Moon Pictures

Forty-eight years ago today, Ranger 7 sent back the first close-up images of the moon. They were 1,000 times clearer than any photos earth-bound telescopes had captured in the past. Simply put, the world had never seen anything like it.

The United States hasn't sent a man to the moon since 1972. In fact, we haven't even made a "soft landing" on the lunar surface since 1976.

But that doesn't mean our photo library is dwindling. It's just the opposite. Lunar orbital satellites continue to snap photos of the moon — and those images get more detailed with each new mission.

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To celebrate the moon's first photo shoot, we dug through NASA's archive to see how far we've come. One thing we learned? Our faithful friend the moon just doesn't have a bad angle.