Gemini 8 (Neil Armstrong) flown Double Eagle.

[SkyMan]

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

[kryptonitecomics]

They had a piece of the heat shielding in lucite come in on the TV show pawn stars.....don't remember what the seller was asking but I don't believe they were able to make a deal on the piece. (thumbs u

[bsshog40]

It sure would been much easier on the coin if they would have labeled it in a slab.

[jerseycat10]

Question is... can the lucite be safely removed from the coin?

 

Can the coin be authenticated by our host with the pedigree assigned?

[SkyMan]

Question is... can the lucite be safely removed from the coin?

 

Can the coin be authenticated by our host with the pedigree assigned?

 

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.

 

Assuming our hosts accept the certificate of authenticity signed by the original owner of the coin then they would have no problem assigning the pedigree. Up until this double eagle came to market, I was only familiar with one other gold US coin that had flown during the MGA era, a Gemini 4 quarter eagle that I own. NGC slabbed it and assigned it's pedigree. Now, of course, the pedigree would have to read something like: Owner = X, Carried aboard by Armstrong.

 

[physics-fan3.14]

Very nice, too bad you didn't win it.

[Wehwalt]

Most interesting. Why were these coins flown? To create souvenirs or gifts?

[nwcs]

Most interesting. Why were these coins flown? To create souvenirs or gifts?

Almost all the time for souvenirs and to make a little extra cash.