EVER INCREASING CIRCLES

It is hard to keep a good idea down, sometimes and in the sixties, during the space race ideas abounded as research and conceptualisation were the order of the day, as scientists came up with deigns for craft to explore the moon and space. Many of the fabulous ideas never made it beyond the drawing board and others found favour in different guises, as a an expectant public eagerly snapped up any information about the upcoming missions. Tabloids and periodicals such as Colliers and Life magazine carried articles about the development of the materiel which would be used to conquer space and popular Mechanics and Air Progress magazines covered all kinds of weird and wonderful designs for lunar exploration vehicles and spacecraft. Science Fiction was a burgeoning industry too and the monthly pulps and magazines took advantage of the wealth of information coming from the engineering companies, US Air Force and NASA news agencies, using imagery from the publicity materials to bolster sales.

Analog was a monthly magazine that carried science fiction stories, balanced with a mix of science fact articles. One of the artists who contributed to the magazine, was John Schoenherr who became famous for his illustrations for Frank Herbert's 'Dune' sequence. Schoenherr was a talented artist, who produced some stunning painted artwork for Analog over the next few years, including a simple painting of a 'Moon Crawler' vehicle on the surface of the moon. This in itself is not unusual, but the simple image became the basis of a number of toys which would be produced over the next decade.

Probably the single most direct influence would be the use of the image in a small plastic jigsaw, made by JAK PAK. Clearly an attempt to cash in on the craze, JAK PAK made five small jigsaws named 'Lunarprobe' with space imagery on them. The original painting has been loosely interpreted in a comic book fashion and has a pair of astronauts shoehorned into the image, along with a distinctly recognisble Apollo CSM sailing overhead.
 

Curious about the origins of the painting itself, Paul Woods of Moonbase Central attempted to contact the artist, who had unfortunately passed away just a little time before. However, his son Ian was in charge of his fathers estate and in the process of organising the work, uncovered two remarkable pre-production sketches of the image. The full story can be read here:

https://projectswordtoys.blogspot.com/2011/09/john-schoenherrs-moon-crawler.html

Ian remarked that his dad kept a lot of reference material on file for his commissions and one image from LIFE magazine was especially pertinent to the Moon Crawler design.  Its very plain to see where the big balloon tyre idea came from and very possibly, the colour scheme for the crawler too!

Before the JAK PAK jigsaw was recognised by the Moonbase Central community, the crawler image was found in another book, 'Men on the Moon' in 1963. This volume struck a chord with toy collectors, as it showed the moon crawler image and a second vehicle, which would had found its way into toy fandom as part of the Tri-ang Spacex series as the Surveyor and Molab respectively. Detailed information on both these toys and the rest of the line can be discovered here:

https://www.triangspacextoys.info/SpGAorig/SrvyrOrF/Srvr_OrP.html

The Men on the Moon book suggests it is based on "America's Project Apollo", but the cover is much more indicative of pulp imagery and the contents are a mixture of factual articles and a fictional account of a moon landing, interspersed with imagery clearly culled from the pulp realm, along with some very interesting early Apollo Project concept art and models.

Schoenherr's original Moon Crawler directly influenced the design of the Project SWORD Moon Crawler,as well as the Spacex Surveyor. Project Sword was a Gerry Anderson series of toys and stories, which did not benefit from the usual TV series to carry it and despite reasonable success, did not find as much fame as Thunderbirds or Captain Scarlet.

The SWORD Moon Crawler never made it beyond the pages of the single 1968 Annual release, although Japanese kit manufacturer Imai, did make a number of versions of the vehicle, in similar livery, but without any connection to the franchise.

The other vehicle in the book is what has become known as the 'Molab' (or Mobile Laboratory) which was quite slavishly copied for the Spacex line.

Scattered around the book are a number of other early LEM concepts, proposed around 1962, which show a streamlined, upright vehicle.

Some of the images clearly show conceptual models, probably made of wood and plastic, which were often shown at press conferences to illustrate how dockings and landing might take place. It was models like these that I saw as a child in books and on tv coverage, which I was led to believe would be landing on the moon in a few short years. I recall being really disappointed with the eventual skeletal and ugly LEM that was unveiled as the final design!

