posted 05-28-2016 07:21 AM               

Space Cover #370: A Tribute to Astronaut Wally Schirra

Original Mercury 7 Astronaut Walter (Wally) M. Schirra, Jr., was the only astronaut to fly a Mercury (MA-8), a Gemini (GT-6A) and an Apollo (Apollo 7) manned space flight and, thus, was the only astronaut to be launched aboard Atlas, Gemini-Titan II and Saturn 1B launch vehicles.

His six-orbit Mercury-Atlas 8 flight was called "The Perfect Flight"; his GT-6A flight, with Tom Stafford, accomplished the first rendezvous of two manned spacecraft, with GT-7; and as the Commander of the 11-day Apollo 7 mission, proved that the Apollo CSM spacecraft was ready to take astronauts to the moon and gave confidence to the decision to send Apollo 8 to the moon.

Schirra retired from NASA in 1969 and became a space commentator with CBS News, along with Walter Crobkite. Schirra passed away in 2007 at age 84.

The top cover is a MA-8 "Orbit" cacheted cover and is nicely autographed by Schirra. The bottom cover is an impressive Apollo 7 USS Essex Beck printed cachet cover and autographed by Schirra. He was a very cooperative and long-time signer and his autograph is readily available.

The top cover is a GT-6A crew signed launch cover with an official NASA/KSC rubber stamp "Rendezvous" cachet (11,120 total cachets were applied of two types; this with a clear/white background, the other with a blue background). The bottom cover is a crew signed GT-6A USS Wasp PRS cover.

The top cover is an Apollo 7 crew signed launch cover. with an official NASA/KSC gummed label attached (trimmed). 10,760 labels were applied to Apollo 7 covers by the KSC post office, with no official rubber stamp cachets provided for Apollo 7 and Apollo 8, which also had gummed labels attached. The cover at the bottom, signed by the Apollo 7 crew of Schirra, Cunningham and Eisele, is a USS Essex PRS cover with a standard recovery force rubber stamp cachet.

The successful flight and recovery of Apollo 7 brought the 11-day mission to a close; next was Apollo 8's flight to the moon!

posted 05-28-2016 04:07 PM               

I met Schirra for the first and only time at an autograph show in New Jersey in (I think) 2005. He signed my Sigma 7 Captain's Cover below.