The Lockheed YF-12 Interceptor was the aircraft that would go on to become the SR-71 Blackbird – one of the most famous of all the Skunk Works projects. The YF-12 was capable of Mach 3 and above, it set 9 world records for speed and altitude in a single afternoon (later surpassed by the SR-71),…
Bulova and Omega were in a heated battle during the early years of the Space Race to become the official chronograph used in space and eventually worn on the surface of the Moon. As is well known, Omega won the battle and specially prepared Speedmasters were worn by all Apollo astronauts. What isn’t as widely…
Until very recently I wasn’t aware that NASA’s Gemini astronauts were issued with switchblades for emergency use, it’s likely that the knives were intended to be used in the result of a crash landing in a forest or jungle rather than the ocean as planned. Soviet cosmonauts from the same era were issued with machetes for…
Moonwalk One is a film that started production 18 months before the launch of Apollo 11, NASA wanted the mission recorded for posterity and so they hired Francis Thompson to head the project, who was widely considered to be the best documentary filmmaker in the USA at the time. In 1970 the population of the…
Michael Kagan is an artist with a unique style that tends to appeal to people who are otherwise not particularly interested in art, especially those with an interest in engineering, machines and flight. In order to see the images in Kagan’s paintings you typically have to stand a few feet back from the canvas, if…
This American flag was onboard Apollo 12 for the entirety of its mission to the Moon in November of 1969, it’s made of silk and has the signature of Alan L. Bean in the lower right corner – Bean was the Lunar Module Pilot for the mission, which also happened to be his first time…
The Apollo 13 Owners’ Workshop Manual is one of the most detailed and reader-friendly books about the Apollo 13 mission currently in print. It’s the work of David Baker – a veteran of the Apollo Space Program and a man who was actually in the room working with the other engineers on the consumables calculations…
This Apollo 11 parade wallpaper is a wonderful astronaut eye-view of a classic American ticker-tape parade. It’s thought that the first ever ticker tape parade took place in New York on October the 28th 1886 during the dedication of the Statue of Liberty – it was a spontaneous celebration caused by a stockbroker flinging reels of stock…
This collection of over 400 Gemini and Apollo Hasselblad Positives offer a remarkable and disarming look at life in space during the most important years of the American space program. The collection includes images from Gemini 4, Apollo 8 and the Apollo 9 missions – the Gemini 4 images feature earth terrain photography from magazine…
“Debrief: Apollo 8” is a 1969 documentary about the Apollo 8 mission of a year earlier that saw the first humans leave Earth’s orbit and enter the orbit of the Moon. It was an essential mission in preparation for the Apollo 11 mission of 1969 that resulted in the first manned landing on the…
The Red Stuff is a fascinating look behind the Iron Curtain at the Soviet space program and the men and women who formed the opposite half of the space race throughout the mid to late 20th century. We all know the names Alan Shepard, Buzz Aldrin, Gus Grissom and many other NASA astronauts but their…
It’s always surprising to me how many people don’t know that the American Optical sunglasses worn by the Gemini, Mercury and Apollo astronauts are still being made and can be bought for a rather reasonable $39 USD. They’re built to the same standards as the originals by the same company (American Optical) and they suit…
