Posts: 35
From: Palo Alto, Calif.
Registered: Jun 2015

posted 05-14-2018 01:48 PM               

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I just returned home from a really wonderful experience and I'm dying to share it with others. I was reading about the Pioneer 10 and 11 plaques and, according to Wikipedia, they were fabricated in a little shop called Precision Engravers in San Carlos, California. I live in Palo Alto and according to the GPS on my smartphone, Precision Engravers was just under 10 miles away and less than 19 minutes by car.

On a whim, I jumped in my car and in 20 minutes I was there. Ponciano, who owns the shop, could not have been nicer. He showed me the master from which the original plaques were made as well as the engraving equipment (still in use) on which they were created. I felt that I was handling true treasures of spaceflight history.

The crazy thing is all this was just 10 miles from my home and I could have gone anytime but I just didn’t know it was there. I wonder how many other cool things are around just waiting to be discovered.

Posts: 1328
From: Carrollton, GA USA
Registered: Jan 2003

Posts: 35
From: Palo Alto, Calif.
Registered: Jun 2015