orbit issue 83 (october 2009)
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ORBIT
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copy Copyright 2009 The Astro Space Stamp Society No article contained herein may be reproduced without
prior permission of the Author and the Society
Editorial
Copy Deadline for the January 2010 issue is December 14th by which time all material intended for publication
should be with the Editor
ANNUAL SUBSCRIPTION RATES Members in UKmdashpound15
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ASSS website at URL
wwwasssutvinternetcom
ISSN 0953 1599 THE JOURNAL OF THE ASTRO
SPACE STAMP SOCIETY Issue No 83 October 2009
Patron
Cosmonaut Georgi Grechko Hero of the Soviet Union
COMMITTEE
Chair Margaret Morris 55 Canniesburn Drive Bearsden Glasgow
GS1 1RX (E-mail MMorris671aolcom)
Hon Secretary Brian JLockyer 21 Exford CloseWeston-Super-Mare
Somerset BS23 4RE
(E-mail brianlockyertesconet)
Compiler of Checklist Hon Treasurer Postal Packet Organiser
Harvey Duncan16 Begg Avenue Falkirk Scotland FK1 5DL
(E-mail duncan1975btinternetcom)
Orbit Editor Jeff Dugdale Glebe Cottage Speymouth Mosstodloch Moray
Scotland IV32 7LE (E-mail jefforbitedaolcom)
Webmaster Derek Clarke 36 Cherryfield Road Walkington
Dublin 12 (E-mail dclarkeutvinternetcom)
Postal Auction Organiser David Saunders 42 Burnet Road Bradwell
Great Yarmouth NR31 8SL
Overseas Representatives
Australia Charles Bromser 37 Bridport Street Melbourne 3205 GermanyJurgen P Esders An der Apostelkirche 10 10783 Berlin
EireDerek Clarke 36 Cherryfield Rd Walkinstown Dublin 12 France Jean-Louis Lafon 23 Rue de Mercantour 78310 Maurepas
Netherlands Bart Beimers NJ Haismasrt 7 9061 BV Gierkerk Russia Mikhail Vorobyov 31-12 Krupskaya Str Kostroma
United States Dr Ben Ramkissoon 3011 White Oak Lane Oak Brook Il 60521 USA
Life Members UK - Harvey Duncan George Spiteri Ian Ridpath Margaret Morris Michael Packham Dr WR Withey Paul Uppington
Jillian Wood Derek Clarke (Eire) Charles Bromser (Australia) Tom Baughn (USA) Ross Smith (Australia)
Vincent Leung Wing Sing (Hong Kong) Mohammed KSafdar (Saudi Arabia)
Heavens Above What a good year it has been for our hobby We have enjoyed not only the International Year of
Astronomy related to an important Galileo anniversary but also the 40th anniversary of Apollo XI
and Apollo XII
IYA has meant a plethora of stamps to test your
pockets if you collect astronomy and cosmological science some of which are featured in this issue after
a refreshed article on Galileo by John Beenen which begins on page 3 In forthcoming issues we hope to
review all the IYA stamps
Apollo XI naturally has attracted a lot of philatelic
attention and a few of the issues so far are shown on the back page but so far we are just scraping the
surface of an expensive sub-theme and others will be
illustrated in next yearrsquos editions
I have tried to lead the way in promoting our hobby with articles on the Apollo flights in STAMP and in
Gibbons Stamp Monthly and there are to be further
articles on Galileo and on Copernicus in these British glossies before the end of the year which I have
tailored for the general philatelist
One final anniversary which seems to have passed without much attention the 50th birthday of NASA in
October 2008 is also featured in this edition
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IYA Europa stamps referencing Galileo For all 2009 Europa stamps see
httpeuropa-stampsblogspotcom
Issue date 3409 15409
17409
25409
4509
4509
5509
7509 6509
7509
8509
1609 12509
9509
Hungary below 8509
Azerbaijan below right 13409
9
ORBIT
Collecting US Space Covers by Bruce Cranford Part Two
Monitoring tracking mission control and communications Satellite and manned vehicle tracking stations have had a complex history The number of tracking sites grew from a few down range sites for the Eastern and Western Ranges in the 1950s to many dozens worldwide for the Mercury Gemini and Apollo Programs All manned missions and many satellite missions require constant uninterrupted communications world as the satellite orbits the earth or travels through space Many tracking stations used existing facilities or were located on existing sites Many of these sites were located at NASA facilities Army Navy and Air Force facilities (including planes and ships) Where possible tracking stations were located on foreign soil in partnership with the host government Some collect covers cancelled at all the tracking stationssites worldwide for each manned launch
The number of tracking stations began to decline as the manned flight program moved into the Apollo Program due primarily to cost reductions from improved satellite communication technology Satellites now orbiting the earth do a better job of tracking and communicating with other satellites and manned vehicles than earth-bound stations The US Department of Defense has tracking and communication stations for their satellites but for security reasons do not advertise the site=s existence Commercial amp government communication satellites systems are the exception and are increasing the number of Earth based communications sitesstations Most countries worldwide have satellite communications capability within their own country With the advent of communication satellites including television and internet communications nearly every home in the US has the potential to receive signals from satellites Activities include cancellations at monitoring tracking control and communications sites when contact is first made with the
satellitespacecraft Interest in this area declined after the Apollo program
Activities in space Once the satellitespacecraft reaches space many activities are of interest to collectors For unmanned missions they include
i) orbital changes ii) insertion into a trajectory which may take the
spacecraft to another planet moon asteroid or an observation point in space (eg Lagrange 2 GEO)
iii) reaching a specific program milestone (eg flyby of a celestial object in service for a communications satellite)
iv) arriving at or departing from a celestial object (eg arriving at Mars)
v) impacting or landing and vi) end of mission
For manned missions they may include dockings spacewalks accomplishing a specific mission milestone undocking The USPS has produced very few covers for sale to the public
that have been flown into space The USPS produced officially flown space covers on 19830830 They were flown on the Challenger STS 008 It is the current policy for both NASA and the USPS that mail will not be delivered to or received from the
US astronauts on the International Space Station A few space covers were flown into space some illegally during the early manned program (Mercury Gemini Apollo) The Smithsonian=s Postal Museum in Washington DC has examples these covers
Recovery Spacecraft recovery is typically limited to manned space vehicles and early spy satellites From Mercury through the Apollo missions the recovery sites were the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans The US Navy deployed ships at the recovery site to retrieve the astronauts and their capsule This changed when the Space Transportation System (STS) was developed The STS Space Shuttles were designed for conventional aircraft landing The two major sites are Edwards Air Force Base California and Kennedy Space Center Florida Early spy satellites required the recovery photographic film in the air over the ocean to prevent damaged to land based structures and humans and to prevent the film from falling into the wrong hands if the Air Force missed the recovery capsule Newer communications technology has eliminated the need to recover spy satellite film capsules NASA has several new programs that will return material from space and will require recovering of the returning payload Nearly all earth orbiting satellites and those less fortunate that never made it into orbit will eventually renter the atmosphere Depending on the size and materials some will burn up and some may make it to the ground (eg SKYLAB)
Cachets A variety of cachet types have been and are being used in the US from no markings to high quality graphics For a general description of space cover cachets available in the US see Appendix Space Covers The most popular are multi color printed cachets using archival inks (Figure 103)
Envelopes and postcards Two types of envelopes are popular with US collectors with the size designated as letter (6) and business (10 ) Post cards are occasionally used in the US but the most popular is the 6 envelope Postal Stationery and Official Mail covers are also used See Appendix Space Covers Stamps or Postage
Philatelic Organizations For the collector of space covers which are
philatelic material there are three major organizations that offer information about space covers (See section 14 for addresses)
I) The Space Unit (httpstargate1usacomstamps ) formed in 1958 provides the majority of information for collectors of US space covers It publishes a by-monthly publication called the AAstrophile Journal of Astrophilately
ii) American Philatelic Society (APS) (httpwwwstampsorg) the largest nonprofit society in the world for stamp collectors that provides a number of services for stamp collectors and postal historians
10
ORBIT ORBIT
The APS existed before the first satellite was launched in 1957 The APS library is a great source of philatelic historical information The collector can borrow material contacting the American Philatelic Research Library (APRL)
iii) The American Topical Association (ATA) Organizations that have since ceased to exist include
the Explorer and Inner and Outer Space Past issues are available from the American Philatelic Research Library and the Space Unit See 14 Sources of Information
How covers are made Space covers are typically made from envelopes (letter 6 or business size 10) with at least 25 rag content and archival quality The acid left in paper from the manufacturing process turns the paper yellow with age and eventually destroys the paper Archival quality envelopes are
acid free have 25 rag content and will survive storage for long periods of time They cost more but result in a better space cover Envelopes purchased from the USPS or those used by organizations are typically not archival
Some collectors choose to make envelops from space related documents (maps figures photographs) This makes for an interesting envelope but be concerned about the archival quality of the paper and adhesives If you plan to make envelopes with different dimensions than the standard envelopes used by the USPS check with the USPS to ensure
the envelope is acceptable Some collectors use post cards or make post cards
for space covers The thickness of the papercardboard must be greater than that of the envelops in order to give the card the necessary stiffness and strength to survive the postal handling system The same caution about dimensions and archival ability applies to post cards For more information see Space Covers Definition and Description
Short history of space covers and types US space covers started in 1958 with the launch or attempted launch of the first US satellites (VANGUARD and EXPLORER) Space covers have been produced for every US satellite launch or attempted launch since 1958 Many space events have also been commemorated by space covers Space covers have been produced for foreign satellites launched by the US and US satellites launched by other countries US Space Cover manufactures have also produced space covers for non US satellites launched by other countries and various space events both US and foreign Space covers from past events can be purchased or traded from a number of different sources in the US and around the world See section 12 Sources of Space Covers It is unfortunate by some space cover manufactures have produced covers of suspect authenticity or outright forgeries Excellent sources of information are Bulver and the Astrophile see section 14 Sources of Information
Different methods are use to create and deliver space covers to the collector The more popular are
- Manufactured cachets applied to covers sold covers as own (eg Space Voyage Orbit Goldcraft Space Craft Beck)
- Manufactured cachets applied to covers sold covers through a reseller (eg Havekotte)
- Manufactured cachets sold or given cachets to others (eg Swanson Dubeau)
- Given or purchased cachets applied to covers covers sold as own (eg Dubeau)
- Given or purchased cachets applied to covers covers sold through a reseller (eg Whitney)
- Given or purchased covers sold covers as own - Given or purchased covers with cachets added
information to cover sold covers as own (eg Titusville Moonport Stamp Club Dubeau)
Given or purchased covers with cachets added information to cover sold covers through a reseller
Sources for space covers The collector has two options for obtaining space covers 1) purchase them or 2) make one=s own But the buyer-
beware should always be practiced Many great references are listed in section 14 Sources of Information and the Bibliography and should be read before purchasing space covers Many attempts have been made to identifycatalog all the space covers produce in the USby US Manufacturersfor US space Events None are complete Some catalogs may focus on a specific topic eg APOLLO Program Be that as it may something is better than nothing The following is a list of some of the more comprehensive listcatalogs listed in alphabetical order and found in the bibliography Courtney Davis Dubeau 2
Lollini Ramkissoon2 Vukotich and Wilhelm
The following is a partial list of space cover providersmanufacturersproducerssellers for US events (as of 2005)Astrophile 20021
- Goddard Space Flight Stamp Club Box 261 Greenbelt MD 20768 ‑‑0261
- JPL Stamp Club PO Box 771 La Canada CA 91012‑0771 httpwwwjplrecclubscaltechedustampindexshtml
- Resellers A good source is the Astrophile - Space Coast Philately PO box 446 Cape
Canaveral FL 32920 - Space equipment manufacturer individuals companies organizations clubs - SpaceCoast Cover services 1190
Montego Bay Dr Merritt Island FL 32953 - Stamp shows A good source of information about local stamp shows is
Linn=s Stamp News Astrophile and the APS - Titusville Moonport Stamp Club PO Box
6071 Titusville FL 32782 - Web sites httpstargate1usacom
stampsresourcehtm Auctions Space Unit Tom Steiner PO Box 550 Northville MI 48167 Web sites (eg E-Bay)
Most US space events are documented by space cover manufacturers Whether it is a major manned launch or a rocket motor test someone usually produces a space cover
11
ORBIT
commemorating the event This was more evident during manned programs See Space Covers Definition and Description
Making your own space cover Place the necessary postage on the envelopecard
At this point you have several options Put a return address on the envelopescard Include a Self Address Stamped Envelope (SASE) for the return of your covers The types of addressing will depend if you want the address to be a permanent part of the space cover or removable after the cover is returned to you Use a live gummed label that is removable if you do not want the address to be part of the cover Contact the post office where you want the envelope to be cancelled to determine if - a) they will hold the covers until the day of the event b) cancel them on that day and c)place the cancelled covers in the mail to you Follow the instruction of the post office
After receiving the envelopescards from the post
office (which are now Space Covers) many collectors apply a cachet to the Space Cover and place additional information inside the cover It is recommended that you identify who made the space cover and cachet in or on the Space Cover For more information see Space Covers Definition and Description
The following are the more popular post offices that
service space covers (as of 2005)Astrophile 20021 - Postmaster Kennedy Space Center Fl 32815 (about
1 week before the event)
- Window Services Unit Houston GPO 401 Franklin St Houston TX 77201-9999
Postmaster Edwards AFB CA 93523
Sources of Information
- Ad Astra Magazine of the National Space Society 922
Pennsylvania Ave SE Washington DC 20003 httpwwwnssorg
- American Philatelic Research Library (APRL) 100 Match Factory Place Bellefonte PA 16823 wwwstamplibraryorg
- American Philatelic Society American Philatelist Journal of the American Philatelic Society APS 100 Oakwood Ave PO Box 8000 State College PA 16803 Phone 814‑237 ‑3803 Fax 814 ‑237‑6128 httpwwwstampsorg
- Aviation Week and Space Technology 1221 Avenue of the Americas New York NY httpwwwaviationweekcom
- Bulver Ramkissoon Winick A Study of Suspect Space Covers 2001 Space Unit see Astrophile in the Bibliography
- Cranford Bruce ldquoSpace Covers Dictionary amp Identifier 2006 Editionrdquo Bruce Cranford 1 Cliffe Hill Ct Potomac MD 20854 USA ISBN 978-0-9711657-1-7
- Explorer International Association of Space Philatelists BO Box 302 Yonkers NY 10710 Editor Bill York 780 West End Ave Apt 11F New York NY 10025 No longer in business
- FIP Section for Astrophilately Joseacute Bergamin 16 6C 28030 Madrid Spain wwwastrophilatelycom Astrophile 200201
- Final Frontier Magazine PO Box 20089 Minneapolis MN 55420
- Linn=s Stamp News PO Box 29 Sidney OH 45365-0029 wwwLinnscom 800-837-0194
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration NASA 300 E Street SW Washington DC 20024‑3210 USA httpwwwhqnasagov
- Orbit Newsletter of the British based ASSS Orbit which had a special section on space stamps and postmarks httpwwwasssutvinternetcom Brian Lockyer The Secretary ASSS 21 Exford Close Weston‑Super‑Mare Somerset BS23 4RE Great Britain
- Quest The history of Spaceflight Magazine CSPACE 123 32nd St SE Grand Rapids MI 49509-0331 Glen Swanson httpwwwspaceeduquest
- Smithsonian Air amp Space Magazine monthly 900 Jefferson Dr Washington DC 20560 httpwwwsiedu
- Smithsonian National Postal Museum 2 Massachusetts Ave NE Washington DC 20002 (202) 33‑5555httpwwwpostalmuseumsiedu
- Space Unit President Tom Steiner PO Box 550 Northville MI 48167-0550 (As of 2005) publishes The Astrophile Member of the American Philatelic Association American Topical Association httpstargate1usacomstamps
- Space Week weekly publication of Army Times Publishing Co 6883 Commercial Drive Springfield VA 22159-0500
- Spaceflight The international Magazine of Space and Astronautics published by the British Interplanetary Society (BIS) 2729 South Lambeth Road London SW8 1SZ England httpfreespacevirginnetbisbisBishtm - US Library of Congress The Library of Congress 101
Independence Ave SE Washington DC 20540 (202) 707‑5000 httpwwwlocgov
- US Postal Service (USPS) Washington DC 20260-2435 (httpwwwuspsgov )
- USPS Stamp Fulfillment Service PO Box 219424 Kansas City MO 64121-9424 1-800-782-6724 fax 816-545-1212 wwwstampsonlinecom - Web Sites
- Friends and Partners in Space 1999 httpsolarrtdutkedu7Ejgreenfpspacehtml
- Mark Wade s Encyclopedia Astronautica 1998 httpsolarrtdutkedu~mwadespaceflthtm
- International Spacecraft and Launch Vehicle Names Glossary 2003 httpwwwspacecraftnamesinfo
- NASA httpwww‑paokscnasagovkscpaoscheduleschedulehtm
- Spaceflight Now httpwwwspaceflightnowcomtrackingindexhtml
- Gunther=s Space Page httpwwwskyrocketdespacespacehtml
- Contractors (many have merged or gone out of business since 1958)
Lockheed Martin httplmmsexternallmcocomremospascieoshtml Boeing httpwwwboeingcomflashhtml Orbital Science httpwwworbitalcom
Editorrsquos Note
Bruce has asked me to point out that he is not the
owner of the flown Apollo XI cover which I attributed to his collection on page 40 of the last edition
He just wishes he was
12
ORBIT
50th anniversary of NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration was established
by the National Aeronautics and Space Act on July 29 1958 replacing its predecessor the National Advisory Committee for
Aeronautics (NACA) The agency became operational on October 1 1958
13
ORBIT
So Who Did Invent the Telescope
A memorable fact from a different viewpoint
Did you know that in 2009 it is four hundred years since the first great discoveries in space took place Then it so happened that for the first time in the history of mankind craters on the moon some details on the planets and amongst other things the four great moons around Jupiter were seen Very soon the observation instruments became better and larger and gradually many more details on the moon and planets were seen Rings were discovered around Saturn bands of clouds and areas of storms on Jupiter and polar caps and surface structures on Mars
Now you may think where is the writer going with this
That is quite simple it so happened that in 2008 precisely 400 years ago the telescope was invented and that happened in our own little Holland For a long time it was not determined who had made the first Dutch viewer as these were called (see the New Zealand stamp issued 12-2-1997)
Zacharias Jansen and Hans Lipperhey both resident in Middelburg were seen as inventors of the telescope but there were other people who claimed this discovery It was said that Robert Bacon (1214-1294) already knew how the instrument could be made Jacob Metius of Alkmaar could also be the inventor he knew Jansen and Lipperhey and had also visited them Then there is also the Italian Raffael Gualterotti (1543-1639) of whom it is known with some certainty that in 1598 he had already made a viewer However this man evidently did not recognise the significance of his discovery and did not act upon it After very lengthy investigation it was finally decided that Hans Lipperhey (1570-1619 right) could lay claim to this invention
As often happens with new inventions the telescope was first seen as a military instrument to outsmart the enemy With the telescope the movements of the enemy could now be seen and followed over a much greater distance so that timely countermeasures could be taken It was the famous scholar Galileo Galileiuml (1564-1642) who heard about this discovery from others and immediately saw what further possibilities this instrument had to offer Based on the data he could get hold of Galileiuml himself made a telescope that magnified nine times Soon after he made another that
magnified to almost thirty times These instruments consisted of two lenses in a tube a lightly curved convex lens in front and at the rear a powerful concave lens as an eyepiece We must not expect too much from these first telescopes because the
optics at that time were far from the quality that we now know
At that time it was very difficult to make pure glass and the lenses were really rather small in proportion to the focal length so as a result the luminosity was mediocre To get a good lens a piece of clear rock crystal was sometimes used We can suppose that the first telescopes were of a lesser optical quality than simple binoculars in our time Nevertheless in 1609 Galileiuml was able to see craters on the moon and Venus as a sickle for the first time He was the discoverer of the first four moons of Jupiter and he concluded from sunspots that the rotation of the sun around its axis was about 25 days
The discovery of the telescope heralded a new era in space research in the widest sense of the word In my opinion we could call this the start of space exploration such as we in space travel now readily do Meanwhile all the nearby planets in our solar system have been explored with a space probe one or more times except Plutohelliphellipbut yes we cannot call that a planet any longer We have even been to the Moon and new discoveries are reported daily also in our own solar system moons of minor planets new rings around Uranus and small moons around the giant planets Jupiter and Saturn
Although in the very beginning there were no space probes doing investigation it is my opinion that we may take the opportunity during this commemoration year to recognise the fact that the telescope was invented four hundred years ago After all this was the beginning of a great voyage of discovery in space Therefore the year 2009 has been declared the International Year of Astronomy 2009 - IYA 2009 - by the UN (on the recommendation of the International Astronomical Union) The UN has designated UNESCO as the body chiefly responsible for IYA 2009 and the IAU as a support organisation for practical interpretation
HN Frankener March 2009
Specially translated for Orbit by Eleanor Coker this feature by Henk Nieuwenhuis first appeared in issue 24 2009 of Nieuwsbrief the journal of
Ruimtevaart Filatelie Club Nederland and is produced (with different illustrations) by
permission of the author and Editor Arie Olckers
14
ORBIT
Our Astonishing Nicolaus Copernicus By Stan Wekka Bydgoszcz Poland with Jeff Dugdale
IYA could not go past without our journal
marking once again this great thinker so here
is a specially commissioned and edited article
from an Orbit enthusiast in Poland
Nicolaus Copernicus was born 19 February 1473 in the wonderful City of Toruń on the River Vistula and died 24 May 1543 in Frombork
Consider this famous astronomermdashmathematician- doctor of medicine and monetary system expert (economist ) - physicianmdashclassical scholar - jurist - artistmdashtranslatormdashmilitary leadermdashdiplomat and hellipCatholic cleric - Treasure of our Earth NICOLAUS COPERNICUS (in Polish Mikolaj Kopernik)
He has been honoured in international philately on hundreds of postage-stamps items of postal ndashstationery commemorative cancellationshellip
His name is on Navyrsquos ships planes streets places schools universities factories on Moon satellites planetoidshellip
There have been are currently and will be in the future many
different celebrations of that Great Man of Geniushellip as for inst World Philatelic Exhibition ldquoPoland 1973rdquo organized from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of His Birth US carnet issued 1973 presents three proofs of stamps from Poland and the US
dedicated to Copernicus
A selection of Polish postage-stamps presents
Him as most important citizen of Poland and World see a page from my stock book opposite filled with Polish stamps for the great man
In this short memorial to His Life and Work we must mention a few events of his rich life His family had its roots in the Polish Region of Lower Silesia ( today in SW Poland ) On a few covers and post-cards are shown different cancels of the KOPERNIKI Post Office initiated from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of the Great Astronomerrsquos Birth
After the death of Nicolausrsquo father his uncle Bishop Watzenrode of Warmia looked after the family and saw young Copernicus into university at Cracov As an 18 year old youth he presented himself at the Jagiellonian University in 1491 and studied geometry trigonometry mathematics and astronomy there for the next four years
15
ORBIT
His teachers were famous in those times astronomers and mathematicians such as John of Glogoacutew (1445-1507) who had written a commentary on Ptolemyrsquos Cosmography and Wojciech Brudzewski (1445-1497) who was hostile to the geocentric system expounded by Ptolemy It was he who infected Copernicus with his theories based on the writings of Aristarchus of Samos three centuries before Christ Their teachings bore fruit in due course in Copernicusrsquos De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium published at Nuremberg at the printing house of John Petreius in 1543 This stamp issued in March 1942 and cancelled on September 11th 1943 depicts a monument to Nicolaus Copernicus within the quadrangle of the library of the
Jagiellionian University
In due course Copernicus proved that the Geocentric System by Ptolemy was not true and his Heliocentric or Solar System was accurate This is shown on block Michel Cat Bl52 and 2 interesting philatelic items showing His most famous work De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium his autograph and the Solar System on the postmark
In 1510 Copernicus settled at Frombork and having bought the Castlersquos Tower he established his Observatory and Library
there as seen on rare pair of especially overprinted (middle vertical black overprints ) post-cards and stamps Michel Cat 805 1194
Many people assign a single nationality to Copernicus Nazi Germany claimed Copernicus to have been purely German as on stamps Michel Cat 100 104 However Germans destroyed the monument to Copernicus in the quadrangle of the library (shown on stamps Michel Cat 396 446) at the University of Cracov in 1944
After World War II Poles rebuilt that Monument and it is now displayed at Cracovrsquos Botanical Gardens
During World War II Polish Prisoners of War of The Woldenberg Camp II C organized by Germans for Polish
officers initiated Camprsquos Post there and issued many interesting philatelic values One of them is a complete of souvenir sheet or block and set of 3 stamps dedicated to 400th Anniversary of Copernicus Death (shown right)
Warsawrsquos Scientific Society initiated the investigation of Copernicusrsquo tomb and remnants in 1802 but found little of interest In 2004 Prof George Gąsowski of The Institute of Anthropology and Archaeology in Pułtusk initiated new wave of investigation and in 2005-2008 he found human remains in the crypt of The Cathedral at Frombork After the war with Sweden war in the 17th century the Swedish robbed many Polish national treasures and among them were books formerly belonging to Copernicus One of books was ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo found in the Museum of Uppsala In that book were found two of Copernicusrsquo hairs which were examined forensically
In due course genetic comparison of the alleged Copernicus remnants found in Frombork Cathedral crypt and those two hairs in the ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo at Uppsala confirmed that the Frombork remains were those of Copernicus proving once and for all where his tomb lies
Polish anthropologists have since tried to do a reconstruction of Copernicusrsquo face and published their results in the Polish
press see below
16
ORBIT
Un-manned Satellites on Postage Stamps 31 By Guest Contributors Don Hillger and Garry Toth
A version of this article first appeared in The Astrophile for July-August 2008
The Elektron Series This is the thirty-first in a series of articles about un-
manned satellites on postage stamps This article
features the Russian Elektron-series satellites Four Elektron satellites were successfully launched with
Elektron-1 and 2 paired up on 30 January 1964 and Elektron-3 and 4 similarly paired on 10 July 1964
Elektron was one of the earliest Soviet scientific satellite missions to be authorized following the initial
Sputnik series The spacecraft had the mission of mapping the van Allen radiation belts at higher
inclinations than previous US satellites had followed In these missions two different types of spacecraft
were paired and launched together as mentioned
above Elektron-1 and 3 were put into a lower orbit to map the inner van Allen belt while Elekton-2 and 4
were boosted to a higher orbit to study the outer belt
For identification purposes Elektron-1 and 3 had
cylindrical bodies 075 m in diameter and 13 m long with six solar panels extending outward almost like
paddles Elektron-2 and 4 were shaped like the cupola of a public building in the basic form of a cylinder with
a flattened and broadened end with a diameter of 18 m and a height of 24 m
Both Elektron types are easily distinguished and are represented on many postal items mostly from
eastern bloc nations Some of the items show both Elektron-1 and 2 (or Elektron-3 and 4) since they
were launched together
A checklist of postal items identified as showing the
E l e k t r o n - s e r i e s s a t e l l i t e s ( h t t p wwwciracolostateedurammhillgerElektronhtm) is
available on the Website developed by the authors for the un-manned satellites featured in this series of
articles (httpwwwciracolostateedurammhillger
satelliteshtm) E-mail correspondence with the authors is welcome Don Hillger can be reached at
hillgerciracolostateedu and Garry Toth at garry_tothhotmailcom
Elektron-A
From Mark Wadersquos site httpwwwastronautixcom
Elektron-B
17
ORBIT
18
ORBIT
Flight STS-107 Commander Rick Husband Pilot William McCool MS Michael Anderson MS David Brown MS Laurel Clark MS Ilan Ramon MS Kalpana Chawla KSC Launch Date 1612003 Proposed KSC Landing 1203 Purpose SPACEHAB Double Main Payload Module
Shuttle Story 2003 STS ndash107 The Columbia Disaster
Columbia disintegrates on re-entry killing all seven astronauts on board
ldquocontingency declaredrdquo
STS-107 was a multi-disciplinary microgravity and Earth science research mission with a multitude of international scientific
investigations conducted continuously during 16 days in orbit
The seven-member crew died on February 1 2003 when the
shuttle disintegrated during re-entry into the Earths atmosphere The cause of the accident was determined to be a piece of foam
that broke off during launch and damaged the thermal protection system components (reinforced carbon-carbon panels and
thermal protection tiles) on the leading edge of the left wing of
the Shuttle orbiter causing an extensive heat build-up During re-entry the damaged wing slowly overheated and came apart
eventually leading to loss of control and total disintegration of the vehicle
STS-107 carried the SPACEHAB Double Research Module on its inaugural flight the Freestar experiment (mounted on a
Hitchhiker Program rack) and the Extended Duration Orbiter pallet
One of the experiments a video taken to study atmospheric dust may have detected a new atmospheric phenomenon
dubbed a TIGER (Transient Ionospheric
Glow Emission in Red)
On board the Columbia was a copy of a drawing by Petr Ginz the editor-in-chief of
the magazine Vedem who depicted what he
imagined the Earth looked like from the Moon when he was a 14-year-old prisoner in the
Tereziacuten concentration camp The copy was in the possession of Ilan Ramon and was lost in
the crash
19
ORBIT
Historical Document
Downloaded by your Editor on the day of the tragedy this page from a NASA
website presents starkly the dreadful
truth of what has just happened
The opening phrasing ldquoA contingency has been declaredrdquo is very much in the
laconic and measured tradition of Apollo
13rsquos ldquoHouston we have a problemrdquo and the ldquoObviously a major malfunctionrdquo
used by Mission Control of the Challenger tragedy in January 1986
Below and at bottom of opposite page Launch and Conclusion covers for the
flight The brightly coloured mission patch is appropriately printed in black
20
ORBIT
21
ORBIT
Faux commemorative dollar bills with a
value of ldquo107rdquo were issued to mark the occasion
The Israeli issue of 2422004
commemorated their first astronaut was a revised version of the stamps issued in
advance of Ilan Ramonrsquos flight see page 22
At least one territory under Islamic influence
which has traditionally cashed in on shuttle flight issues did not print a reference to
Israel on their commemoratives for political reasons see page 23
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
2
ORBIT
ADVERTISING RATES We invite advertisers to use ORBIT to reach Astro-Philatelic enthusiasts worldwide If readers have
a commercial source they think they would like others to benefit from please let the firm know of
us Rates are Full page Display - pound24 Half Page - pound12 Quarter
Page pound6 One eighth of a page - pound4 Camera ready copy required with remittance by the above stated copy deadline for inclusion in
our next edition
copy Copyright 2009 The Astro Space Stamp Society No article contained herein may be reproduced without
prior permission of the Author and the Society
Editorial
Copy Deadline for the January 2010 issue is December 14th by which time all material intended for publication
should be with the Editor
ANNUAL SUBSCRIPTION RATES Members in UKmdashpound15
in Europe (EU and non-EU) - euro30
Elsewhere - $45 equivalent
Juniors (under 18) pound650
ASSS website at URL
wwwasssutvinternetcom
ISSN 0953 1599 THE JOURNAL OF THE ASTRO
SPACE STAMP SOCIETY Issue No 83 October 2009
Patron
Cosmonaut Georgi Grechko Hero of the Soviet Union
COMMITTEE
Chair Margaret Morris 55 Canniesburn Drive Bearsden Glasgow
GS1 1RX (E-mail MMorris671aolcom)
Hon Secretary Brian JLockyer 21 Exford CloseWeston-Super-Mare
Somerset BS23 4RE
(E-mail brianlockyertesconet)
