 Apollo 8 , the second human spaceflight mission in the United States Apollo space program , was launched on December 21 , 1968 , and became the first manned spacecraft to leave Earth orbit , reach the Earth 's Moon , orbit it and return safely to Earth . The three @-@ astronaut crew — Commander Frank Borman , Command Module Pilot James Lovell , and Lunar Module Pilot William Anders — became the first humans to travel beyond low Earth orbit , the first to see Earth as a whole planet , the first to directly see the far side of the Moon , and then the first to witness Earthrise . The 1968 mission , the third flight of the Saturn V rocket and that rocket 's first manned launch , was also the first human spaceflight launch from the Kennedy Space Center , Florida , located adjacent to Cape Canaveral Air Force Station . 
