posted 05-20-2017 09:07 PM               

Space Cover 418: Glenn Goldcraft Cards – They do exist!

George Goldey was one of the very early space cover servicers covering the largest variety of early space events of any servicer at the time producing "Space Age Cover" under the "Goldcraft" name. Goldcraft covered events from launches at Cape Canaveral, Vandenberg AFB, Wallops Island, White Sands Missile Range and occasionally other locations such as Canada and Okinawa; astronaut and presidential space related visits and awards; recovery ships; X-15 and LLRV events at Edwards AFB; and space FDCs.

Many times, especially manned launches and FDC, Goldcraft created mutiple cachets for the event or FDI. Goldcraft had a unique style of cachet and you can tell a Goldcraft item with or without the Goldcraft name on the item. Goldcraft serviced covers through some of the shuttle development tests but I have not seen any covers after 1980.

While collectors normally think of standard covers for events Goldcraft periodically created special items in addition to the standard size envelopes – for example - Monarch sized covers for Schirra and Gemini 3 flights, recovery ship folder for Cooper and Gemini 3 flights, and a series of 5"x7" cards for Project Mercury flights and multiple unmanned mission such as Anna and Telstar.

Here is an image of the card for Cooper flight:

Here is an image of the card for Anna launch:

These cards, while rare, can be periodically found for the Project Mercury flights for Grissom, Carpenter, Schirra and Cooper. But until recently I had never seen any for John Glenn's flight – but since they existed for Grissom and Carpenter I was pretty sure at least one version existed. So why had I never seen one? Well now they have appeared, and not one version but at least two versions were produced! The Glenn cards are shown at the top of this post and here:

Since these are oversized they won't be with the regular covers so when you attend stamp shows always ask to see the large sized space items – you may be surprised at what turns up!