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  Great Western Mint Niobium Apollo XI medal

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Author Topic:   Great Western Mint Niobium Apollo XI medal
oke
Member

Posts: 35
From:
Registered: Jun 2003

posted 06-27-2003 06:33 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for oke     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
I was wondering if you could help me find one of the Great Western Mint Niobium Apollo 11 commemorative coins.

It was a commemorative made in 1994, and I guess only available to those who knew Wah Chang and received their newsletter. People at Wah Chang and The Great Western Mint (which is connected somehow to the Liberty Mint) do not have any leads as to who might have any extras for sale.

Wah Chang is now making new "First in Flight" commemoratives and I got news that they might make a redesigned Apollo 11 coin for the 35th anniversary (for either the end of this year or sometime next year), but I wanted to track down one of the first niobium coins.

(I got an email that the third "First in Flight" coin isn't about the Apollo 11 moon landing.)

oke
Member

Posts: 35
From:
Registered: Jun 2003

posted 12-13-2012 03:54 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for oke     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
(Nine years later...) So, anyway, I was able to find one of these coins from the person who was directly involved with its creation (he worked at Wah-Chang and with those at Liberty Mint/The Great Western Mint who minted the coin), so that's kind of a fun backstory for it:

Meademan
Member

Posts: 24
From: Gatwick, West Sussex, UK
Registered: Oct 2012

posted 12-28-2012 06:13 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Meademan   Click Here to Email Meademan     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
What is Niobium? Is it special?

oke
Member

Posts: 35
From:
Registered: Jun 2003

posted 01-03-2013 12:50 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for oke     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
A niobium alloy (C-103) was used for some critical parts of the lunar lander, including the rocket engine skirt extensions.

They chose to create this world's first niobium coin to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission. So, it's not a flown medallion, or anything special like that, but it's one that might be less common or at least one which has an interesting backstory to it.

Here are more details, in case folks want to read about the niobium coins.

All times are CT (US)

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