Compiler of Checklist Hon Treasurer Postal Packet Organiser
Harvey Duncan16 Begg Avenue Falkirk Scotland FK1 5DL
(E-mail duncan1975btinternetcom)
Orbit Editor Jeff Dugdale Glebe Cottage Speymouth Mosstodloch Moray
Scotland IV32 7LE (E-mail jefforbitedaolcom)
Webmaster Derek Clarke 36 Cherryfield Road Walkington
Dublin 12 (E-mail dclarkeutvinternetcom)
Postal Auction Organiser David Saunders 42 Burnet Road Bradwell
Great Yarmouth NR31 8SL
Overseas Representatives
Australia Charles Bromser 37 Bridport Street Melbourne 3205 GermanyJurgen P Esders An der Apostelkirche 10 10783 Berlin
EireDerek Clarke 36 Cherryfield Rd Walkinstown Dublin 12 France Jean-Louis Lafon 23 Rue de Mercantour 78310 Maurepas
Netherlands Bart Beimers NJ Haismasrt 7 9061 BV Gierkerk Russia Mikhail Vorobyov 31-12 Krupskaya Str Kostroma
United States Dr Ben Ramkissoon 3011 White Oak Lane Oak Brook Il 60521 USA
Life Members UK - Harvey Duncan George Spiteri Ian Ridpath Margaret Morris Michael Packham Dr WR Withey Paul Uppington
Jillian Wood Derek Clarke (Eire) Charles Bromser (Australia) Tom Baughn (USA) Ross Smith (Australia)
Vincent Leung Wing Sing (Hong Kong) Mohammed KSafdar (Saudi Arabia)
Heavens Above What a good year it has been for our hobby We have enjoyed not only the International Year of
Astronomy related to an important Galileo anniversary but also the 40th anniversary of Apollo XI
and Apollo XII
IYA has meant a plethora of stamps to test your
pockets if you collect astronomy and cosmological science some of which are featured in this issue after
a refreshed article on Galileo by John Beenen which begins on page 3 In forthcoming issues we hope to
review all the IYA stamps
Apollo XI naturally has attracted a lot of philatelic
attention and a few of the issues so far are shown on the back page but so far we are just scraping the
surface of an expensive sub-theme and others will be
illustrated in next yearrsquos editions
I have tried to lead the way in promoting our hobby with articles on the Apollo flights in STAMP and in
Gibbons Stamp Monthly and there are to be further
articles on Galileo and on Copernicus in these British glossies before the end of the year which I have
tailored for the general philatelist
One final anniversary which seems to have passed without much attention the 50th birthday of NASA in
October 2008 is also featured in this edition
3
ORBIT
4
ORBIT
5
ORBIT
6
ORBIT
7
ORBIT
8
ORBIT
IYA Europa stamps referencing Galileo For all 2009 Europa stamps see
httpeuropa-stampsblogspotcom
Issue date 3409 15409
17409
25409
4509
4509
5509
7509 6509
7509
8509
1609 12509
9509
Hungary below 8509
Azerbaijan below right 13409
9
ORBIT
Collecting US Space Covers by Bruce Cranford Part Two
Monitoring tracking mission control and communications Satellite and manned vehicle tracking stations have had a complex history The number of tracking sites grew from a few down range sites for the Eastern and Western Ranges in the 1950s to many dozens worldwide for the Mercury Gemini and Apollo Programs All manned missions and many satellite missions require constant uninterrupted communications world as the satellite orbits the earth or travels through space Many tracking stations used existing facilities or were located on existing sites Many of these sites were located at NASA facilities Army Navy and Air Force facilities (including planes and ships) Where possible tracking stations were located on foreign soil in partnership with the host government Some collect covers cancelled at all the tracking stationssites worldwide for each manned launch
The number of tracking stations began to decline as the manned flight program moved into the Apollo Program due primarily to cost reductions from improved satellite communication technology Satellites now orbiting the earth do a better job of tracking and communicating with other satellites and manned vehicles than earth-bound stations The US Department of Defense has tracking and communication stations for their satellites but for security reasons do not advertise the site=s existence Commercial amp government communication satellites systems are the exception and are increasing the number of Earth based communications sitesstations Most countries worldwide have satellite communications capability within their own country With the advent of communication satellites including television and internet communications nearly every home in the US has the potential to receive signals from satellites Activities include cancellations at monitoring tracking control and communications sites when contact is first made with the
satellitespacecraft Interest in this area declined after the Apollo program
Activities in space Once the satellitespacecraft reaches space many activities are of interest to collectors For unmanned missions they include
i) orbital changes ii) insertion into a trajectory which may take the
spacecraft to another planet moon asteroid or an observation point in space (eg Lagrange 2 GEO)
iii) reaching a specific program milestone (eg flyby of a celestial object in service for a communications satellite)
iv) arriving at or departing from a celestial object (eg arriving at Mars)
v) impacting or landing and vi) end of mission
For manned missions they may include dockings spacewalks accomplishing a specific mission milestone undocking The USPS has produced very few covers for sale to the public
that have been flown into space The USPS produced officially flown space covers on 19830830 They were flown on the Challenger STS 008 It is the current policy for both NASA and the USPS that mail will not be delivered to or received from the
US astronauts on the International Space Station A few space covers were flown into space some illegally during the early manned program (Mercury Gemini Apollo) The Smithsonian=s Postal Museum in Washington DC has examples these covers
Recovery Spacecraft recovery is typically limited to manned space vehicles and early spy satellites From Mercury through the Apollo missions the recovery sites were the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans The US Navy deployed ships at the recovery site to retrieve the astronauts and their capsule This changed when the Space Transportation System (STS) was developed The STS Space Shuttles were designed for conventional aircraft landing The two major sites are Edwards Air Force Base California and Kennedy Space Center Florida Early spy satellites required the recovery photographic film in the air over the ocean to prevent damaged to land based structures and humans and to prevent the film from falling into the wrong hands if the Air Force missed the recovery capsule Newer communications technology has eliminated the need to recover spy satellite film capsules NASA has several new programs that will return material from space and will require recovering of the returning payload Nearly all earth orbiting satellites and those less fortunate that never made it into orbit will eventually renter the atmosphere Depending on the size and materials some will burn up and some may make it to the ground (eg SKYLAB)
Cachets A variety of cachet types have been and are being used in the US from no markings to high quality graphics For a general description of space cover cachets available in the US see Appendix Space Covers The most popular are multi color printed cachets using archival inks (Figure 103)
Envelopes and postcards Two types of envelopes are popular with US collectors with the size designated as letter (6) and business (10 ) Post cards are occasionally used in the US but the most popular is the 6 envelope Postal Stationery and Official Mail covers are also used See Appendix Space Covers Stamps or Postage
Philatelic Organizations For the collector of space covers which are
philatelic material there are three major organizations that offer information about space covers (See section 14 for addresses)
I) The Space Unit (httpstargate1usacomstamps ) formed in 1958 provides the majority of information for collectors of US space covers It publishes a by-monthly publication called the AAstrophile Journal of Astrophilately
ii) American Philatelic Society (APS) (httpwwwstampsorg) the largest nonprofit society in the world for stamp collectors that provides a number of services for stamp collectors and postal historians
10
ORBIT ORBIT
The APS existed before the first satellite was launched in 1957 The APS library is a great source of philatelic historical information The collector can borrow material contacting the American Philatelic Research Library (APRL)
iii) The American Topical Association (ATA) Organizations that have since ceased to exist include
the Explorer and Inner and Outer Space Past issues are available from the American Philatelic Research Library and the Space Unit See 14 Sources of Information
How covers are made Space covers are typically made from envelopes (letter 6 or business size 10) with at least 25 rag content and archival quality The acid left in paper from the manufacturing process turns the paper yellow with age and eventually destroys the paper Archival quality envelopes are
acid free have 25 rag content and will survive storage for long periods of time They cost more but result in a better space cover Envelopes purchased from the USPS or those used by organizations are typically not archival
Some collectors choose to make envelops from space related documents (maps figures photographs) This makes for an interesting envelope but be concerned about the archival quality of the paper and adhesives If you plan to make envelopes with different dimensions than the standard envelopes used by the USPS check with the USPS to ensure
the envelope is acceptable Some collectors use post cards or make post cards
for space covers The thickness of the papercardboard must be greater than that of the envelops in order to give the card the necessary stiffness and strength to survive the postal handling system The same caution about dimensions and archival ability applies to post cards For more information see Space Covers Definition and Description
Short history of space covers and types US space covers started in 1958 with the launch or attempted launch of the first US satellites (VANGUARD and EXPLORER) Space covers have been produced for every US satellite launch or attempted launch since 1958 Many space events have also been commemorated by space covers Space covers have been produced for foreign satellites launched by the US and US satellites launched by other countries US Space Cover manufactures have also produced space covers for non US satellites launched by other countries and various space events both US and foreign Space covers from past events can be purchased or traded from a number of different sources in the US and around the world See section 12 Sources of Space Covers It is unfortunate by some space cover manufactures have produced covers of suspect authenticity or outright forgeries Excellent sources of information are Bulver and the Astrophile see section 14 Sources of Information
Different methods are use to create and deliver space covers to the collector The more popular are
- Manufactured cachets applied to covers sold covers as own (eg Space Voyage Orbit Goldcraft Space Craft Beck)
- Manufactured cachets applied to covers sold covers through a reseller (eg Havekotte)
- Manufactured cachets sold or given cachets to others (eg Swanson Dubeau)
- Given or purchased cachets applied to covers covers sold as own (eg Dubeau)
- Given or purchased cachets applied to covers covers sold through a reseller (eg Whitney)
- Given or purchased covers sold covers as own - Given or purchased covers with cachets added
information to cover sold covers as own (eg Titusville Moonport Stamp Club Dubeau)
Given or purchased covers with cachets added information to cover sold covers through a reseller
Sources for space covers The collector has two options for obtaining space covers 1) purchase them or 2) make one=s own But the buyer-
beware should always be practiced Many great references are listed in section 14 Sources of Information and the Bibliography and should be read before purchasing space covers Many attempts have been made to identifycatalog all the space covers produce in the USby US Manufacturersfor US space Events None are complete Some catalogs may focus on a specific topic eg APOLLO Program Be that as it may something is better than nothing The following is a list of some of the more comprehensive listcatalogs listed in alphabetical order and found in the bibliography Courtney Davis Dubeau 2
Lollini Ramkissoon2 Vukotich and Wilhelm
The following is a partial list of space cover providersmanufacturersproducerssellers for US events (as of 2005)Astrophile 20021
- Goddard Space Flight Stamp Club Box 261 Greenbelt MD 20768 ‑‑0261
- JPL Stamp Club PO Box 771 La Canada CA 91012‑0771 httpwwwjplrecclubscaltechedustampindexshtml
- Resellers A good source is the Astrophile - Space Coast Philately PO box 446 Cape
Canaveral FL 32920 - Space equipment manufacturer individuals companies organizations clubs - SpaceCoast Cover services 1190
Montego Bay Dr Merritt Island FL 32953 - Stamp shows A good source of information about local stamp shows is
Linn=s Stamp News Astrophile and the APS - Titusville Moonport Stamp Club PO Box
6071 Titusville FL 32782 - Web sites httpstargate1usacom
stampsresourcehtm Auctions Space Unit Tom Steiner PO Box 550 Northville MI 48167 Web sites (eg E-Bay)
Most US space events are documented by space cover manufacturers Whether it is a major manned launch or a rocket motor test someone usually produces a space cover
11
ORBIT
commemorating the event This was more evident during manned programs See Space Covers Definition and Description
Making your own space cover Place the necessary postage on the envelopecard
At this point you have several options Put a return address on the envelopescard Include a Self Address Stamped Envelope (SASE) for the return of your covers The types of addressing will depend if you want the address to be a permanent part of the space cover or removable after the cover is returned to you Use a live gummed label that is removable if you do not want the address to be part of the cover Contact the post office where you want the envelope to be cancelled to determine if - a) they will hold the covers until the day of the event b) cancel them on that day and c)place the cancelled covers in the mail to you Follow the instruction of the post office
After receiving the envelopescards from the post
office (which are now Space Covers) many collectors apply a cachet to the Space Cover and place additional information inside the cover It is recommended that you identify who made the space cover and cachet in or on the Space Cover For more information see Space Covers Definition and Description
The following are the more popular post offices that
service space covers (as of 2005)Astrophile 20021 - Postmaster Kennedy Space Center Fl 32815 (about
1 week before the event)
- Window Services Unit Houston GPO 401 Franklin St Houston TX 77201-9999
Postmaster Edwards AFB CA 93523
Sources of Information
- Ad Astra Magazine of the National Space Society 922
Pennsylvania Ave SE Washington DC 20003 httpwwwnssorg
- American Philatelic Research Library (APRL) 100 Match Factory Place Bellefonte PA 16823 wwwstamplibraryorg
- American Philatelic Society American Philatelist Journal of the American Philatelic Society APS 100 Oakwood Ave PO Box 8000 State College PA 16803 Phone 814‑237 ‑3803 Fax 814 ‑237‑6128 httpwwwstampsorg
- Aviation Week and Space Technology 1221 Avenue of the Americas New York NY httpwwwaviationweekcom
- Bulver Ramkissoon Winick A Study of Suspect Space Covers 2001 Space Unit see Astrophile in the Bibliography
- Cranford Bruce ldquoSpace Covers Dictionary amp Identifier 2006 Editionrdquo Bruce Cranford 1 Cliffe Hill Ct Potomac MD 20854 USA ISBN 978-0-9711657-1-7
- Explorer International Association of Space Philatelists BO Box 302 Yonkers NY 10710 Editor Bill York 780 West End Ave Apt 11F New York NY 10025 No longer in business
- FIP Section for Astrophilately Joseacute Bergamin 16 6C 28030 Madrid Spain wwwastrophilatelycom Astrophile 200201
- Final Frontier Magazine PO Box 20089 Minneapolis MN 55420
- Linn=s Stamp News PO Box 29 Sidney OH 45365-0029 wwwLinnscom 800-837-0194
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration NASA 300 E Street SW Washington DC 20024‑3210 USA httpwwwhqnasagov
- Orbit Newsletter of the British based ASSS Orbit which had a special section on space stamps and postmarks httpwwwasssutvinternetcom Brian Lockyer The Secretary ASSS 21 Exford Close Weston‑Super‑Mare Somerset BS23 4RE Great Britain
- Quest The history of Spaceflight Magazine CSPACE 123 32nd St SE Grand Rapids MI 49509-0331 Glen Swanson httpwwwspaceeduquest
- Smithsonian Air amp Space Magazine monthly 900 Jefferson Dr Washington DC 20560 httpwwwsiedu
- Smithsonian National Postal Museum 2 Massachusetts Ave NE Washington DC 20002 (202) 33‑5555httpwwwpostalmuseumsiedu
- Space Unit President Tom Steiner PO Box 550 Northville MI 48167-0550 (As of 2005) publishes The Astrophile Member of the American Philatelic Association American Topical Association httpstargate1usacomstamps
- Space Week weekly publication of Army Times Publishing Co 6883 Commercial Drive Springfield VA 22159-0500
- Spaceflight The international Magazine of Space and Astronautics published by the British Interplanetary Society (BIS) 2729 South Lambeth Road London SW8 1SZ England httpfreespacevirginnetbisbisBishtm - US Library of Congress The Library of Congress 101
Independence Ave SE Washington DC 20540 (202) 707‑5000 httpwwwlocgov
- US Postal Service (USPS) Washington DC 20260-2435 (httpwwwuspsgov )
- USPS Stamp Fulfillment Service PO Box 219424 Kansas City MO 64121-9424 1-800-782-6724 fax 816-545-1212 wwwstampsonlinecom - Web Sites
- Friends and Partners in Space 1999 httpsolarrtdutkedu7Ejgreenfpspacehtml
- Mark Wade s Encyclopedia Astronautica 1998 httpsolarrtdutkedu~mwadespaceflthtm
- International Spacecraft and Launch Vehicle Names Glossary 2003 httpwwwspacecraftnamesinfo
- NASA httpwww‑paokscnasagovkscpaoscheduleschedulehtm
- Spaceflight Now httpwwwspaceflightnowcomtrackingindexhtml
- Gunther=s Space Page httpwwwskyrocketdespacespacehtml
- Contractors (many have merged or gone out of business since 1958)
Lockheed Martin httplmmsexternallmcocomremospascieoshtml Boeing httpwwwboeingcomflashhtml Orbital Science httpwwworbitalcom
Editorrsquos Note
Bruce has asked me to point out that he is not the
owner of the flown Apollo XI cover which I attributed to his collection on page 40 of the last edition
He just wishes he was
12
ORBIT
50th anniversary of NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration was established
by the National Aeronautics and Space Act on July 29 1958 replacing its predecessor the National Advisory Committee for
Aeronautics (NACA) The agency became operational on October 1 1958
13
ORBIT
So Who Did Invent the Telescope
A memorable fact from a different viewpoint
Did you know that in 2009 it is four hundred years since the first great discoveries in space took place Then it so happened that for the first time in the history of mankind craters on the moon some details on the planets and amongst other things the four great moons around Jupiter were seen Very soon the observation instruments became better and larger and gradually many more details on the moon and planets were seen Rings were discovered around Saturn bands of clouds and areas of storms on Jupiter and polar caps and surface structures on Mars
Now you may think where is the writer going with this
That is quite simple it so happened that in 2008 precisely 400 years ago the telescope was invented and that happened in our own little Holland For a long time it was not determined who had made the first Dutch viewer as these were called (see the New Zealand stamp issued 12-2-1997)
Zacharias Jansen and Hans Lipperhey both resident in Middelburg were seen as inventors of the telescope but there were other people who claimed this discovery It was said that Robert Bacon (1214-1294) already knew how the instrument could be made Jacob Metius of Alkmaar could also be the inventor he knew Jansen and Lipperhey and had also visited them Then there is also the Italian Raffael Gualterotti (1543-1639) of whom it is known with some certainty that in 1598 he had already made a viewer However this man evidently did not recognise the significance of his discovery and did not act upon it After very lengthy investigation it was finally decided that Hans Lipperhey (1570-1619 right) could lay claim to this invention
As often happens with new inventions the telescope was first seen as a military instrument to outsmart the enemy With the telescope the movements of the enemy could now be seen and followed over a much greater distance so that timely countermeasures could be taken It was the famous scholar Galileo Galileiuml (1564-1642) who heard about this discovery from others and immediately saw what further possibilities this instrument had to offer Based on the data he could get hold of Galileiuml himself made a telescope that magnified nine times Soon after he made another that
magnified to almost thirty times These instruments consisted of two lenses in a tube a lightly curved convex lens in front and at the rear a powerful concave lens as an eyepiece We must not expect too much from these first telescopes because the
optics at that time were far from the quality that we now know
At that time it was very difficult to make pure glass and the lenses were really rather small in proportion to the focal length so as a result the luminosity was mediocre To get a good lens a piece of clear rock crystal was sometimes used We can suppose that the first telescopes were of a lesser optical quality than simple binoculars in our time Nevertheless in 1609 Galileiuml was able to see craters on the moon and Venus as a sickle for the first time He was the discoverer of the first four moons of Jupiter and he concluded from sunspots that the rotation of the sun around its axis was about 25 days
The discovery of the telescope heralded a new era in space research in the widest sense of the word In my opinion we could call this the start of space exploration such as we in space travel now readily do Meanwhile all the nearby planets in our solar system have been explored with a space probe one or more times except Plutohelliphellipbut yes we cannot call that a planet any longer We have even been to the Moon and new discoveries are reported daily also in our own solar system moons of minor planets new rings around Uranus and small moons around the giant planets Jupiter and Saturn
Although in the very beginning there were no space probes doing investigation it is my opinion that we may take the opportunity during this commemoration year to recognise the fact that the telescope was invented four hundred years ago After all this was the beginning of a great voyage of discovery in space Therefore the year 2009 has been declared the International Year of Astronomy 2009 - IYA 2009 - by the UN (on the recommendation of the International Astronomical Union) The UN has designated UNESCO as the body chiefly responsible for IYA 2009 and the IAU as a support organisation for practical interpretation
HN Frankener March 2009
Specially translated for Orbit by Eleanor Coker this feature by Henk Nieuwenhuis first appeared in issue 24 2009 of Nieuwsbrief the journal of
Ruimtevaart Filatelie Club Nederland and is produced (with different illustrations) by
permission of the author and Editor Arie Olckers
14
ORBIT
Our Astonishing Nicolaus Copernicus By Stan Wekka Bydgoszcz Poland with Jeff Dugdale
IYA could not go past without our journal
marking once again this great thinker so here
is a specially commissioned and edited article
from an Orbit enthusiast in Poland
Nicolaus Copernicus was born 19 February 1473 in the wonderful City of Toruń on the River Vistula and died 24 May 1543 in Frombork
Consider this famous astronomermdashmathematician- doctor of medicine and monetary system expert (economist ) - physicianmdashclassical scholar - jurist - artistmdashtranslatormdashmilitary leadermdashdiplomat and hellipCatholic cleric - Treasure of our Earth NICOLAUS COPERNICUS (in Polish Mikolaj Kopernik)
He has been honoured in international philately on hundreds of postage-stamps items of postal ndashstationery commemorative cancellationshellip
His name is on Navyrsquos ships planes streets places schools universities factories on Moon satellites planetoidshellip
There have been are currently and will be in the future many
different celebrations of that Great Man of Geniushellip as for inst World Philatelic Exhibition ldquoPoland 1973rdquo organized from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of His Birth US carnet issued 1973 presents three proofs of stamps from Poland and the US
dedicated to Copernicus
A selection of Polish postage-stamps presents
Him as most important citizen of Poland and World see a page from my stock book opposite filled with Polish stamps for the great man
In this short memorial to His Life and Work we must mention a few events of his rich life His family had its roots in the Polish Region of Lower Silesia ( today in SW Poland ) On a few covers and post-cards are shown different cancels of the KOPERNIKI Post Office initiated from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of the Great Astronomerrsquos Birth
After the death of Nicolausrsquo father his uncle Bishop Watzenrode of Warmia looked after the family and saw young Copernicus into university at Cracov As an 18 year old youth he presented himself at the Jagiellonian University in 1491 and studied geometry trigonometry mathematics and astronomy there for the next four years
15
ORBIT
His teachers were famous in those times astronomers and mathematicians such as John of Glogoacutew (1445-1507) who had written a commentary on Ptolemyrsquos Cosmography and Wojciech Brudzewski (1445-1497) who was hostile to the geocentric system expounded by Ptolemy It was he who infected Copernicus with his theories based on the writings of Aristarchus of Samos three centuries before Christ Their teachings bore fruit in due course in Copernicusrsquos De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium published at Nuremberg at the printing house of John Petreius in 1543 This stamp issued in March 1942 and cancelled on September 11th 1943 depicts a monument to Nicolaus Copernicus within the quadrangle of the library of the
Jagiellionian University
In due course Copernicus proved that the Geocentric System by Ptolemy was not true and his Heliocentric or Solar System was accurate This is shown on block Michel Cat Bl52 and 2 interesting philatelic items showing His most famous work De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium his autograph and the Solar System on the postmark
In 1510 Copernicus settled at Frombork and having bought the Castlersquos Tower he established his Observatory and Library
there as seen on rare pair of especially overprinted (middle vertical black overprints ) post-cards and stamps Michel Cat 805 1194
Many people assign a single nationality to Copernicus Nazi Germany claimed Copernicus to have been purely German as on stamps Michel Cat 100 104 However Germans destroyed the monument to Copernicus in the quadrangle of the library (shown on stamps Michel Cat 396 446) at the University of Cracov in 1944
After World War II Poles rebuilt that Monument and it is now displayed at Cracovrsquos Botanical Gardens
During World War II Polish Prisoners of War of The Woldenberg Camp II C organized by Germans for Polish
officers initiated Camprsquos Post there and issued many interesting philatelic values One of them is a complete of souvenir sheet or block and set of 3 stamps dedicated to 400th Anniversary of Copernicus Death (shown right)
Warsawrsquos Scientific Society initiated the investigation of Copernicusrsquo tomb and remnants in 1802 but found little of interest In 2004 Prof George Gąsowski of The Institute of Anthropology and Archaeology in Pułtusk initiated new wave of investigation and in 2005-2008 he found human remains in the crypt of The Cathedral at Frombork After the war with Sweden war in the 17th century the Swedish robbed many Polish national treasures and among them were books formerly belonging to Copernicus One of books was ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo found in the Museum of Uppsala In that book were found two of Copernicusrsquo hairs which were examined forensically
In due course genetic comparison of the alleged Copernicus remnants found in Frombork Cathedral crypt and those two hairs in the ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo at Uppsala confirmed that the Frombork remains were those of Copernicus proving once and for all where his tomb lies
Polish anthropologists have since tried to do a reconstruction of Copernicusrsquo face and published their results in the Polish
press see below
16
ORBIT
Un-manned Satellites on Postage Stamps 31 By Guest Contributors Don Hillger and Garry Toth
A version of this article first appeared in The Astrophile for July-August 2008
The Elektron Series This is the thirty-first in a series of articles about un-
manned satellites on postage stamps This article
features the Russian Elektron-series satellites Four Elektron satellites were successfully launched with
Elektron-1 and 2 paired up on 30 January 1964 and Elektron-3 and 4 similarly paired on 10 July 1964
Elektron was one of the earliest Soviet scientific satellite missions to be authorized following the initial
Sputnik series The spacecraft had the mission of mapping the van Allen radiation belts at higher
inclinations than previous US satellites had followed In these missions two different types of spacecraft
were paired and launched together as mentioned
above Elektron-1 and 3 were put into a lower orbit to map the inner van Allen belt while Elekton-2 and 4
were boosted to a higher orbit to study the outer belt
For identification purposes Elektron-1 and 3 had
cylindrical bodies 075 m in diameter and 13 m long with six solar panels extending outward almost like
paddles Elektron-2 and 4 were shaped like the cupola of a public building in the basic form of a cylinder with
a flattened and broadened end with a diameter of 18 m and a height of 24 m
Both Elektron types are easily distinguished and are represented on many postal items mostly from
eastern bloc nations Some of the items show both Elektron-1 and 2 (or Elektron-3 and 4) since they
were launched together
A checklist of postal items identified as showing the
E l e k t r o n - s e r i e s s a t e l l i t e s ( h t t p wwwciracolostateedurammhillgerElektronhtm) is
available on the Website developed by the authors for the un-manned satellites featured in this series of
articles (httpwwwciracolostateedurammhillger
satelliteshtm) E-mail correspondence with the authors is welcome Don Hillger can be reached at
hillgerciracolostateedu and Garry Toth at garry_tothhotmailcom
Elektron-A
From Mark Wadersquos site httpwwwastronautixcom
Elektron-B
17
ORBIT
18
ORBIT
Flight STS-107 Commander Rick Husband Pilot William McCool MS Michael Anderson MS David Brown MS Laurel Clark MS Ilan Ramon MS Kalpana Chawla KSC Launch Date 1612003 Proposed KSC Landing 1203 Purpose SPACEHAB Double Main Payload Module
Shuttle Story 2003 STS ndash107 The Columbia Disaster
Columbia disintegrates on re-entry killing all seven astronauts on board
ldquocontingency declaredrdquo
STS-107 was a multi-disciplinary microgravity and Earth science research mission with a multitude of international scientific
investigations conducted continuously during 16 days in orbit
The seven-member crew died on February 1 2003 when the
shuttle disintegrated during re-entry into the Earths atmosphere The cause of the accident was determined to be a piece of foam
that broke off during launch and damaged the thermal protection system components (reinforced carbon-carbon panels and
thermal protection tiles) on the leading edge of the left wing of
the Shuttle orbiter causing an extensive heat build-up During re-entry the damaged wing slowly overheated and came apart
eventually leading to loss of control and total disintegration of the vehicle
STS-107 carried the SPACEHAB Double Research Module on its inaugural flight the Freestar experiment (mounted on a
Hitchhiker Program rack) and the Extended Duration Orbiter pallet
One of the experiments a video taken to study atmospheric dust may have detected a new atmospheric phenomenon
dubbed a TIGER (Transient Ionospheric
Glow Emission in Red)
On board the Columbia was a copy of a drawing by Petr Ginz the editor-in-chief of
the magazine Vedem who depicted what he
imagined the Earth looked like from the Moon when he was a 14-year-old prisoner in the
Tereziacuten concentration camp The copy was in the possession of Ilan Ramon and was lost in
the crash
19
ORBIT
Historical Document
Downloaded by your Editor on the day of the tragedy this page from a NASA
website presents starkly the dreadful
truth of what has just happened
The opening phrasing ldquoA contingency has been declaredrdquo is very much in the
laconic and measured tradition of Apollo
13rsquos ldquoHouston we have a problemrdquo and the ldquoObviously a major malfunctionrdquo
used by Mission Control of the Challenger tragedy in January 1986
Below and at bottom of opposite page Launch and Conclusion covers for the
flight The brightly coloured mission patch is appropriately printed in black
20
ORBIT
21
ORBIT
Faux commemorative dollar bills with a
value of ldquo107rdquo were issued to mark the occasion
The Israeli issue of 2422004
commemorated their first astronaut was a revised version of the stamps issued in
advance of Ilan Ramonrsquos flight see page 22
At least one territory under Islamic influence
which has traditionally cashed in on shuttle flight issues did not print a reference to
Israel on their commemoratives for political reasons see page 23
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
3
ORBIT
4
ORBIT
5
ORBIT
6
ORBIT
7
ORBIT
8
ORBIT
IYA Europa stamps referencing Galileo For all 2009 Europa stamps see
httpeuropa-stampsblogspotcom
Issue date 3409 15409
17409
25409
4509
4509
5509
7509 6509
7509
8509
1609 12509
9509
Hungary below 8509
Azerbaijan below right 13409
9
ORBIT
Collecting US Space Covers by Bruce Cranford Part Two
Monitoring tracking mission control and communications Satellite and manned vehicle tracking stations have had a complex history The number of tracking sites grew from a few down range sites for the Eastern and Western Ranges in the 1950s to many dozens worldwide for the Mercury Gemini and Apollo Programs All manned missions and many satellite missions require constant uninterrupted communications world as the satellite orbits the earth or travels through space Many tracking stations used existing facilities or were located on existing sites Many of these sites were located at NASA facilities Army Navy and Air Force facilities (including planes and ships) Where possible tracking stations were located on foreign soil in partnership with the host government Some collect covers cancelled at all the tracking stationssites worldwide for each manned launch
The number of tracking stations began to decline as the manned flight program moved into the Apollo Program due primarily to cost reductions from improved satellite communication technology Satellites now orbiting the earth do a better job of tracking and communicating with other satellites and manned vehicles than earth-bound stations The US Department of Defense has tracking and communication stations for their satellites but for security reasons do not advertise the site=s existence Commercial amp government communication satellites systems are the exception and are increasing the number of Earth based communications sitesstations Most countries worldwide have satellite communications capability within their own country With the advent of communication satellites including television and internet communications nearly every home in the US has the potential to receive signals from satellites Activities include cancellations at monitoring tracking control and communications sites when contact is first made with the
satellitespacecraft Interest in this area declined after the Apollo program
