posted 07-20-2015 04:53 AM               

Smithsonian launches Kickstarter to 'reboot' Neil Armstrong spacesuit display

The Smithsonian launched its first-ever crowdfunding campaign on Monday (July 20) in an effort to preserve, conserve and display the spacesuit that Apollo 11 astronaut Neil Armstrong wore while becoming the first man to walk on the moon.

The Washington, DC institution inaugurated a multi-project partnership with the crowdfunding website Kickstarter with "Reboot the Suit," a campaign to raise $500,000 to digitize and exhibit Armstrong's spacesuit at the National Air and Space Museum in time for the 50th anniversary of the first lunar landing mission in 2019. The fundraising effort began 46 years to the day after Armstrong's historic "small step" on July 20, 1969.

"This is the crown jewel of our collection," Cathleen Lewis, who as curator oversees the spacesuits at the National Air and Space Museum, told collectSPACE. "Kickstarter is a very new and innovative way to go for the Smithsonian. We haven't done anything like this before."

posted 07-20-2015 05:40 AM               

This will be the suit of reference. We're hoping that once we do it for this suit, we'll find ways to do it quicker and more efficiently for the rest of the suits in our collection.

We hope we will be able to increase the number of suits that we have on loan to other museums for display through this process, because we will be minimizing the difference in conditions from storage to display, and that is our greatest hope.

We're taking the next steps. Bringing those storage conditions out for the public to enjoy. So we won't have as many suits in storage — we'll have many, many more we're hoping on display so that people can appreciate the incredible machines these spacesuits are.

posted 07-20-2015 09:00 AM               

quote:

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Originally posted by lucspace:
...counter now at just over $500!

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posted 07-20-2015 09:15 AM               

quote:

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Originally posted by onesmallstep:
Hopefully Aldrin (and Collins) won't be overlooked at the 50th anniversary exhibit.

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As for the 50th anniversary, we have ambitious plans. Depending on the success of this and other funding efforts we are committed to meet our responsibility to lead an appropriate and meaningful national discussion. Stay tuned.

posted 07-20-2015 05:05 PM               

Kickstarter Backers, we're all dancing the moon walk because of you! We've soared to $100,000 in one day — and on the anniversary of Neil Armstrong's walk on the moon. What a way to commemorate this historic day!

Please help us get even closer to our goal by sharing this project with your friends and family. We want everyone to have the chance to be part of bringing back Neil Armstrong's spacesuit!

posted 07-21-2015 06:24 AM               

Does anyone know if the patches and name tags on Neil's suit are original?

posted 07-21-2015 06:25 AM               

I believe that the bladders are pretty much shot in all of the Apollo lunar EVA suits with the exception of Jack Schmitt's which can still hold pressure.

posted 07-21-2015 06:28 AM               

quote:

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Originally posted by holcombeyates:
Does anyone know if the patches and name tags on Neil's suit are original?

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posted 07-21-2015 09:52 AM               

"Our stretch goals will directly contribute to the 'Destination Moon' project. There will be additional scanning and research that will be dedicated to objects — first of all spacesuits — that will also be in the 'Destination' gallery."

posted 07-21-2015 12:43 PM               

You can spare $11 to an iconic American space artifact.

posted 07-21-2015 03:43 PM               

It's about 250,000 miles to the moon and 250,000 miles back to earth. We're halfway to a complete journey. A BIG THANKS to the thousands of you who believe in this mission.

posted 07-24-2015 03:51 PM               

In the time it took the Apollo 11 crew to land on the Moon and return safely back to Earth, we have accomplished our goal thanks to your phenomenal response and passionate belief in our mission. We can't wait to get to work on Neil Armstrong's spacesuit and bring it back to the Museum, to the world, and most of all, to you. The journey now extends towards further, exciting destinations. Please check our Project Page to find out about our "Stretch Goals."

posted 07-27-2015 01:43 PM               

Armstrong spacesuit funded, Smithsonian takes next 'giant leap' on Kickstarter

The Smithsonian's first-ever crowdfunding campaign to conserve, digitize and display astronaut Neil Armstrong's lunar spacesuit has rocketed to success and is now stretching to "reboot" other space history artifacts in the national collection.

