin/mother Earth as Other to a male conscious-
world calling attention to itself, reestablishing itself ness. As a self-styled ecofeminist, Gaarb is less
as a psychic reality. (Bishop 1986:69) comfortable with this conclusion, enquiring
whether the Whole-earth image retains
Bishop's analysis recognizes the inspirational
sufficient virtue to be rescued from the alien-
quality of the Whole-earth image, its simulta-
ating and exploitative impulses it embodies. His
neous appeal to global utopia and global de-
answer draws upon sentiments similar to those
struction. Like Michael Collins, he reminds us
identified by Bishop: that the very distance and
of the sublime in these images, whose appeal
bleak isolation of the Earth represented in
to awe and wonder is more than merely uplift-
22727 perhaps stimulates "a deep ache of long-
ing and humbling; it is also terrifying. Earthrise
ing for a beauty we somehow cannot touch."
and 22727 share this quality. The former con-
Unlike Bishop, he does not identify the shadow
trasts the shining but shadowed silver Earth
that accompanies such sublimity but rather
against the deathly gray of a cratered lunar
appeals to us to "see without staring, and al-
landscape that seems almost post-nuclear;13
low the Earth to speak to us through this im-
the latter, the majestic color, geometric purity,
age, to declare its own subjecthood" (Gaarb
and harmonic unity of earth, water, and air with
1990:276-277). Perhaps the sheer distance of
the stygian infinity of its encircling void.
the Earth in these images, which obscures their
In contrast to Bishop, Yaakov Jerome Gaarb
cartography and renders them almost tenable,
offers a more political critique of the Apollo
constitutes the challenge that they present to
photographs. He points out the inherent irony
the gaze.
of Whole-earth images which, while read as
representations of the round globe, in reality
show a disk, a two-dimensional image that rep-
resents the Earth according to established pic- Conclusion
torial conventions and that achieves coherence
only within these conventions. 22727 may be Analyses of the Apollo photographs, of their
compared with the "bird's eye" view of land- composition, color and content, the conditions
scape which has conflated cartography and of their production, the contexts of their repro-
landscape painting since the European Renais- duction, and the texts that accompanied their
sance. It is a perspective which privileges vi- cultural reception, give some support to both
sion over other senses in the mimetic achieve- these interpretations of the Whole-earth image
ment, rendering the object of vision passive even as they draw attention to an alternative,
and feminized, offering up merely voyeuristic and still popular, One-world reading. These
pleasure. Certainly the sustained reference to two discourses associated with the photo-
seeing the world as it really is, to men and graphs draw upon and extend ideas of human
brotherhood, together with the references to territoriality that have deep historical, geo-
the landscape tradition found in MacLeish's graphical, and cultural roots in Western imag-
and Dickey's One-world writings on the pho- inings. One-world is a geopolitical conception
tographs lend support to this interpretation. coeval with the European and Christian sense
Gaarb argues not only that 22727 is "the mag- of imperium. It signifies the expansion of a spe-
num opus of patriarchal consciousness," ex- cific socio-economic order across space.
tended to the whole of the natural world, but Throughout Western history, this has been