Activities in space Once the satellitespacecraft reaches space many activities are of interest to collectors For unmanned missions they include
i) orbital changes ii) insertion into a trajectory which may take the
spacecraft to another planet moon asteroid or an observation point in space (eg Lagrange 2 GEO)
iii) reaching a specific program milestone (eg flyby of a celestial object in service for a communications satellite)
iv) arriving at or departing from a celestial object (eg arriving at Mars)
v) impacting or landing and vi) end of mission
For manned missions they may include dockings spacewalks accomplishing a specific mission milestone undocking The USPS has produced very few covers for sale to the public
that have been flown into space The USPS produced officially flown space covers on 19830830 They were flown on the Challenger STS 008 It is the current policy for both NASA and the USPS that mail will not be delivered to or received from the
US astronauts on the International Space Station A few space covers were flown into space some illegally during the early manned program (Mercury Gemini Apollo) The Smithsonian=s Postal Museum in Washington DC has examples these covers
Recovery Spacecraft recovery is typically limited to manned space vehicles and early spy satellites From Mercury through the Apollo missions the recovery sites were the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans The US Navy deployed ships at the recovery site to retrieve the astronauts and their capsule This changed when the Space Transportation System (STS) was developed The STS Space Shuttles were designed for conventional aircraft landing The two major sites are Edwards Air Force Base California and Kennedy Space Center Florida Early spy satellites required the recovery photographic film in the air over the ocean to prevent damaged to land based structures and humans and to prevent the film from falling into the wrong hands if the Air Force missed the recovery capsule Newer communications technology has eliminated the need to recover spy satellite film capsules NASA has several new programs that will return material from space and will require recovering of the returning payload Nearly all earth orbiting satellites and those less fortunate that never made it into orbit will eventually renter the atmosphere Depending on the size and materials some will burn up and some may make it to the ground (eg SKYLAB)
Cachets A variety of cachet types have been and are being used in the US from no markings to high quality graphics For a general description of space cover cachets available in the US see Appendix Space Covers The most popular are multi color printed cachets using archival inks (Figure 103)
Envelopes and postcards Two types of envelopes are popular with US collectors with the size designated as letter (6) and business (10 ) Post cards are occasionally used in the US but the most popular is the 6 envelope Postal Stationery and Official Mail covers are also used See Appendix Space Covers Stamps or Postage
Philatelic Organizations For the collector of space covers which are
philatelic material there are three major organizations that offer information about space covers (See section 14 for addresses)
I) The Space Unit (httpstargate1usacomstamps ) formed in 1958 provides the majority of information for collectors of US space covers It publishes a by-monthly publication called the AAstrophile Journal of Astrophilately
ii) American Philatelic Society (APS) (httpwwwstampsorg) the largest nonprofit society in the world for stamp collectors that provides a number of services for stamp collectors and postal historians
10
ORBIT ORBIT
The APS existed before the first satellite was launched in 1957 The APS library is a great source of philatelic historical information The collector can borrow material contacting the American Philatelic Research Library (APRL)
iii) The American Topical Association (ATA) Organizations that have since ceased to exist include
the Explorer and Inner and Outer Space Past issues are available from the American Philatelic Research Library and the Space Unit See 14 Sources of Information
How covers are made Space covers are typically made from envelopes (letter 6 or business size 10) with at least 25 rag content and archival quality The acid left in paper from the manufacturing process turns the paper yellow with age and eventually destroys the paper Archival quality envelopes are
acid free have 25 rag content and will survive storage for long periods of time They cost more but result in a better space cover Envelopes purchased from the USPS or those used by organizations are typically not archival
Some collectors choose to make envelops from space related documents (maps figures photographs) This makes for an interesting envelope but be concerned about the archival quality of the paper and adhesives If you plan to make envelopes with different dimensions than the standard envelopes used by the USPS check with the USPS to ensure
the envelope is acceptable Some collectors use post cards or make post cards
for space covers The thickness of the papercardboard must be greater than that of the envelops in order to give the card the necessary stiffness and strength to survive the postal handling system The same caution about dimensions and archival ability applies to post cards For more information see Space Covers Definition and Description
Short history of space covers and types US space covers started in 1958 with the launch or attempted launch of the first US satellites (VANGUARD and EXPLORER) Space covers have been produced for every US satellite launch or attempted launch since 1958 Many space events have also been commemorated by space covers Space covers have been produced for foreign satellites launched by the US and US satellites launched by other countries US Space Cover manufactures have also produced space covers for non US satellites launched by other countries and various space events both US and foreign Space covers from past events can be purchased or traded from a number of different sources in the US and around the world See section 12 Sources of Space Covers It is unfortunate by some space cover manufactures have produced covers of suspect authenticity or outright forgeries Excellent sources of information are Bulver and the Astrophile see section 14 Sources of Information
Different methods are use to create and deliver space covers to the collector The more popular are
- Manufactured cachets applied to covers sold covers as own (eg Space Voyage Orbit Goldcraft Space Craft Beck)
- Manufactured cachets applied to covers sold covers through a reseller (eg Havekotte)
- Manufactured cachets sold or given cachets to others (eg Swanson Dubeau)
- Given or purchased cachets applied to covers covers sold as own (eg Dubeau)
- Given or purchased cachets applied to covers covers sold through a reseller (eg Whitney)
- Given or purchased covers sold covers as own - Given or purchased covers with cachets added
information to cover sold covers as own (eg Titusville Moonport Stamp Club Dubeau)
Given or purchased covers with cachets added information to cover sold covers through a reseller
Sources for space covers The collector has two options for obtaining space covers 1) purchase them or 2) make one=s own But the buyer-
beware should always be practiced Many great references are listed in section 14 Sources of Information and the Bibliography and should be read before purchasing space covers Many attempts have been made to identifycatalog all the space covers produce in the USby US Manufacturersfor US space Events None are complete Some catalogs may focus on a specific topic eg APOLLO Program Be that as it may something is better than nothing The following is a list of some of the more comprehensive listcatalogs listed in alphabetical order and found in the bibliography Courtney Davis Dubeau 2
Lollini Ramkissoon2 Vukotich and Wilhelm
The following is a partial list of space cover providersmanufacturersproducerssellers for US events (as of 2005)Astrophile 20021
- Goddard Space Flight Stamp Club Box 261 Greenbelt MD 20768 ‑‑0261
- JPL Stamp Club PO Box 771 La Canada CA 91012‑0771 httpwwwjplrecclubscaltechedustampindexshtml
- Resellers A good source is the Astrophile - Space Coast Philately PO box 446 Cape
Canaveral FL 32920 - Space equipment manufacturer individuals companies organizations clubs - SpaceCoast Cover services 1190
Montego Bay Dr Merritt Island FL 32953 - Stamp shows A good source of information about local stamp shows is
Linn=s Stamp News Astrophile and the APS - Titusville Moonport Stamp Club PO Box
6071 Titusville FL 32782 - Web sites httpstargate1usacom
stampsresourcehtm Auctions Space Unit Tom Steiner PO Box 550 Northville MI 48167 Web sites (eg E-Bay)
Most US space events are documented by space cover manufacturers Whether it is a major manned launch or a rocket motor test someone usually produces a space cover
11
ORBIT
commemorating the event This was more evident during manned programs See Space Covers Definition and Description
Making your own space cover Place the necessary postage on the envelopecard
At this point you have several options Put a return address on the envelopescard Include a Self Address Stamped Envelope (SASE) for the return of your covers The types of addressing will depend if you want the address to be a permanent part of the space cover or removable after the cover is returned to you Use a live gummed label that is removable if you do not want the address to be part of the cover Contact the post office where you want the envelope to be cancelled to determine if - a) they will hold the covers until the day of the event b) cancel them on that day and c)place the cancelled covers in the mail to you Follow the instruction of the post office
After receiving the envelopescards from the post
office (which are now Space Covers) many collectors apply a cachet to the Space Cover and place additional information inside the cover It is recommended that you identify who made the space cover and cachet in or on the Space Cover For more information see Space Covers Definition and Description
The following are the more popular post offices that
service space covers (as of 2005)Astrophile 20021 - Postmaster Kennedy Space Center Fl 32815 (about
1 week before the event)
- Window Services Unit Houston GPO 401 Franklin St Houston TX 77201-9999
Postmaster Edwards AFB CA 93523
Sources of Information
- Ad Astra Magazine of the National Space Society 922
Pennsylvania Ave SE Washington DC 20003 httpwwwnssorg
- American Philatelic Research Library (APRL) 100 Match Factory Place Bellefonte PA 16823 wwwstamplibraryorg
- American Philatelic Society American Philatelist Journal of the American Philatelic Society APS 100 Oakwood Ave PO Box 8000 State College PA 16803 Phone 814‑237 ‑3803 Fax 814 ‑237‑6128 httpwwwstampsorg
- Aviation Week and Space Technology 1221 Avenue of the Americas New York NY httpwwwaviationweekcom
- Bulver Ramkissoon Winick A Study of Suspect Space Covers 2001 Space Unit see Astrophile in the Bibliography
- Cranford Bruce ldquoSpace Covers Dictionary amp Identifier 2006 Editionrdquo Bruce Cranford 1 Cliffe Hill Ct Potomac MD 20854 USA ISBN 978-0-9711657-1-7
- Explorer International Association of Space Philatelists BO Box 302 Yonkers NY 10710 Editor Bill York 780 West End Ave Apt 11F New York NY 10025 No longer in business
- FIP Section for Astrophilately Joseacute Bergamin 16 6C 28030 Madrid Spain wwwastrophilatelycom Astrophile 200201
- Final Frontier Magazine PO Box 20089 Minneapolis MN 55420
- Linn=s Stamp News PO Box 29 Sidney OH 45365-0029 wwwLinnscom 800-837-0194
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration NASA 300 E Street SW Washington DC 20024‑3210 USA httpwwwhqnasagov
- Orbit Newsletter of the British based ASSS Orbit which had a special section on space stamps and postmarks httpwwwasssutvinternetcom Brian Lockyer The Secretary ASSS 21 Exford Close Weston‑Super‑Mare Somerset BS23 4RE Great Britain
- Quest The history of Spaceflight Magazine CSPACE 123 32nd St SE Grand Rapids MI 49509-0331 Glen Swanson httpwwwspaceeduquest
- Smithsonian Air amp Space Magazine monthly 900 Jefferson Dr Washington DC 20560 httpwwwsiedu
- Smithsonian National Postal Museum 2 Massachusetts Ave NE Washington DC 20002 (202) 33‑5555httpwwwpostalmuseumsiedu
- Space Unit President Tom Steiner PO Box 550 Northville MI 48167-0550 (As of 2005) publishes The Astrophile Member of the American Philatelic Association American Topical Association httpstargate1usacomstamps
- Space Week weekly publication of Army Times Publishing Co 6883 Commercial Drive Springfield VA 22159-0500
- Spaceflight The international Magazine of Space and Astronautics published by the British Interplanetary Society (BIS) 2729 South Lambeth Road London SW8 1SZ England httpfreespacevirginnetbisbisBishtm - US Library of Congress The Library of Congress 101
Independence Ave SE Washington DC 20540 (202) 707‑5000 httpwwwlocgov
- US Postal Service (USPS) Washington DC 20260-2435 (httpwwwuspsgov )
- USPS Stamp Fulfillment Service PO Box 219424 Kansas City MO 64121-9424 1-800-782-6724 fax 816-545-1212 wwwstampsonlinecom - Web Sites
- Friends and Partners in Space 1999 httpsolarrtdutkedu7Ejgreenfpspacehtml
- Mark Wade s Encyclopedia Astronautica 1998 httpsolarrtdutkedu~mwadespaceflthtm
- International Spacecraft and Launch Vehicle Names Glossary 2003 httpwwwspacecraftnamesinfo
- NASA httpwww‑paokscnasagovkscpaoscheduleschedulehtm
- Spaceflight Now httpwwwspaceflightnowcomtrackingindexhtml
- Gunther=s Space Page httpwwwskyrocketdespacespacehtml
- Contractors (many have merged or gone out of business since 1958)
Lockheed Martin httplmmsexternallmcocomremospascieoshtml Boeing httpwwwboeingcomflashhtml Orbital Science httpwwworbitalcom
Editorrsquos Note
Bruce has asked me to point out that he is not the
owner of the flown Apollo XI cover which I attributed to his collection on page 40 of the last edition
He just wishes he was
12
ORBIT
50th anniversary of NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration was established
by the National Aeronautics and Space Act on July 29 1958 replacing its predecessor the National Advisory Committee for
Aeronautics (NACA) The agency became operational on October 1 1958
13
ORBIT
So Who Did Invent the Telescope
A memorable fact from a different viewpoint
Did you know that in 2009 it is four hundred years since the first great discoveries in space took place Then it so happened that for the first time in the history of mankind craters on the moon some details on the planets and amongst other things the four great moons around Jupiter were seen Very soon the observation instruments became better and larger and gradually many more details on the moon and planets were seen Rings were discovered around Saturn bands of clouds and areas of storms on Jupiter and polar caps and surface structures on Mars
Now you may think where is the writer going with this
That is quite simple it so happened that in 2008 precisely 400 years ago the telescope was invented and that happened in our own little Holland For a long time it was not determined who had made the first Dutch viewer as these were called (see the New Zealand stamp issued 12-2-1997)
Zacharias Jansen and Hans Lipperhey both resident in Middelburg were seen as inventors of the telescope but there were other people who claimed this discovery It was said that Robert Bacon (1214-1294) already knew how the instrument could be made Jacob Metius of Alkmaar could also be the inventor he knew Jansen and Lipperhey and had also visited them Then there is also the Italian Raffael Gualterotti (1543-1639) of whom it is known with some certainty that in 1598 he had already made a viewer However this man evidently did not recognise the significance of his discovery and did not act upon it After very lengthy investigation it was finally decided that Hans Lipperhey (1570-1619 right) could lay claim to this invention
As often happens with new inventions the telescope was first seen as a military instrument to outsmart the enemy With the telescope the movements of the enemy could now be seen and followed over a much greater distance so that timely countermeasures could be taken It was the famous scholar Galileo Galileiuml (1564-1642) who heard about this discovery from others and immediately saw what further possibilities this instrument had to offer Based on the data he could get hold of Galileiuml himself made a telescope that magnified nine times Soon after he made another that
magnified to almost thirty times These instruments consisted of two lenses in a tube a lightly curved convex lens in front and at the rear a powerful concave lens as an eyepiece We must not expect too much from these first telescopes because the
optics at that time were far from the quality that we now know
At that time it was very difficult to make pure glass and the lenses were really rather small in proportion to the focal length so as a result the luminosity was mediocre To get a good lens a piece of clear rock crystal was sometimes used We can suppose that the first telescopes were of a lesser optical quality than simple binoculars in our time Nevertheless in 1609 Galileiuml was able to see craters on the moon and Venus as a sickle for the first time He was the discoverer of the first four moons of Jupiter and he concluded from sunspots that the rotation of the sun around its axis was about 25 days
The discovery of the telescope heralded a new era in space research in the widest sense of the word In my opinion we could call this the start of space exploration such as we in space travel now readily do Meanwhile all the nearby planets in our solar system have been explored with a space probe one or more times except Plutohelliphellipbut yes we cannot call that a planet any longer We have even been to the Moon and new discoveries are reported daily also in our own solar system moons of minor planets new rings around Uranus and small moons around the giant planets Jupiter and Saturn
Although in the very beginning there were no space probes doing investigation it is my opinion that we may take the opportunity during this commemoration year to recognise the fact that the telescope was invented four hundred years ago After all this was the beginning of a great voyage of discovery in space Therefore the year 2009 has been declared the International Year of Astronomy 2009 - IYA 2009 - by the UN (on the recommendation of the International Astronomical Union) The UN has designated UNESCO as the body chiefly responsible for IYA 2009 and the IAU as a support organisation for practical interpretation
HN Frankener March 2009
Specially translated for Orbit by Eleanor Coker this feature by Henk Nieuwenhuis first appeared in issue 24 2009 of Nieuwsbrief the journal of
Ruimtevaart Filatelie Club Nederland and is produced (with different illustrations) by
permission of the author and Editor Arie Olckers
14
ORBIT
Our Astonishing Nicolaus Copernicus By Stan Wekka Bydgoszcz Poland with Jeff Dugdale
IYA could not go past without our journal
marking once again this great thinker so here
is a specially commissioned and edited article
from an Orbit enthusiast in Poland
Nicolaus Copernicus was born 19 February 1473 in the wonderful City of Toruń on the River Vistula and died 24 May 1543 in Frombork
Consider this famous astronomermdashmathematician- doctor of medicine and monetary system expert (economist ) - physicianmdashclassical scholar - jurist - artistmdashtranslatormdashmilitary leadermdashdiplomat and hellipCatholic cleric - Treasure of our Earth NICOLAUS COPERNICUS (in Polish Mikolaj Kopernik)
He has been honoured in international philately on hundreds of postage-stamps items of postal ndashstationery commemorative cancellationshellip
His name is on Navyrsquos ships planes streets places schools universities factories on Moon satellites planetoidshellip
There have been are currently and will be in the future many
different celebrations of that Great Man of Geniushellip as for inst World Philatelic Exhibition ldquoPoland 1973rdquo organized from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of His Birth US carnet issued 1973 presents three proofs of stamps from Poland and the US
dedicated to Copernicus
A selection of Polish postage-stamps presents
Him as most important citizen of Poland and World see a page from my stock book opposite filled with Polish stamps for the great man
In this short memorial to His Life and Work we must mention a few events of his rich life His family had its roots in the Polish Region of Lower Silesia ( today in SW Poland ) On a few covers and post-cards are shown different cancels of the KOPERNIKI Post Office initiated from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of the Great Astronomerrsquos Birth
After the death of Nicolausrsquo father his uncle Bishop Watzenrode of Warmia looked after the family and saw young Copernicus into university at Cracov As an 18 year old youth he presented himself at the Jagiellonian University in 1491 and studied geometry trigonometry mathematics and astronomy there for the next four years
15
ORBIT
His teachers were famous in those times astronomers and mathematicians such as John of Glogoacutew (1445-1507) who had written a commentary on Ptolemyrsquos Cosmography and Wojciech Brudzewski (1445-1497) who was hostile to the geocentric system expounded by Ptolemy It was he who infected Copernicus with his theories based on the writings of Aristarchus of Samos three centuries before Christ Their teachings bore fruit in due course in Copernicusrsquos De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium published at Nuremberg at the printing house of John Petreius in 1543 This stamp issued in March 1942 and cancelled on September 11th 1943 depicts a monument to Nicolaus Copernicus within the quadrangle of the library of the
Jagiellionian University
In due course Copernicus proved that the Geocentric System by Ptolemy was not true and his Heliocentric or Solar System was accurate This is shown on block Michel Cat Bl52 and 2 interesting philatelic items showing His most famous work De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium his autograph and the Solar System on the postmark
In 1510 Copernicus settled at Frombork and having bought the Castlersquos Tower he established his Observatory and Library
there as seen on rare pair of especially overprinted (middle vertical black overprints ) post-cards and stamps Michel Cat 805 1194
Many people assign a single nationality to Copernicus Nazi Germany claimed Copernicus to have been purely German as on stamps Michel Cat 100 104 However Germans destroyed the monument to Copernicus in the quadrangle of the library (shown on stamps Michel Cat 396 446) at the University of Cracov in 1944
After World War II Poles rebuilt that Monument and it is now displayed at Cracovrsquos Botanical Gardens
During World War II Polish Prisoners of War of The Woldenberg Camp II C organized by Germans for Polish
officers initiated Camprsquos Post there and issued many interesting philatelic values One of them is a complete of souvenir sheet or block and set of 3 stamps dedicated to 400th Anniversary of Copernicus Death (shown right)
Warsawrsquos Scientific Society initiated the investigation of Copernicusrsquo tomb and remnants in 1802 but found little of interest In 2004 Prof George Gąsowski of The Institute of Anthropology and Archaeology in Pułtusk initiated new wave of investigation and in 2005-2008 he found human remains in the crypt of The Cathedral at Frombork After the war with Sweden war in the 17th century the Swedish robbed many Polish national treasures and among them were books formerly belonging to Copernicus One of books was ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo found in the Museum of Uppsala In that book were found two of Copernicusrsquo hairs which were examined forensically
In due course genetic comparison of the alleged Copernicus remnants found in Frombork Cathedral crypt and those two hairs in the ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo at Uppsala confirmed that the Frombork remains were those of Copernicus proving once and for all where his tomb lies
Polish anthropologists have since tried to do a reconstruction of Copernicusrsquo face and published their results in the Polish
press see below
16
ORBIT
Un-manned Satellites on Postage Stamps 31 By Guest Contributors Don Hillger and Garry Toth
A version of this article first appeared in The Astrophile for July-August 2008
The Elektron Series This is the thirty-first in a series of articles about un-
manned satellites on postage stamps This article
features the Russian Elektron-series satellites Four Elektron satellites were successfully launched with
Elektron-1 and 2 paired up on 30 January 1964 and Elektron-3 and 4 similarly paired on 10 July 1964
Elektron was one of the earliest Soviet scientific satellite missions to be authorized following the initial
Sputnik series The spacecraft had the mission of mapping the van Allen radiation belts at higher
inclinations than previous US satellites had followed In these missions two different types of spacecraft
were paired and launched together as mentioned
above Elektron-1 and 3 were put into a lower orbit to map the inner van Allen belt while Elekton-2 and 4
were boosted to a higher orbit to study the outer belt
For identification purposes Elektron-1 and 3 had
cylindrical bodies 075 m in diameter and 13 m long with six solar panels extending outward almost like
paddles Elektron-2 and 4 were shaped like the cupola of a public building in the basic form of a cylinder with
a flattened and broadened end with a diameter of 18 m and a height of 24 m
Both Elektron types are easily distinguished and are represented on many postal items mostly from
eastern bloc nations Some of the items show both Elektron-1 and 2 (or Elektron-3 and 4) since they
were launched together
A checklist of postal items identified as showing the
E l e k t r o n - s e r i e s s a t e l l i t e s ( h t t p wwwciracolostateedurammhillgerElektronhtm) is
available on the Website developed by the authors for the un-manned satellites featured in this series of
articles (httpwwwciracolostateedurammhillger
satelliteshtm) E-mail correspondence with the authors is welcome Don Hillger can be reached at
hillgerciracolostateedu and Garry Toth at garry_tothhotmailcom
Elektron-A
From Mark Wadersquos site httpwwwastronautixcom
Elektron-B
17
ORBIT
18
ORBIT
Flight STS-107 Commander Rick Husband Pilot William McCool MS Michael Anderson MS David Brown MS Laurel Clark MS Ilan Ramon MS Kalpana Chawla KSC Launch Date 1612003 Proposed KSC Landing 1203 Purpose SPACEHAB Double Main Payload Module
Shuttle Story 2003 STS ndash107 The Columbia Disaster
Columbia disintegrates on re-entry killing all seven astronauts on board
ldquocontingency declaredrdquo
STS-107 was a multi-disciplinary microgravity and Earth science research mission with a multitude of international scientific
investigations conducted continuously during 16 days in orbit
The seven-member crew died on February 1 2003 when the
shuttle disintegrated during re-entry into the Earths atmosphere The cause of the accident was determined to be a piece of foam
that broke off during launch and damaged the thermal protection system components (reinforced carbon-carbon panels and
thermal protection tiles) on the leading edge of the left wing of
the Shuttle orbiter causing an extensive heat build-up During re-entry the damaged wing slowly overheated and came apart
eventually leading to loss of control and total disintegration of the vehicle
STS-107 carried the SPACEHAB Double Research Module on its inaugural flight the Freestar experiment (mounted on a
Hitchhiker Program rack) and the Extended Duration Orbiter pallet
One of the experiments a video taken to study atmospheric dust may have detected a new atmospheric phenomenon
dubbed a TIGER (Transient Ionospheric
Glow Emission in Red)
On board the Columbia was a copy of a drawing by Petr Ginz the editor-in-chief of
the magazine Vedem who depicted what he
imagined the Earth looked like from the Moon when he was a 14-year-old prisoner in the
Tereziacuten concentration camp The copy was in the possession of Ilan Ramon and was lost in
the crash
19
ORBIT
Historical Document
Downloaded by your Editor on the day of the tragedy this page from a NASA
website presents starkly the dreadful
truth of what has just happened
The opening phrasing ldquoA contingency has been declaredrdquo is very much in the
laconic and measured tradition of Apollo
13rsquos ldquoHouston we have a problemrdquo and the ldquoObviously a major malfunctionrdquo
used by Mission Control of the Challenger tragedy in January 1986
Below and at bottom of opposite page Launch and Conclusion covers for the
flight The brightly coloured mission patch is appropriately printed in black
20
ORBIT
21
ORBIT
Faux commemorative dollar bills with a
value of ldquo107rdquo were issued to mark the occasion
The Israeli issue of 2422004
commemorated their first astronaut was a revised version of the stamps issued in
advance of Ilan Ramonrsquos flight see page 22
At least one territory under Islamic influence
which has traditionally cashed in on shuttle flight issues did not print a reference to
Israel on their commemoratives for political reasons see page 23
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
4
ORBIT
5
ORBIT
6
ORBIT
7
ORBIT
8
ORBIT
IYA Europa stamps referencing Galileo For all 2009 Europa stamps see
httpeuropa-stampsblogspotcom
Issue date 3409 15409
17409
25409
4509
4509
5509
7509 6509
7509
8509
1609 12509
9509
Hungary below 8509
Azerbaijan below right 13409
9
ORBIT
Collecting US Space Covers by Bruce Cranford Part Two
Monitoring tracking mission control and communications Satellite and manned vehicle tracking stations have had a complex history The number of tracking sites grew from a few down range sites for the Eastern and Western Ranges in the 1950s to many dozens worldwide for the Mercury Gemini and Apollo Programs All manned missions and many satellite missions require constant uninterrupted communications world as the satellite orbits the earth or travels through space Many tracking stations used existing facilities or were located on existing sites Many of these sites were located at NASA facilities Army Navy and Air Force facilities (including planes and ships) Where possible tracking stations were located on foreign soil in partnership with the host government Some collect covers cancelled at all the tracking stationssites worldwide for each manned launch
The number of tracking stations began to decline as the manned flight program moved into the Apollo Program due primarily to cost reductions from improved satellite communication technology Satellites now orbiting the earth do a better job of tracking and communicating with other satellites and manned vehicles than earth-bound stations The US Department of Defense has tracking and communication stations for their satellites but for security reasons do not advertise the site=s existence Commercial amp government communication satellites systems are the exception and are increasing the number of Earth based communications sitesstations Most countries worldwide have satellite communications capability within their own country With the advent of communication satellites including television and internet communications nearly every home in the US has the potential to receive signals from satellites Activities include cancellations at monitoring tracking control and communications sites when contact is first made with the
satellitespacecraft Interest in this area declined after the Apollo program
Activities in space Once the satellitespacecraft reaches space many activities are of interest to collectors For unmanned missions they include
i) orbital changes ii) insertion into a trajectory which may take the
spacecraft to another planet moon asteroid or an observation point in space (eg Lagrange 2 GEO)
iii) reaching a specific program milestone (eg flyby of a celestial object in service for a communications satellite)
iv) arriving at or departing from a celestial object (eg arriving at Mars)
v) impacting or landing and vi) end of mission
For manned missions they may include dockings spacewalks accomplishing a specific mission milestone undocking The USPS has produced very few covers for sale to the public
that have been flown into space The USPS produced officially flown space covers on 19830830 They were flown on the Challenger STS 008 It is the current policy for both NASA and the USPS that mail will not be delivered to or received from the
US astronauts on the International Space Station A few space covers were flown into space some illegally during the early manned program (Mercury Gemini Apollo) The Smithsonian=s Postal Museum in Washington DC has examples these covers
Recovery Spacecraft recovery is typically limited to manned space vehicles and early spy satellites From Mercury through the Apollo missions the recovery sites were the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans The US Navy deployed ships at the recovery site to retrieve the astronauts and their capsule This changed when the Space Transportation System (STS) was developed The STS Space Shuttles were designed for conventional aircraft landing The two major sites are Edwards Air Force Base California and Kennedy Space Center Florida Early spy satellites required the recovery photographic film in the air over the ocean to prevent damaged to land based structures and humans and to prevent the film from falling into the wrong hands if the Air Force missed the recovery capsule Newer communications technology has eliminated the need to recover spy satellite film capsules NASA has several new programs that will return material from space and will require recovering of the returning payload Nearly all earth orbiting satellites and those less fortunate that never made it into orbit will eventually renter the atmosphere Depending on the size and materials some will burn up and some may make it to the ground (eg SKYLAB)
Cachets A variety of cachet types have been and are being used in the US from no markings to high quality graphics For a general description of space cover cachets available in the US see Appendix Space Covers The most popular are multi color printed cachets using archival inks (Figure 103)
Envelopes and postcards Two types of envelopes are popular with US collectors with the size designated as letter (6) and business (10 ) Post cards are occasionally used in the US but the most popular is the 6 envelope Postal Stationery and Official Mail covers are also used See Appendix Space Covers Stamps or Postage
Philatelic Organizations For the collector of space covers which are
philatelic material there are three major organizations that offer information about space covers (See section 14 for addresses)
I) The Space Unit (httpstargate1usacomstamps ) formed in 1958 provides the majority of information for collectors of US space covers It publishes a by-monthly publication called the AAstrophile Journal of Astrophilately
ii) American Philatelic Society (APS) (httpwwwstampsorg) the largest nonprofit society in the world for stamp collectors that provides a number of services for stamp collectors and postal historians
10
ORBIT ORBIT
The APS existed before the first satellite was launched in 1957 The APS library is a great source of philatelic historical information The collector can borrow material contacting the American Philatelic Research Library (APRL)
iii) The American Topical Association (ATA) Organizations that have since ceased to exist include
the Explorer and Inner and Outer Space Past issues are available from the American Philatelic Research Library and the Space Unit See 14 Sources of Information
How covers are made Space covers are typically made from envelopes (letter 6 or business size 10) with at least 25 rag content and archival quality The acid left in paper from the manufacturing process turns the paper yellow with age and eventually destroys the paper Archival quality envelopes are
acid free have 25 rag content and will survive storage for long periods of time They cost more but result in a better space cover Envelopes purchased from the USPS or those used by organizations are typically not archival