The Washington institution's "Reboot the Suit" fundraising campaign soared beyond its $500,000 goal on Friday (July 24), just four days after being launched on the Kickstarter website. The sum, which represents pledges by more than 6,000 backers, was achieved 46 years to the day after the Armstrong suit (and the astronaut) splashed down back on Earth following the historic 1969 moonwalk.

"In the time it took the Apollo 11 crew to land on the moon and return safely back to Earth, we've accomplished our goal thanks to your phenomenal response and passionate belief in our mission," the curators and conservators at the National Air and Space Museum wrote on Kickstarter. "We can't wait to get to work on Neil Armstrong's spacesuit and bring it back to the museum, to the world, and most of all, to you."

posted 08-02-2015 01:07 PM               

Half-Way Through Our Stretch Goal!

We've reached the $600K mark! That's $100K more than our original goal of $500K and half-way to our "stretch" goal of $700K. Our target to conserve, digitize and display Alan Shepard's Mercury spacesuit is getting closer.

A huge THANKS to everyone for helping us get here! It's great to see that over 7,700 have backed our project and that you've shared it with your friends. Along with Neil Armstrong's story, you are helping us tell the story of the first American in space and the suit he wore during the first American manned space flight in 1961.

Would you please help us stay on course through this important mission? Please keep sharing and telling your friends about #RebootTheSuit! SHARE our project on Facebook and/or RETWEET. Thanks so much!

To celebrate this milestone, our brilliant 2015 summer interns at the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum proudly present this fun mockumentary. Uhm, but Cathy Lewis, our Curator of International Space Programs and Spacesuits, may not be all that amused.

posted 08-18-2015 01:23 PM               

$700,000 Stretch Goal Reached at T-17 Hours!

Thank you to our 9,122 backers!

Thanks to all of you, we did it! $700,000 reached with 17 hours to go! We hope you are as proud as we are to be a part of this mission.

If you have friends who want to join this journey and/or want access to our exclusive rewards, please tell them it's not too late. There's still 17 hours to go to gain access to unique items and experiences such as Mike Okuda's mission patch, the ILC Dover spacesuit factory tour, and the video tour of the conservation process.

Neil Armstrong's and Alan Shepard's spacesuits will now be conserved, digitized and displayed in the upcoming Destination Moon exhibition. You will help us tell the enthralling story of the human quest to explore the moon. Pledges that come in beyond the stretch goal of $700,000 will go towards the Destination Moon exhibition.

posted 07-20-2017 07:09 AM               

A Case for Neil Armstrong's Spacesuit

Wow! How time flies. Today not only marks the 48th anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon landing, but it also marks two years since you and a community of more than 9,000 backers from around the world came together to help the Smithsonian conserve, digitize, and display Neil Armstrong's and Alan Shepard's spacesuits. We remain as grateful for all of you today as we did when we first set off on our bold mission!

We're just crossing the mid-point of our project. Neil Armstrong's spacesuit will go back on display in two years, in time for the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon landing.

Today, we're excited to report that we now have a display case design for the suit!

Why is the display case for Neil Armstrong's spacesuit so special?

Lisa Young, Objects Conservator at the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum, has spent almost two decades researching the ideal conditions for the complex combinations of materials that comprise our suits, and therefore what will be required in the new display case.

The conditions inside the sealed glass case will replicate our ideal storage conditions as closely as possible, allowing us to preserve the Apollo suit while sharing it with the public.

The primary material of the case will be museum glass, providing the visitors with a clear view of three sides of the suit — the front, back and left side. The light will be at a low level to avoid the cumulative damage that prolonged light exposure can have on textiles.

