posted 07-18-2012 01:05 PM               

Earlier this year, we were approached by a researcher who found an unusual item in the George Abbey Papers, Box 10 inside the folder labeled, "Alternate Columbia Crew Patch and Humorous Documents."

The folder also contained an undated handwritten letter from Bo [Bobko] that read:

"Dear George, We knew you would be interested in seeing our new patch proposal for 41F as soon as we had it completed. We hope it meets with your approval."

posted 07-19-2012 12:39 AM               

The 41F note seems to be unrelated. Bobko's crew was already taken off 41F in the Summer of 1984, when it was combined with 41D. Maybe the humorous part of the document is that the original 41F patch (with 'Discovery' and two stars for the second flight of Discovery), after having been changed to 'Challenger' for the also cancelled 51E flight (and changed again to include Jake Garn), was recycled for STS-51D, again with 'Discovery'and two stars (now symbolizing something else, since 51D was the 3rd flight of this orbiter). I could imagine that Bobko submitted his 51D patch with this note, since it was basically the same as the one he had submitted the first time, as a reference to the long design history.

By the way, nice Russian touch, especially with a crew commander who would become the first to dock with the Russian space station Mir some ten years later.

posted 07-19-2012 03:08 AM               

From what I can recall of the "patch" design, it looked sort of like it was a color copy on slick paper (did they even have laser copiers in the early 1980s?) or a clipping from a magazine. So I have a feeling somebody clipped the Dragon artwork from another source (probably an advertisement for Dungeons and Dragons in a magazine) and the person or persons went about doing the rest of the mission patch around it. The bit I found really bizarre though was seeing Columbia firing its RCS jets to "burn" down a Soviet Salyut type station. Whether done as a serious proposal or something a bit more humorous, a lot of effort went into it. I appreciated the efforts at least since it reminded me of my "edited" STS-124 patch with the toilet paper roll.

We never did get a good followup on it as I was focusing on other things and I don't have any contact information for Bo Bobko. I am curious as to what Bo might have to say about it though (if anything).

posted 07-19-2012 08:14 AM               

Our particular patch was designed by Hoot (Gibson) after input from the other NASA crew members. For some reason that escaped us all, George Abbey wanted a picture of a dragon to appear on the patch. None of the crew members felt a dragon was appropriate. Instead, the patch showed the COLUMBIA in a nose-up position with shock waves coming off the nose as it reentered earth's atmosphere. In addition to the Stars and Stripes, the astronauts decided to include the constellation Draco in the background. Pinky Nelson, who has a doctorate in astronomy, joked "that's as close as we can come to George's dragon"...

posted 05-11-2015 11:47 AM               

There are even a few funny crew patches in private files. The chief of crew operations had to approve all patches. Jokingly, he looked at one and told the commander there had never been a dragon on a patch and to add one. The design that came back with Columbia as a fire-breathing dragon destroying a Russian space vehicle was not acceptable. Cleverly, to comply with the order, the crew arranged stars on the patch in the shape of the constellation Draco (the dragon).