Some collectors choose to make envelops from space related documents (maps figures photographs) This makes for an interesting envelope but be concerned about the archival quality of the paper and adhesives If you plan to make envelopes with different dimensions than the standard envelopes used by the USPS check with the USPS to ensure
the envelope is acceptable Some collectors use post cards or make post cards
for space covers The thickness of the papercardboard must be greater than that of the envelops in order to give the card the necessary stiffness and strength to survive the postal handling system The same caution about dimensions and archival ability applies to post cards For more information see Space Covers Definition and Description
Short history of space covers and types US space covers started in 1958 with the launch or attempted launch of the first US satellites (VANGUARD and EXPLORER) Space covers have been produced for every US satellite launch or attempted launch since 1958 Many space events have also been commemorated by space covers Space covers have been produced for foreign satellites launched by the US and US satellites launched by other countries US Space Cover manufactures have also produced space covers for non US satellites launched by other countries and various space events both US and foreign Space covers from past events can be purchased or traded from a number of different sources in the US and around the world See section 12 Sources of Space Covers It is unfortunate by some space cover manufactures have produced covers of suspect authenticity or outright forgeries Excellent sources of information are Bulver and the Astrophile see section 14 Sources of Information
Different methods are use to create and deliver space covers to the collector The more popular are
- Manufactured cachets applied to covers sold covers as own (eg Space Voyage Orbit Goldcraft Space Craft Beck)
- Manufactured cachets applied to covers sold covers through a reseller (eg Havekotte)
- Manufactured cachets sold or given cachets to others (eg Swanson Dubeau)
- Given or purchased cachets applied to covers covers sold as own (eg Dubeau)
- Given or purchased cachets applied to covers covers sold through a reseller (eg Whitney)
- Given or purchased covers sold covers as own - Given or purchased covers with cachets added
information to cover sold covers as own (eg Titusville Moonport Stamp Club Dubeau)
Given or purchased covers with cachets added information to cover sold covers through a reseller
Sources for space covers The collector has two options for obtaining space covers 1) purchase them or 2) make one=s own But the buyer-
beware should always be practiced Many great references are listed in section 14 Sources of Information and the Bibliography and should be read before purchasing space covers Many attempts have been made to identifycatalog all the space covers produce in the USby US Manufacturersfor US space Events None are complete Some catalogs may focus on a specific topic eg APOLLO Program Be that as it may something is better than nothing The following is a list of some of the more comprehensive listcatalogs listed in alphabetical order and found in the bibliography Courtney Davis Dubeau 2
Lollini Ramkissoon2 Vukotich and Wilhelm
The following is a partial list of space cover providersmanufacturersproducerssellers for US events (as of 2005)Astrophile 20021
- Goddard Space Flight Stamp Club Box 261 Greenbelt MD 20768 ‑‑0261
- JPL Stamp Club PO Box 771 La Canada CA 91012‑0771 httpwwwjplrecclubscaltechedustampindexshtml
- Resellers A good source is the Astrophile - Space Coast Philately PO box 446 Cape
Canaveral FL 32920 - Space equipment manufacturer individuals companies organizations clubs - SpaceCoast Cover services 1190
Montego Bay Dr Merritt Island FL 32953 - Stamp shows A good source of information about local stamp shows is
Linn=s Stamp News Astrophile and the APS - Titusville Moonport Stamp Club PO Box
6071 Titusville FL 32782 - Web sites httpstargate1usacom
stampsresourcehtm Auctions Space Unit Tom Steiner PO Box 550 Northville MI 48167 Web sites (eg E-Bay)
Most US space events are documented by space cover manufacturers Whether it is a major manned launch or a rocket motor test someone usually produces a space cover
11
ORBIT
commemorating the event This was more evident during manned programs See Space Covers Definition and Description
Making your own space cover Place the necessary postage on the envelopecard
At this point you have several options Put a return address on the envelopescard Include a Self Address Stamped Envelope (SASE) for the return of your covers The types of addressing will depend if you want the address to be a permanent part of the space cover or removable after the cover is returned to you Use a live gummed label that is removable if you do not want the address to be part of the cover Contact the post office where you want the envelope to be cancelled to determine if - a) they will hold the covers until the day of the event b) cancel them on that day and c)place the cancelled covers in the mail to you Follow the instruction of the post office
After receiving the envelopescards from the post
office (which are now Space Covers) many collectors apply a cachet to the Space Cover and place additional information inside the cover It is recommended that you identify who made the space cover and cachet in or on the Space Cover For more information see Space Covers Definition and Description
The following are the more popular post offices that
service space covers (as of 2005)Astrophile 20021 - Postmaster Kennedy Space Center Fl 32815 (about
1 week before the event)
- Window Services Unit Houston GPO 401 Franklin St Houston TX 77201-9999
Postmaster Edwards AFB CA 93523
Sources of Information
- Ad Astra Magazine of the National Space Society 922
Pennsylvania Ave SE Washington DC 20003 httpwwwnssorg
- American Philatelic Research Library (APRL) 100 Match Factory Place Bellefonte PA 16823 wwwstamplibraryorg
- American Philatelic Society American Philatelist Journal of the American Philatelic Society APS 100 Oakwood Ave PO Box 8000 State College PA 16803 Phone 814‑237 ‑3803 Fax 814 ‑237‑6128 httpwwwstampsorg
- Aviation Week and Space Technology 1221 Avenue of the Americas New York NY httpwwwaviationweekcom
- Bulver Ramkissoon Winick A Study of Suspect Space Covers 2001 Space Unit see Astrophile in the Bibliography
- Cranford Bruce ldquoSpace Covers Dictionary amp Identifier 2006 Editionrdquo Bruce Cranford 1 Cliffe Hill Ct Potomac MD 20854 USA ISBN 978-0-9711657-1-7
- Explorer International Association of Space Philatelists BO Box 302 Yonkers NY 10710 Editor Bill York 780 West End Ave Apt 11F New York NY 10025 No longer in business
- FIP Section for Astrophilately Joseacute Bergamin 16 6C 28030 Madrid Spain wwwastrophilatelycom Astrophile 200201
- Final Frontier Magazine PO Box 20089 Minneapolis MN 55420
- Linn=s Stamp News PO Box 29 Sidney OH 45365-0029 wwwLinnscom 800-837-0194
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration NASA 300 E Street SW Washington DC 20024‑3210 USA httpwwwhqnasagov
- Orbit Newsletter of the British based ASSS Orbit which had a special section on space stamps and postmarks httpwwwasssutvinternetcom Brian Lockyer The Secretary ASSS 21 Exford Close Weston‑Super‑Mare Somerset BS23 4RE Great Britain
- Quest The history of Spaceflight Magazine CSPACE 123 32nd St SE Grand Rapids MI 49509-0331 Glen Swanson httpwwwspaceeduquest
- Smithsonian Air amp Space Magazine monthly 900 Jefferson Dr Washington DC 20560 httpwwwsiedu
- Smithsonian National Postal Museum 2 Massachusetts Ave NE Washington DC 20002 (202) 33‑5555httpwwwpostalmuseumsiedu
- Space Unit President Tom Steiner PO Box 550 Northville MI 48167-0550 (As of 2005) publishes The Astrophile Member of the American Philatelic Association American Topical Association httpstargate1usacomstamps
- Space Week weekly publication of Army Times Publishing Co 6883 Commercial Drive Springfield VA 22159-0500
- Spaceflight The international Magazine of Space and Astronautics published by the British Interplanetary Society (BIS) 2729 South Lambeth Road London SW8 1SZ England httpfreespacevirginnetbisbisBishtm - US Library of Congress The Library of Congress 101
Independence Ave SE Washington DC 20540 (202) 707‑5000 httpwwwlocgov
- US Postal Service (USPS) Washington DC 20260-2435 (httpwwwuspsgov )
- USPS Stamp Fulfillment Service PO Box 219424 Kansas City MO 64121-9424 1-800-782-6724 fax 816-545-1212 wwwstampsonlinecom - Web Sites
- Friends and Partners in Space 1999 httpsolarrtdutkedu7Ejgreenfpspacehtml
- Mark Wade s Encyclopedia Astronautica 1998 httpsolarrtdutkedu~mwadespaceflthtm
- International Spacecraft and Launch Vehicle Names Glossary 2003 httpwwwspacecraftnamesinfo
- NASA httpwww‑paokscnasagovkscpaoscheduleschedulehtm
- Spaceflight Now httpwwwspaceflightnowcomtrackingindexhtml
- Gunther=s Space Page httpwwwskyrocketdespacespacehtml
- Contractors (many have merged or gone out of business since 1958)
Lockheed Martin httplmmsexternallmcocomremospascieoshtml Boeing httpwwwboeingcomflashhtml Orbital Science httpwwworbitalcom
Editorrsquos Note
Bruce has asked me to point out that he is not the
owner of the flown Apollo XI cover which I attributed to his collection on page 40 of the last edition
He just wishes he was
12
ORBIT
50th anniversary of NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration was established
by the National Aeronautics and Space Act on July 29 1958 replacing its predecessor the National Advisory Committee for
Aeronautics (NACA) The agency became operational on October 1 1958
13
ORBIT
So Who Did Invent the Telescope
A memorable fact from a different viewpoint
Did you know that in 2009 it is four hundred years since the first great discoveries in space took place Then it so happened that for the first time in the history of mankind craters on the moon some details on the planets and amongst other things the four great moons around Jupiter were seen Very soon the observation instruments became better and larger and gradually many more details on the moon and planets were seen Rings were discovered around Saturn bands of clouds and areas of storms on Jupiter and polar caps and surface structures on Mars
Now you may think where is the writer going with this
That is quite simple it so happened that in 2008 precisely 400 years ago the telescope was invented and that happened in our own little Holland For a long time it was not determined who had made the first Dutch viewer as these were called (see the New Zealand stamp issued 12-2-1997)
Zacharias Jansen and Hans Lipperhey both resident in Middelburg were seen as inventors of the telescope but there were other people who claimed this discovery It was said that Robert Bacon (1214-1294) already knew how the instrument could be made Jacob Metius of Alkmaar could also be the inventor he knew Jansen and Lipperhey and had also visited them Then there is also the Italian Raffael Gualterotti (1543-1639) of whom it is known with some certainty that in 1598 he had already made a viewer However this man evidently did not recognise the significance of his discovery and did not act upon it After very lengthy investigation it was finally decided that Hans Lipperhey (1570-1619 right) could lay claim to this invention
As often happens with new inventions the telescope was first seen as a military instrument to outsmart the enemy With the telescope the movements of the enemy could now be seen and followed over a much greater distance so that timely countermeasures could be taken It was the famous scholar Galileo Galileiuml (1564-1642) who heard about this discovery from others and immediately saw what further possibilities this instrument had to offer Based on the data he could get hold of Galileiuml himself made a telescope that magnified nine times Soon after he made another that
magnified to almost thirty times These instruments consisted of two lenses in a tube a lightly curved convex lens in front and at the rear a powerful concave lens as an eyepiece We must not expect too much from these first telescopes because the
optics at that time were far from the quality that we now know
At that time it was very difficult to make pure glass and the lenses were really rather small in proportion to the focal length so as a result the luminosity was mediocre To get a good lens a piece of clear rock crystal was sometimes used We can suppose that the first telescopes were of a lesser optical quality than simple binoculars in our time Nevertheless in 1609 Galileiuml was able to see craters on the moon and Venus as a sickle for the first time He was the discoverer of the first four moons of Jupiter and he concluded from sunspots that the rotation of the sun around its axis was about 25 days
The discovery of the telescope heralded a new era in space research in the widest sense of the word In my opinion we could call this the start of space exploration such as we in space travel now readily do Meanwhile all the nearby planets in our solar system have been explored with a space probe one or more times except Plutohelliphellipbut yes we cannot call that a planet any longer We have even been to the Moon and new discoveries are reported daily also in our own solar system moons of minor planets new rings around Uranus and small moons around the giant planets Jupiter and Saturn
Although in the very beginning there were no space probes doing investigation it is my opinion that we may take the opportunity during this commemoration year to recognise the fact that the telescope was invented four hundred years ago After all this was the beginning of a great voyage of discovery in space Therefore the year 2009 has been declared the International Year of Astronomy 2009 - IYA 2009 - by the UN (on the recommendation of the International Astronomical Union) The UN has designated UNESCO as the body chiefly responsible for IYA 2009 and the IAU as a support organisation for practical interpretation
HN Frankener March 2009
Specially translated for Orbit by Eleanor Coker this feature by Henk Nieuwenhuis first appeared in issue 24 2009 of Nieuwsbrief the journal of
Ruimtevaart Filatelie Club Nederland and is produced (with different illustrations) by
permission of the author and Editor Arie Olckers
14
ORBIT
Our Astonishing Nicolaus Copernicus By Stan Wekka Bydgoszcz Poland with Jeff Dugdale
IYA could not go past without our journal
marking once again this great thinker so here
is a specially commissioned and edited article
from an Orbit enthusiast in Poland
Nicolaus Copernicus was born 19 February 1473 in the wonderful City of Toruń on the River Vistula and died 24 May 1543 in Frombork
Consider this famous astronomermdashmathematician- doctor of medicine and monetary system expert (economist ) - physicianmdashclassical scholar - jurist - artistmdashtranslatormdashmilitary leadermdashdiplomat and hellipCatholic cleric - Treasure of our Earth NICOLAUS COPERNICUS (in Polish Mikolaj Kopernik)
He has been honoured in international philately on hundreds of postage-stamps items of postal ndashstationery commemorative cancellationshellip
His name is on Navyrsquos ships planes streets places schools universities factories on Moon satellites planetoidshellip
There have been are currently and will be in the future many
different celebrations of that Great Man of Geniushellip as for inst World Philatelic Exhibition ldquoPoland 1973rdquo organized from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of His Birth US carnet issued 1973 presents three proofs of stamps from Poland and the US
dedicated to Copernicus
A selection of Polish postage-stamps presents
Him as most important citizen of Poland and World see a page from my stock book opposite filled with Polish stamps for the great man
In this short memorial to His Life and Work we must mention a few events of his rich life His family had its roots in the Polish Region of Lower Silesia ( today in SW Poland ) On a few covers and post-cards are shown different cancels of the KOPERNIKI Post Office initiated from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of the Great Astronomerrsquos Birth
After the death of Nicolausrsquo father his uncle Bishop Watzenrode of Warmia looked after the family and saw young Copernicus into university at Cracov As an 18 year old youth he presented himself at the Jagiellonian University in 1491 and studied geometry trigonometry mathematics and astronomy there for the next four years
15
ORBIT
His teachers were famous in those times astronomers and mathematicians such as John of Glogoacutew (1445-1507) who had written a commentary on Ptolemyrsquos Cosmography and Wojciech Brudzewski (1445-1497) who was hostile to the geocentric system expounded by Ptolemy It was he who infected Copernicus with his theories based on the writings of Aristarchus of Samos three centuries before Christ Their teachings bore fruit in due course in Copernicusrsquos De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium published at Nuremberg at the printing house of John Petreius in 1543 This stamp issued in March 1942 and cancelled on September 11th 1943 depicts a monument to Nicolaus Copernicus within the quadrangle of the library of the
Jagiellionian University
In due course Copernicus proved that the Geocentric System by Ptolemy was not true and his Heliocentric or Solar System was accurate This is shown on block Michel Cat Bl52 and 2 interesting philatelic items showing His most famous work De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium his autograph and the Solar System on the postmark
In 1510 Copernicus settled at Frombork and having bought the Castlersquos Tower he established his Observatory and Library
there as seen on rare pair of especially overprinted (middle vertical black overprints ) post-cards and stamps Michel Cat 805 1194
Many people assign a single nationality to Copernicus Nazi Germany claimed Copernicus to have been purely German as on stamps Michel Cat 100 104 However Germans destroyed the monument to Copernicus in the quadrangle of the library (shown on stamps Michel Cat 396 446) at the University of Cracov in 1944
After World War II Poles rebuilt that Monument and it is now displayed at Cracovrsquos Botanical Gardens
During World War II Polish Prisoners of War of The Woldenberg Camp II C organized by Germans for Polish
officers initiated Camprsquos Post there and issued many interesting philatelic values One of them is a complete of souvenir sheet or block and set of 3 stamps dedicated to 400th Anniversary of Copernicus Death (shown right)
Warsawrsquos Scientific Society initiated the investigation of Copernicusrsquo tomb and remnants in 1802 but found little of interest In 2004 Prof George Gąsowski of The Institute of Anthropology and Archaeology in Pułtusk initiated new wave of investigation and in 2005-2008 he found human remains in the crypt of The Cathedral at Frombork After the war with Sweden war in the 17th century the Swedish robbed many Polish national treasures and among them were books formerly belonging to Copernicus One of books was ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo found in the Museum of Uppsala In that book were found two of Copernicusrsquo hairs which were examined forensically
In due course genetic comparison of the alleged Copernicus remnants found in Frombork Cathedral crypt and those two hairs in the ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo at Uppsala confirmed that the Frombork remains were those of Copernicus proving once and for all where his tomb lies
Polish anthropologists have since tried to do a reconstruction of Copernicusrsquo face and published their results in the Polish
press see below
16
ORBIT
Un-manned Satellites on Postage Stamps 31 By Guest Contributors Don Hillger and Garry Toth
A version of this article first appeared in The Astrophile for July-August 2008
The Elektron Series This is the thirty-first in a series of articles about un-
manned satellites on postage stamps This article
features the Russian Elektron-series satellites Four Elektron satellites were successfully launched with
Elektron-1 and 2 paired up on 30 January 1964 and Elektron-3 and 4 similarly paired on 10 July 1964
Elektron was one of the earliest Soviet scientific satellite missions to be authorized following the initial
Sputnik series The spacecraft had the mission of mapping the van Allen radiation belts at higher
inclinations than previous US satellites had followed In these missions two different types of spacecraft
were paired and launched together as mentioned
above Elektron-1 and 3 were put into a lower orbit to map the inner van Allen belt while Elekton-2 and 4
were boosted to a higher orbit to study the outer belt
For identification purposes Elektron-1 and 3 had
cylindrical bodies 075 m in diameter and 13 m long with six solar panels extending outward almost like
paddles Elektron-2 and 4 were shaped like the cupola of a public building in the basic form of a cylinder with
a flattened and broadened end with a diameter of 18 m and a height of 24 m
Both Elektron types are easily distinguished and are represented on many postal items mostly from
eastern bloc nations Some of the items show both Elektron-1 and 2 (or Elektron-3 and 4) since they
were launched together
A checklist of postal items identified as showing the
E l e k t r o n - s e r i e s s a t e l l i t e s ( h t t p wwwciracolostateedurammhillgerElektronhtm) is
available on the Website developed by the authors for the un-manned satellites featured in this series of
articles (httpwwwciracolostateedurammhillger
satelliteshtm) E-mail correspondence with the authors is welcome Don Hillger can be reached at
hillgerciracolostateedu and Garry Toth at garry_tothhotmailcom
Elektron-A
From Mark Wadersquos site httpwwwastronautixcom
Elektron-B
17
ORBIT
18
ORBIT
Flight STS-107 Commander Rick Husband Pilot William McCool MS Michael Anderson MS David Brown MS Laurel Clark MS Ilan Ramon MS Kalpana Chawla KSC Launch Date 1612003 Proposed KSC Landing 1203 Purpose SPACEHAB Double Main Payload Module
Shuttle Story 2003 STS ndash107 The Columbia Disaster
Columbia disintegrates on re-entry killing all seven astronauts on board
ldquocontingency declaredrdquo
STS-107 was a multi-disciplinary microgravity and Earth science research mission with a multitude of international scientific
investigations conducted continuously during 16 days in orbit
The seven-member crew died on February 1 2003 when the
shuttle disintegrated during re-entry into the Earths atmosphere The cause of the accident was determined to be a piece of foam
that broke off during launch and damaged the thermal protection system components (reinforced carbon-carbon panels and
thermal protection tiles) on the leading edge of the left wing of
the Shuttle orbiter causing an extensive heat build-up During re-entry the damaged wing slowly overheated and came apart
eventually leading to loss of control and total disintegration of the vehicle
STS-107 carried the SPACEHAB Double Research Module on its inaugural flight the Freestar experiment (mounted on a
Hitchhiker Program rack) and the Extended Duration Orbiter pallet
One of the experiments a video taken to study atmospheric dust may have detected a new atmospheric phenomenon
dubbed a TIGER (Transient Ionospheric
Glow Emission in Red)
On board the Columbia was a copy of a drawing by Petr Ginz the editor-in-chief of
the magazine Vedem who depicted what he
imagined the Earth looked like from the Moon when he was a 14-year-old prisoner in the
Tereziacuten concentration camp The copy was in the possession of Ilan Ramon and was lost in
the crash
19
ORBIT
Historical Document
Downloaded by your Editor on the day of the tragedy this page from a NASA
website presents starkly the dreadful
truth of what has just happened
The opening phrasing ldquoA contingency has been declaredrdquo is very much in the
laconic and measured tradition of Apollo
13rsquos ldquoHouston we have a problemrdquo and the ldquoObviously a major malfunctionrdquo
used by Mission Control of the Challenger tragedy in January 1986
Below and at bottom of opposite page Launch and Conclusion covers for the
flight The brightly coloured mission patch is appropriately printed in black
20
ORBIT
21
ORBIT
Faux commemorative dollar bills with a
value of ldquo107rdquo were issued to mark the occasion
The Israeli issue of 2422004
commemorated their first astronaut was a revised version of the stamps issued in
advance of Ilan Ramonrsquos flight see page 22
At least one territory under Islamic influence
which has traditionally cashed in on shuttle flight issues did not print a reference to
Israel on their commemoratives for political reasons see page 23
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
5
ORBIT
6
ORBIT
7
ORBIT
8
ORBIT
IYA Europa stamps referencing Galileo For all 2009 Europa stamps see
httpeuropa-stampsblogspotcom
Issue date 3409 15409
17409
25409
4509
4509
5509
7509 6509
7509
8509
1609 12509
9509
Hungary below 8509
Azerbaijan below right 13409
9
ORBIT
Collecting US Space Covers by Bruce Cranford Part Two
Monitoring tracking mission control and communications Satellite and manned vehicle tracking stations have had a complex history The number of tracking sites grew from a few down range sites for the Eastern and Western Ranges in the 1950s to many dozens worldwide for the Mercury Gemini and Apollo Programs All manned missions and many satellite missions require constant uninterrupted communications world as the satellite orbits the earth or travels through space Many tracking stations used existing facilities or were located on existing sites Many of these sites were located at NASA facilities Army Navy and Air Force facilities (including planes and ships) Where possible tracking stations were located on foreign soil in partnership with the host government Some collect covers cancelled at all the tracking stationssites worldwide for each manned launch
The number of tracking stations began to decline as the manned flight program moved into the Apollo Program due primarily to cost reductions from improved satellite communication technology Satellites now orbiting the earth do a better job of tracking and communicating with other satellites and manned vehicles than earth-bound stations The US Department of Defense has tracking and communication stations for their satellites but for security reasons do not advertise the site=s existence Commercial amp government communication satellites systems are the exception and are increasing the number of Earth based communications sitesstations Most countries worldwide have satellite communications capability within their own country With the advent of communication satellites including television and internet communications nearly every home in the US has the potential to receive signals from satellites Activities include cancellations at monitoring tracking control and communications sites when contact is first made with the
satellitespacecraft Interest in this area declined after the Apollo program
Activities in space Once the satellitespacecraft reaches space many activities are of interest to collectors For unmanned missions they include
i) orbital changes ii) insertion into a trajectory which may take the
spacecraft to another planet moon asteroid or an observation point in space (eg Lagrange 2 GEO)
iii) reaching a specific program milestone (eg flyby of a celestial object in service for a communications satellite)
iv) arriving at or departing from a celestial object (eg arriving at Mars)
v) impacting or landing and vi) end of mission
For manned missions they may include dockings spacewalks accomplishing a specific mission milestone undocking The USPS has produced very few covers for sale to the public
that have been flown into space The USPS produced officially flown space covers on 19830830 They were flown on the Challenger STS 008 It is the current policy for both NASA and the USPS that mail will not be delivered to or received from the
US astronauts on the International Space Station A few space covers were flown into space some illegally during the early manned program (Mercury Gemini Apollo) The Smithsonian=s Postal Museum in Washington DC has examples these covers
Recovery Spacecraft recovery is typically limited to manned space vehicles and early spy satellites From Mercury through the Apollo missions the recovery sites were the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans The US Navy deployed ships at the recovery site to retrieve the astronauts and their capsule This changed when the Space Transportation System (STS) was developed The STS Space Shuttles were designed for conventional aircraft landing The two major sites are Edwards Air Force Base California and Kennedy Space Center Florida Early spy satellites required the recovery photographic film in the air over the ocean to prevent damaged to land based structures and humans and to prevent the film from falling into the wrong hands if the Air Force missed the recovery capsule Newer communications technology has eliminated the need to recover spy satellite film capsules NASA has several new programs that will return material from space and will require recovering of the returning payload Nearly all earth orbiting satellites and those less fortunate that never made it into orbit will eventually renter the atmosphere Depending on the size and materials some will burn up and some may make it to the ground (eg SKYLAB)
Cachets A variety of cachet types have been and are being used in the US from no markings to high quality graphics For a general description of space cover cachets available in the US see Appendix Space Covers The most popular are multi color printed cachets using archival inks (Figure 103)
Envelopes and postcards Two types of envelopes are popular with US collectors with the size designated as letter (6) and business (10 ) Post cards are occasionally used in the US but the most popular is the 6 envelope Postal Stationery and Official Mail covers are also used See Appendix Space Covers Stamps or Postage
Philatelic Organizations For the collector of space covers which are
philatelic material there are three major organizations that offer information about space covers (See section 14 for addresses)
I) The Space Unit (httpstargate1usacomstamps ) formed in 1958 provides the majority of information for collectors of US space covers It publishes a by-monthly publication called the AAstrophile Journal of Astrophilately
ii) American Philatelic Society (APS) (httpwwwstampsorg) the largest nonprofit society in the world for stamp collectors that provides a number of services for stamp collectors and postal historians
10
ORBIT ORBIT
The APS existed before the first satellite was launched in 1957 The APS library is a great source of philatelic historical information The collector can borrow material contacting the American Philatelic Research Library (APRL)
iii) The American Topical Association (ATA) Organizations that have since ceased to exist include
the Explorer and Inner and Outer Space Past issues are available from the American Philatelic Research Library and the Space Unit See 14 Sources of Information
How covers are made Space covers are typically made from envelopes (letter 6 or business size 10) with at least 25 rag content and archival quality The acid left in paper from the manufacturing process turns the paper yellow with age and eventually destroys the paper Archival quality envelopes are
acid free have 25 rag content and will survive storage for long periods of time They cost more but result in a better space cover Envelopes purchased from the USPS or those used by organizations are typically not archival
Some collectors choose to make envelops from space related documents (maps figures photographs) This makes for an interesting envelope but be concerned about the archival quality of the paper and adhesives If you plan to make envelopes with different dimensions than the standard envelopes used by the USPS check with the USPS to ensure
the envelope is acceptable Some collectors use post cards or make post cards
for space covers The thickness of the papercardboard must be greater than that of the envelops in order to give the card the necessary stiffness and strength to survive the postal handling system The same caution about dimensions and archival ability applies to post cards For more information see Space Covers Definition and Description
Short history of space covers and types US space covers started in 1958 with the launch or attempted launch of the first US satellites (VANGUARD and EXPLORER) Space covers have been produced for every US satellite launch or attempted launch since 1958 Many space events have also been commemorated by space covers Space covers have been produced for foreign satellites launched by the US and US satellites launched by other countries US Space Cover manufactures have also produced space covers for non US satellites launched by other countries and various space events both US and foreign Space covers from past events can be purchased or traded from a number of different sources in the US and around the world See section 12 Sources of Space Covers It is unfortunate by some space cover manufactures have produced covers of suspect authenticity or outright forgeries Excellent sources of information are Bulver and the Astrophile see section 14 Sources of Information
Different methods are use to create and deliver space covers to the collector The more popular are
- Manufactured cachets applied to covers sold covers as own (eg Space Voyage Orbit Goldcraft Space Craft Beck)
- Manufactured cachets applied to covers sold covers through a reseller (eg Havekotte)
- Manufactured cachets sold or given cachets to others (eg Swanson Dubeau)
- Given or purchased cachets applied to covers covers sold as own (eg Dubeau)
- Given or purchased cachets applied to covers covers sold through a reseller (eg Whitney)
- Given or purchased covers sold covers as own - Given or purchased covers with cachets added
information to cover sold covers as own (eg Titusville Moonport Stamp Club Dubeau)
Given or purchased covers with cachets added information to cover sold covers through a reseller
Sources for space covers The collector has two options for obtaining space covers 1) purchase them or 2) make one=s own But the buyer-
beware should always be practiced Many great references are listed in section 14 Sources of Information and the Bibliography and should be read before purchasing space covers Many attempts have been made to identifycatalog all the space covers produce in the USby US Manufacturersfor US space Events None are complete Some catalogs may focus on a specific topic eg APOLLO Program Be that as it may something is better than nothing The following is a list of some of the more comprehensive listcatalogs listed in alphabetical order and found in the bibliography Courtney Davis Dubeau 2
Lollini Ramkissoon2 Vukotich and Wilhelm
The following is a partial list of space cover providersmanufacturersproducerssellers for US events (as of 2005)Astrophile 20021
- Goddard Space Flight Stamp Club Box 261 Greenbelt MD 20768 ‑‑0261
- JPL Stamp Club PO Box 771 La Canada CA 91012‑0771 httpwwwjplrecclubscaltechedustampindexshtml
- Resellers A good source is the Astrophile - Space Coast Philately PO box 446 Cape
Canaveral FL 32920 - Space equipment manufacturer individuals companies organizations clubs - SpaceCoast Cover services 1190
Montego Bay Dr Merritt Island FL 32953 - Stamp shows A good source of information about local stamp shows is
Linn=s Stamp News Astrophile and the APS - Titusville Moonport Stamp Club PO Box
6071 Titusville FL 32782 - Web sites httpstargate1usacom
stampsresourcehtm Auctions Space Unit Tom Steiner PO Box 550 Northville MI 48167 Web sites (eg E-Bay)
Most US space events are documented by space cover manufacturers Whether it is a major manned launch or a rocket motor test someone usually produces a space cover
11
ORBIT
commemorating the event This was more evident during manned programs See Space Covers Definition and Description
Making your own space cover Place the necessary postage on the envelopecard
