Neil Armstrong December 23, 1968, as Apollo 8 orbited the Moon. In a meeting that was not made public until the publication of Armstrong's biography in 2005, Slayton told him that although the planned crew was Commander Armstrong, Lunar Module Pilot Buzz Aldrin, and Command Module Pilot Michael Collins, he was offering Armstrong the chance to replace Aldrin with Jim Lovell. After thinking it over for a day, Armstrong told Slayton he would stick with Aldrin, as he had no difficulty working with him and thought Lovell deserved his own command. Replacing Aldrin with Lovell would have made Lovell the lunar module
6470 Aldrin 14.78. This minor planet was named for American astronaut Buzz Aldrin (born 1930), on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission. He was one of the first two humans to land on the Moon, and the second person to walk on it, following Neil Armstrong, after whom the asteroid 6469 Armstrong is named. Its name was suggested by Czech astronomers Jana Tichá, Miloš Tichý and Zdeněk Moravec, who observed the asteroid during its 1995-opposition, shortly before being numbered. The official naming citation was published by the Minor Planet Center on 4 May 1999 (). 6470 Aldrin