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290 Cosgrove
based in large measure on military and political drafts: Stephen Daniels, Mike Heffernan, Neil
Roberts, Ron Doel, and anonymous referees. I also
power. Today's imperium is primarily an eco-
acknowledge the financial support of the Nuffield
nomic and technological order of which Foundation for the research project of which this
22727's erasure of political boundaries allows forms a part.
representation in the networks of financial,
media, or communications links etched across
an unbounded globe. Whole-earth is, by con- Notes
trast, an environmentalist conception that ap-
peals to the organic and spiritual unity of ter- 1. The distance is approximate since it was not re-
corded by the crew. It is also worth mentioning
restrial life. Humans are incorporated through
that the actual photographer remains unknown.
visceral bonds between land and life (individ- The three crew members aboard Apollo 17,
ual, family, community), bonds that have tradi- Gene Sherman, Ron Evans, and Jack Schmitt,
tionally been localized, frequently as mystical have refused to state which of them took the
ties of blood and soil. Despite this rhetoric of sequence. I do not deal in this essay with Soviet
space photographs. The quality of their film was
localism, Whole-earth readings of the Apollo much lower than that available to American
images have difficulty keeping faith with the crews, pictures appeared red-tinged and mud-
local because the photograph's erasure of hu- died, with poor color resolution. Also, they pro-
man signs implies the extension of organic duced no whole Earth photographs taken by
hand, and none of their pictures achieved the
bonds across all humanity and the entire globe.
widespread cultural impact of the images dis-
In this too we might note the echoes of West- cussed here.
ern Christianity's traditional missionary impera- 2. Ptolemy's fourth projection is based upon a con-
tive. A Whole-earth interpretation seems struction which assumes an observer standing
drawn, like so many Renaissance globe gazers, beyond the globe, fixing the line of sight on a
vanishing point along the earth's axis. A famous
toward a transcendental vitalism as a basis for engraving by Albrecht Durer illustrates the pro-
universal order and harmony. jection with an eye looking in on the Earth. It was
It is highly questionable whether the con- widely reproduced in sixteenth-century publica-
ceptions of space, environment, and humanity tions of Ptolemy's Geography.
3. Considerable critical attention has recently been
drawn from these images can reconcile such
given to the significance attached to seeing as
divergent but equally totalizing tendencies in the dominant mode of power/knowledge in
Western discourse. An alternative approach Western society since the fifteenth century and
might avoid the "visualist assumption" under- its connection to the philosophical separation of
lying the idea of the world as a globe and the active human subject from a passive, objec-
tive nature. The distanced and gendered charac-
replace it with an older notion of the world as ter of the gaze has become a dominant theme
sphere, a body that contains life, including hu- in some feminist theory (Bryson 1983; Harraway
man life-worlds and that is itself contained 1 991).
within greater spheres beyond (Ingold 1992)- 4. The 1958 Space Act establishing NASA directed
the agency to place all of the information that it
spheres that are completely absent from the
gathered into the public domain, unless spe-
Apollo photographs. Such a perspective, in ad- cifically excluded for reasons of national security.
dition to immediately localizing us within the Any citizen of the United States may therefore
world rather than beyond it, might, in John request and reproduce the Apollo space photo-
graphs without fee.
Kennedy's words and Michael Collins's hopes,
5. This paper deals only with American and Euro-
"return us safely to the earth."
pean receptions of the Apollo images. Beyond
the Western world they may have been under-
stood rather differently. I am aware that the pho-
tographs have been widely reproduced in Is-
Acknowledgments lamic countries and beyond, but explication of
the meanings that other cultures attach to them
I am grateful to staff at the Lyndon B. Johnson Space would require detailed cultural analysis.
Center at Houston, Texas for their help during my 6. Most of the scientific literature dealing with
research for this paper, specifically Doug Ward, for- space photography gives only passing attention
mer Director of Public Affairs, Bill Robbins of the to the specific images discussed here since they
Public Affairs Office, Jack Riley of the Media Services are of little scientific value. Photography's impor-
Office, Mike Gentry of Still Photographic Research, tance is decidedly subordinate to that of remote
and Joey Pellerin of the History Office. Thanks are sensing. Writings on the Whole-earth image are
also due to colleagues who commented on earlier discussed below; in general they ignore individ-

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 Contested Global Visions 291
ual pictures and do not stress the uniqueness of scape features of the lunar surface and those de-
the images specified here. picted in Richard Misrach's (1990) powerful pho-
7. NASA used John Glenn's photography of Earth tographs of the Nevada desert exploring the sub-
to support its case for manned space flight 8n limity of a landscape devastated by nuclear
the grounds that the human photographer was testing.
much more flexible in identifying good targets
than pre-set mechanical cameras. The debate is
discussed in detail in Mack (1990). On the sig-
nificance given to the graphic representation of References
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Cosgrove, Denis. 1994. Contested Global Visions: One-World, Whole-Earth, and the Apollo
Space Photographs. Annals of the Association of American Geographers 84(2):270-294. Ab-
stract.

The paper examines two photographs of the Earth taken during the Apollo Space program in
1968 and 1972 as representations of the Earth whose cartographic significance is of less impor-
tance than their relations with the contemporary Western geographical imagination. Earthrise
and AS17-148-22727 are unique as eyewitness photographs of the terracqueous globe. They
are interpreted within a historical context of seeing and representation in which Western culture
has consistently associated the globe with Christianity and imperialism. The essay summarizes
certain technical aspects of Apollo space photography, examines the iconography of the two
images, and places them in the twentieth-century cultural contexts of aerial views, both military
and civil, airborne photography, and geopolitics, while paying particular attention to the mas-
tering gaze associated with these practices as well as the specifically American use of global
iconography in the post-war period. Specific texts structured early cultural interpretation of the
Apollo photographs, most notably the writings of the American Modernist intellectual Archibald
MacLeish, the astronauts themselves, and the American press. These texts produce two distinct

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294 Cosgrove
but related interpretations, here termed One-world and Whole-earth. The respective uses of
the Apollo space photographs as global spatial and environmental images over the past two
decades reveal their significance in shaping aspects of the contemporary Western geographical
imagination. Key Words: cartography, gaze, geographical imagination, geopolitics, globe, images,
Modernism, One-world, representation, space photography, Whole-earth.

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