posted 01-06-2019 06:31 PM               

Space Cover #497: Apollo 8 50th anniversary

For this week’s Space Cover of the Week I chose to honor the 50th anniversary of Apollo 8 with a couple of favorite Apollo 8 covers from my collection.

As we all know, Apollo 8 was launched with the intention to send the first human beings to orbit another world. The launch took place on December 21, 1968 with the lunar orbit happening three days later on Christmas Eve. It has been estimated that one quarter of the people on Earth tuned in to the Christmas Eve broadcast featuring the reading from Genesis. With a successful splashdown in December 27, Apollo 8 paved the way for the coming Apollo flights in 1969 including man’s first landing and footsteps on the moon.

Pictured above is a Space Craft cover for the Christmas Eve orbit of the moon. The cover is signed by the crew of Frank Borman, Jim Lovell and Bill Anders. The Borman and Lovell signatures were obtained through the mail in the 70s. For many years during the 80s it was reported that Bill Anders would sign only in person and only one item.

In April 1999, I was lucky to meet Bill Anders at what was called the Gathering of Mustangs at the Kissimmee Airport, which was only 2 miles from my apartment. It was a fly-in of over 75 P-51 Mustangs. Chuck Yeager, Bud Anderson, Frank Borman and Bill Anders were to be there. Frank Borman left early due to a family emergency but I got to meet both Yeager and Anderson before they went off flying. I spotted Bill Anders giving an interview in front of his Mustang. After the interview I approached him with two covers and Frank Borman’s book. He looked at them and said "I'll sign one of them. You'd be surprised how often these show up for sale after I sign them."

He signed the cover previously signed by Borman and Lovell. I thanked him and promised the cover was for my dad who worked on the Apollo program and would never be for sale. I found out years later that fellow contributor Bob McLeod was also there just a couple of people behind me to meet Anders.

The second cover pictured is for the splashdown and recovery of the Apollo 8 crew and command module. It's a #10 envelope postmarked on USS Yorktown on the recovery day but with a very scarce hand cancel. It appears that it was sent by a crew member to himself as a souvenir. This cover was graciously gifted to me a few years ago by David Ball.

So what other great covers do you have for this historic mission? Lets see them.

posted 01-07-2019 07:51 AM               

One of my favourite covers is a USS Guadalcanal cover signed by the four crew members of the main recovery helicopter. Normally I prefer signatures on PRS covers. However, such covers from Apollo 8 appear to be as scarce as hen's teeth!

posted 01-07-2019 10:14 AM               

Below are some of my favorite Apollo 8 covers, all with different cachet selections, and signed in various ways. Two of the KSC launch day covers were signed in crew quarters prior to the historic first lunar liftoff. During the 1970s, though, I was able to meet Anders here at Kennedy during a later Apollo launch event, in which he was kind enough to sign my Apollo 8 PRS cover (unfortunately, Eddie, it was machine cancelled and not containing one of the hard-to-find hand cancels).

LMP Anders also signed for me a photo along with another item during a different occasion. Those were the only two times, while meeting Anders, he did in fact sign something for me. Another was during his 30th Apollo flight anniversary and an Astronaut Hall of Fame event, but no autographs were asked for, and both were pleasant encounters.

All of the Anders' signed covers depicted here contain his early or original-type "Bill Anders" signatures, which are my desired autographs of him. I just don't like nor care for any of his later-style versions, rather genuine or not. Only one of the signatures below, though, was signed "Anders" with no first name added.

Please do note the signed SpaceShots trading card by Anders! This may be one of the only/or very limited such cards signed by Anders. This one had been presented to Edward H. White III in 1991. The famous Earthrise pictured card was from the original or first "astronaut endorsed" card-issued series by Space Ventures, Inc. and the Astronauts Memorial Foundation. There is a fascinating story behind it if anyone is interested.

posted 01-07-2019 01:41 PM               

I went to the Apollo 8 25th Anniversary Reunion in 1993 at JSC. At the time I did not have an Anders autograph. Knowing that he had a reputation for signing one, maybe two items, I took the top cover (a Beck B771 USS Yorktown PRS postmarked on the recovery day) that had already been autographed by Borman and Lovell, and the lower cover (a KSC Official postmarked on the launch day) with no autographs in case I got lucky and Anders went for two.

So at the conclusion of the panel discussions, the crew was wandering about the stage, and Anders attracted a line of people looking for autographs right away. I got in line and noticed that Anders was signing two items for the people who handed him two items! Looked like I was in luck!

Well, right in front of me in the line was one of our less-ethical brethren who plopped down an inch-thick stack of photos for Anders to sign. Anders very tersely told him to "pick one" and then growled down the waiting line for everyone to "pick just one thing". Nerts! So, the Beck got signed by Anders, and to date that is still my only Anders autograph.

In addition to the crew's panel discussion that day was a panel of the engineers and operations folks who made Apollo 8 happen. So I decided to get their signatures on the KSC Official. This was the first time (that I knew of) that Bill Tindall's role in developing the navigation and guidance algorithms that enabled Apollo 8 to get to the moon was really brought out. So I went to Tindall and asked him to autograph the cover. He blushed and timidly asked "You want ME to sign this? Why?" I explained and he signed. As I was walking away, someone else asked him for an autograph and I heard him say "You are the second person to ever ask me for an autograph, and (pointing at me) there goes the first!" That made both of our days!

In addition to Tindall the cover got signed by the rest of the panel (top to bottom): Aaron Cohen, Max Faget, Chris Kraft, and Glynn Lunney.

posted 12-23-2019 06:17 PM               

quote:

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Originally posted by Ken Havekotte:
There is a fascinating story behind it if anyone is interested.

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posted 12-29-2019 01:35 PM               

quote:

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Originally posted by astrobock:
Ken, can you tell us the Anders signed SpaceShots card story?

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Please note the below letter from M/Gen. Anders written to Ed White III in 1991. As you may know, Eddie was the only son of Gemini/Apollo astronaut Ed White II. This is the first time ever to my knowledge that the Apollo 8 LMP had requested an autograph from someone that he admired!

It's a fascinating letter, with autograph content, and note the signed Apollo 8 1st Earthrise card that Anders signed for Mr. White along with the SpaceShots order form filled out.

I did get a chuckle when Anders said in the letter, "I have a favor to ask. Would you please autograph the Edward H. White II card. I'd be honored to have you do it..."