The Houston Chronicle reported yesterday that a computer programmer from Australia has found convincing evidence of the existence of the missing "a" from one of the most famous sentences ever uttered, "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind." That's what we on earth heard broadcast live from a quarter-million miles away on July 20, 1968, when Neil Armstrong became the first person to set foot on the moon. At best that sentence is awkward, at worst it's ungramattical, sexist and politically incorrect. Even as a teenager I remember thinking that Armstrong's choice of the word "man" meaning "human beings" followed by "mankind" meaning the same thing `was unnecessarily provocative -- not to mention chiseled in stone --at a time when the nacsent feminist movement was protesting exactly that kind of male chauvinism ingrained in the language.

And for the last 38 years when Neil Armstrong has been asked about it, he has repeated that what he meant to say and what he thought he did say was, "That's one small step for a man. . ." Which changes everything, don't you think? Without the "a" Armstrong sounds like a self-important symbol. With the "a" he sounds more like a guy. An "a" can make all the difference in the world. It can be the difference between describing someone as Dick or a dick.

Australian computer programmer Peter Ford discovered the missing "a" while working with some sound-editing software that allows paralyzed people to communicate with others via nerve impulses. When he downloaded Armstrong's "small step" speech from the NASA website, he found graphical proof that Armstrong transmitted the "a man" version but somehow the "a" got lost in space. After reviewing Ford's documentation, Armstrong declared the evidence to be "persuasive" while resisting the temptation to say, "Nyah, nyah, nyah, nyah, nyah! I told you so"! But imagine being Armstrong and living all these years knowing what he actually said and understanding full well that he is doomed to be misquoted for all time. Think of all the history books that would have to be revised, let alone the thousands of public monuments to the American space program that proudly quote the words, "One small step for man. . ."

There are any number of famous quotations that get corrupted by popular repetition. Bogie never said, "Play it again, Sam" to the piano player in Casablanca. He said, "Play it." Appolo 13 commander James Lovell never said, "Houston, we have a problem" following the explosion on the return flight to earth. He said "Houston, we've had a problem." But that kind of editing of famous quotations usually happens over a number of years. Armstrong's historic aphorism was wrong from the start, and no one at NASA seemed to notice how stilted it sounded when they heard it. If Jim Lovell had dropped his "a" along with the past tense -- "Houston, we have problem." -- NASA would have started an investigation of how a Russian cosmonaut stowed away.