Posts: 197
From: Ridgefield, CT
Registered: Jan 2009

posted 09-17-2023 09:21 AM               

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Space Cover of the Week, Week 719 (September 17, 2023)

Space Cover 719: All in the Family

Like many who are reading this I have a collection of various signed space covers. Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo astronaut signed covers top my list followed by launch recovery team members. The list goes on from scientists to NASA support personal, politicians, actors and seemingly everything in between.

By far my most extensive collection is for the1 1969 First Man on the Moon #C76 United States postage stamp designed by my father Paul Calle. In this group I have two covers that I believe are quite unique, a #C76 autographed by Lone Eagle aviator Charles Lindbergh and one signed by my boyhood sports hero, Baseball Hall of Fame player Willie Mays.

Another group of signed space covers I am always on the search for are those signed by family members of astronauts.

Two examples here are a Project Gemini-Titan 5 cover signed by astronaut Gordon Cooper's mother Hattie Cooper, and an Apollo 9 cover signed by astronaut Jim McDivitt's parents. It is very interesting to note Jim's autograph is very similar in many ways to that of his father's signature especially in the way he signs "D" and the two t's at the end of McDivitt.

Also the "Cooper" signed by Hattie Cooper very closely mirrors that of early autographs of Gordon Cooper.

I have seen this in both mine and my brother's signatures where the "Calle" resembles that of my father. We do pick up various traits from our parents and handwriting seems to be one of them!

Two more examples are an Apollo 10 cover signed by Gene Cernan's mother Rose signing Mrs. Andrew Cernan, and a cover signed by Apollo 7 astronaut Donn Eisele's wife Harriet and two of their children.

Let's see your covers signed by astronaut family members!

Posts: 1707
From: Washington, DC, USA
Registered: Apr 2003

Posts: 1869
From: Atlanta-area, GA USA
Registered: Aug 2000

Posts: 863
From: Marietta GA USA
Registered: Dec 1999

posted 09-18-2023 06:36 AM               

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Bob, I'm not a very knowledgeable cover collector so I have no idea why your two covers are considered "quite controversial."

Can you please share the story, thanks.

Posts: 1869
From: Atlanta-area, GA USA
Registered: Aug 2000

posted 09-18-2023 09:28 AM               

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The same Apollo 1 tenth anniversary cover above was featured in SCOTW 646 of April 17, 2022. It generated some interesting comments and information about these Marsar-provided replicas of actual official NASA/KSC Apollo 1 rubber stamp cachets.

They are controversial because of their close resemblance to the real NASA/KSC cachets, which are rare and valuable. After all these years and being spread around could be sold as real.

Posts: 812
From: Salzburg, Austria
Registered: Jun 2003

posted 09-18-2023 10:59 AM               

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You can find a picture of a Oct. 27, 1967 KSC cover here.

Decades ago the late German space cover collector Paul Wittmaack investigated minor changes of the KSC machine postmark. He came to the conclusion that either the KSC post office re-opened for servicing covers or they were done in the morning before changing the date of the machine postmark. All of them bear a JFK stamp.

The guy who did those covers had more plain covers than stamps. So he postmarked the remaining covers without a stamp. A stamp and a KSC hand postmark were added later. You can find one of them here from RR Auction.

All Apollo Fire covers with NASA cachet and KSC hand postmark are backdated.

Posts: 3678
From: Merritt Island, Florida, Brevard
Registered: Mar 2001

posted 09-18-2023 04:46 PM               

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To further expand Chris' SCOTW #719, here are a few other "all in the family" signed space covers. One is similar to Bob's recent posting of Armstrong's hometown in Ohio signed by his parents. Below at top right is another signed hometown cover by "The First Man's" Mom and Dad with a July 20, 1969, machine slogan cancel of a different type.

Perhaps a more unusual Apollo 11 "family" cover for man's first lunar landing splashdown is a popular Dow-Unicover cachet at top left. It has been autographed by the wives of the Apollo 11 astronaut crew, Jan Armstrong, Joan Aldrin, and Patricia Collins. All the signatures were gotten in person, along with Patricia Nixon and Judy Agnew, the wives of President Richard Nixon and Vice President Spiro Agnew during that era when men first went to the moon. The Cape-posted cover was signed during the Presidential Dinner honoring the Apollo 11 crew at the Century Plaza Hotel in Los Angeles on August 13, 1969. The cover had been owned by one of the VIP dinner attendees that managed in getting all the signatures that evening.

Another favorite of mine is from the wives of the second Skylab crew (SL-3) in 1973 in which they had signed a limited number of special covers and decal stickers in commemoration of the first astronaut wives patch ever created for a manned U.S. spaceflight. I'll try to show some other "family-type" covers if there is further interest.