posted 08-22-2016 01:13 PM               

Throughout that time period, as Bob pointed out, Scott did in fact sign many similar covers, especially those in preparation and actual flight testing of the shuttle orbiter Enterprise/747/ALT program.

That was an exciting and busy time for us space cover collectors during the mid/late 1970's with ASTP just completed, the twin Viking spacecrafts going to Mars, Voyagers off to the outer planets, the Pioneer Venus Multiprobe bus, and the continuation of human spaceflight getting underway with the new space shuttle and ALT series of flight tests.

posted 08-22-2016 03:02 PM               

So he evidently was serving as Deputy Director of the Flight Research Center at the time of the Boeing 747's arrival that the cover marks, and then as Ken has stated, a little later became the actual Center Director.

Whatever, as Ken has stated, the autograph is authentic and Scott's autograph on the cover quite appropriate for the event.

posted 08-23-2016 10:57 AM               

At one time, though, I did have about 15+ Scott-signed Rank/Space Voyage cachet covers from this early shuttle/ALT preparation and test period throughout the early to mid-1970's.

Requesting genuine autographs from Col. Scott through the mail during his astronaut tenure while at the now-Johnson Space Center was never a "sure thing" with him.

He would on most instances use the autopen, but did on occasion, actually hand-sign some mailed-in requests.

But with the recent 1971-72 Apollo 15 moon cover incident, and with Scott's departure from the astronaut office, I do believe from a public relations standpoint he thought it would be best (or was told) to hand-sign cover and stamp requests once he had been re-assigned to Dryden in 1973.

Perhaps this would account for the fact that collectors started to see their current requests to him at Dryden coming back to them with authentic cover signatures.