Bonhams NYC Auction: Spacesuits And Moon Notes Among The Stars

Two top lots in the sale are from Apollo 11, the first spaceflight to put men on the moon. 

An Apollo 11 mission badge (lot 210) flown with the craft into lunar orbit, and signed by the most famous space crew in history - Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins, and Buzz Aldrin - is estimated at $40,000-60,000.

Bonhams Space History sale on April 8 will feature nearly 300 fascinating artifacts related to decades of international space exploration, including genuine spacesuits, critical flight items from the famed Apollo 11 mission, lunar-flown American flags, rare photographs and astronauts' personal effects.

Two top lots in the sale are from Apollo 11, the first spaceflight to put men on the moon.

An Apollo 11 mission badge (lot 210) flown with the craft into lunar orbit, and signed by the most famous space crew in history - Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins, and Buzz Aldrin - is estimated at $40,000-60,000.

Also from Apollo 11, and estimated at $35,000-45,000, is a checklist sheet (lot 212) with notes made by Buzz Aldrin while on the moon.

Both sides of the sheet contain critical data that enabled Armstrong and Aldrin to return to earth. It is one of the most extensive sets of notations ever made on the lunar surface.

One of the more fascinating pieces in the sale is a spacesuit from the United States' first manned flight program, Project Mercury (lot 56) (est. $8,000-12,000).

Conducted between 1959 and 1963, Project Mercury aimed to put a human being into orbit around the earth.

Bonhams offer a beautiful example of a Phase 2 suit, made circa 1960, featuring the iconic silver coloring and an early "widow's peak" helmet.

In addition to the iconic Project Mercury suit, Bonhams offer a Russian Strizh spacesuit, (lot 58) designed to protect cosmonauts from ejection at altitudes up to 30 kilometers and speeds up to Mach 3 (est. $15,000-20,000).

This rare example is one of only 27 created for test and training purposes between 1981-1991, many of which were damaged or destroyed.

A NASA A6L prototype spacesuit (lot 57) will also be offered (est. $8,000-12,000).

Lunar-flown American flags are certain to attract attention. Highlights include a silk American flag (lot 211) carried to the moon by Buzz Aldrin on the Apollo 11 mission (est. $20,000-30,000), as well as a stars and stripes carried by Fred Haise (lot 249) on the infamous Apollo 13 mission (est. $15,000-20,000).

Haise intended to take the flag to the lunar surface, but the landing was scrubbed when an oxygen tank exploded causing a major electrical outage in the command and service modules.

Awe inspiring photographs and important signed portraits can be found throughout the sale. A NASA photograph of the lunar surface signed by all 12 moonwalkers is an extraordinarily rare offering (est. $8,000-12,000).

Showing an Earth rise in the distance, the image was taken as the Apollo 16 command module orbited the moon.

A Lunar Orbiter V panorama of the crater Copernicus (lot 178) is also available (est. $5,000-8,000).

The 32 large silver gelatin prints are the most comprehensive view of the crater to date.

Technology aficionados will appreciate the remarkable models and equipment available in the sale.

A motion picture ring sight (lot 139) used on the moon during Apollo 15 will be available (est. $20,000-30,000).

A Mir space station control panel (lot 28) (est. $4,000-6,000), a five foot-tall Vostok space rocket model (lot 22) (est. $10,000-15,000) and a Saturn IB rocket model (lot 97)  made by the Marshall Space Flight Center, showing the genius of Wernher von Braun and his team (est. $10,000-15,000).

Astronauts' personal effects are bound to capture the imagination of bidders.

Charles Conrad's stowage strap (lot 241) from Apollo 12 is truly out of this world, having been embedded with lunar dust transferred from the astronauts' hands while inside their lunar module (est. $25,000-35,000).

A cast of Buzz Aldrin's moon boot (lot 240), number two of three made by Chicago artist Jo Mead, embodies both the spirit of 1960's Pop Art and period's fascination with the cosmos (est. $20,000-30,000).

Equally striking is the Cosmonaut Survival Machete (Lot 65), of the same design carried by all Russian Soyuz flights to assist the cosmonaut crew after a remote unscheduled landing (est. $500-700).

The Space History sale will take place April 8 at Bonhams New York. The sale will preview at Bonhams April 4-8.

The complete catalogue is available here

Melvin Calvin's moon dust rediscovered at Berkeley Lab

Moon dust found in Berkeley Lab storage. Credit: Marilee Bailey

When Apollo 11 returned from its historic flight in 1969, the moon rocks and lunar soil collected by Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin eventually found their way to some 150 laboratories worldwide.

One of those was the Space Sciences Laboratory in Latimer Hall on the UC Berkeley campus.

After experiments were conducted and papers published, those samples should have been sent back to NASA.

Instead they wound up in storage, where they sat collecting dust until they were discovered more than four decades later.

Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) archivist Karen Nelson uncovered the moon dust—about 20 vials with handwritten labels and dated "24 July 1970"—last month while reviewing and clearing out artifacts from Berkeley Lab's warehouse.

"They were vacuum sealed in a glass jar," said Nelson, who has worked in Berkeley Lab's Archives and Records Office for 17 years. "We don't know how or when they ended up in storage."

Along with the jar was a copy of the paper "Study of carbon compounds in Apollo 11 and Apollo 12 returned lunar samples," published in the Proceedings of the Second Lunar Science Conference in 1971.

Melvin Calvin

Among the five co-authors, all from the Space Sciences Laboratory, is Melvin Calvin, who was also an associate director of Berkeley Lab (then known as Ernest O. Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory) and 1961 winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry.

The paper examined the nature and chemical characteristics of the carbon in the lunar samples.

According to a biography of Calvin by Glenn Seaborg and Andrew Benson, Calvin helped shape NASA's efforts to search for extraterrestrial life, including searching for organic and biologic compounds in the lunar samples.

Nelson contacted the Space Sciences Laboratory.

Berkeley Lab archivist Karen Nelson holds lunar samples used by Melvin Calvin for scientific experiments 43 years ago. Credit: Roy Kaltschmidt

"They were surprised we had the samples," she said. She then contacted NASA, who asked that the samples be sent back but allowed her to first open the jar to remove the vials.

Next she is trying to figure out what to do with other equipment from Calvin's lab, mainly glass pieces from Berkeley Lab's own glass shop.

In fact, Berkeley Lab's warehouse in San Jose contains 140 other pieces of scientific equipment that Nelson, who has a master's degree in museum studies, has been charged with clearing out.

While a few of the more important items will go on display at Berkeley Lab, she hopes the Smithsonian might be interested in some of the others.

"We're hoping another institution will be able to display them," she said. "The problem is we don't have room for display or storage."

While the Berkeley Lab Archives and Records Office will still accept some historically significant artifacts, it is quite limited in what it can accept. Fortunately, in this age of supercomputers, there are fewer and fewer tangible scientific artifacts.

"Scientists are using less machinery and more computers," she said.

NASA Astronaut Michael Collins: Apollo 11 Crewmate of Armstrong and Aldrin

America is mourning the first man to walk on the moon. Among those paying tribute to Neil Armstrong is his Apollo 11 crewmate Buzz Aldrin, the second man to tread the lunar surface.

"My friend Neil took the small step but giant leap that changed the world and will forever be remembered as a historic moment in human history," Aldrin said in a statement Saturday.

Many of us are familiar with the exploits of Armstrong and Aldrin. But what of the third astronaut on Apollo 11?

Michael Collins never set foot on the moon. As Armstrong and Aldrin descended to the lunar surface in the Eagle lander, Collins orbited around the moon in the command module of Apollo 11, called Columbia.

For a day he circled, waiting for his comrades to lift off again. As he passed behind the dark side of the moon, his communication with Earth was totally cut off.

In his autobiography "Carrying the Fire: An Astronaut's Journeys," Collins wrote about that isolation with surprising enthusiasm: "I feel this powerfully -- not as fear or loneliness -- but as awareness, anticipation, satisfaction, confidence, almost exultation.

I like the feeling. Outside my window I can see stars -- and that is all. Where I know the moon to be, there is simply a black void, the moon's presence is defined solely by the absence of stars."

After leaving NASA in 1970, Collins became director of the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum and later started an aerospace consulting firm.

He has not been one to court media attention. In a rare statement released by NASA in 2009, Collins said he was happy with his role in man's first trip to the moon.

The three astronauts of Apollo 11, he said, came along at exactly the right time to succeed in their careers.

"In my own case at least, it was 10 percent shrewd planning and 90 percent blind luck. Put LUCKY on my tombstone," Collins said.

On learning of Armstrong's death, the quiet Collins told NASA that he will miss Armstrong terribly, agency spokesman Bob Jacobs tweeted. 

Sad Loss of the most famous US Astronaut in History - Neil Armstrong

"I am, and ever will be, a nerdy engineer," Neil Armstrong once said, trying to downplay any suggestion that he was some sort of modern icon or superman. 

After making history in 1969 as the first person to walk on the moon, he spent much of the rest of his career out of the limelight and leading a quiet, modest life.

But his achievements were never, and will never, be forgotten. 

On hearing the news of Armstrong's death, President Obama said: "He was a hero not just of his time, but of all time."

Let us all celebrate the life of one of history's most acclaimed yet unassuming pioneers.

A footprint left by Neil Armstrong on the surface of the moon on 20 July 1969. 

The Apollo 11 astronauts - Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins and Edwin E. Aldrin, Jr - were launched to the moon by a Saturn V rocket on 16 July in Houston, Texas.

A photograph of Neil Armstrong taken by Buzz Aldrin on their way back from the moon.