At this point you have several options Put a return address on the envelopescard Include a Self Address Stamped Envelope (SASE) for the return of your covers The types of addressing will depend if you want the address to be a permanent part of the space cover or removable after the cover is returned to you Use a live gummed label that is removable if you do not want the address to be part of the cover Contact the post office where you want the envelope to be cancelled to determine if - a) they will hold the covers until the day of the event b) cancel them on that day and c)place the cancelled covers in the mail to you Follow the instruction of the post office
After receiving the envelopescards from the post
office (which are now Space Covers) many collectors apply a cachet to the Space Cover and place additional information inside the cover It is recommended that you identify who made the space cover and cachet in or on the Space Cover For more information see Space Covers Definition and Description
The following are the more popular post offices that
service space covers (as of 2005)Astrophile 20021 - Postmaster Kennedy Space Center Fl 32815 (about
1 week before the event)
- Window Services Unit Houston GPO 401 Franklin St Houston TX 77201-9999
Postmaster Edwards AFB CA 93523
Sources of Information
- Ad Astra Magazine of the National Space Society 922
Pennsylvania Ave SE Washington DC 20003 httpwwwnssorg
- American Philatelic Research Library (APRL) 100 Match Factory Place Bellefonte PA 16823 wwwstamplibraryorg
- American Philatelic Society American Philatelist Journal of the American Philatelic Society APS 100 Oakwood Ave PO Box 8000 State College PA 16803 Phone 814‑237 ‑3803 Fax 814 ‑237‑6128 httpwwwstampsorg
- Aviation Week and Space Technology 1221 Avenue of the Americas New York NY httpwwwaviationweekcom
- Bulver Ramkissoon Winick A Study of Suspect Space Covers 2001 Space Unit see Astrophile in the Bibliography
- Cranford Bruce ldquoSpace Covers Dictionary amp Identifier 2006 Editionrdquo Bruce Cranford 1 Cliffe Hill Ct Potomac MD 20854 USA ISBN 978-0-9711657-1-7
- Explorer International Association of Space Philatelists BO Box 302 Yonkers NY 10710 Editor Bill York 780 West End Ave Apt 11F New York NY 10025 No longer in business
- FIP Section for Astrophilately Joseacute Bergamin 16 6C 28030 Madrid Spain wwwastrophilatelycom Astrophile 200201
- Final Frontier Magazine PO Box 20089 Minneapolis MN 55420
- Linn=s Stamp News PO Box 29 Sidney OH 45365-0029 wwwLinnscom 800-837-0194
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration NASA 300 E Street SW Washington DC 20024‑3210 USA httpwwwhqnasagov
- Orbit Newsletter of the British based ASSS Orbit which had a special section on space stamps and postmarks httpwwwasssutvinternetcom Brian Lockyer The Secretary ASSS 21 Exford Close Weston‑Super‑Mare Somerset BS23 4RE Great Britain
- Quest The history of Spaceflight Magazine CSPACE 123 32nd St SE Grand Rapids MI 49509-0331 Glen Swanson httpwwwspaceeduquest
- Smithsonian Air amp Space Magazine monthly 900 Jefferson Dr Washington DC 20560 httpwwwsiedu
- Smithsonian National Postal Museum 2 Massachusetts Ave NE Washington DC 20002 (202) 33‑5555httpwwwpostalmuseumsiedu
- Space Unit President Tom Steiner PO Box 550 Northville MI 48167-0550 (As of 2005) publishes The Astrophile Member of the American Philatelic Association American Topical Association httpstargate1usacomstamps
- Space Week weekly publication of Army Times Publishing Co 6883 Commercial Drive Springfield VA 22159-0500
- Spaceflight The international Magazine of Space and Astronautics published by the British Interplanetary Society (BIS) 2729 South Lambeth Road London SW8 1SZ England httpfreespacevirginnetbisbisBishtm - US Library of Congress The Library of Congress 101
Independence Ave SE Washington DC 20540 (202) 707‑5000 httpwwwlocgov
- US Postal Service (USPS) Washington DC 20260-2435 (httpwwwuspsgov )
- USPS Stamp Fulfillment Service PO Box 219424 Kansas City MO 64121-9424 1-800-782-6724 fax 816-545-1212 wwwstampsonlinecom - Web Sites
- Friends and Partners in Space 1999 httpsolarrtdutkedu7Ejgreenfpspacehtml
- Mark Wade s Encyclopedia Astronautica 1998 httpsolarrtdutkedu~mwadespaceflthtm
- International Spacecraft and Launch Vehicle Names Glossary 2003 httpwwwspacecraftnamesinfo
- NASA httpwww‑paokscnasagovkscpaoscheduleschedulehtm
- Spaceflight Now httpwwwspaceflightnowcomtrackingindexhtml
- Gunther=s Space Page httpwwwskyrocketdespacespacehtml
- Contractors (many have merged or gone out of business since 1958)
Lockheed Martin httplmmsexternallmcocomremospascieoshtml Boeing httpwwwboeingcomflashhtml Orbital Science httpwwworbitalcom
Editorrsquos Note
Bruce has asked me to point out that he is not the
owner of the flown Apollo XI cover which I attributed to his collection on page 40 of the last edition
He just wishes he was
12
ORBIT
50th anniversary of NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration was established
by the National Aeronautics and Space Act on July 29 1958 replacing its predecessor the National Advisory Committee for
Aeronautics (NACA) The agency became operational on October 1 1958
13
ORBIT
So Who Did Invent the Telescope
A memorable fact from a different viewpoint
Did you know that in 2009 it is four hundred years since the first great discoveries in space took place Then it so happened that for the first time in the history of mankind craters on the moon some details on the planets and amongst other things the four great moons around Jupiter were seen Very soon the observation instruments became better and larger and gradually many more details on the moon and planets were seen Rings were discovered around Saturn bands of clouds and areas of storms on Jupiter and polar caps and surface structures on Mars
Now you may think where is the writer going with this
That is quite simple it so happened that in 2008 precisely 400 years ago the telescope was invented and that happened in our own little Holland For a long time it was not determined who had made the first Dutch viewer as these were called (see the New Zealand stamp issued 12-2-1997)
Zacharias Jansen and Hans Lipperhey both resident in Middelburg were seen as inventors of the telescope but there were other people who claimed this discovery It was said that Robert Bacon (1214-1294) already knew how the instrument could be made Jacob Metius of Alkmaar could also be the inventor he knew Jansen and Lipperhey and had also visited them Then there is also the Italian Raffael Gualterotti (1543-1639) of whom it is known with some certainty that in 1598 he had already made a viewer However this man evidently did not recognise the significance of his discovery and did not act upon it After very lengthy investigation it was finally decided that Hans Lipperhey (1570-1619 right) could lay claim to this invention
As often happens with new inventions the telescope was first seen as a military instrument to outsmart the enemy With the telescope the movements of the enemy could now be seen and followed over a much greater distance so that timely countermeasures could be taken It was the famous scholar Galileo Galileiuml (1564-1642) who heard about this discovery from others and immediately saw what further possibilities this instrument had to offer Based on the data he could get hold of Galileiuml himself made a telescope that magnified nine times Soon after he made another that
magnified to almost thirty times These instruments consisted of two lenses in a tube a lightly curved convex lens in front and at the rear a powerful concave lens as an eyepiece We must not expect too much from these first telescopes because the
optics at that time were far from the quality that we now know
At that time it was very difficult to make pure glass and the lenses were really rather small in proportion to the focal length so as a result the luminosity was mediocre To get a good lens a piece of clear rock crystal was sometimes used We can suppose that the first telescopes were of a lesser optical quality than simple binoculars in our time Nevertheless in 1609 Galileiuml was able to see craters on the moon and Venus as a sickle for the first time He was the discoverer of the first four moons of Jupiter and he concluded from sunspots that the rotation of the sun around its axis was about 25 days
The discovery of the telescope heralded a new era in space research in the widest sense of the word In my opinion we could call this the start of space exploration such as we in space travel now readily do Meanwhile all the nearby planets in our solar system have been explored with a space probe one or more times except Plutohelliphellipbut yes we cannot call that a planet any longer We have even been to the Moon and new discoveries are reported daily also in our own solar system moons of minor planets new rings around Uranus and small moons around the giant planets Jupiter and Saturn
Although in the very beginning there were no space probes doing investigation it is my opinion that we may take the opportunity during this commemoration year to recognise the fact that the telescope was invented four hundred years ago After all this was the beginning of a great voyage of discovery in space Therefore the year 2009 has been declared the International Year of Astronomy 2009 - IYA 2009 - by the UN (on the recommendation of the International Astronomical Union) The UN has designated UNESCO as the body chiefly responsible for IYA 2009 and the IAU as a support organisation for practical interpretation
HN Frankener March 2009
Specially translated for Orbit by Eleanor Coker this feature by Henk Nieuwenhuis first appeared in issue 24 2009 of Nieuwsbrief the journal of
Ruimtevaart Filatelie Club Nederland and is produced (with different illustrations) by
permission of the author and Editor Arie Olckers
14
ORBIT
Our Astonishing Nicolaus Copernicus By Stan Wekka Bydgoszcz Poland with Jeff Dugdale
IYA could not go past without our journal
marking once again this great thinker so here
is a specially commissioned and edited article
from an Orbit enthusiast in Poland
Nicolaus Copernicus was born 19 February 1473 in the wonderful City of Toruń on the River Vistula and died 24 May 1543 in Frombork
Consider this famous astronomermdashmathematician- doctor of medicine and monetary system expert (economist ) - physicianmdashclassical scholar - jurist - artistmdashtranslatormdashmilitary leadermdashdiplomat and hellipCatholic cleric - Treasure of our Earth NICOLAUS COPERNICUS (in Polish Mikolaj Kopernik)
He has been honoured in international philately on hundreds of postage-stamps items of postal ndashstationery commemorative cancellationshellip
His name is on Navyrsquos ships planes streets places schools universities factories on Moon satellites planetoidshellip
There have been are currently and will be in the future many
different celebrations of that Great Man of Geniushellip as for inst World Philatelic Exhibition ldquoPoland 1973rdquo organized from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of His Birth US carnet issued 1973 presents three proofs of stamps from Poland and the US
dedicated to Copernicus
A selection of Polish postage-stamps presents
Him as most important citizen of Poland and World see a page from my stock book opposite filled with Polish stamps for the great man
In this short memorial to His Life and Work we must mention a few events of his rich life His family had its roots in the Polish Region of Lower Silesia ( today in SW Poland ) On a few covers and post-cards are shown different cancels of the KOPERNIKI Post Office initiated from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of the Great Astronomerrsquos Birth
After the death of Nicolausrsquo father his uncle Bishop Watzenrode of Warmia looked after the family and saw young Copernicus into university at Cracov As an 18 year old youth he presented himself at the Jagiellonian University in 1491 and studied geometry trigonometry mathematics and astronomy there for the next four years
15
ORBIT
His teachers were famous in those times astronomers and mathematicians such as John of Glogoacutew (1445-1507) who had written a commentary on Ptolemyrsquos Cosmography and Wojciech Brudzewski (1445-1497) who was hostile to the geocentric system expounded by Ptolemy It was he who infected Copernicus with his theories based on the writings of Aristarchus of Samos three centuries before Christ Their teachings bore fruit in due course in Copernicusrsquos De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium published at Nuremberg at the printing house of John Petreius in 1543 This stamp issued in March 1942 and cancelled on September 11th 1943 depicts a monument to Nicolaus Copernicus within the quadrangle of the library of the
Jagiellionian University
In due course Copernicus proved that the Geocentric System by Ptolemy was not true and his Heliocentric or Solar System was accurate This is shown on block Michel Cat Bl52 and 2 interesting philatelic items showing His most famous work De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium his autograph and the Solar System on the postmark
In 1510 Copernicus settled at Frombork and having bought the Castlersquos Tower he established his Observatory and Library
there as seen on rare pair of especially overprinted (middle vertical black overprints ) post-cards and stamps Michel Cat 805 1194
Many people assign a single nationality to Copernicus Nazi Germany claimed Copernicus to have been purely German as on stamps Michel Cat 100 104 However Germans destroyed the monument to Copernicus in the quadrangle of the library (shown on stamps Michel Cat 396 446) at the University of Cracov in 1944
After World War II Poles rebuilt that Monument and it is now displayed at Cracovrsquos Botanical Gardens
During World War II Polish Prisoners of War of The Woldenberg Camp II C organized by Germans for Polish
officers initiated Camprsquos Post there and issued many interesting philatelic values One of them is a complete of souvenir sheet or block and set of 3 stamps dedicated to 400th Anniversary of Copernicus Death (shown right)
Warsawrsquos Scientific Society initiated the investigation of Copernicusrsquo tomb and remnants in 1802 but found little of interest In 2004 Prof George Gąsowski of The Institute of Anthropology and Archaeology in Pułtusk initiated new wave of investigation and in 2005-2008 he found human remains in the crypt of The Cathedral at Frombork After the war with Sweden war in the 17th century the Swedish robbed many Polish national treasures and among them were books formerly belonging to Copernicus One of books was ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo found in the Museum of Uppsala In that book were found two of Copernicusrsquo hairs which were examined forensically
In due course genetic comparison of the alleged Copernicus remnants found in Frombork Cathedral crypt and those two hairs in the ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo at Uppsala confirmed that the Frombork remains were those of Copernicus proving once and for all where his tomb lies
Polish anthropologists have since tried to do a reconstruction of Copernicusrsquo face and published their results in the Polish
press see below
16
ORBIT
Un-manned Satellites on Postage Stamps 31 By Guest Contributors Don Hillger and Garry Toth
A version of this article first appeared in The Astrophile for July-August 2008
The Elektron Series This is the thirty-first in a series of articles about un-
manned satellites on postage stamps This article
features the Russian Elektron-series satellites Four Elektron satellites were successfully launched with
Elektron-1 and 2 paired up on 30 January 1964 and Elektron-3 and 4 similarly paired on 10 July 1964
Elektron was one of the earliest Soviet scientific satellite missions to be authorized following the initial
Sputnik series The spacecraft had the mission of mapping the van Allen radiation belts at higher
inclinations than previous US satellites had followed In these missions two different types of spacecraft
were paired and launched together as mentioned
above Elektron-1 and 3 were put into a lower orbit to map the inner van Allen belt while Elekton-2 and 4
were boosted to a higher orbit to study the outer belt
For identification purposes Elektron-1 and 3 had
cylindrical bodies 075 m in diameter and 13 m long with six solar panels extending outward almost like
paddles Elektron-2 and 4 were shaped like the cupola of a public building in the basic form of a cylinder with
a flattened and broadened end with a diameter of 18 m and a height of 24 m
Both Elektron types are easily distinguished and are represented on many postal items mostly from
eastern bloc nations Some of the items show both Elektron-1 and 2 (or Elektron-3 and 4) since they
were launched together
A checklist of postal items identified as showing the
E l e k t r o n - s e r i e s s a t e l l i t e s ( h t t p wwwciracolostateedurammhillgerElektronhtm) is
available on the Website developed by the authors for the un-manned satellites featured in this series of
articles (httpwwwciracolostateedurammhillger
satelliteshtm) E-mail correspondence with the authors is welcome Don Hillger can be reached at
hillgerciracolostateedu and Garry Toth at garry_tothhotmailcom
Elektron-A
From Mark Wadersquos site httpwwwastronautixcom
Elektron-B
17
ORBIT
18
ORBIT
Flight STS-107 Commander Rick Husband Pilot William McCool MS Michael Anderson MS David Brown MS Laurel Clark MS Ilan Ramon MS Kalpana Chawla KSC Launch Date 1612003 Proposed KSC Landing 1203 Purpose SPACEHAB Double Main Payload Module
Shuttle Story 2003 STS ndash107 The Columbia Disaster
Columbia disintegrates on re-entry killing all seven astronauts on board
ldquocontingency declaredrdquo
STS-107 was a multi-disciplinary microgravity and Earth science research mission with a multitude of international scientific
investigations conducted continuously during 16 days in orbit
The seven-member crew died on February 1 2003 when the
shuttle disintegrated during re-entry into the Earths atmosphere The cause of the accident was determined to be a piece of foam
that broke off during launch and damaged the thermal protection system components (reinforced carbon-carbon panels and
thermal protection tiles) on the leading edge of the left wing of
the Shuttle orbiter causing an extensive heat build-up During re-entry the damaged wing slowly overheated and came apart
eventually leading to loss of control and total disintegration of the vehicle
STS-107 carried the SPACEHAB Double Research Module on its inaugural flight the Freestar experiment (mounted on a
Hitchhiker Program rack) and the Extended Duration Orbiter pallet
One of the experiments a video taken to study atmospheric dust may have detected a new atmospheric phenomenon
dubbed a TIGER (Transient Ionospheric
Glow Emission in Red)
On board the Columbia was a copy of a drawing by Petr Ginz the editor-in-chief of
the magazine Vedem who depicted what he
imagined the Earth looked like from the Moon when he was a 14-year-old prisoner in the
Tereziacuten concentration camp The copy was in the possession of Ilan Ramon and was lost in
the crash
19
ORBIT
Historical Document
Downloaded by your Editor on the day of the tragedy this page from a NASA
website presents starkly the dreadful
truth of what has just happened
The opening phrasing ldquoA contingency has been declaredrdquo is very much in the
laconic and measured tradition of Apollo
13rsquos ldquoHouston we have a problemrdquo and the ldquoObviously a major malfunctionrdquo
used by Mission Control of the Challenger tragedy in January 1986
Below and at bottom of opposite page Launch and Conclusion covers for the
flight The brightly coloured mission patch is appropriately printed in black
20
ORBIT
21
ORBIT
Faux commemorative dollar bills with a
value of ldquo107rdquo were issued to mark the occasion
The Israeli issue of 2422004
commemorated their first astronaut was a revised version of the stamps issued in
advance of Ilan Ramonrsquos flight see page 22
At least one territory under Islamic influence
which has traditionally cashed in on shuttle flight issues did not print a reference to
Israel on their commemoratives for political reasons see page 23
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
6
ORBIT
7
ORBIT
8
ORBIT
IYA Europa stamps referencing Galileo For all 2009 Europa stamps see
httpeuropa-stampsblogspotcom
Issue date 3409 15409
17409
25409
4509
4509
5509
7509 6509
7509
8509
1609 12509
9509
Hungary below 8509
Azerbaijan below right 13409
9
ORBIT
Collecting US Space Covers by Bruce Cranford Part Two
Monitoring tracking mission control and communications Satellite and manned vehicle tracking stations have had a complex history The number of tracking sites grew from a few down range sites for the Eastern and Western Ranges in the 1950s to many dozens worldwide for the Mercury Gemini and Apollo Programs All manned missions and many satellite missions require constant uninterrupted communications world as the satellite orbits the earth or travels through space Many tracking stations used existing facilities or were located on existing sites Many of these sites were located at NASA facilities Army Navy and Air Force facilities (including planes and ships) Where possible tracking stations were located on foreign soil in partnership with the host government Some collect covers cancelled at all the tracking stationssites worldwide for each manned launch
The number of tracking stations began to decline as the manned flight program moved into the Apollo Program due primarily to cost reductions from improved satellite communication technology Satellites now orbiting the earth do a better job of tracking and communicating with other satellites and manned vehicles than earth-bound stations The US Department of Defense has tracking and communication stations for their satellites but for security reasons do not advertise the site=s existence Commercial amp government communication satellites systems are the exception and are increasing the number of Earth based communications sitesstations Most countries worldwide have satellite communications capability within their own country With the advent of communication satellites including television and internet communications nearly every home in the US has the potential to receive signals from satellites Activities include cancellations at monitoring tracking control and communications sites when contact is first made with the
satellitespacecraft Interest in this area declined after the Apollo program
Activities in space Once the satellitespacecraft reaches space many activities are of interest to collectors For unmanned missions they include
i) orbital changes ii) insertion into a trajectory which may take the
spacecraft to another planet moon asteroid or an observation point in space (eg Lagrange 2 GEO)
iii) reaching a specific program milestone (eg flyby of a celestial object in service for a communications satellite)
iv) arriving at or departing from a celestial object (eg arriving at Mars)
v) impacting or landing and vi) end of mission
For manned missions they may include dockings spacewalks accomplishing a specific mission milestone undocking The USPS has produced very few covers for sale to the public
that have been flown into space The USPS produced officially flown space covers on 19830830 They were flown on the Challenger STS 008 It is the current policy for both NASA and the USPS that mail will not be delivered to or received from the
US astronauts on the International Space Station A few space covers were flown into space some illegally during the early manned program (Mercury Gemini Apollo) The Smithsonian=s Postal Museum in Washington DC has examples these covers
Recovery Spacecraft recovery is typically limited to manned space vehicles and early spy satellites From Mercury through the Apollo missions the recovery sites were the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans The US Navy deployed ships at the recovery site to retrieve the astronauts and their capsule This changed when the Space Transportation System (STS) was developed The STS Space Shuttles were designed for conventional aircraft landing The two major sites are Edwards Air Force Base California and Kennedy Space Center Florida Early spy satellites required the recovery photographic film in the air over the ocean to prevent damaged to land based structures and humans and to prevent the film from falling into the wrong hands if the Air Force missed the recovery capsule Newer communications technology has eliminated the need to recover spy satellite film capsules NASA has several new programs that will return material from space and will require recovering of the returning payload Nearly all earth orbiting satellites and those less fortunate that never made it into orbit will eventually renter the atmosphere Depending on the size and materials some will burn up and some may make it to the ground (eg SKYLAB)
Cachets A variety of cachet types have been and are being used in the US from no markings to high quality graphics For a general description of space cover cachets available in the US see Appendix Space Covers The most popular are multi color printed cachets using archival inks (Figure 103)
Envelopes and postcards Two types of envelopes are popular with US collectors with the size designated as letter (6) and business (10 ) Post cards are occasionally used in the US but the most popular is the 6 envelope Postal Stationery and Official Mail covers are also used See Appendix Space Covers Stamps or Postage
Philatelic Organizations For the collector of space covers which are
philatelic material there are three major organizations that offer information about space covers (See section 14 for addresses)
I) The Space Unit (httpstargate1usacomstamps ) formed in 1958 provides the majority of information for collectors of US space covers It publishes a by-monthly publication called the AAstrophile Journal of Astrophilately
ii) American Philatelic Society (APS) (httpwwwstampsorg) the largest nonprofit society in the world for stamp collectors that provides a number of services for stamp collectors and postal historians
10
ORBIT ORBIT
The APS existed before the first satellite was launched in 1957 The APS library is a great source of philatelic historical information The collector can borrow material contacting the American Philatelic Research Library (APRL)
iii) The American Topical Association (ATA) Organizations that have since ceased to exist include
the Explorer and Inner and Outer Space Past issues are available from the American Philatelic Research Library and the Space Unit See 14 Sources of Information
How covers are made Space covers are typically made from envelopes (letter 6 or business size 10) with at least 25 rag content and archival quality The acid left in paper from the manufacturing process turns the paper yellow with age and eventually destroys the paper Archival quality envelopes are
acid free have 25 rag content and will survive storage for long periods of time They cost more but result in a better space cover Envelopes purchased from the USPS or those used by organizations are typically not archival
Some collectors choose to make envelops from space related documents (maps figures photographs) This makes for an interesting envelope but be concerned about the archival quality of the paper and adhesives If you plan to make envelopes with different dimensions than the standard envelopes used by the USPS check with the USPS to ensure
the envelope is acceptable Some collectors use post cards or make post cards
for space covers The thickness of the papercardboard must be greater than that of the envelops in order to give the card the necessary stiffness and strength to survive the postal handling system The same caution about dimensions and archival ability applies to post cards For more information see Space Covers Definition and Description
Short history of space covers and types US space covers started in 1958 with the launch or attempted launch of the first US satellites (VANGUARD and EXPLORER) Space covers have been produced for every US satellite launch or attempted launch since 1958 Many space events have also been commemorated by space covers Space covers have been produced for foreign satellites launched by the US and US satellites launched by other countries US Space Cover manufactures have also produced space covers for non US satellites launched by other countries and various space events both US and foreign Space covers from past events can be purchased or traded from a number of different sources in the US and around the world See section 12 Sources of Space Covers It is unfortunate by some space cover manufactures have produced covers of suspect authenticity or outright forgeries Excellent sources of information are Bulver and the Astrophile see section 14 Sources of Information
Different methods are use to create and deliver space covers to the collector The more popular are
- Manufactured cachets applied to covers sold covers as own (eg Space Voyage Orbit Goldcraft Space Craft Beck)
- Manufactured cachets applied to covers sold covers through a reseller (eg Havekotte)
- Manufactured cachets sold or given cachets to others (eg Swanson Dubeau)
- Given or purchased cachets applied to covers covers sold as own (eg Dubeau)
- Given or purchased cachets applied to covers covers sold through a reseller (eg Whitney)
- Given or purchased covers sold covers as own - Given or purchased covers with cachets added
information to cover sold covers as own (eg Titusville Moonport Stamp Club Dubeau)
Given or purchased covers with cachets added information to cover sold covers through a reseller
Sources for space covers The collector has two options for obtaining space covers 1) purchase them or 2) make one=s own But the buyer-
beware should always be practiced Many great references are listed in section 14 Sources of Information and the Bibliography and should be read before purchasing space covers Many attempts have been made to identifycatalog all the space covers produce in the USby US Manufacturersfor US space Events None are complete Some catalogs may focus on a specific topic eg APOLLO Program Be that as it may something is better than nothing The following is a list of some of the more comprehensive listcatalogs listed in alphabetical order and found in the bibliography Courtney Davis Dubeau 2
Lollini Ramkissoon2 Vukotich and Wilhelm
The following is a partial list of space cover providersmanufacturersproducerssellers for US events (as of 2005)Astrophile 20021
- Goddard Space Flight Stamp Club Box 261 Greenbelt MD 20768 ‑‑0261
- JPL Stamp Club PO Box 771 La Canada CA 91012‑0771 httpwwwjplrecclubscaltechedustampindexshtml
- Resellers A good source is the Astrophile - Space Coast Philately PO box 446 Cape
Canaveral FL 32920 - Space equipment manufacturer individuals companies organizations clubs - SpaceCoast Cover services 1190
Montego Bay Dr Merritt Island FL 32953 - Stamp shows A good source of information about local stamp shows is
Linn=s Stamp News Astrophile and the APS - Titusville Moonport Stamp Club PO Box
6071 Titusville FL 32782 - Web sites httpstargate1usacom
stampsresourcehtm Auctions Space Unit Tom Steiner PO Box 550 Northville MI 48167 Web sites (eg E-Bay)
Most US space events are documented by space cover manufacturers Whether it is a major manned launch or a rocket motor test someone usually produces a space cover
11
ORBIT
commemorating the event This was more evident during manned programs See Space Covers Definition and Description
Making your own space cover Place the necessary postage on the envelopecard
At this point you have several options Put a return address on the envelopescard Include a Self Address Stamped Envelope (SASE) for the return of your covers The types of addressing will depend if you want the address to be a permanent part of the space cover or removable after the cover is returned to you Use a live gummed label that is removable if you do not want the address to be part of the cover Contact the post office where you want the envelope to be cancelled to determine if - a) they will hold the covers until the day of the event b) cancel them on that day and c)place the cancelled covers in the mail to you Follow the instruction of the post office
After receiving the envelopescards from the post
office (which are now Space Covers) many collectors apply a cachet to the Space Cover and place additional information inside the cover It is recommended that you identify who made the space cover and cachet in or on the Space Cover For more information see Space Covers Definition and Description
The following are the more popular post offices that
service space covers (as of 2005)Astrophile 20021 - Postmaster Kennedy Space Center Fl 32815 (about
1 week before the event)
- Window Services Unit Houston GPO 401 Franklin St Houston TX 77201-9999
Postmaster Edwards AFB CA 93523
Sources of Information
- Ad Astra Magazine of the National Space Society 922
Pennsylvania Ave SE Washington DC 20003 httpwwwnssorg
- American Philatelic Research Library (APRL) 100 Match Factory Place Bellefonte PA 16823 wwwstamplibraryorg
- American Philatelic Society American Philatelist Journal of the American Philatelic Society APS 100 Oakwood Ave PO Box 8000 State College PA 16803 Phone 814‑237 ‑3803 Fax 814 ‑237‑6128 httpwwwstampsorg
- Aviation Week and Space Technology 1221 Avenue of the Americas New York NY httpwwwaviationweekcom
- Bulver Ramkissoon Winick A Study of Suspect Space Covers 2001 Space Unit see Astrophile in the Bibliography
- Cranford Bruce ldquoSpace Covers Dictionary amp Identifier 2006 Editionrdquo Bruce Cranford 1 Cliffe Hill Ct Potomac MD 20854 USA ISBN 978-0-9711657-1-7
- Explorer International Association of Space Philatelists BO Box 302 Yonkers NY 10710 Editor Bill York 780 West End Ave Apt 11F New York NY 10025 No longer in business
- FIP Section for Astrophilately Joseacute Bergamin 16 6C 28030 Madrid Spain wwwastrophilatelycom Astrophile 200201
- Final Frontier Magazine PO Box 20089 Minneapolis MN 55420
- Linn=s Stamp News PO Box 29 Sidney OH 45365-0029 wwwLinnscom 800-837-0194
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration NASA 300 E Street SW Washington DC 20024‑3210 USA httpwwwhqnasagov
- Orbit Newsletter of the British based ASSS Orbit which had a special section on space stamps and postmarks httpwwwasssutvinternetcom Brian Lockyer The Secretary ASSS 21 Exford Close Weston‑Super‑Mare Somerset BS23 4RE Great Britain
- Quest The history of Spaceflight Magazine CSPACE 123 32nd St SE Grand Rapids MI 49509-0331 Glen Swanson httpwwwspaceeduquest
- Smithsonian Air amp Space Magazine monthly 900 Jefferson Dr Washington DC 20560 httpwwwsiedu
- Smithsonian National Postal Museum 2 Massachusetts Ave NE Washington DC 20002 (202) 33‑5555httpwwwpostalmuseumsiedu
- Space Unit President Tom Steiner PO Box 550 Northville MI 48167-0550 (As of 2005) publishes The Astrophile Member of the American Philatelic Association American Topical Association httpstargate1usacomstamps
- Space Week weekly publication of Army Times Publishing Co 6883 Commercial Drive Springfield VA 22159-0500
- Spaceflight The international Magazine of Space and Astronautics published by the British Interplanetary Society (BIS) 2729 South Lambeth Road London SW8 1SZ England httpfreespacevirginnetbisbisBishtm - US Library of Congress The Library of Congress 101
Independence Ave SE Washington DC 20540 (202) 707‑5000 httpwwwlocgov
- US Postal Service (USPS) Washington DC 20260-2435 (httpwwwuspsgov )
- USPS Stamp Fulfillment Service PO Box 219424 Kansas City MO 64121-9424 1-800-782-6724 fax 816-545-1212 wwwstampsonlinecom - Web Sites
- Friends and Partners in Space 1999 httpsolarrtdutkedu7Ejgreenfpspacehtml
- Mark Wade s Encyclopedia Astronautica 1998 httpsolarrtdutkedu~mwadespaceflthtm
- International Spacecraft and Launch Vehicle Names Glossary 2003 httpwwwspacecraftnamesinfo
- NASA httpwww‑paokscnasagovkscpaoscheduleschedulehtm
- Spaceflight Now httpwwwspaceflightnowcomtrackingindexhtml
- Gunther=s Space Page httpwwwskyrocketdespacespacehtml
- Contractors (many have merged or gone out of business since 1958)
Lockheed Martin httplmmsexternallmcocomremospascieoshtml Boeing httpwwwboeingcomflashhtml Orbital Science httpwwworbitalcom
Editorrsquos Note