FLICKERING SPACE

A common sight in the sixties were the false 3d effect pictures which were used on greetings cards, novelties and keyrings. Made of a plastic laminate, I was always fascinated by the corrugated surface and never really understood how the process worked. Years later, i discovered that they were called 'lenticular' images and were covered by a special prismatic coating, which used tiny lenses to deceive the eye into viewing separate images as a whole, giving the flickering, three dimensional effect.

As most of the examples I had seen previously were always small - such as novelty items from lucky bags of part f a toy, I never really gave them much attention as an image format, assuming the quality of the image would be poor, given the strange nature of the format.  Recently, I bought a couple of lenticular postcards, again from the sixties, depicting space scenes and was very surprised as how crisp and sharp the images were, despite being sheathed in thick laminate.

The first one I bought was a scene with a moon landing with a large rocket and two astronauts waving to their colleagues on the plan below. This was a standard postcard and was mounted in a double frame, with a small plain wooden frame, recessed into a larger gilt frame with a glass front. The whole assembly being supported by a wire hanger. The increased depth of the frames made the 3d effect even more immersive, almost like looking though a small window. Unmounting the frame and cleaning the glass and the surface of the card revealed a profound difference in clarity too, as dust had accumulated on the card and on the glass.

The card is assumed to have been produced by the japanese Asahi trading company and is clearly from the early sixties. The scene shows a large 'Atlas' style rocket fitted with landing gear in a 'SSTO' (Single Stage To Orbit) deployment. next to it are two astronaut figures waving to two capsules in the distance, on the lunar surface. Rather than being an illustration, the image seems to be a photographed model, with a diorama supporting the models. The rocket is not a familiar design, but seems to be similar to early Atlas ICBM vehicles, with telescopic legs fitted. In the middle distance are two very simplistic landers, which seem to be redundant as the rocket itself has clearly already made a successful landing and would not need a dedicated landing capsule.

The two landers are very rudimentary and obviously predate the Apollo programme by around five years. They are cosmetically similar to some of the early space toys I have from the same era and very closely resemble modern a 'LEM-type' capsule that I have found recently.

The second and later card is from Gibraltar and made by a local company. This shows a very recognisable Lunar Module, presumably one of the early Revell releases as it is too finely cast to be the more rudimentary Airfix kit, which appeared in the latter half of the sixties. Several other lenticular cards have used the Revell Astronaut kit to great effect, too. It is very similar to a Clifford toy LEM that I have, but does resemble a kit rather than a toy, much more closely. The docking collar is missing and a simple light ha been installed inside for effect. The Apollo Service module behind it, is another small model, with the image of the Earth probably a photograph and the luxuriantly green moon surface being made from plaster or resin.

 

Some LEM variants are shown below, illustrating the variance in toy and novelty makers approach to making a moon lander, in the rush to produce product for the Moon Landing in 1968.

AIMING FOR THE MOON

 

I've had a fascination with our nearest neighbour from an early age, but as I grew older and began to appreciate the significance of the Moon and its features, I started to invest in maps and quite recently a large moon globe. The globe was an ebay purchase, sold loose, with little in the way of information, although the seller did remark - as I collected it in person at Preston railway station!- that her Dad had owned it and it originally had a stand, which was now lost. Taking possession of it, in a large plastic shopping bag, I found it was blow moulded plastic, quite heavy, with surface relief details, hand painted decoration and decals applied. Luckily, its previous owner had also varnished it, so everything was still intact, including the little stickers showing the moon landing sites.

As it was loose, I had no idea of what it was, or who had made it, but during a recent ebay trawl for a more conventional globe, I found another identical one, listed as a 'Wightman Moon Globe' from 1970. The seller suggested that it was supplied as an unpainted kit form, which the owner could paint and apply the decals to.

This example had suffered over the years and lost some of the paint and stickers and also the original stand. It does look very similar to my own version, so I assume there would have been painting guides and instructions and possibly specific paints provided. So, armed with this new information, I did a quick internet search and found that the Royal Museum at Greenwich have a copy of the globe in their archival collections, which also includes the original box, stand and instruction sheet.

https://www.rmg.co.uk/collections/objects/rmgc-object-388811

Reproduced courtesy of RMG

Its safe to assume that the Wightman Lunaglobe would have been a premium item, intended for specialists rather than children and would probably have been quite expensive. The record also shows the original stand, so now I can set about making a suitable stand for my own model.

