Gemini 8 (Neil Armstrong) flown Double Eagle.
SkyMan
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Here's an item I was quite hot to trot about. It just sold at auction. It is the largest US gold coin that I've heard of that was flown during the Mercury, Gemini, Apollo (MGA) era. It was flown onboard Gemini 8 (1966) which was commanded by Neil Armstrong, and Armstrong personally took the coin aboard at the request of a technician who was working on the capsule. However, once I saw a picture of the coin, I backed away from bidding on it. The coin was "slabbed" in lucite. If my reading of the accompanying certificate of authenticity is correct, it was Armstrong himself who had the coin encased in lucite.
Encasing flown items in lucite is quite common for space memorabilia (SM). There are any numbers of lucite encased heat shield "plugs" (a core of a heat shield) from MGA missions on the market, as well as a wide variety of lucite encased beta cloth swatches etc. I just am not a fan of these sort of items. Also, very importantly, the item went for (with commission) ~ $15,200, which is well more than I was willing to spend on it. Here's a link to the coin:
Link
Encasing flown items in lucite is quite common for space memorabilia (SM). There are any numbers of lucite encased heat shield "plugs" (a core of a heat shield) from MGA missions on the market, as well as a wide variety of lucite encased beta cloth swatches etc. I just am not a fan of these sort of items. Also, very importantly, the item went for (with commission) ~ $15,200, which is well more than I was willing to spend on it. Here's a link to the coin:
Link
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How would one go about removing it from Lucite so that it can be properly enjoyed?
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<< <i>$13k! wow! >>
Actually, it was $15,200, with the juice. Maybe if you offered the buyer $15,320, he would sell it to you.
Here is a summary of the Voyager missions (taken from Nasa):
"The twin spacecraft Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 were launched by NASA in separate months in the summer of 1977 from Cape Canaveral, Florida. As originally designed, the Voyagers were to conduct closeup studies of Jupiter and Saturn, Saturn's rings, and the larger moons of the two planets.
To accomplish their two-planet mission, the spacecraft were built to last five years. But as the mission went on, and with the successful achievement of all its objectives, the additional flybys of the two outermost giant planets, Uranus and Neptune, proved possible -- and irresistible to mission scientists and engineers at the Voyagers' home at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.
As the spacecraft flew across the solar system, remote-control reprogramming was used to endow the Voyagers with greater capabilities than they possessed when they left the Earth. Their two-planet mission became four. Their five-year lifetimes stretched to 12 and is now near thirty years.
Eventually, between them, Voyager 1 and 2 would explore all the giant outer planets of our solar system, 48 of their moons, and the unique systems of rings and magnetic fields those planets possess.
Had the Voyager mission ended after the Jupiter and Saturn flybys alone, it still would have provided the material to rewrite astronomy textbooks. But having doubled their already ambitious itineraries, the Voyagers returned to Earth information over the years that has revolutionized the science of planetary astronomy, helping to resolve key questions while raising intriguing new ones about the origin and evolution of the planets in our solar system.
History Of The Voyager Missions:
The Voyager mission was designed to take advantage of a rare geometric arrangement of the outer planets in the late 1970s and the 1980s which allowed for a four-planet tour for a minimum of propellant and trip time. This layout of Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune, which occurs about every 175 years, allows a spacecraft on a particular flight path to swing from one planet to the next without the need for large onboard propulsion systems. The flyby of each planet bends the spacecraft's flight path and increases its velocity enough to deliver it to the next destination. Using this "gravity assist" technique, first demonstrated with NASA's Mariner 10 Venus/Mercury mission in 1973-74, the flight time to Neptune was reduced from 30 years to 12.
While the four-planet mission was known to be possible, it was deemed to be too expensive to build a spacecraft that could go the distance, carry the instruments needed and last long enough to accomplish such a long mission. Thus, the Voyagers were funded to conduct intensive flyby studies of Jupiter and Saturn only. More than 10,000 trajectories were studied before choosing the two that would allow close flybys of Jupiter and its large moon Io, and Saturn and its large moon Titan; the chosen flight path for Voyager 2 also preserved the option to continue on to Uranus and Neptune.