Bruce has asked me to point out that he is not the
owner of the flown Apollo XI cover which I attributed to his collection on page 40 of the last edition
He just wishes he was
12
ORBIT
50th anniversary of NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration was established
by the National Aeronautics and Space Act on July 29 1958 replacing its predecessor the National Advisory Committee for
Aeronautics (NACA) The agency became operational on October 1 1958
13
ORBIT
So Who Did Invent the Telescope
A memorable fact from a different viewpoint
Did you know that in 2009 it is four hundred years since the first great discoveries in space took place Then it so happened that for the first time in the history of mankind craters on the moon some details on the planets and amongst other things the four great moons around Jupiter were seen Very soon the observation instruments became better and larger and gradually many more details on the moon and planets were seen Rings were discovered around Saturn bands of clouds and areas of storms on Jupiter and polar caps and surface structures on Mars
Now you may think where is the writer going with this
That is quite simple it so happened that in 2008 precisely 400 years ago the telescope was invented and that happened in our own little Holland For a long time it was not determined who had made the first Dutch viewer as these were called (see the New Zealand stamp issued 12-2-1997)
Zacharias Jansen and Hans Lipperhey both resident in Middelburg were seen as inventors of the telescope but there were other people who claimed this discovery It was said that Robert Bacon (1214-1294) already knew how the instrument could be made Jacob Metius of Alkmaar could also be the inventor he knew Jansen and Lipperhey and had also visited them Then there is also the Italian Raffael Gualterotti (1543-1639) of whom it is known with some certainty that in 1598 he had already made a viewer However this man evidently did not recognise the significance of his discovery and did not act upon it After very lengthy investigation it was finally decided that Hans Lipperhey (1570-1619 right) could lay claim to this invention
As often happens with new inventions the telescope was first seen as a military instrument to outsmart the enemy With the telescope the movements of the enemy could now be seen and followed over a much greater distance so that timely countermeasures could be taken It was the famous scholar Galileo Galileiuml (1564-1642) who heard about this discovery from others and immediately saw what further possibilities this instrument had to offer Based on the data he could get hold of Galileiuml himself made a telescope that magnified nine times Soon after he made another that
magnified to almost thirty times These instruments consisted of two lenses in a tube a lightly curved convex lens in front and at the rear a powerful concave lens as an eyepiece We must not expect too much from these first telescopes because the
optics at that time were far from the quality that we now know
At that time it was very difficult to make pure glass and the lenses were really rather small in proportion to the focal length so as a result the luminosity was mediocre To get a good lens a piece of clear rock crystal was sometimes used We can suppose that the first telescopes were of a lesser optical quality than simple binoculars in our time Nevertheless in 1609 Galileiuml was able to see craters on the moon and Venus as a sickle for the first time He was the discoverer of the first four moons of Jupiter and he concluded from sunspots that the rotation of the sun around its axis was about 25 days
The discovery of the telescope heralded a new era in space research in the widest sense of the word In my opinion we could call this the start of space exploration such as we in space travel now readily do Meanwhile all the nearby planets in our solar system have been explored with a space probe one or more times except Plutohelliphellipbut yes we cannot call that a planet any longer We have even been to the Moon and new discoveries are reported daily also in our own solar system moons of minor planets new rings around Uranus and small moons around the giant planets Jupiter and Saturn
Although in the very beginning there were no space probes doing investigation it is my opinion that we may take the opportunity during this commemoration year to recognise the fact that the telescope was invented four hundred years ago After all this was the beginning of a great voyage of discovery in space Therefore the year 2009 has been declared the International Year of Astronomy 2009 - IYA 2009 - by the UN (on the recommendation of the International Astronomical Union) The UN has designated UNESCO as the body chiefly responsible for IYA 2009 and the IAU as a support organisation for practical interpretation
HN Frankener March 2009
Specially translated for Orbit by Eleanor Coker this feature by Henk Nieuwenhuis first appeared in issue 24 2009 of Nieuwsbrief the journal of
Ruimtevaart Filatelie Club Nederland and is produced (with different illustrations) by
permission of the author and Editor Arie Olckers
14
ORBIT
Our Astonishing Nicolaus Copernicus By Stan Wekka Bydgoszcz Poland with Jeff Dugdale
IYA could not go past without our journal
marking once again this great thinker so here
is a specially commissioned and edited article
from an Orbit enthusiast in Poland
Nicolaus Copernicus was born 19 February 1473 in the wonderful City of Toruń on the River Vistula and died 24 May 1543 in Frombork
Consider this famous astronomermdashmathematician- doctor of medicine and monetary system expert (economist ) - physicianmdashclassical scholar - jurist - artistmdashtranslatormdashmilitary leadermdashdiplomat and hellipCatholic cleric - Treasure of our Earth NICOLAUS COPERNICUS (in Polish Mikolaj Kopernik)
He has been honoured in international philately on hundreds of postage-stamps items of postal ndashstationery commemorative cancellationshellip
His name is on Navyrsquos ships planes streets places schools universities factories on Moon satellites planetoidshellip
There have been are currently and will be in the future many
different celebrations of that Great Man of Geniushellip as for inst World Philatelic Exhibition ldquoPoland 1973rdquo organized from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of His Birth US carnet issued 1973 presents three proofs of stamps from Poland and the US
dedicated to Copernicus
A selection of Polish postage-stamps presents
Him as most important citizen of Poland and World see a page from my stock book opposite filled with Polish stamps for the great man
In this short memorial to His Life and Work we must mention a few events of his rich life His family had its roots in the Polish Region of Lower Silesia ( today in SW Poland ) On a few covers and post-cards are shown different cancels of the KOPERNIKI Post Office initiated from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of the Great Astronomerrsquos Birth
After the death of Nicolausrsquo father his uncle Bishop Watzenrode of Warmia looked after the family and saw young Copernicus into university at Cracov As an 18 year old youth he presented himself at the Jagiellonian University in 1491 and studied geometry trigonometry mathematics and astronomy there for the next four years
15
ORBIT
His teachers were famous in those times astronomers and mathematicians such as John of Glogoacutew (1445-1507) who had written a commentary on Ptolemyrsquos Cosmography and Wojciech Brudzewski (1445-1497) who was hostile to the geocentric system expounded by Ptolemy It was he who infected Copernicus with his theories based on the writings of Aristarchus of Samos three centuries before Christ Their teachings bore fruit in due course in Copernicusrsquos De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium published at Nuremberg at the printing house of John Petreius in 1543 This stamp issued in March 1942 and cancelled on September 11th 1943 depicts a monument to Nicolaus Copernicus within the quadrangle of the library of the
Jagiellionian University
In due course Copernicus proved that the Geocentric System by Ptolemy was not true and his Heliocentric or Solar System was accurate This is shown on block Michel Cat Bl52 and 2 interesting philatelic items showing His most famous work De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium his autograph and the Solar System on the postmark
In 1510 Copernicus settled at Frombork and having bought the Castlersquos Tower he established his Observatory and Library
there as seen on rare pair of especially overprinted (middle vertical black overprints ) post-cards and stamps Michel Cat 805 1194
Many people assign a single nationality to Copernicus Nazi Germany claimed Copernicus to have been purely German as on stamps Michel Cat 100 104 However Germans destroyed the monument to Copernicus in the quadrangle of the library (shown on stamps Michel Cat 396 446) at the University of Cracov in 1944
After World War II Poles rebuilt that Monument and it is now displayed at Cracovrsquos Botanical Gardens
During World War II Polish Prisoners of War of The Woldenberg Camp II C organized by Germans for Polish
officers initiated Camprsquos Post there and issued many interesting philatelic values One of them is a complete of souvenir sheet or block and set of 3 stamps dedicated to 400th Anniversary of Copernicus Death (shown right)
Warsawrsquos Scientific Society initiated the investigation of Copernicusrsquo tomb and remnants in 1802 but found little of interest In 2004 Prof George Gąsowski of The Institute of Anthropology and Archaeology in Pułtusk initiated new wave of investigation and in 2005-2008 he found human remains in the crypt of The Cathedral at Frombork After the war with Sweden war in the 17th century the Swedish robbed many Polish national treasures and among them were books formerly belonging to Copernicus One of books was ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo found in the Museum of Uppsala In that book were found two of Copernicusrsquo hairs which were examined forensically
In due course genetic comparison of the alleged Copernicus remnants found in Frombork Cathedral crypt and those two hairs in the ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo at Uppsala confirmed that the Frombork remains were those of Copernicus proving once and for all where his tomb lies
Polish anthropologists have since tried to do a reconstruction of Copernicusrsquo face and published their results in the Polish
press see below
16
ORBIT
Un-manned Satellites on Postage Stamps 31 By Guest Contributors Don Hillger and Garry Toth
A version of this article first appeared in The Astrophile for July-August 2008
The Elektron Series This is the thirty-first in a series of articles about un-
manned satellites on postage stamps This article
features the Russian Elektron-series satellites Four Elektron satellites were successfully launched with
Elektron-1 and 2 paired up on 30 January 1964 and Elektron-3 and 4 similarly paired on 10 July 1964
Elektron was one of the earliest Soviet scientific satellite missions to be authorized following the initial
Sputnik series The spacecraft had the mission of mapping the van Allen radiation belts at higher
inclinations than previous US satellites had followed In these missions two different types of spacecraft
were paired and launched together as mentioned
above Elektron-1 and 3 were put into a lower orbit to map the inner van Allen belt while Elekton-2 and 4
were boosted to a higher orbit to study the outer belt
For identification purposes Elektron-1 and 3 had
cylindrical bodies 075 m in diameter and 13 m long with six solar panels extending outward almost like
paddles Elektron-2 and 4 were shaped like the cupola of a public building in the basic form of a cylinder with
a flattened and broadened end with a diameter of 18 m and a height of 24 m
Both Elektron types are easily distinguished and are represented on many postal items mostly from
eastern bloc nations Some of the items show both Elektron-1 and 2 (or Elektron-3 and 4) since they
were launched together
A checklist of postal items identified as showing the
E l e k t r o n - s e r i e s s a t e l l i t e s ( h t t p wwwciracolostateedurammhillgerElektronhtm) is
available on the Website developed by the authors for the un-manned satellites featured in this series of
articles (httpwwwciracolostateedurammhillger
satelliteshtm) E-mail correspondence with the authors is welcome Don Hillger can be reached at
hillgerciracolostateedu and Garry Toth at garry_tothhotmailcom
Elektron-A
From Mark Wadersquos site httpwwwastronautixcom
Elektron-B
17
ORBIT
18
ORBIT
Flight STS-107 Commander Rick Husband Pilot William McCool MS Michael Anderson MS David Brown MS Laurel Clark MS Ilan Ramon MS Kalpana Chawla KSC Launch Date 1612003 Proposed KSC Landing 1203 Purpose SPACEHAB Double Main Payload Module
Shuttle Story 2003 STS ndash107 The Columbia Disaster
Columbia disintegrates on re-entry killing all seven astronauts on board
ldquocontingency declaredrdquo
STS-107 was a multi-disciplinary microgravity and Earth science research mission with a multitude of international scientific
investigations conducted continuously during 16 days in orbit
The seven-member crew died on February 1 2003 when the
shuttle disintegrated during re-entry into the Earths atmosphere The cause of the accident was determined to be a piece of foam
that broke off during launch and damaged the thermal protection system components (reinforced carbon-carbon panels and
thermal protection tiles) on the leading edge of the left wing of
the Shuttle orbiter causing an extensive heat build-up During re-entry the damaged wing slowly overheated and came apart
eventually leading to loss of control and total disintegration of the vehicle
STS-107 carried the SPACEHAB Double Research Module on its inaugural flight the Freestar experiment (mounted on a
Hitchhiker Program rack) and the Extended Duration Orbiter pallet
One of the experiments a video taken to study atmospheric dust may have detected a new atmospheric phenomenon
dubbed a TIGER (Transient Ionospheric
Glow Emission in Red)
On board the Columbia was a copy of a drawing by Petr Ginz the editor-in-chief of
the magazine Vedem who depicted what he
imagined the Earth looked like from the Moon when he was a 14-year-old prisoner in the
Tereziacuten concentration camp The copy was in the possession of Ilan Ramon and was lost in
the crash
19
ORBIT
Historical Document
Downloaded by your Editor on the day of the tragedy this page from a NASA
website presents starkly the dreadful
truth of what has just happened
The opening phrasing ldquoA contingency has been declaredrdquo is very much in the
laconic and measured tradition of Apollo
13rsquos ldquoHouston we have a problemrdquo and the ldquoObviously a major malfunctionrdquo
used by Mission Control of the Challenger tragedy in January 1986
Below and at bottom of opposite page Launch and Conclusion covers for the
flight The brightly coloured mission patch is appropriately printed in black
20
ORBIT
21
ORBIT
Faux commemorative dollar bills with a
value of ldquo107rdquo were issued to mark the occasion
The Israeli issue of 2422004
commemorated their first astronaut was a revised version of the stamps issued in
advance of Ilan Ramonrsquos flight see page 22
At least one territory under Islamic influence
which has traditionally cashed in on shuttle flight issues did not print a reference to
Israel on their commemoratives for political reasons see page 23
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
7
ORBIT
8
ORBIT
IYA Europa stamps referencing Galileo For all 2009 Europa stamps see
httpeuropa-stampsblogspotcom
Issue date 3409 15409
17409
25409
4509
4509
5509
7509 6509
7509
8509
1609 12509
9509
Hungary below 8509
Azerbaijan below right 13409
9
ORBIT
Collecting US Space Covers by Bruce Cranford Part Two
Monitoring tracking mission control and communications Satellite and manned vehicle tracking stations have had a complex history The number of tracking sites grew from a few down range sites for the Eastern and Western Ranges in the 1950s to many dozens worldwide for the Mercury Gemini and Apollo Programs All manned missions and many satellite missions require constant uninterrupted communications world as the satellite orbits the earth or travels through space Many tracking stations used existing facilities or were located on existing sites Many of these sites were located at NASA facilities Army Navy and Air Force facilities (including planes and ships) Where possible tracking stations were located on foreign soil in partnership with the host government Some collect covers cancelled at all the tracking stationssites worldwide for each manned launch
The number of tracking stations began to decline as the manned flight program moved into the Apollo Program due primarily to cost reductions from improved satellite communication technology Satellites now orbiting the earth do a better job of tracking and communicating with other satellites and manned vehicles than earth-bound stations The US Department of Defense has tracking and communication stations for their satellites but for security reasons do not advertise the site=s existence Commercial amp government communication satellites systems are the exception and are increasing the number of Earth based communications sitesstations Most countries worldwide have satellite communications capability within their own country With the advent of communication satellites including television and internet communications nearly every home in the US has the potential to receive signals from satellites Activities include cancellations at monitoring tracking control and communications sites when contact is first made with the
satellitespacecraft Interest in this area declined after the Apollo program
Activities in space Once the satellitespacecraft reaches space many activities are of interest to collectors For unmanned missions they include
i) orbital changes ii) insertion into a trajectory which may take the
spacecraft to another planet moon asteroid or an observation point in space (eg Lagrange 2 GEO)
iii) reaching a specific program milestone (eg flyby of a celestial object in service for a communications satellite)
iv) arriving at or departing from a celestial object (eg arriving at Mars)
v) impacting or landing and vi) end of mission
For manned missions they may include dockings spacewalks accomplishing a specific mission milestone undocking The USPS has produced very few covers for sale to the public
that have been flown into space The USPS produced officially flown space covers on 19830830 They were flown on the Challenger STS 008 It is the current policy for both NASA and the USPS that mail will not be delivered to or received from the
US astronauts on the International Space Station A few space covers were flown into space some illegally during the early manned program (Mercury Gemini Apollo) The Smithsonian=s Postal Museum in Washington DC has examples these covers
Recovery Spacecraft recovery is typically limited to manned space vehicles and early spy satellites From Mercury through the Apollo missions the recovery sites were the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans The US Navy deployed ships at the recovery site to retrieve the astronauts and their capsule This changed when the Space Transportation System (STS) was developed The STS Space Shuttles were designed for conventional aircraft landing The two major sites are Edwards Air Force Base California and Kennedy Space Center Florida Early spy satellites required the recovery photographic film in the air over the ocean to prevent damaged to land based structures and humans and to prevent the film from falling into the wrong hands if the Air Force missed the recovery capsule Newer communications technology has eliminated the need to recover spy satellite film capsules NASA has several new programs that will return material from space and will require recovering of the returning payload Nearly all earth orbiting satellites and those less fortunate that never made it into orbit will eventually renter the atmosphere Depending on the size and materials some will burn up and some may make it to the ground (eg SKYLAB)
Cachets A variety of cachet types have been and are being used in the US from no markings to high quality graphics For a general description of space cover cachets available in the US see Appendix Space Covers The most popular are multi color printed cachets using archival inks (Figure 103)
Envelopes and postcards Two types of envelopes are popular with US collectors with the size designated as letter (6) and business (10 ) Post cards are occasionally used in the US but the most popular is the 6 envelope Postal Stationery and Official Mail covers are also used See Appendix Space Covers Stamps or Postage
Philatelic Organizations For the collector of space covers which are
philatelic material there are three major organizations that offer information about space covers (See section 14 for addresses)
I) The Space Unit (httpstargate1usacomstamps ) formed in 1958 provides the majority of information for collectors of US space covers It publishes a by-monthly publication called the AAstrophile Journal of Astrophilately
ii) American Philatelic Society (APS) (httpwwwstampsorg) the largest nonprofit society in the world for stamp collectors that provides a number of services for stamp collectors and postal historians
10
ORBIT ORBIT
The APS existed before the first satellite was launched in 1957 The APS library is a great source of philatelic historical information The collector can borrow material contacting the American Philatelic Research Library (APRL)
iii) The American Topical Association (ATA) Organizations that have since ceased to exist include
the Explorer and Inner and Outer Space Past issues are available from the American Philatelic Research Library and the Space Unit See 14 Sources of Information
How covers are made Space covers are typically made from envelopes (letter 6 or business size 10) with at least 25 rag content and archival quality The acid left in paper from the manufacturing process turns the paper yellow with age and eventually destroys the paper Archival quality envelopes are
acid free have 25 rag content and will survive storage for long periods of time They cost more but result in a better space cover Envelopes purchased from the USPS or those used by organizations are typically not archival
Some collectors choose to make envelops from space related documents (maps figures photographs) This makes for an interesting envelope but be concerned about the archival quality of the paper and adhesives If you plan to make envelopes with different dimensions than the standard envelopes used by the USPS check with the USPS to ensure
the envelope is acceptable Some collectors use post cards or make post cards
for space covers The thickness of the papercardboard must be greater than that of the envelops in order to give the card the necessary stiffness and strength to survive the postal handling system The same caution about dimensions and archival ability applies to post cards For more information see Space Covers Definition and Description
Short history of space covers and types US space covers started in 1958 with the launch or attempted launch of the first US satellites (VANGUARD and EXPLORER) Space covers have been produced for every US satellite launch or attempted launch since 1958 Many space events have also been commemorated by space covers Space covers have been produced for foreign satellites launched by the US and US satellites launched by other countries US Space Cover manufactures have also produced space covers for non US satellites launched by other countries and various space events both US and foreign Space covers from past events can be purchased or traded from a number of different sources in the US and around the world See section 12 Sources of Space Covers It is unfortunate by some space cover manufactures have produced covers of suspect authenticity or outright forgeries Excellent sources of information are Bulver and the Astrophile see section 14 Sources of Information
Different methods are use to create and deliver space covers to the collector The more popular are
- Manufactured cachets applied to covers sold covers as own (eg Space Voyage Orbit Goldcraft Space Craft Beck)
- Manufactured cachets applied to covers sold covers through a reseller (eg Havekotte)
- Manufactured cachets sold or given cachets to others (eg Swanson Dubeau)
- Given or purchased cachets applied to covers covers sold as own (eg Dubeau)
- Given or purchased cachets applied to covers covers sold through a reseller (eg Whitney)
- Given or purchased covers sold covers as own - Given or purchased covers with cachets added
information to cover sold covers as own (eg Titusville Moonport Stamp Club Dubeau)
Given or purchased covers with cachets added information to cover sold covers through a reseller
Sources for space covers The collector has two options for obtaining space covers 1) purchase them or 2) make one=s own But the buyer-
beware should always be practiced Many great references are listed in section 14 Sources of Information and the Bibliography and should be read before purchasing space covers Many attempts have been made to identifycatalog all the space covers produce in the USby US Manufacturersfor US space Events None are complete Some catalogs may focus on a specific topic eg APOLLO Program Be that as it may something is better than nothing The following is a list of some of the more comprehensive listcatalogs listed in alphabetical order and found in the bibliography Courtney Davis Dubeau 2
Lollini Ramkissoon2 Vukotich and Wilhelm
The following is a partial list of space cover providersmanufacturersproducerssellers for US events (as of 2005)Astrophile 20021
- Goddard Space Flight Stamp Club Box 261 Greenbelt MD 20768 ‑‑0261
- JPL Stamp Club PO Box 771 La Canada CA 91012‑0771 httpwwwjplrecclubscaltechedustampindexshtml
- Resellers A good source is the Astrophile - Space Coast Philately PO box 446 Cape
Canaveral FL 32920 - Space equipment manufacturer individuals companies organizations clubs - SpaceCoast Cover services 1190
Montego Bay Dr Merritt Island FL 32953 - Stamp shows A good source of information about local stamp shows is
Linn=s Stamp News Astrophile and the APS - Titusville Moonport Stamp Club PO Box
6071 Titusville FL 32782 - Web sites httpstargate1usacom
stampsresourcehtm Auctions Space Unit Tom Steiner PO Box 550 Northville MI 48167 Web sites (eg E-Bay)
Most US space events are documented by space cover manufacturers Whether it is a major manned launch or a rocket motor test someone usually produces a space cover
11
ORBIT
commemorating the event This was more evident during manned programs See Space Covers Definition and Description
Making your own space cover Place the necessary postage on the envelopecard
At this point you have several options Put a return address on the envelopescard Include a Self Address Stamped Envelope (SASE) for the return of your covers The types of addressing will depend if you want the address to be a permanent part of the space cover or removable after the cover is returned to you Use a live gummed label that is removable if you do not want the address to be part of the cover Contact the post office where you want the envelope to be cancelled to determine if - a) they will hold the covers until the day of the event b) cancel them on that day and c)place the cancelled covers in the mail to you Follow the instruction of the post office
After receiving the envelopescards from the post
office (which are now Space Covers) many collectors apply a cachet to the Space Cover and place additional information inside the cover It is recommended that you identify who made the space cover and cachet in or on the Space Cover For more information see Space Covers Definition and Description
The following are the more popular post offices that
service space covers (as of 2005)Astrophile 20021 - Postmaster Kennedy Space Center Fl 32815 (about
1 week before the event)
- Window Services Unit Houston GPO 401 Franklin St Houston TX 77201-9999
Postmaster Edwards AFB CA 93523
Sources of Information
- Ad Astra Magazine of the National Space Society 922
Pennsylvania Ave SE Washington DC 20003 httpwwwnssorg
- American Philatelic Research Library (APRL) 100 Match Factory Place Bellefonte PA 16823 wwwstamplibraryorg
- American Philatelic Society American Philatelist Journal of the American Philatelic Society APS 100 Oakwood Ave PO Box 8000 State College PA 16803 Phone 814‑237 ‑3803 Fax 814 ‑237‑6128 httpwwwstampsorg
- Aviation Week and Space Technology 1221 Avenue of the Americas New York NY httpwwwaviationweekcom
- Bulver Ramkissoon Winick A Study of Suspect Space Covers 2001 Space Unit see Astrophile in the Bibliography
- Cranford Bruce ldquoSpace Covers Dictionary amp Identifier 2006 Editionrdquo Bruce Cranford 1 Cliffe Hill Ct Potomac MD 20854 USA ISBN 978-0-9711657-1-7
- Explorer International Association of Space Philatelists BO Box 302 Yonkers NY 10710 Editor Bill York 780 West End Ave Apt 11F New York NY 10025 No longer in business
- FIP Section for Astrophilately Joseacute Bergamin 16 6C 28030 Madrid Spain wwwastrophilatelycom Astrophile 200201
- Final Frontier Magazine PO Box 20089 Minneapolis MN 55420
- Linn=s Stamp News PO Box 29 Sidney OH 45365-0029 wwwLinnscom 800-837-0194
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration NASA 300 E Street SW Washington DC 20024‑3210 USA httpwwwhqnasagov
- Orbit Newsletter of the British based ASSS Orbit which had a special section on space stamps and postmarks httpwwwasssutvinternetcom Brian Lockyer The Secretary ASSS 21 Exford Close Weston‑Super‑Mare Somerset BS23 4RE Great Britain
- Quest The history of Spaceflight Magazine CSPACE 123 32nd St SE Grand Rapids MI 49509-0331 Glen Swanson httpwwwspaceeduquest
- Smithsonian Air amp Space Magazine monthly 900 Jefferson Dr Washington DC 20560 httpwwwsiedu
- Smithsonian National Postal Museum 2 Massachusetts Ave NE Washington DC 20002 (202) 33‑5555httpwwwpostalmuseumsiedu
- Space Unit President Tom Steiner PO Box 550 Northville MI 48167-0550 (As of 2005) publishes The Astrophile Member of the American Philatelic Association American Topical Association httpstargate1usacomstamps
- Space Week weekly publication of Army Times Publishing Co 6883 Commercial Drive Springfield VA 22159-0500
- Spaceflight The international Magazine of Space and Astronautics published by the British Interplanetary Society (BIS) 2729 South Lambeth Road London SW8 1SZ England httpfreespacevirginnetbisbisBishtm - US Library of Congress The Library of Congress 101
Independence Ave SE Washington DC 20540 (202) 707‑5000 httpwwwlocgov
- US Postal Service (USPS) Washington DC 20260-2435 (httpwwwuspsgov )
- USPS Stamp Fulfillment Service PO Box 219424 Kansas City MO 64121-9424 1-800-782-6724 fax 816-545-1212 wwwstampsonlinecom - Web Sites
- Friends and Partners in Space 1999 httpsolarrtdutkedu7Ejgreenfpspacehtml
- Mark Wade s Encyclopedia Astronautica 1998 httpsolarrtdutkedu~mwadespaceflthtm
- International Spacecraft and Launch Vehicle Names Glossary 2003 httpwwwspacecraftnamesinfo
- NASA httpwww‑paokscnasagovkscpaoscheduleschedulehtm
- Spaceflight Now httpwwwspaceflightnowcomtrackingindexhtml
- Gunther=s Space Page httpwwwskyrocketdespacespacehtml
- Contractors (many have merged or gone out of business since 1958)
Lockheed Martin httplmmsexternallmcocomremospascieoshtml Boeing httpwwwboeingcomflashhtml Orbital Science httpwwworbitalcom
Editorrsquos Note
Bruce has asked me to point out that he is not the
owner of the flown Apollo XI cover which I attributed to his collection on page 40 of the last edition
He just wishes he was
12
ORBIT
50th anniversary of NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration was established
by the National Aeronautics and Space Act on July 29 1958 replacing its predecessor the National Advisory Committee for
Aeronautics (NACA) The agency became operational on October 1 1958
13
ORBIT
So Who Did Invent the Telescope
A memorable fact from a different viewpoint
Did you know that in 2009 it is four hundred years since the first great discoveries in space took place Then it so happened that for the first time in the history of mankind craters on the moon some details on the planets and amongst other things the four great moons around Jupiter were seen Very soon the observation instruments became better and larger and gradually many more details on the moon and planets were seen Rings were discovered around Saturn bands of clouds and areas of storms on Jupiter and polar caps and surface structures on Mars
Now you may think where is the writer going with this
That is quite simple it so happened that in 2008 precisely 400 years ago the telescope was invented and that happened in our own little Holland For a long time it was not determined who had made the first Dutch viewer as these were called (see the New Zealand stamp issued 12-2-1997)
Zacharias Jansen and Hans Lipperhey both resident in Middelburg were seen as inventors of the telescope but there were other people who claimed this discovery It was said that Robert Bacon (1214-1294) already knew how the instrument could be made Jacob Metius of Alkmaar could also be the inventor he knew Jansen and Lipperhey and had also visited them Then there is also the Italian Raffael Gualterotti (1543-1639) of whom it is known with some certainty that in 1598 he had already made a viewer However this man evidently did not recognise the significance of his discovery and did not act upon it After very lengthy investigation it was finally decided that Hans Lipperhey (1570-1619 right) could lay claim to this invention
As often happens with new inventions the telescope was first seen as a military instrument to outsmart the enemy With the telescope the movements of the enemy could now be seen and followed over a much greater distance so that timely countermeasures could be taken It was the famous scholar Galileo Galileiuml (1564-1642) who heard about this discovery from others and immediately saw what further possibilities this instrument had to offer Based on the data he could get hold of Galileiuml himself made a telescope that magnified nine times Soon after he made another that
magnified to almost thirty times These instruments consisted of two lenses in a tube a lightly curved convex lens in front and at the rear a powerful concave lens as an eyepiece We must not expect too much from these first telescopes because the
optics at that time were far from the quality that we now know
At that time it was very difficult to make pure glass and the lenses were really rather small in proportion to the focal length so as a result the luminosity was mediocre To get a good lens a piece of clear rock crystal was sometimes used We can suppose that the first telescopes were of a lesser optical quality than simple binoculars in our time Nevertheless in 1609 Galileiuml was able to see craters on the moon and Venus as a sickle for the first time He was the discoverer of the first four moons of Jupiter and he concluded from sunspots that the rotation of the sun around its axis was about 25 days
The discovery of the telescope heralded a new era in space research in the widest sense of the word In my opinion we could call this the start of space exploration such as we in space travel now readily do Meanwhile all the nearby planets in our solar system have been explored with a space probe one or more times except Plutohelliphellipbut yes we cannot call that a planet any longer We have even been to the Moon and new discoveries are reported daily also in our own solar system moons of minor planets new rings around Uranus and small moons around the giant planets Jupiter and Saturn
Although in the very beginning there were no space probes doing investigation it is my opinion that we may take the opportunity during this commemoration year to recognise the fact that the telescope was invented four hundred years ago After all this was the beginning of a great voyage of discovery in space Therefore the year 2009 has been declared the International Year of Astronomy 2009 - IYA 2009 - by the UN (on the recommendation of the International Astronomical Union) The UN has designated UNESCO as the body chiefly responsible for IYA 2009 and the IAU as a support organisation for practical interpretation