Above is a print of the moon rock, brought back from Apollo 11, which was on display in Liverpool Museum at around the same time the Wightman globes would have been available and one of the things which started me down the path of all things lunar.

IN DEEP, FAR OUT

Starting in 1958, the series of Pioneer probes was divided into two main sections, with the early attempts to study the moon and later probes aimed towards Venus and the outer planets. The early missions were beset with failure, as launch vehicles caused problems at take off and when Pioneer 3 finally achieved escape velocity, it missed the Moon entirely. It wasn't until the launch of Pioneer 6 in 1965, that the US began to see positive results, as probes were dispatched to orbit the sun and study space weather. However, the Jupiter bound missions 10 and 11 which launched in 1972/3 respectively, were the most successful, as besides reaching their remote destination, the probes achieved sufficient velocity to allow them to later leave the Solar System  entirely.

This rare booklet by TRW Industries commemorates the launch of Pioneer 10 and looks forward towards its encounter with the gas giant Jupiter.

The probe was designed to study the gas giant and was not expected to remain functional following its exposure to Jupiter's high radiation output. Some of the cameras and equipment did succumb to the extreme environments, but overall, the probe was way more successful than its designers could have imagined.

Carl Sagan was an astronomer and planetary scientist, who advocated the inclusion of a 'golden record' and a plaque containing informational graphics which might be accessible by intelligent life in outer space. The idea of the plaque was met with criticism by the general public and TRW held a competition for ideas for information to be included on the mision.

As the probe approached and successfully encountered Jupiter, the idea of a Grand Tour of the Solar System was suggested, to take advantage of the future planetary positions of the major outer planets. This would eventually become the Voyager mission.

The following year,  the companion probe 11 was launched, with the intention of repeating Pioneer 10's successful encounter, before moving on to explore Saturn.

After the success of the two probes initial missions, both craft subsequently went on to pass the orbits of Neptune and Pluto, to moving into interstellar space, becoming the first man made objects to leave the solar system.

Final contact with Pioneer 10 was made as the onboard power ultimately failed, in 2003, with a faint signal being recorded by the Deep Space network as the probe disappeared into the unknown.

Early in the 1960's, the idea of the Grand Tour was , for a planetary exploration of the gas giants Jupiter and Saturn and their moons and the ice giants Uranus and Neptune, to take advantage of a once in 175 years conjunction and employing gravity assists for the probes.

With the success of the Pioneer Jupiter missions, a Mariner probe design was to be refitted for the next mission to visit the outer system and it was only late in the programme that it was suggested that the probe be renamed Voyager.

Using a similar shaped vehicle to Pioneer, two Mariner probes were prepared for launch in 1972, before being renamed some years later, prior to launch in 1977, with an initial remit to visit Jupiter and Saturn only.

Voyager 2 launched first, although it would reach its destination after Voyager 1, encountering Jupiter in 1979. The probes also took advantage of close fly-bys of the moons of Ganymede and Io. Both carried the same plaque as Pioneer, but also a 'golden record' disk with sounds of Earth and people speaking different languages, in the remote possibility that the probe might be intercepted by intelligent life.

The Voyager programme exceeded their expectations and life expectancy, outliving their own inventors and designers. Some of the images returned by the probes are still being examined and processed today and gave us the closest views of the gas giants and their moons. The probes passed the previous Pioneer probes in the mid 1990's, becoming the farthest man made objects in space as they embarked on the extended Interstellar Mission. Voyager 1 is now over 15 billion miles away and will log 47 years in space this year and is still returning useable data. Voyager 2 is 13 billion miles away and currently experiencing a pause in communications, as the antenna has become misaligned.

Some of the imagery returned by the probes gave resident NASA artists inspiration for artwork in support of the mission, which is contained in a large volume 'Nasa and the Exploration of Space' which holds a wealth of wonderful paintings and drawings from the beginnings of the administration to the present, illustrating launches, landings, planetary scenes and mission activities from all points in history.

The Pioneer and Voyager images would remain the premier source of information on the outer planets for many years, until the probes Cassini and Galileo reached the gas giants and paved the way for further missions such as New Horizons and very shortly the Europa Clipper.

The TRW company also worked on other satellites and probes and have most recently been involved with the James Webb Telescope, producing some of the best deep space images ever recorded.