Buzz Aldrin (Glen Ridge, New Jersey, January 20, 1930), born Edwin Eugene Aldrin Jr.

, is a
retired American engineer, Air Force pilot, and astronaut. As lunar module pilot for the Apollo
11 mission, he and Commander Neil Armstrong were the first two humans to set foot on the
Moon, in 1969

He attended the United States Military Academy at West Point, earning a degree in
mechanical engineering.He entered the Air Force and was commissioned as a fighter pilot
during the Korean War , after which he served as an air gunnery instructor and later as a
flight commander at Bitburg Air Base, West Germany.After earning a doctorate in
astronautics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology,he was selected as a member
of NASA's Astronaut Group 3, becoming the first astronaut with a doctorate degree.His
efforts on the Gemini 12 mission, one of his first space missions, helped complete the
unfinished EVA tasks of previous missions, and served as a precedent for the Apollo
program. Three years later, he stepped onto the lunar surface as part of Apollo 11 and, due
to his affiliation with the Presbyterian Church, officiated at a short religious ceremony that
concluded with communion.