HN Frankener March 2009
Specially translated for Orbit by Eleanor Coker this feature by Henk Nieuwenhuis first appeared in issue 24 2009 of Nieuwsbrief the journal of
Ruimtevaart Filatelie Club Nederland and is produced (with different illustrations) by
permission of the author and Editor Arie Olckers
14
ORBIT
Our Astonishing Nicolaus Copernicus By Stan Wekka Bydgoszcz Poland with Jeff Dugdale
IYA could not go past without our journal
marking once again this great thinker so here
is a specially commissioned and edited article
from an Orbit enthusiast in Poland
Nicolaus Copernicus was born 19 February 1473 in the wonderful City of Toruń on the River Vistula and died 24 May 1543 in Frombork
Consider this famous astronomermdashmathematician- doctor of medicine and monetary system expert (economist ) - physicianmdashclassical scholar - jurist - artistmdashtranslatormdashmilitary leadermdashdiplomat and hellipCatholic cleric - Treasure of our Earth NICOLAUS COPERNICUS (in Polish Mikolaj Kopernik)
He has been honoured in international philately on hundreds of postage-stamps items of postal ndashstationery commemorative cancellationshellip
His name is on Navyrsquos ships planes streets places schools universities factories on Moon satellites planetoidshellip
There have been are currently and will be in the future many
different celebrations of that Great Man of Geniushellip as for inst World Philatelic Exhibition ldquoPoland 1973rdquo organized from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of His Birth US carnet issued 1973 presents three proofs of stamps from Poland and the US
dedicated to Copernicus
A selection of Polish postage-stamps presents
Him as most important citizen of Poland and World see a page from my stock book opposite filled with Polish stamps for the great man
In this short memorial to His Life and Work we must mention a few events of his rich life His family had its roots in the Polish Region of Lower Silesia ( today in SW Poland ) On a few covers and post-cards are shown different cancels of the KOPERNIKI Post Office initiated from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of the Great Astronomerrsquos Birth
After the death of Nicolausrsquo father his uncle Bishop Watzenrode of Warmia looked after the family and saw young Copernicus into university at Cracov As an 18 year old youth he presented himself at the Jagiellonian University in 1491 and studied geometry trigonometry mathematics and astronomy there for the next four years
15
ORBIT
His teachers were famous in those times astronomers and mathematicians such as John of Glogoacutew (1445-1507) who had written a commentary on Ptolemyrsquos Cosmography and Wojciech Brudzewski (1445-1497) who was hostile to the geocentric system expounded by Ptolemy It was he who infected Copernicus with his theories based on the writings of Aristarchus of Samos three centuries before Christ Their teachings bore fruit in due course in Copernicusrsquos De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium published at Nuremberg at the printing house of John Petreius in 1543 This stamp issued in March 1942 and cancelled on September 11th 1943 depicts a monument to Nicolaus Copernicus within the quadrangle of the library of the
Jagiellionian University
In due course Copernicus proved that the Geocentric System by Ptolemy was not true and his Heliocentric or Solar System was accurate This is shown on block Michel Cat Bl52 and 2 interesting philatelic items showing His most famous work De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium his autograph and the Solar System on the postmark
In 1510 Copernicus settled at Frombork and having bought the Castlersquos Tower he established his Observatory and Library
there as seen on rare pair of especially overprinted (middle vertical black overprints ) post-cards and stamps Michel Cat 805 1194
Many people assign a single nationality to Copernicus Nazi Germany claimed Copernicus to have been purely German as on stamps Michel Cat 100 104 However Germans destroyed the monument to Copernicus in the quadrangle of the library (shown on stamps Michel Cat 396 446) at the University of Cracov in 1944
After World War II Poles rebuilt that Monument and it is now displayed at Cracovrsquos Botanical Gardens
During World War II Polish Prisoners of War of The Woldenberg Camp II C organized by Germans for Polish
officers initiated Camprsquos Post there and issued many interesting philatelic values One of them is a complete of souvenir sheet or block and set of 3 stamps dedicated to 400th Anniversary of Copernicus Death (shown right)
Warsawrsquos Scientific Society initiated the investigation of Copernicusrsquo tomb and remnants in 1802 but found little of interest In 2004 Prof George Gąsowski of The Institute of Anthropology and Archaeology in Pułtusk initiated new wave of investigation and in 2005-2008 he found human remains in the crypt of The Cathedral at Frombork After the war with Sweden war in the 17th century the Swedish robbed many Polish national treasures and among them were books formerly belonging to Copernicus One of books was ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo found in the Museum of Uppsala In that book were found two of Copernicusrsquo hairs which were examined forensically
In due course genetic comparison of the alleged Copernicus remnants found in Frombork Cathedral crypt and those two hairs in the ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo at Uppsala confirmed that the Frombork remains were those of Copernicus proving once and for all where his tomb lies
Polish anthropologists have since tried to do a reconstruction of Copernicusrsquo face and published their results in the Polish
press see below
16
ORBIT
Un-manned Satellites on Postage Stamps 31 By Guest Contributors Don Hillger and Garry Toth
A version of this article first appeared in The Astrophile for July-August 2008
The Elektron Series This is the thirty-first in a series of articles about un-
manned satellites on postage stamps This article
features the Russian Elektron-series satellites Four Elektron satellites were successfully launched with
Elektron-1 and 2 paired up on 30 January 1964 and Elektron-3 and 4 similarly paired on 10 July 1964
Elektron was one of the earliest Soviet scientific satellite missions to be authorized following the initial
Sputnik series The spacecraft had the mission of mapping the van Allen radiation belts at higher
inclinations than previous US satellites had followed In these missions two different types of spacecraft
were paired and launched together as mentioned
above Elektron-1 and 3 were put into a lower orbit to map the inner van Allen belt while Elekton-2 and 4
were boosted to a higher orbit to study the outer belt
For identification purposes Elektron-1 and 3 had
cylindrical bodies 075 m in diameter and 13 m long with six solar panels extending outward almost like
paddles Elektron-2 and 4 were shaped like the cupola of a public building in the basic form of a cylinder with
a flattened and broadened end with a diameter of 18 m and a height of 24 m
Both Elektron types are easily distinguished and are represented on many postal items mostly from
eastern bloc nations Some of the items show both Elektron-1 and 2 (or Elektron-3 and 4) since they
were launched together
A checklist of postal items identified as showing the
E l e k t r o n - s e r i e s s a t e l l i t e s ( h t t p wwwciracolostateedurammhillgerElektronhtm) is
available on the Website developed by the authors for the un-manned satellites featured in this series of
articles (httpwwwciracolostateedurammhillger
satelliteshtm) E-mail correspondence with the authors is welcome Don Hillger can be reached at
hillgerciracolostateedu and Garry Toth at garry_tothhotmailcom
Elektron-A
From Mark Wadersquos site httpwwwastronautixcom
Elektron-B
17
ORBIT
18
ORBIT
Flight STS-107 Commander Rick Husband Pilot William McCool MS Michael Anderson MS David Brown MS Laurel Clark MS Ilan Ramon MS Kalpana Chawla KSC Launch Date 1612003 Proposed KSC Landing 1203 Purpose SPACEHAB Double Main Payload Module
Shuttle Story 2003 STS ndash107 The Columbia Disaster
Columbia disintegrates on re-entry killing all seven astronauts on board
ldquocontingency declaredrdquo
STS-107 was a multi-disciplinary microgravity and Earth science research mission with a multitude of international scientific
investigations conducted continuously during 16 days in orbit
The seven-member crew died on February 1 2003 when the
shuttle disintegrated during re-entry into the Earths atmosphere The cause of the accident was determined to be a piece of foam
that broke off during launch and damaged the thermal protection system components (reinforced carbon-carbon panels and
thermal protection tiles) on the leading edge of the left wing of
the Shuttle orbiter causing an extensive heat build-up During re-entry the damaged wing slowly overheated and came apart
eventually leading to loss of control and total disintegration of the vehicle
STS-107 carried the SPACEHAB Double Research Module on its inaugural flight the Freestar experiment (mounted on a
Hitchhiker Program rack) and the Extended Duration Orbiter pallet
One of the experiments a video taken to study atmospheric dust may have detected a new atmospheric phenomenon
dubbed a TIGER (Transient Ionospheric
Glow Emission in Red)
On board the Columbia was a copy of a drawing by Petr Ginz the editor-in-chief of
the magazine Vedem who depicted what he
imagined the Earth looked like from the Moon when he was a 14-year-old prisoner in the
Tereziacuten concentration camp The copy was in the possession of Ilan Ramon and was lost in
the crash
19
ORBIT
Historical Document
Downloaded by your Editor on the day of the tragedy this page from a NASA
website presents starkly the dreadful
truth of what has just happened
The opening phrasing ldquoA contingency has been declaredrdquo is very much in the
laconic and measured tradition of Apollo
13rsquos ldquoHouston we have a problemrdquo and the ldquoObviously a major malfunctionrdquo
used by Mission Control of the Challenger tragedy in January 1986
Below and at bottom of opposite page Launch and Conclusion covers for the
flight The brightly coloured mission patch is appropriately printed in black
20
ORBIT
21
ORBIT
Faux commemorative dollar bills with a
value of ldquo107rdquo were issued to mark the occasion
The Israeli issue of 2422004
commemorated their first astronaut was a revised version of the stamps issued in
advance of Ilan Ramonrsquos flight see page 22
At least one territory under Islamic influence
which has traditionally cashed in on shuttle flight issues did not print a reference to
Israel on their commemoratives for political reasons see page 23
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
8
ORBIT
IYA Europa stamps referencing Galileo For all 2009 Europa stamps see
httpeuropa-stampsblogspotcom
Issue date 3409 15409
17409
25409
4509
4509
5509
7509 6509
7509
8509
1609 12509
9509
Hungary below 8509
Azerbaijan below right 13409
9
ORBIT
Collecting US Space Covers by Bruce Cranford Part Two
Monitoring tracking mission control and communications Satellite and manned vehicle tracking stations have had a complex history The number of tracking sites grew from a few down range sites for the Eastern and Western Ranges in the 1950s to many dozens worldwide for the Mercury Gemini and Apollo Programs All manned missions and many satellite missions require constant uninterrupted communications world as the satellite orbits the earth or travels through space Many tracking stations used existing facilities or were located on existing sites Many of these sites were located at NASA facilities Army Navy and Air Force facilities (including planes and ships) Where possible tracking stations were located on foreign soil in partnership with the host government Some collect covers cancelled at all the tracking stationssites worldwide for each manned launch
The number of tracking stations began to decline as the manned flight program moved into the Apollo Program due primarily to cost reductions from improved satellite communication technology Satellites now orbiting the earth do a better job of tracking and communicating with other satellites and manned vehicles than earth-bound stations The US Department of Defense has tracking and communication stations for their satellites but for security reasons do not advertise the site=s existence Commercial amp government communication satellites systems are the exception and are increasing the number of Earth based communications sitesstations Most countries worldwide have satellite communications capability within their own country With the advent of communication satellites including television and internet communications nearly every home in the US has the potential to receive signals from satellites Activities include cancellations at monitoring tracking control and communications sites when contact is first made with the
satellitespacecraft Interest in this area declined after the Apollo program
Activities in space Once the satellitespacecraft reaches space many activities are of interest to collectors For unmanned missions they include
i) orbital changes ii) insertion into a trajectory which may take the
spacecraft to another planet moon asteroid or an observation point in space (eg Lagrange 2 GEO)
iii) reaching a specific program milestone (eg flyby of a celestial object in service for a communications satellite)
iv) arriving at or departing from a celestial object (eg arriving at Mars)
v) impacting or landing and vi) end of mission
For manned missions they may include dockings spacewalks accomplishing a specific mission milestone undocking The USPS has produced very few covers for sale to the public
that have been flown into space The USPS produced officially flown space covers on 19830830 They were flown on the Challenger STS 008 It is the current policy for both NASA and the USPS that mail will not be delivered to or received from the
US astronauts on the International Space Station A few space covers were flown into space some illegally during the early manned program (Mercury Gemini Apollo) The Smithsonian=s Postal Museum in Washington DC has examples these covers
Recovery Spacecraft recovery is typically limited to manned space vehicles and early spy satellites From Mercury through the Apollo missions the recovery sites were the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans The US Navy deployed ships at the recovery site to retrieve the astronauts and their capsule This changed when the Space Transportation System (STS) was developed The STS Space Shuttles were designed for conventional aircraft landing The two major sites are Edwards Air Force Base California and Kennedy Space Center Florida Early spy satellites required the recovery photographic film in the air over the ocean to prevent damaged to land based structures and humans and to prevent the film from falling into the wrong hands if the Air Force missed the recovery capsule Newer communications technology has eliminated the need to recover spy satellite film capsules NASA has several new programs that will return material from space and will require recovering of the returning payload Nearly all earth orbiting satellites and those less fortunate that never made it into orbit will eventually renter the atmosphere Depending on the size and materials some will burn up and some may make it to the ground (eg SKYLAB)
Cachets A variety of cachet types have been and are being used in the US from no markings to high quality graphics For a general description of space cover cachets available in the US see Appendix Space Covers The most popular are multi color printed cachets using archival inks (Figure 103)
Envelopes and postcards Two types of envelopes are popular with US collectors with the size designated as letter (6) and business (10 ) Post cards are occasionally used in the US but the most popular is the 6 envelope Postal Stationery and Official Mail covers are also used See Appendix Space Covers Stamps or Postage
Philatelic Organizations For the collector of space covers which are
philatelic material there are three major organizations that offer information about space covers (See section 14 for addresses)
I) The Space Unit (httpstargate1usacomstamps ) formed in 1958 provides the majority of information for collectors of US space covers It publishes a by-monthly publication called the AAstrophile Journal of Astrophilately
ii) American Philatelic Society (APS) (httpwwwstampsorg) the largest nonprofit society in the world for stamp collectors that provides a number of services for stamp collectors and postal historians
10
ORBIT ORBIT
The APS existed before the first satellite was launched in 1957 The APS library is a great source of philatelic historical information The collector can borrow material contacting the American Philatelic Research Library (APRL)
iii) The American Topical Association (ATA) Organizations that have since ceased to exist include
the Explorer and Inner and Outer Space Past issues are available from the American Philatelic Research Library and the Space Unit See 14 Sources of Information
How covers are made Space covers are typically made from envelopes (letter 6 or business size 10) with at least 25 rag content and archival quality The acid left in paper from the manufacturing process turns the paper yellow with age and eventually destroys the paper Archival quality envelopes are
acid free have 25 rag content and will survive storage for long periods of time They cost more but result in a better space cover Envelopes purchased from the USPS or those used by organizations are typically not archival
Some collectors choose to make envelops from space related documents (maps figures photographs) This makes for an interesting envelope but be concerned about the archival quality of the paper and adhesives If you plan to make envelopes with different dimensions than the standard envelopes used by the USPS check with the USPS to ensure
the envelope is acceptable Some collectors use post cards or make post cards
for space covers The thickness of the papercardboard must be greater than that of the envelops in order to give the card the necessary stiffness and strength to survive the postal handling system The same caution about dimensions and archival ability applies to post cards For more information see Space Covers Definition and Description
Short history of space covers and types US space covers started in 1958 with the launch or attempted launch of the first US satellites (VANGUARD and EXPLORER) Space covers have been produced for every US satellite launch or attempted launch since 1958 Many space events have also been commemorated by space covers Space covers have been produced for foreign satellites launched by the US and US satellites launched by other countries US Space Cover manufactures have also produced space covers for non US satellites launched by other countries and various space events both US and foreign Space covers from past events can be purchased or traded from a number of different sources in the US and around the world See section 12 Sources of Space Covers It is unfortunate by some space cover manufactures have produced covers of suspect authenticity or outright forgeries Excellent sources of information are Bulver and the Astrophile see section 14 Sources of Information
Different methods are use to create and deliver space covers to the collector The more popular are
- Manufactured cachets applied to covers sold covers as own (eg Space Voyage Orbit Goldcraft Space Craft Beck)
- Manufactured cachets applied to covers sold covers through a reseller (eg Havekotte)
- Manufactured cachets sold or given cachets to others (eg Swanson Dubeau)
- Given or purchased cachets applied to covers covers sold as own (eg Dubeau)
- Given or purchased cachets applied to covers covers sold through a reseller (eg Whitney)
- Given or purchased covers sold covers as own - Given or purchased covers with cachets added
information to cover sold covers as own (eg Titusville Moonport Stamp Club Dubeau)
Given or purchased covers with cachets added information to cover sold covers through a reseller
Sources for space covers The collector has two options for obtaining space covers 1) purchase them or 2) make one=s own But the buyer-
beware should always be practiced Many great references are listed in section 14 Sources of Information and the Bibliography and should be read before purchasing space covers Many attempts have been made to identifycatalog all the space covers produce in the USby US Manufacturersfor US space Events None are complete Some catalogs may focus on a specific topic eg APOLLO Program Be that as it may something is better than nothing The following is a list of some of the more comprehensive listcatalogs listed in alphabetical order and found in the bibliography Courtney Davis Dubeau 2
Lollini Ramkissoon2 Vukotich and Wilhelm
The following is a partial list of space cover providersmanufacturersproducerssellers for US events (as of 2005)Astrophile 20021
- Goddard Space Flight Stamp Club Box 261 Greenbelt MD 20768 ‑‑0261
- JPL Stamp Club PO Box 771 La Canada CA 91012‑0771 httpwwwjplrecclubscaltechedustampindexshtml
- Resellers A good source is the Astrophile - Space Coast Philately PO box 446 Cape
Canaveral FL 32920 - Space equipment manufacturer individuals companies organizations clubs - SpaceCoast Cover services 1190
Montego Bay Dr Merritt Island FL 32953 - Stamp shows A good source of information about local stamp shows is
Linn=s Stamp News Astrophile and the APS - Titusville Moonport Stamp Club PO Box
6071 Titusville FL 32782 - Web sites httpstargate1usacom
stampsresourcehtm Auctions Space Unit Tom Steiner PO Box 550 Northville MI 48167 Web sites (eg E-Bay)
Most US space events are documented by space cover manufacturers Whether it is a major manned launch or a rocket motor test someone usually produces a space cover
11
ORBIT
commemorating the event This was more evident during manned programs See Space Covers Definition and Description
Making your own space cover Place the necessary postage on the envelopecard
At this point you have several options Put a return address on the envelopescard Include a Self Address Stamped Envelope (SASE) for the return of your covers The types of addressing will depend if you want the address to be a permanent part of the space cover or removable after the cover is returned to you Use a live gummed label that is removable if you do not want the address to be part of the cover Contact the post office where you want the envelope to be cancelled to determine if - a) they will hold the covers until the day of the event b) cancel them on that day and c)place the cancelled covers in the mail to you Follow the instruction of the post office
After receiving the envelopescards from the post
office (which are now Space Covers) many collectors apply a cachet to the Space Cover and place additional information inside the cover It is recommended that you identify who made the space cover and cachet in or on the Space Cover For more information see Space Covers Definition and Description
The following are the more popular post offices that
service space covers (as of 2005)Astrophile 20021 - Postmaster Kennedy Space Center Fl 32815 (about
1 week before the event)
- Window Services Unit Houston GPO 401 Franklin St Houston TX 77201-9999
Postmaster Edwards AFB CA 93523
Sources of Information
- Ad Astra Magazine of the National Space Society 922
Pennsylvania Ave SE Washington DC 20003 httpwwwnssorg
- American Philatelic Research Library (APRL) 100 Match Factory Place Bellefonte PA 16823 wwwstamplibraryorg
- American Philatelic Society American Philatelist Journal of the American Philatelic Society APS 100 Oakwood Ave PO Box 8000 State College PA 16803 Phone 814‑237 ‑3803 Fax 814 ‑237‑6128 httpwwwstampsorg
- Aviation Week and Space Technology 1221 Avenue of the Americas New York NY httpwwwaviationweekcom
- Bulver Ramkissoon Winick A Study of Suspect Space Covers 2001 Space Unit see Astrophile in the Bibliography
- Cranford Bruce ldquoSpace Covers Dictionary amp Identifier 2006 Editionrdquo Bruce Cranford 1 Cliffe Hill Ct Potomac MD 20854 USA ISBN 978-0-9711657-1-7
- Explorer International Association of Space Philatelists BO Box 302 Yonkers NY 10710 Editor Bill York 780 West End Ave Apt 11F New York NY 10025 No longer in business
- FIP Section for Astrophilately Joseacute Bergamin 16 6C 28030 Madrid Spain wwwastrophilatelycom Astrophile 200201
- Final Frontier Magazine PO Box 20089 Minneapolis MN 55420
- Linn=s Stamp News PO Box 29 Sidney OH 45365-0029 wwwLinnscom 800-837-0194
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration NASA 300 E Street SW Washington DC 20024‑3210 USA httpwwwhqnasagov
- Orbit Newsletter of the British based ASSS Orbit which had a special section on space stamps and postmarks httpwwwasssutvinternetcom Brian Lockyer The Secretary ASSS 21 Exford Close Weston‑Super‑Mare Somerset BS23 4RE Great Britain
- Quest The history of Spaceflight Magazine CSPACE 123 32nd St SE Grand Rapids MI 49509-0331 Glen Swanson httpwwwspaceeduquest
- Smithsonian Air amp Space Magazine monthly 900 Jefferson Dr Washington DC 20560 httpwwwsiedu
- Smithsonian National Postal Museum 2 Massachusetts Ave NE Washington DC 20002 (202) 33‑5555httpwwwpostalmuseumsiedu
- Space Unit President Tom Steiner PO Box 550 Northville MI 48167-0550 (As of 2005) publishes The Astrophile Member of the American Philatelic Association American Topical Association httpstargate1usacomstamps
- Space Week weekly publication of Army Times Publishing Co 6883 Commercial Drive Springfield VA 22159-0500
- Spaceflight The international Magazine of Space and Astronautics published by the British Interplanetary Society (BIS) 2729 South Lambeth Road London SW8 1SZ England httpfreespacevirginnetbisbisBishtm - US Library of Congress The Library of Congress 101
Independence Ave SE Washington DC 20540 (202) 707‑5000 httpwwwlocgov
- US Postal Service (USPS) Washington DC 20260-2435 (httpwwwuspsgov )
- USPS Stamp Fulfillment Service PO Box 219424 Kansas City MO 64121-9424 1-800-782-6724 fax 816-545-1212 wwwstampsonlinecom - Web Sites
- Friends and Partners in Space 1999 httpsolarrtdutkedu7Ejgreenfpspacehtml
- Mark Wade s Encyclopedia Astronautica 1998 httpsolarrtdutkedu~mwadespaceflthtm
- International Spacecraft and Launch Vehicle Names Glossary 2003 httpwwwspacecraftnamesinfo
- NASA httpwww‑paokscnasagovkscpaoscheduleschedulehtm
- Spaceflight Now httpwwwspaceflightnowcomtrackingindexhtml
- Gunther=s Space Page httpwwwskyrocketdespacespacehtml
- Contractors (many have merged or gone out of business since 1958)
Lockheed Martin httplmmsexternallmcocomremospascieoshtml Boeing httpwwwboeingcomflashhtml Orbital Science httpwwworbitalcom
Editorrsquos Note
Bruce has asked me to point out that he is not the
owner of the flown Apollo XI cover which I attributed to his collection on page 40 of the last edition
He just wishes he was
12
ORBIT
50th anniversary of NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration was established
by the National Aeronautics and Space Act on July 29 1958 replacing its predecessor the National Advisory Committee for
Aeronautics (NACA) The agency became operational on October 1 1958
13
ORBIT
So Who Did Invent the Telescope
A memorable fact from a different viewpoint
Did you know that in 2009 it is four hundred years since the first great discoveries in space took place Then it so happened that for the first time in the history of mankind craters on the moon some details on the planets and amongst other things the four great moons around Jupiter were seen Very soon the observation instruments became better and larger and gradually many more details on the moon and planets were seen Rings were discovered around Saturn bands of clouds and areas of storms on Jupiter and polar caps and surface structures on Mars
Now you may think where is the writer going with this
That is quite simple it so happened that in 2008 precisely 400 years ago the telescope was invented and that happened in our own little Holland For a long time it was not determined who had made the first Dutch viewer as these were called (see the New Zealand stamp issued 12-2-1997)
Zacharias Jansen and Hans Lipperhey both resident in Middelburg were seen as inventors of the telescope but there were other people who claimed this discovery It was said that Robert Bacon (1214-1294) already knew how the instrument could be made Jacob Metius of Alkmaar could also be the inventor he knew Jansen and Lipperhey and had also visited them Then there is also the Italian Raffael Gualterotti (1543-1639) of whom it is known with some certainty that in 1598 he had already made a viewer However this man evidently did not recognise the significance of his discovery and did not act upon it After very lengthy investigation it was finally decided that Hans Lipperhey (1570-1619 right) could lay claim to this invention
As often happens with new inventions the telescope was first seen as a military instrument to outsmart the enemy With the telescope the movements of the enemy could now be seen and followed over a much greater distance so that timely countermeasures could be taken It was the famous scholar Galileo Galileiuml (1564-1642) who heard about this discovery from others and immediately saw what further possibilities this instrument had to offer Based on the data he could get hold of Galileiuml himself made a telescope that magnified nine times Soon after he made another that
magnified to almost thirty times These instruments consisted of two lenses in a tube a lightly curved convex lens in front and at the rear a powerful concave lens as an eyepiece We must not expect too much from these first telescopes because the
optics at that time were far from the quality that we now know
At that time it was very difficult to make pure glass and the lenses were really rather small in proportion to the focal length so as a result the luminosity was mediocre To get a good lens a piece of clear rock crystal was sometimes used We can suppose that the first telescopes were of a lesser optical quality than simple binoculars in our time Nevertheless in 1609 Galileiuml was able to see craters on the moon and Venus as a sickle for the first time He was the discoverer of the first four moons of Jupiter and he concluded from sunspots that the rotation of the sun around its axis was about 25 days
The discovery of the telescope heralded a new era in space research in the widest sense of the word In my opinion we could call this the start of space exploration such as we in space travel now readily do Meanwhile all the nearby planets in our solar system have been explored with a space probe one or more times except Plutohelliphellipbut yes we cannot call that a planet any longer We have even been to the Moon and new discoveries are reported daily also in our own solar system moons of minor planets new rings around Uranus and small moons around the giant planets Jupiter and Saturn
Although in the very beginning there were no space probes doing investigation it is my opinion that we may take the opportunity during this commemoration year to recognise the fact that the telescope was invented four hundred years ago After all this was the beginning of a great voyage of discovery in space Therefore the year 2009 has been declared the International Year of Astronomy 2009 - IYA 2009 - by the UN (on the recommendation of the International Astronomical Union) The UN has designated UNESCO as the body chiefly responsible for IYA 2009 and the IAU as a support organisation for practical interpretation
HN Frankener March 2009
Specially translated for Orbit by Eleanor Coker this feature by Henk Nieuwenhuis first appeared in issue 24 2009 of Nieuwsbrief the journal of
Ruimtevaart Filatelie Club Nederland and is produced (with different illustrations) by
permission of the author and Editor Arie Olckers
14
ORBIT
Our Astonishing Nicolaus Copernicus By Stan Wekka Bydgoszcz Poland with Jeff Dugdale
IYA could not go past without our journal
marking once again this great thinker so here
is a specially commissioned and edited article
from an Orbit enthusiast in Poland
Nicolaus Copernicus was born 19 February 1473 in the wonderful City of Toruń on the River Vistula and died 24 May 1543 in Frombork
Consider this famous astronomermdashmathematician- doctor of medicine and monetary system expert (economist ) - physicianmdashclassical scholar - jurist - artistmdashtranslatormdashmilitary leadermdashdiplomat and hellipCatholic cleric - Treasure of our Earth NICOLAUS COPERNICUS (in Polish Mikolaj Kopernik)
He has been honoured in international philately on hundreds of postage-stamps items of postal ndashstationery commemorative cancellationshellip
His name is on Navyrsquos ships planes streets places schools universities factories on Moon satellites planetoidshellip
There have been are currently and will be in the future many
different celebrations of that Great Man of Geniushellip as for inst World Philatelic Exhibition ldquoPoland 1973rdquo organized from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of His Birth US carnet issued 1973 presents three proofs of stamps from Poland and the US
dedicated to Copernicus
A selection of Polish postage-stamps presents
Him as most important citizen of Poland and World see a page from my stock book opposite filled with Polish stamps for the great man
In this short memorial to His Life and Work we must mention a few events of his rich life His family had its roots in the Polish Region of Lower Silesia ( today in SW Poland ) On a few covers and post-cards are shown different cancels of the KOPERNIKI Post Office initiated from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of the Great Astronomerrsquos Birth
After the death of Nicolausrsquo father his uncle Bishop Watzenrode of Warmia looked after the family and saw young Copernicus into university at Cracov As an 18 year old youth he presented himself at the Jagiellonian University in 1491 and studied geometry trigonometry mathematics and astronomy there for the next four years
15
ORBIT
His teachers were famous in those times astronomers and mathematicians such as John of Glogoacutew (1445-1507) who had written a commentary on Ptolemyrsquos Cosmography and Wojciech Brudzewski (1445-1497) who was hostile to the geocentric system expounded by Ptolemy It was he who infected Copernicus with his theories based on the writings of Aristarchus of Samos three centuries before Christ Their teachings bore fruit in due course in Copernicusrsquos De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium published at Nuremberg at the printing house of John Petreius in 1543 This stamp issued in March 1942 and cancelled on September 11th 1943 depicts a monument to Nicolaus Copernicus within the quadrangle of the library of the
Jagiellionian University
In due course Copernicus proved that the Geocentric System by Ptolemy was not true and his Heliocentric or Solar System was accurate This is shown on block Michel Cat Bl52 and 2 interesting philatelic items showing His most famous work De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium his autograph and the Solar System on the postmark
In 1510 Copernicus settled at Frombork and having bought the Castlersquos Tower he established his Observatory and Library
there as seen on rare pair of especially overprinted (middle vertical black overprints ) post-cards and stamps Michel Cat 805 1194
Many people assign a single nationality to Copernicus Nazi Germany claimed Copernicus to have been purely German as on stamps Michel Cat 100 104 However Germans destroyed the monument to Copernicus in the quadrangle of the library (shown on stamps Michel Cat 396 446) at the University of Cracov in 1944
After World War II Poles rebuilt that Monument and it is now displayed at Cracovrsquos Botanical Gardens
During World War II Polish Prisoners of War of The Woldenberg Camp II C organized by Germans for Polish
