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Forum:	Hardware & Flown Items
Topic:	The search for the goodwill moon rocks

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Your Reply: HTML is ON UBB Code is ON Smilies Legend	[QUOTE]Originally posted by Robert Pearlman: [B]Associated Press: [URL=http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090827/ap_on_re_eu/eu_netherlands_not_moon_rock_3]'Moon rock' in Dutch museum is just petrified wood[/URL] <BLOCKQUOTE>[i]The Dutch national museum said Thursday that one of its prized possessions, a rock supposedly brought back from the moon by U.S. astronauts, is just a piece of petrified wood. <center><img src="http://www.collectspace.com/review/moonrock_amsterdam01.jpg" WIDTH="384" HEIGHT="345"> <font size="-2">Photo credit: Rijksmuseum</font></center> Rijksmuseum spokeswoman Xandra van Gelder, who oversaw the investigation that proved the piece was a fake, said the museum will keep it anyway as a curiosity. "It's a good story, with some questions that are still unanswered," she said. "We can laugh about it." The museum acquired the rock after the death of former prime minister Willem Drees in 1988. Drees received it as a private gift on Oct. 9, 1969 from then-U.S. ambassador J. William Middendorf during a visit by the three Apollo 11 astronauts, part of their "Giant Leap" goodwill tour after the first moon landing. Middendorf, who lives in Rhode Island, told Dutch NOS news that he had gotten it from the U.S. State Department, but couldn't recall the exact details. The U.S. Embassy in the Hague said it was investigating the matter.[/i]</BLOCKQUOTE> According to the article, van Gelder consulted with NASA, who told her "it was possible the country had received a rock: NASA gave moon rocks to more than 100 countries in the early 1970s, but those were from later missions." In fact, The Netherlands received samples from both [URL=http://www.collectspace.com/resources/moonrocks_apollo11.html]Apollo 11[/URL] and [URL=http://www.collectspace.com/resources/moonrocks_goodwill.html]Apollo 17[/URL]; both are held in the archives of the National Museum of the History of Science and Medicine in Leiden. <center><object width="420" height="339"><param name="movie" value="http://www.dailymotion.com/swf/x1jvh4_boerhaave1_tech" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always" /><embed src="http://www.dailymotion.com/swf/x1jvh4_boerhaave1_tech" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="420" height="339" allowFullScreen="true" allowScriptAccess="always"></embed></object> <font size="-2">Video credit: [URL=http://www.depers.nl/wetenschap/46497/VIDEO-Maanstof-in-Nederland.html]DePers[/URL]</font></center> A third sample, also from Apollo 17, is [URL=http://www-curator.jsc.nasa.gov/lunar/displays/displays.cfm]on loan from NASA[/URL] to the Space Expo in Noordwijk. NASA, nor any member of the U.S. government has ever been authorized to gift a moon rock to any individual.[/B][/QUOTE]
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