BARACK Obama joined the chorus of voices paying tribute to the late Neil Armstrong when he called him a great American hero who had "delivered a moment of human achievement that will never be forgotten".
The US President made his comments as recognition of Armstrong's achievement continued to flow from people around the world, the day after he died aged 82 from complications after heart bypass surgery.
Space pioneer Mr Armstrong was also being remembered in Langholm, his ancestral home in Dumfries and Galloway; Glasgow, which he visited in October 1974; and Fife, where he thrilled locals in 2010 by playing a round of golf at Leven Links.
Mr Armstrong flew into Glasgow Airport on October 9, 1974, where he was photographed with a piper from the City Of Glasgow Police Band and John Santos, vice-president of General Time International, the company that made the quartz timepieces used on the moon missions.
From the airport he was taken on a tour of the company's Westclox factory in the Vale of Leven, had lunch in the Dumbuck Hotel then travelled into Glasgow, where he gave a talk to a group of schoolchildren. He later attended a dinner at the Lomond Castle Hotel.
"He was a very quiet man and very reticent and didn't want to meet many people," recalled Mr Santos's widow Anne, now 77, whose then 10-year-old son Christopher presented the astronaut with Armstrong tartan.
"He wouldn't have any television [interviews] and there were no photographs taken. He didn't talk about any spirituality that he felt, which I felt he might have done. It was just really that he had been the first man on the moon and it had had quite an impact on him.
"But he was perfectly charming – a very quiet and unassuming man who felt he ought to come to places like this because people wished to meet him or see him."
Also present with Mr Armstrong in Glasgow and Dumbarton was the astronomer Sir Patrick Moore, who paid his own tribute yesterday.
The presenter of the long-running BBC show The Sky At Night said: "As the first man on the moon, he broke all records. I knew him well. He was a man who had all the courage in the world."
Two years earlier, in 1972, Mr Armstrong had visited Langholm, notionally his ancestral home, where he had the freedom of the town conferred on him. Scott Armstrong, now 79, is assistant curator of the town's Clan Armstrong Centre and served the American drinks at a reception in a bar in the town.
"I thought he was a great man," said Mr Armstrong. "I got a chance to talk to him and I also got his autograph on a menu.
"He was surrounded by Armstrongs – the town clerk at the time was called Eddie Armstrong."
In 2010, meanwhile, the former astronaut and some friends visited Leven Links in Fife to play golf. Typically, he had wanted to keep his trip secret but word leaked out.
The mother of two young boys who met him said the astronaut told them the mission was much more famous than he was.
Fellow astronauts Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin and Michael Collins joined the tributes. Mr Collins said: "He was the best and I will miss him terribly."
Mitt Romney, who is standing for the Republican Party against Mr Obama in November's US elections, said: "His passion for space, science and discovery and his devotion to America will inspire me through my lifetime."
Meanwhile, a statement released by the Armstrong family praised his example of "service, accomplishment and modesty" adding: "The next time you walk outside on a clear night and see the moon smiling down at you, think of Neil Armstrong and give him a wink."
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