Many features of the case will be obvious, but some, though equally important, are unseen. The inner workings of the case will help us come close to replicating the best storage conditions possible for this precious artifact. The case will house a climate system that will maintain the cool, dry environment that is so essential to preserving our spacesuit collection. As an added preservation measure, the case will pass conditioned air through a "chemical scavenger" that will remove the byproducts of chemical off-gassing from the case, further slowing the process of degradation.

Above: Rendering of the proposed design for the Neil Armstrong spacesuit display. (National Air and Space Museum)

Constructing Display Mounts

You'll notice that in the rendering above, the suit seems to be standing on its own. That's the magic that Adam Bradshaw, Exhibits Specialist, is working on right now—creating a display mount that is both rigorous enough to hold the weight of the suit while delicate enough to cause no further damage on the interior of the suit when it is being inserted. Adam is currently working on prototypes for these support structures.

Display Details

Behind the suit on the rear pane of glass will be a full-scale transparency of an x-ray of the suit. This high-resolution cross section of Armstrong's suit will allow everyone to marvel at the complexities of this machine that allowed the first humans to explore another world. The ventilation tubes, communications and life support wiring and complex restraint systems that make the suit work will be plain to see, as will many of the suit layers.

The accompanying labels on each side of the case will describe Armstrong's life, his work at NASA, the first steps on the Moon and the efforts that the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum has made to preserve this marvelous object and share it with the world.

When can I see it at the Museum?

This case and design will debut at the museum in July 2019 in the Wright Brothers gallery with Armstrong's suit inside for the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon landing. The case and the suit will eventually move down the hall to its permanent home, joining the Apollo 11 Command Module "Columbia" and the museum's rich collection of Moon exploration artifacts, in the Destination Moon gallery.

posted 08-28-2017 11:46 AM               

...to minimize further damage — say, by shoving in ill-fitting foam inserts — curators need to know every nook and cranny. Given its delicate state, they did not want to reach into it and grope around. The only openings are from the neck and a very small hole in the waist. Instead, the curators rolled the suit into a computed tomography (CT) scanner and gathered the most explicit details — from the inside out.

posted 04-18-2019 09:12 PM               

Neil Armstrong's Apollo 11 spacesuit will go on display July 16, 2019 for the first time in 13 years.

It will be temporarily displayed near the 1903 Wright Flyer until its future home, the "Destination Moon" exhibition, is completed in approximately 2022.

posted 05-01-2019 12:18 PM               

Who wants to see brand-new photos of Neil Armstrong's spacesuit?

Our conservation of Neil Armstrong's Apollo 11 spacesuit is complete, and we are excited to finally release brand new photography of the suit. It will go back on display for the first time in over a decade on July 16, the 50th anniversary of the launch of Apollo 11.

Thank you to the nearly 10,000 backers who supported our #ReboottheSuit Kickstarter and made it possible for us to conserve Neil Armstrong’s spacesuit, and put it back on display, in time for the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing.

posted 07-16-2019 08:00 AM               

Neil Armstrong's Apollo 11 spacesuit is now back on display at Smithsonian

Neil Armstrong's Apollo 11 spacesuit has returned to display, 13 years after the Smithsonian removed it from exhibit and 50 years to the day — and nearly the very minute — that it lifted off on the historic first moon landing mission.

The Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C. revealed the Apollo 11 astronaut's A7L pressure garment, helmet assembly and gloves at 9 a.m. (1300 GMT) Tuesday (July 16), just 32 minutes shy of the 50th anniversary of its Saturn V rocket launch.

posted 07-18-2019 12:59 PM               

The three spacesuits worn by the Apollo 11 astronauts on their historic mission to the moon. Left to right, are the suits of Edwin E. Aldrin, Michael Collins and Neil A. Armstrong together in the Emil Buehler Conservation Lab at National Air and Space Museum’s Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly, VA, June 28, 2019.