Mike Gruntman alongside Soviet ICBM SS-18, at a former base of
the USSR Strategic Rocket Forces in Ukraine
Few turning points in history are as well documented as the moment that Neil Armstrong became the first person to walk on the moon. Less has been shared about what he decided to do next – shortly after the lunar landing, he finally completed his master’s degree in aerospace engineering from USC.
A new book by Mike Gruntman, professor of astronautics, addresses that knowledge gap and investigates Armstrong’s relationship with USC before and after the Apollo 11 mission in 1969.
Neil Armstrong at USC and on the Moon: Apollo 11 Lunar Landing (2025) begins with Armstrong’s graduate studies at USC in the 1950s. The book then describes his return to campus on January 22, 1970, when he presented a lecture on techniques and procedures of lunar landing – an event that celebrated the dedication of a new science center, while simultaneously fulfilling the final requirements of Armstrong’s master’s degree.
It was just a small step to completion – but many years in the making. Armstrong had to interrupt his graduate studies when NASA selected him for astronaut training and transferred to Houston. Six months before his lecture at USC, he had commanded the Apollo 11 lunar mission and taken that first legendary “small step” – that “giant leap for mankind.”
Image of the lunar module at Tranquility Base, captured
by Neil Armstrong during the Apollo 11 mission. Courtesy of NASA.
The book goes on to investigate the nuances of the mission from an engineer’s perspective. Numerous technical details reveal the challenges of developing, designing and operating the Apollo spacecraft, particularly its lunar landing modules, as well as the process of training the crews.
Gruntman – as a specialist in spacecraft and space mission design, among other areas – is well-placed to explain what it really takes to achieve a lunar landing. He is also widely recognized as a writer of engineering histories. The award-winning Blazing the Trail (2004) was acclaimed for encyclopedic coverage of the early history of spacecraft and rocketry, bridging the gap between accessible storytelling and technical depth. Intercept 1961: The Birth of Soviet Missile Defense.(2015) told the little-known story of the earliest breakthroughs that paved the way for the powerful missile defense complex in the Soviet Union, a major factor in the Cold War.
As it happens, Gruntman’s own life story has the makings of a compelling work of nonfiction. He was born in the Soviet Union and spent part of his childhood at the Tyuratam Missile Test Range (also known as Baikonur Cosmodrome) in present-day Kazakhstan, where his father served as chief engineer of construction. Gruntman lived there at the launch of Sputnik in 1957, the first man-made satellite, and the flight of Yuri Gagarin in 1961, setting the tone for his later pursuit of a PhD in physics and work on space programs at the Space Research Institute (IKI) of the USSR Academy of Sciences and Institute for Problems in Mechanics (IPM). His pioneer work on imaging of space plasmas in energetic neutral atoms significantly contributed to developing the concept and instrumentation of a future NASA mission, with him as a team member, that mapped the interstellar boundary of the solar system in 2009. The discovery was featured on the cover of Science magazine.
Gruntman was all set to become a key player on the Soviet space program – but there was one insurmountable hurdle. As a staunch anti-communist (in 1984, he showed his support of the Polish underground Solidarity movement during demonstrations and clashes with riot police in the city of Gdansk), he knew that he would be at risk if he stayed in the Soviet Union. In 1990, as the Iron Curtain started to break down, he made his way to the US and took on a new role at USC.
As a co-founder of the USC Department of Astronautical Engineering in 2004, he has spearheaded the department’s master’s program – one of the largest academic space engineering programs in the US, and a go-to for recruiters from the nation’s top space engineering companies and research institutions. As such, he has helped to craft a program worthy of a university that counts Armstrong as an alumnus – as well as alumni who are currently shaping the future of human space exploration and expanding commercial space as the space industry undergoes its fastest transformation since the Apollo era.
Dramatically reduced launch costs and breakthroughs in manufacturing, satellite technology, software and commercial business models are reframing the type of problems engineers are tasked with tackling. For Gruntman, the study of the breakthroughs of the past holds clues to how to innovate for the future. Read with an engineer’s mindset, Neil Armstrong at USC and on the Moon: Apollo 11 Lunar Landing is a practical handbook as much as a work of history.
Published on December 22nd, 2025
Last updated on December 22nd, 2025
