REFLECTING ON MIRRORS

A major milestone on my book collecting journey is this apparently unassuming 'annual' - the Daily Mirror Book of Space, from 1970. An xmas present at the time, it would have been on my list at the time as something I had spotted in the shops and looked forward to on the day. A little larger in format than the average annual, its packed full of colour and black and white photographs and illustrations. Written by Maurice Allward and illustrated by Gordon Davies - who also contributed to 'Rockets and Missiles' by John W.R Taylor, re-using some of the artwork for both books.

From the outset, one thing puzzled me greatly and this was the photograph on the cover. As it had a distinctly bluish tinge and is taken from a very odd angle, I struggled as a kid to identify, which spaceship it was - assuming it was a Gemini capsule, especially as the astronauts helmet was red. Many years later, I came back to the image and quickly realised that it was taken from the cockpit of the LEM, looking back along the Service Module of the Apollo vehicle. Seeing the full uncropped image, makes it much more obvious. It shows David Scott conducting the Emergency transfer test from the Apollo 9 capsule in a orbit around Earth, taken by Russell Schweichart aboard the LEM. 

The book is unusual as rather than just show well worn and often used NASA imagery, Gordon Davies depicts some of the more diverse spacecraft and vehicles connected with the programmes.

This spread shows the classic image of  the Ranger series Probe, with the conical cowl over the landing capsule. Early Bird and Telstar as well as french satellite Alouette are also depicted.

Davies illustration of the Moon Lander from Rockets and Missiles

Its notable for its inclusion of many future projects, such as the Mars Viking Lander, shown in the annual as a conceptual diagram, rather than the actual vehicle.

For me, where it really excelled was its examination of the space shuttle concept. It was exciting designs like these Lockheed and Boeing concepts that led me to expect something really cool within the next 15 years, rather than the jumbo jet style shuttle which we were eventually presented with.

I loved the piggy backed delta shaped design, which was so reminiscent of Gerry Anderson shows in the sixties and influenced the design of toys around this time.

Kellogg cereal premiums made by Rosenhain & Lipmann in Melbourne, Australia, included some wonderful little models of space vehicles, including this 'Hooty Toot' Whistle in the shape of the delta ferry, a Molab vehicle and a small, but accurate Apollo and LEM.

Besides the shuttle concepts, Maurice Allward also included some information regarding space rescue, such as proposed lifeboats and rescue craft capable of reaching stranded astronauts, probably influenced by the Apollo 13 disaster that same year. Once more, toy companies used information such as this to produced models in keeping with current trends, such as the Tri-ang Space Rescue Craft.

The book has some unusual space station designs and lunar exploration vehicles such as the POGO and FLEEP platforms, which would surface as toys in the Airfix Astronauts figure set.

The Bendix lunar rover concept depicted in the book is shown here being driven by Werner Von Braun himself in a rare publicity photo.

Once more, I was quite disappointed by the eventual choice of design for the Lunar Rover, having seen so many varied designs for wheeled vehicles, the actual electric go-kart design was pretty uninspiring. The Flying Lunar Excursion Platform or FLEEP was another design included in the Airfix set.

Naturally, astronauts and space suit designs are always a topic included in space books and the Daily Mirror annual was no exception, including the egg-shaped hard shell suit to protect the wearer from micrometeorites and cosmic radiation and also a drawing of  Allyn “Hap” Hazard's revolutionary lunar work suit, shown here being tested in the Mojave desert in 1960, as featured in Life magazine that year.

Mattel toys took the initiative and included the design in their hugely successful 'Man in Space' series with the 7" Major Matt Mason figure. Mattel's toys were always innovative and well made, with a host of realistic action features, such as pneumatic rubber arms on the moon suit.

Seeing so many of my favourite space toys depicted in books and magazines, as real or projected designs was a major influence on my collecting habits of toys and models and was something which would be explored much more fully, decades later via the Moonbase Central blog.