stsmithva
Member Posts: 1933
From: Fairfax, VA, USA
Registered: Feb 2007
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posted 04-23-2015 08:49 PM
   
John Young had the longest career (42 years) of any astronaut, and it was packed with achievements. He was the first person to make six space flights, and commanded four different classes of spacecraft: Gemini (maiden manned voyage), the Apollo command module, the Apollo lunar module, and the space shuttle (maiden voyage).On Apollo 10 he was the first human to orbit the moon alone, and on Apollo 16 he walked (and drove a lunar rover) on the moon's surface. (He is one of three people who went to the moon twice - Jim Lovell and Gene Cernan being the other two.) He served as Chief of the Astronaut Office from 1974-1987 and retired from NASA in 2004.
He sometimes responded to autograph requests during the shuttle era with a personalized litho of him with a shuttle model, but older signed photos are far rarer. After he left NASA, he charged $495 for his autograph, but he has not signed in years. This is a Gemini-era color business-suit litho with a bold, dark signature. It comes with a Steve Zarelli Letter of Authenticity. There is a faint smear on part of the "Young", but besides that it is in superb condition.  
 On the back is a small handstamp reading
John W. Young
Lt. Commander, USN
NASA Astronaut
This stamp was put on the back of photos issued to Group 2 and Group 3 for only a short time after they joined NASA. Just a couple of months ago another Gemini-era litho, of him in a space suit, (inscribed to someone, and with one of those awful PSA/DNA stickers stuck right on the front) sold for $1439. Images of him in his Apollo space suit can sell for over $2000, and photos of him on the moon have sold for almost that much. Those three are rather high-priced examples, but I could show a dozen pre-shuttle signed images that have sold for $500-$1000 in the last three years. The price of this one is $475. |
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