Apollo 11 flown die

[SkyMan]

It turns out that there was a die flown to the Moon on Apollo 11. When the mission returned to the Earth the die was used to strike 1,000 stainless steel medallions to be given to people who had been of particular importance to the program.

 

(These medallions should NOT be confused with the MUCH more common "Flight Awareness" medallions. The FA medallions were made by mixing some flown metal (I believe a small ingot, but I am not 100% sure) with a MUCH larger amount of unflown metal. These FA medallions could then claim to contain flown metal from the mission.)

 

In my opinion the design of the flown die is rather plebeian. The obverse is a modified version of the Apollo Program design, and the reverse states that the die for the medallion was carried to the Moon on Apollo 11 and has facsimiles of the crew's signatures.

 

I wonder where the die is now. My best guess is it's either in the Smithsonian or lost.

 

Here is a link to an article that shows pictures of the medallion, as well as a letter from Max Faget (a high NASA official) explaining about the commemorative medallion and die.

 

Die Link

[Afterword]

Interesting read. I believe I saw one of these in an auction not too long ago. Seems like it went for a couple hundred dollars.

[RWB]

Are the flown atoms marked with little flags so we can tell them from the ordinary ones?

 

[PocketArt]

Fun read SkyMan.

 

I have a Apollo 17 Eyewitness Medal that was minted by the Franklin Mint. Apparently, these too have trace amounts of mission silver. I did a little searching online and found an interesting link that has space related mission coins and other unusual items that may be worth viewing.

 

http://www.space-coins.com/medals/index.html

 

 

In the above link, they have the 2009 Cook Islands coin that celebrates the 50th anniversary of Luna 3, and also the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 manned mission. This particular piece has an embedded piece of lunar meteorite on the coin. One of this particular coin type is featured in February 2016 issue of Coin World on page 108 in article "Coins with a Lunar Theme."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Jacob H. Robbins]

@PocketArt: wrong, no part of your Franklin Mint Apollo 17 Eyewitness Medal has been to outer space.

"Apollo 17 flown items all begin and end with the Apollo 17 Robbins Medal." 

natedsanders.com/blog/2016/11/apollo-17-flown