From the NASA Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral, Florida, Voyager 2 was launched first, on August 20, 1977; Voyager 1 was launched on a faster, shorter trajectory on September 5, 1977. Both spacecraft were delivered to space aboard Titan-Centaur expendable rockets.
The prime Voyager mission to Jupiter and Saturn brought Voyager 1 to Jupiter on March 5, 1979, and Saturn on November 12, 1980, followed by Voyager 2 to Jupiter on July 9, 1979, and Saturn on August 25, 1981.
Voyager 1's trajectory, designed to send the spacecraft closely past the large moon Titan and behind Saturn's rings, bent the spacecraft's path inexorably northward out of the ecliptic plane -- the plane in which most of the planets orbit the Sun. Voyager 2 was aimed to fly by Saturn at a point that would automatically send the spacecraft in the direction of Uranus.
After Voyager 2's successful Saturn encounter, it was shown that Voyager 2 would likely be able to fly on to Uranus with all instruments operating. NASA provided additional funding to continue operating the two spacecraft and authorized JPL to conduct a Uranus flyby. Subsequently, NASA also authorized the Neptune leg of the mission, which was renamed the Voyager Neptune Interstellar Mission.
Voyager 2 encountered Uranus on January 24, 1986, returning detailed photos and other data on the planet, its moons, magnetic field and dark rings. Voyager 1, meanwhile, continues to press outward, conducting studies of interplanetary space. Eventually, its instruments may be the first of any spacecraft to sense the heliopause -- the boundary between the end of the Sun's magnetic influence and the beginning of interstellar space.
Following Voyager 2's closest approach to Neptune on August 25, 1989, the spacecraft flew southward, below the ecliptic plane and onto a course that will take it, too, to interstellar space. Reflecting the Voyagers' new transplanetary destinations, the project is now known as the Voyager Interstellar Mission.
Voyager 1 has crossed into the heliosheath and is leaving the solar system, rising above the ecliptic plane at an angle of about 35 degrees at a rate of about 520 million kilometers (about 320 million miles) a year. Voyager 2 is also headed out of the solar system, diving below the ecliptic plane at an angle of about 48 degrees and a rate of about 470 million kilometers (about 290 million miles) a year.
Both spacecraft will continue to study ultraviolet sources among the stars, and the fields and particles instruments aboard the Voyagers will continue to explore the boundary between the Sun's influence and interstellar space. The Voyagers are expected to return valuable data for at least another decade. Communications will be maintained until the Voyagers' power sources can no longer supply enough electrical energy to power critical subsystems."
Each Voyager spacecraft carries with it a Golden Disk on which are recordings of the sights and sounds of earth; and markings on the disks which contain information regarding the location of the earth, the origin of the two spacecraft. One Saint Gaudens double eagle attached to each spacecraft would have given each a second "Golden Disk" that would be a treat to all coin collectors.
And you purists are just gonna have to get over the lucite. I don't think it detracts at all.
<< <i>I take it that this piece is now forever confined to the realm of exonumisma?
How would one go about removing it from Lucite so that it can be properly enjoyed? >>
Personally I would still consider it numisma in that it is a coin.
As to removing it from lucite, I talked to some people at NCS when I first saw the picture of the coin. I was still considering bidding on it then. According to NCS, they could have removed the coin from the lucite, but it would have been a LONG process, with no guarantees as to the end result. Once I found out that it was Armstrong who had the coin encased in lucite, it seemed wrong to me to strip it. Aside from the fact that the coin was encased in lucite, part of the reason I did NOT bid on it was that the coin was never purchased by Armstrong, it was simply carried along by him... for $15,000+ this seemed a mighty stiff premium. The space flown coins I do have; Liberty Bell 7 and Gemini 3 dimes, and a Gemini 4 quarter eagle were each purchased and carried by their respective flight commanders (Grissom, Grissom and McDivitt), and then held on to for a period of time afterwards.
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<< <i>Once I found out that it was Armstrong who had the coin encased in lucite, it seemed wrong to me to strip it. >>
Definitely.
Nice coin with history.
To bad it's in a casket.
<< <i>Would PCGS be able to retrieve it from the paperweight and attribute it? >>
Maybe they could practice on Realone's Fugio.