officers initiated Camprsquos Post there and issued many interesting philatelic values One of them is a complete of souvenir sheet or block and set of 3 stamps dedicated to 400th Anniversary of Copernicus Death (shown right)
Warsawrsquos Scientific Society initiated the investigation of Copernicusrsquo tomb and remnants in 1802 but found little of interest In 2004 Prof George Gąsowski of The Institute of Anthropology and Archaeology in Pułtusk initiated new wave of investigation and in 2005-2008 he found human remains in the crypt of The Cathedral at Frombork After the war with Sweden war in the 17th century the Swedish robbed many Polish national treasures and among them were books formerly belonging to Copernicus One of books was ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo found in the Museum of Uppsala In that book were found two of Copernicusrsquo hairs which were examined forensically
In due course genetic comparison of the alleged Copernicus remnants found in Frombork Cathedral crypt and those two hairs in the ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo at Uppsala confirmed that the Frombork remains were those of Copernicus proving once and for all where his tomb lies
Polish anthropologists have since tried to do a reconstruction of Copernicusrsquo face and published their results in the Polish
press see below
16
ORBIT
Un-manned Satellites on Postage Stamps 31 By Guest Contributors Don Hillger and Garry Toth
A version of this article first appeared in The Astrophile for July-August 2008
The Elektron Series This is the thirty-first in a series of articles about un-
manned satellites on postage stamps This article
features the Russian Elektron-series satellites Four Elektron satellites were successfully launched with
Elektron-1 and 2 paired up on 30 January 1964 and Elektron-3 and 4 similarly paired on 10 July 1964
Elektron was one of the earliest Soviet scientific satellite missions to be authorized following the initial
Sputnik series The spacecraft had the mission of mapping the van Allen radiation belts at higher
inclinations than previous US satellites had followed In these missions two different types of spacecraft
were paired and launched together as mentioned
above Elektron-1 and 3 were put into a lower orbit to map the inner van Allen belt while Elekton-2 and 4
were boosted to a higher orbit to study the outer belt
For identification purposes Elektron-1 and 3 had
cylindrical bodies 075 m in diameter and 13 m long with six solar panels extending outward almost like
paddles Elektron-2 and 4 were shaped like the cupola of a public building in the basic form of a cylinder with
a flattened and broadened end with a diameter of 18 m and a height of 24 m
Both Elektron types are easily distinguished and are represented on many postal items mostly from
eastern bloc nations Some of the items show both Elektron-1 and 2 (or Elektron-3 and 4) since they
were launched together
A checklist of postal items identified as showing the
E l e k t r o n - s e r i e s s a t e l l i t e s ( h t t p wwwciracolostateedurammhillgerElektronhtm) is
available on the Website developed by the authors for the un-manned satellites featured in this series of
articles (httpwwwciracolostateedurammhillger
satelliteshtm) E-mail correspondence with the authors is welcome Don Hillger can be reached at
hillgerciracolostateedu and Garry Toth at garry_tothhotmailcom
Elektron-A
From Mark Wadersquos site httpwwwastronautixcom
Elektron-B
17
ORBIT
18
ORBIT
Flight STS-107 Commander Rick Husband Pilot William McCool MS Michael Anderson MS David Brown MS Laurel Clark MS Ilan Ramon MS Kalpana Chawla KSC Launch Date 1612003 Proposed KSC Landing 1203 Purpose SPACEHAB Double Main Payload Module
Shuttle Story 2003 STS ndash107 The Columbia Disaster
Columbia disintegrates on re-entry killing all seven astronauts on board
ldquocontingency declaredrdquo
STS-107 was a multi-disciplinary microgravity and Earth science research mission with a multitude of international scientific
investigations conducted continuously during 16 days in orbit
The seven-member crew died on February 1 2003 when the
shuttle disintegrated during re-entry into the Earths atmosphere The cause of the accident was determined to be a piece of foam
that broke off during launch and damaged the thermal protection system components (reinforced carbon-carbon panels and
thermal protection tiles) on the leading edge of the left wing of
the Shuttle orbiter causing an extensive heat build-up During re-entry the damaged wing slowly overheated and came apart
eventually leading to loss of control and total disintegration of the vehicle
STS-107 carried the SPACEHAB Double Research Module on its inaugural flight the Freestar experiment (mounted on a
Hitchhiker Program rack) and the Extended Duration Orbiter pallet
One of the experiments a video taken to study atmospheric dust may have detected a new atmospheric phenomenon
dubbed a TIGER (Transient Ionospheric
Glow Emission in Red)
On board the Columbia was a copy of a drawing by Petr Ginz the editor-in-chief of
the magazine Vedem who depicted what he
imagined the Earth looked like from the Moon when he was a 14-year-old prisoner in the
Tereziacuten concentration camp The copy was in the possession of Ilan Ramon and was lost in
the crash
19
ORBIT
Historical Document
Downloaded by your Editor on the day of the tragedy this page from a NASA
website presents starkly the dreadful
truth of what has just happened
The opening phrasing ldquoA contingency has been declaredrdquo is very much in the
laconic and measured tradition of Apollo
13rsquos ldquoHouston we have a problemrdquo and the ldquoObviously a major malfunctionrdquo
used by Mission Control of the Challenger tragedy in January 1986
Below and at bottom of opposite page Launch and Conclusion covers for the
flight The brightly coloured mission patch is appropriately printed in black
20
ORBIT
21
ORBIT
Faux commemorative dollar bills with a
value of ldquo107rdquo were issued to mark the occasion
The Israeli issue of 2422004
commemorated their first astronaut was a revised version of the stamps issued in
advance of Ilan Ramonrsquos flight see page 22
At least one territory under Islamic influence
which has traditionally cashed in on shuttle flight issues did not print a reference to
Israel on their commemoratives for political reasons see page 23
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
9
ORBIT
Collecting US Space Covers by Bruce Cranford Part Two
Monitoring tracking mission control and communications Satellite and manned vehicle tracking stations have had a complex history The number of tracking sites grew from a few down range sites for the Eastern and Western Ranges in the 1950s to many dozens worldwide for the Mercury Gemini and Apollo Programs All manned missions and many satellite missions require constant uninterrupted communications world as the satellite orbits the earth or travels through space Many tracking stations used existing facilities or were located on existing sites Many of these sites were located at NASA facilities Army Navy and Air Force facilities (including planes and ships) Where possible tracking stations were located on foreign soil in partnership with the host government Some collect covers cancelled at all the tracking stationssites worldwide for each manned launch
The number of tracking stations began to decline as the manned flight program moved into the Apollo Program due primarily to cost reductions from improved satellite communication technology Satellites now orbiting the earth do a better job of tracking and communicating with other satellites and manned vehicles than earth-bound stations The US Department of Defense has tracking and communication stations for their satellites but for security reasons do not advertise the site=s existence Commercial amp government communication satellites systems are the exception and are increasing the number of Earth based communications sitesstations Most countries worldwide have satellite communications capability within their own country With the advent of communication satellites including television and internet communications nearly every home in the US has the potential to receive signals from satellites Activities include cancellations at monitoring tracking control and communications sites when contact is first made with the
satellitespacecraft Interest in this area declined after the Apollo program
Activities in space Once the satellitespacecraft reaches space many activities are of interest to collectors For unmanned missions they include
i) orbital changes ii) insertion into a trajectory which may take the
spacecraft to another planet moon asteroid or an observation point in space (eg Lagrange 2 GEO)
iii) reaching a specific program milestone (eg flyby of a celestial object in service for a communications satellite)
iv) arriving at or departing from a celestial object (eg arriving at Mars)
v) impacting or landing and vi) end of mission
For manned missions they may include dockings spacewalks accomplishing a specific mission milestone undocking The USPS has produced very few covers for sale to the public
that have been flown into space The USPS produced officially flown space covers on 19830830 They were flown on the Challenger STS 008 It is the current policy for both NASA and the USPS that mail will not be delivered to or received from the
US astronauts on the International Space Station A few space covers were flown into space some illegally during the early manned program (Mercury Gemini Apollo) The Smithsonian=s Postal Museum in Washington DC has examples these covers
Recovery Spacecraft recovery is typically limited to manned space vehicles and early spy satellites From Mercury through the Apollo missions the recovery sites were the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans The US Navy deployed ships at the recovery site to retrieve the astronauts and their capsule This changed when the Space Transportation System (STS) was developed The STS Space Shuttles were designed for conventional aircraft landing The two major sites are Edwards Air Force Base California and Kennedy Space Center Florida Early spy satellites required the recovery photographic film in the air over the ocean to prevent damaged to land based structures and humans and to prevent the film from falling into the wrong hands if the Air Force missed the recovery capsule Newer communications technology has eliminated the need to recover spy satellite film capsules NASA has several new programs that will return material from space and will require recovering of the returning payload Nearly all earth orbiting satellites and those less fortunate that never made it into orbit will eventually renter the atmosphere Depending on the size and materials some will burn up and some may make it to the ground (eg SKYLAB)
Cachets A variety of cachet types have been and are being used in the US from no markings to high quality graphics For a general description of space cover cachets available in the US see Appendix Space Covers The most popular are multi color printed cachets using archival inks (Figure 103)
Envelopes and postcards Two types of envelopes are popular with US collectors with the size designated as letter (6) and business (10 ) Post cards are occasionally used in the US but the most popular is the 6 envelope Postal Stationery and Official Mail covers are also used See Appendix Space Covers Stamps or Postage
Philatelic Organizations For the collector of space covers which are
philatelic material there are three major organizations that offer information about space covers (See section 14 for addresses)
I) The Space Unit (httpstargate1usacomstamps ) formed in 1958 provides the majority of information for collectors of US space covers It publishes a by-monthly publication called the AAstrophile Journal of Astrophilately
ii) American Philatelic Society (APS) (httpwwwstampsorg) the largest nonprofit society in the world for stamp collectors that provides a number of services for stamp collectors and postal historians
10
ORBIT ORBIT
The APS existed before the first satellite was launched in 1957 The APS library is a great source of philatelic historical information The collector can borrow material contacting the American Philatelic Research Library (APRL)
iii) The American Topical Association (ATA) Organizations that have since ceased to exist include
the Explorer and Inner and Outer Space Past issues are available from the American Philatelic Research Library and the Space Unit See 14 Sources of Information
How covers are made Space covers are typically made from envelopes (letter 6 or business size 10) with at least 25 rag content and archival quality The acid left in paper from the manufacturing process turns the paper yellow with age and eventually destroys the paper Archival quality envelopes are
acid free have 25 rag content and will survive storage for long periods of time They cost more but result in a better space cover Envelopes purchased from the USPS or those used by organizations are typically not archival
Some collectors choose to make envelops from space related documents (maps figures photographs) This makes for an interesting envelope but be concerned about the archival quality of the paper and adhesives If you plan to make envelopes with different dimensions than the standard envelopes used by the USPS check with the USPS to ensure
the envelope is acceptable Some collectors use post cards or make post cards
for space covers The thickness of the papercardboard must be greater than that of the envelops in order to give the card the necessary stiffness and strength to survive the postal handling system The same caution about dimensions and archival ability applies to post cards For more information see Space Covers Definition and Description
Short history of space covers and types US space covers started in 1958 with the launch or attempted launch of the first US satellites (VANGUARD and EXPLORER) Space covers have been produced for every US satellite launch or attempted launch since 1958 Many space events have also been commemorated by space covers Space covers have been produced for foreign satellites launched by the US and US satellites launched by other countries US Space Cover manufactures have also produced space covers for non US satellites launched by other countries and various space events both US and foreign Space covers from past events can be purchased or traded from a number of different sources in the US and around the world See section 12 Sources of Space Covers It is unfortunate by some space cover manufactures have produced covers of suspect authenticity or outright forgeries Excellent sources of information are Bulver and the Astrophile see section 14 Sources of Information
Different methods are use to create and deliver space covers to the collector The more popular are
- Manufactured cachets applied to covers sold covers as own (eg Space Voyage Orbit Goldcraft Space Craft Beck)
- Manufactured cachets applied to covers sold covers through a reseller (eg Havekotte)
- Manufactured cachets sold or given cachets to others (eg Swanson Dubeau)
- Given or purchased cachets applied to covers covers sold as own (eg Dubeau)
- Given or purchased cachets applied to covers covers sold through a reseller (eg Whitney)
- Given or purchased covers sold covers as own - Given or purchased covers with cachets added
information to cover sold covers as own (eg Titusville Moonport Stamp Club Dubeau)
Given or purchased covers with cachets added information to cover sold covers through a reseller
Sources for space covers The collector has two options for obtaining space covers 1) purchase them or 2) make one=s own But the buyer-
beware should always be practiced Many great references are listed in section 14 Sources of Information and the Bibliography and should be read before purchasing space covers Many attempts have been made to identifycatalog all the space covers produce in the USby US Manufacturersfor US space Events None are complete Some catalogs may focus on a specific topic eg APOLLO Program Be that as it may something is better than nothing The following is a list of some of the more comprehensive listcatalogs listed in alphabetical order and found in the bibliography Courtney Davis Dubeau 2
Lollini Ramkissoon2 Vukotich and Wilhelm
The following is a partial list of space cover providersmanufacturersproducerssellers for US events (as of 2005)Astrophile 20021
- Goddard Space Flight Stamp Club Box 261 Greenbelt MD 20768 ‑‑0261
- JPL Stamp Club PO Box 771 La Canada CA 91012‑0771 httpwwwjplrecclubscaltechedustampindexshtml
- Resellers A good source is the Astrophile - Space Coast Philately PO box 446 Cape
Canaveral FL 32920 - Space equipment manufacturer individuals companies organizations clubs - SpaceCoast Cover services 1190
Montego Bay Dr Merritt Island FL 32953 - Stamp shows A good source of information about local stamp shows is
Linn=s Stamp News Astrophile and the APS - Titusville Moonport Stamp Club PO Box
6071 Titusville FL 32782 - Web sites httpstargate1usacom
stampsresourcehtm Auctions Space Unit Tom Steiner PO Box 550 Northville MI 48167 Web sites (eg E-Bay)
Most US space events are documented by space cover manufacturers Whether it is a major manned launch or a rocket motor test someone usually produces a space cover
11
ORBIT
commemorating the event This was more evident during manned programs See Space Covers Definition and Description
Making your own space cover Place the necessary postage on the envelopecard
At this point you have several options Put a return address on the envelopescard Include a Self Address Stamped Envelope (SASE) for the return of your covers The types of addressing will depend if you want the address to be a permanent part of the space cover or removable after the cover is returned to you Use a live gummed label that is removable if you do not want the address to be part of the cover Contact the post office where you want the envelope to be cancelled to determine if - a) they will hold the covers until the day of the event b) cancel them on that day and c)place the cancelled covers in the mail to you Follow the instruction of the post office
After receiving the envelopescards from the post
office (which are now Space Covers) many collectors apply a cachet to the Space Cover and place additional information inside the cover It is recommended that you identify who made the space cover and cachet in or on the Space Cover For more information see Space Covers Definition and Description
The following are the more popular post offices that
service space covers (as of 2005)Astrophile 20021 - Postmaster Kennedy Space Center Fl 32815 (about
1 week before the event)
- Window Services Unit Houston GPO 401 Franklin St Houston TX 77201-9999
Postmaster Edwards AFB CA 93523
Sources of Information
- Ad Astra Magazine of the National Space Society 922
Pennsylvania Ave SE Washington DC 20003 httpwwwnssorg
- American Philatelic Research Library (APRL) 100 Match Factory Place Bellefonte PA 16823 wwwstamplibraryorg
- American Philatelic Society American Philatelist Journal of the American Philatelic Society APS 100 Oakwood Ave PO Box 8000 State College PA 16803 Phone 814‑237 ‑3803 Fax 814 ‑237‑6128 httpwwwstampsorg
- Aviation Week and Space Technology 1221 Avenue of the Americas New York NY httpwwwaviationweekcom
- Bulver Ramkissoon Winick A Study of Suspect Space Covers 2001 Space Unit see Astrophile in the Bibliography
- Cranford Bruce ldquoSpace Covers Dictionary amp Identifier 2006 Editionrdquo Bruce Cranford 1 Cliffe Hill Ct Potomac MD 20854 USA ISBN 978-0-9711657-1-7
- Explorer International Association of Space Philatelists BO Box 302 Yonkers NY 10710 Editor Bill York 780 West End Ave Apt 11F New York NY 10025 No longer in business
- FIP Section for Astrophilately Joseacute Bergamin 16 6C 28030 Madrid Spain wwwastrophilatelycom Astrophile 200201
- Final Frontier Magazine PO Box 20089 Minneapolis MN 55420
- Linn=s Stamp News PO Box 29 Sidney OH 45365-0029 wwwLinnscom 800-837-0194
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration NASA 300 E Street SW Washington DC 20024‑3210 USA httpwwwhqnasagov
- Orbit Newsletter of the British based ASSS Orbit which had a special section on space stamps and postmarks httpwwwasssutvinternetcom Brian Lockyer The Secretary ASSS 21 Exford Close Weston‑Super‑Mare Somerset BS23 4RE Great Britain
- Quest The history of Spaceflight Magazine CSPACE 123 32nd St SE Grand Rapids MI 49509-0331 Glen Swanson httpwwwspaceeduquest
- Smithsonian Air amp Space Magazine monthly 900 Jefferson Dr Washington DC 20560 httpwwwsiedu
- Smithsonian National Postal Museum 2 Massachusetts Ave NE Washington DC 20002 (202) 33‑5555httpwwwpostalmuseumsiedu
- Space Unit President Tom Steiner PO Box 550 Northville MI 48167-0550 (As of 2005) publishes The Astrophile Member of the American Philatelic Association American Topical Association httpstargate1usacomstamps
- Space Week weekly publication of Army Times Publishing Co 6883 Commercial Drive Springfield VA 22159-0500
- Spaceflight The international Magazine of Space and Astronautics published by the British Interplanetary Society (BIS) 2729 South Lambeth Road London SW8 1SZ England httpfreespacevirginnetbisbisBishtm - US Library of Congress The Library of Congress 101
Independence Ave SE Washington DC 20540 (202) 707‑5000 httpwwwlocgov
- US Postal Service (USPS) Washington DC 20260-2435 (httpwwwuspsgov )
- USPS Stamp Fulfillment Service PO Box 219424 Kansas City MO 64121-9424 1-800-782-6724 fax 816-545-1212 wwwstampsonlinecom - Web Sites
- Friends and Partners in Space 1999 httpsolarrtdutkedu7Ejgreenfpspacehtml
- Mark Wade s Encyclopedia Astronautica 1998 httpsolarrtdutkedu~mwadespaceflthtm
- International Spacecraft and Launch Vehicle Names Glossary 2003 httpwwwspacecraftnamesinfo
- NASA httpwww‑paokscnasagovkscpaoscheduleschedulehtm
- Spaceflight Now httpwwwspaceflightnowcomtrackingindexhtml
- Gunther=s Space Page httpwwwskyrocketdespacespacehtml
- Contractors (many have merged or gone out of business since 1958)
Lockheed Martin httplmmsexternallmcocomremospascieoshtml Boeing httpwwwboeingcomflashhtml Orbital Science httpwwworbitalcom
Editorrsquos Note
Bruce has asked me to point out that he is not the
owner of the flown Apollo XI cover which I attributed to his collection on page 40 of the last edition
He just wishes he was
12
ORBIT
50th anniversary of NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration was established
by the National Aeronautics and Space Act on July 29 1958 replacing its predecessor the National Advisory Committee for
Aeronautics (NACA) The agency became operational on October 1 1958
13
ORBIT
So Who Did Invent the Telescope
A memorable fact from a different viewpoint
Did you know that in 2009 it is four hundred years since the first great discoveries in space took place Then it so happened that for the first time in the history of mankind craters on the moon some details on the planets and amongst other things the four great moons around Jupiter were seen Very soon the observation instruments became better and larger and gradually many more details on the moon and planets were seen Rings were discovered around Saturn bands of clouds and areas of storms on Jupiter and polar caps and surface structures on Mars
Now you may think where is the writer going with this
That is quite simple it so happened that in 2008 precisely 400 years ago the telescope was invented and that happened in our own little Holland For a long time it was not determined who had made the first Dutch viewer as these were called (see the New Zealand stamp issued 12-2-1997)
Zacharias Jansen and Hans Lipperhey both resident in Middelburg were seen as inventors of the telescope but there were other people who claimed this discovery It was said that Robert Bacon (1214-1294) already knew how the instrument could be made Jacob Metius of Alkmaar could also be the inventor he knew Jansen and Lipperhey and had also visited them Then there is also the Italian Raffael Gualterotti (1543-1639) of whom it is known with some certainty that in 1598 he had already made a viewer However this man evidently did not recognise the significance of his discovery and did not act upon it After very lengthy investigation it was finally decided that Hans Lipperhey (1570-1619 right) could lay claim to this invention
As often happens with new inventions the telescope was first seen as a military instrument to outsmart the enemy With the telescope the movements of the enemy could now be seen and followed over a much greater distance so that timely countermeasures could be taken It was the famous scholar Galileo Galileiuml (1564-1642) who heard about this discovery from others and immediately saw what further possibilities this instrument had to offer Based on the data he could get hold of Galileiuml himself made a telescope that magnified nine times Soon after he made another that
magnified to almost thirty times These instruments consisted of two lenses in a tube a lightly curved convex lens in front and at the rear a powerful concave lens as an eyepiece We must not expect too much from these first telescopes because the
optics at that time were far from the quality that we now know
At that time it was very difficult to make pure glass and the lenses were really rather small in proportion to the focal length so as a result the luminosity was mediocre To get a good lens a piece of clear rock crystal was sometimes used We can suppose that the first telescopes were of a lesser optical quality than simple binoculars in our time Nevertheless in 1609 Galileiuml was able to see craters on the moon and Venus as a sickle for the first time He was the discoverer of the first four moons of Jupiter and he concluded from sunspots that the rotation of the sun around its axis was about 25 days
The discovery of the telescope heralded a new era in space research in the widest sense of the word In my opinion we could call this the start of space exploration such as we in space travel now readily do Meanwhile all the nearby planets in our solar system have been explored with a space probe one or more times except Plutohelliphellipbut yes we cannot call that a planet any longer We have even been to the Moon and new discoveries are reported daily also in our own solar system moons of minor planets new rings around Uranus and small moons around the giant planets Jupiter and Saturn
Although in the very beginning there were no space probes doing investigation it is my opinion that we may take the opportunity during this commemoration year to recognise the fact that the telescope was invented four hundred years ago After all this was the beginning of a great voyage of discovery in space Therefore the year 2009 has been declared the International Year of Astronomy 2009 - IYA 2009 - by the UN (on the recommendation of the International Astronomical Union) The UN has designated UNESCO as the body chiefly responsible for IYA 2009 and the IAU as a support organisation for practical interpretation
HN Frankener March 2009
Specially translated for Orbit by Eleanor Coker this feature by Henk Nieuwenhuis first appeared in issue 24 2009 of Nieuwsbrief the journal of
Ruimtevaart Filatelie Club Nederland and is produced (with different illustrations) by
permission of the author and Editor Arie Olckers
14
ORBIT
Our Astonishing Nicolaus Copernicus By Stan Wekka Bydgoszcz Poland with Jeff Dugdale
IYA could not go past without our journal
marking once again this great thinker so here
is a specially commissioned and edited article
from an Orbit enthusiast in Poland
Nicolaus Copernicus was born 19 February 1473 in the wonderful City of Toruń on the River Vistula and died 24 May 1543 in Frombork
Consider this famous astronomermdashmathematician- doctor of medicine and monetary system expert (economist ) - physicianmdashclassical scholar - jurist - artistmdashtranslatormdashmilitary leadermdashdiplomat and hellipCatholic cleric - Treasure of our Earth NICOLAUS COPERNICUS (in Polish Mikolaj Kopernik)
He has been honoured in international philately on hundreds of postage-stamps items of postal ndashstationery commemorative cancellationshellip
His name is on Navyrsquos ships planes streets places schools universities factories on Moon satellites planetoidshellip
There have been are currently and will be in the future many
different celebrations of that Great Man of Geniushellip as for inst World Philatelic Exhibition ldquoPoland 1973rdquo organized from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of His Birth US carnet issued 1973 presents three proofs of stamps from Poland and the US
dedicated to Copernicus
A selection of Polish postage-stamps presents
Him as most important citizen of Poland and World see a page from my stock book opposite filled with Polish stamps for the great man
In this short memorial to His Life and Work we must mention a few events of his rich life His family had its roots in the Polish Region of Lower Silesia ( today in SW Poland ) On a few covers and post-cards are shown different cancels of the KOPERNIKI Post Office initiated from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of the Great Astronomerrsquos Birth
After the death of Nicolausrsquo father his uncle Bishop Watzenrode of Warmia looked after the family and saw young Copernicus into university at Cracov As an 18 year old youth he presented himself at the Jagiellonian University in 1491 and studied geometry trigonometry mathematics and astronomy there for the next four years
15
ORBIT
His teachers were famous in those times astronomers and mathematicians such as John of Glogoacutew (1445-1507) who had written a commentary on Ptolemyrsquos Cosmography and Wojciech Brudzewski (1445-1497) who was hostile to the geocentric system expounded by Ptolemy It was he who infected Copernicus with his theories based on the writings of Aristarchus of Samos three centuries before Christ Their teachings bore fruit in due course in Copernicusrsquos De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium published at Nuremberg at the printing house of John Petreius in 1543 This stamp issued in March 1942 and cancelled on September 11th 1943 depicts a monument to Nicolaus Copernicus within the quadrangle of the library of the
Jagiellionian University
In due course Copernicus proved that the Geocentric System by Ptolemy was not true and his Heliocentric or Solar System was accurate This is shown on block Michel Cat Bl52 and 2 interesting philatelic items showing His most famous work De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium his autograph and the Solar System on the postmark
In 1510 Copernicus settled at Frombork and having bought the Castlersquos Tower he established his Observatory and Library
there as seen on rare pair of especially overprinted (middle vertical black overprints ) post-cards and stamps Michel Cat 805 1194
Many people assign a single nationality to Copernicus Nazi Germany claimed Copernicus to have been purely German as on stamps Michel Cat 100 104 However Germans destroyed the monument to Copernicus in the quadrangle of the library (shown on stamps Michel Cat 396 446) at the University of Cracov in 1944
After World War II Poles rebuilt that Monument and it is now displayed at Cracovrsquos Botanical Gardens
During World War II Polish Prisoners of War of The Woldenberg Camp II C organized by Germans for Polish
officers initiated Camprsquos Post there and issued many interesting philatelic values One of them is a complete of souvenir sheet or block and set of 3 stamps dedicated to 400th Anniversary of Copernicus Death (shown right)
Warsawrsquos Scientific Society initiated the investigation of Copernicusrsquo tomb and remnants in 1802 but found little of interest In 2004 Prof George Gąsowski of The Institute of Anthropology and Archaeology in Pułtusk initiated new wave of investigation and in 2005-2008 he found human remains in the crypt of The Cathedral at Frombork After the war with Sweden war in the 17th century the Swedish robbed many Polish national treasures and among them were books formerly belonging to Copernicus One of books was ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo found in the Museum of Uppsala In that book were found two of Copernicusrsquo hairs which were examined forensically
In due course genetic comparison of the alleged Copernicus remnants found in Frombork Cathedral crypt and those two hairs in the ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo at Uppsala confirmed that the Frombork remains were those of Copernicus proving once and for all where his tomb lies
Polish anthropologists have since tried to do a reconstruction of Copernicusrsquo face and published their results in the Polish
press see below
16
ORBIT
Un-manned Satellites on Postage Stamps 31 By Guest Contributors Don Hillger and Garry Toth
A version of this article first appeared in The Astrophile for July-August 2008
The Elektron Series This is the thirty-first in a series of articles about un-
manned satellites on postage stamps This article
features the Russian Elektron-series satellites Four Elektron satellites were successfully launched with
Elektron-1 and 2 paired up on 30 January 1964 and Elektron-3 and 4 similarly paired on 10 July 1964
Elektron was one of the earliest Soviet scientific satellite missions to be authorized following the initial
Sputnik series The spacecraft had the mission of mapping the van Allen radiation belts at higher
inclinations than previous US satellites had followed In these missions two different types of spacecraft
were paired and launched together as mentioned
above Elektron-1 and 3 were put into a lower orbit to map the inner van Allen belt while Elekton-2 and 4
were boosted to a higher orbit to study the outer belt
For identification purposes Elektron-1 and 3 had
cylindrical bodies 075 m in diameter and 13 m long with six solar panels extending outward almost like
paddles Elektron-2 and 4 were shaped like the cupola of a public building in the basic form of a cylinder with
a flattened and broadened end with a diameter of 18 m and a height of 24 m
Both Elektron types are easily distinguished and are represented on many postal items mostly from
eastern bloc nations Some of the items show both Elektron-1 and 2 (or Elektron-3 and 4) since they
were launched together
A checklist of postal items identified as showing the
E l e k t r o n - s e r i e s s a t e l l i t e s ( h t t p wwwciracolostateedurammhillgerElektronhtm) is
available on the Website developed by the authors for the un-manned satellites featured in this series of
articles (httpwwwciracolostateedurammhillger
satelliteshtm) E-mail correspondence with the authors is welcome Don Hillger can be reached at
hillgerciracolostateedu and Garry Toth at garry_tothhotmailcom
Elektron-A
From Mark Wadersquos site httpwwwastronautixcom
Elektron-B
17
ORBIT
18
ORBIT
Flight STS-107 Commander Rick Husband Pilot William McCool MS Michael Anderson MS David Brown MS Laurel Clark MS Ilan Ramon MS Kalpana Chawla KSC Launch Date 1612003 Proposed KSC Landing 1203 Purpose SPACEHAB Double Main Payload Module
Shuttle Story 2003 STS ndash107 The Columbia Disaster
Columbia disintegrates on re-entry killing all seven astronauts on board
ldquocontingency declaredrdquo
STS-107 was a multi-disciplinary microgravity and Earth science research mission with a multitude of international scientific
investigations conducted continuously during 16 days in orbit
The seven-member crew died on February 1 2003 when the
shuttle disintegrated during re-entry into the Earths atmosphere The cause of the accident was determined to be a piece of foam
that broke off during launch and damaged the thermal protection system components (reinforced carbon-carbon panels and
thermal protection tiles) on the leading edge of the left wing of
the Shuttle orbiter causing an extensive heat build-up During re-entry the damaged wing slowly overheated and came apart
eventually leading to loss of control and total disintegration of the vehicle
STS-107 carried the SPACEHAB Double Research Module on its inaugural flight the Freestar experiment (mounted on a
Hitchhiker Program rack) and the Extended Duration Orbiter pallet
One of the experiments a video taken to study atmospheric dust may have detected a new atmospheric phenomenon
dubbed a TIGER (Transient Ionospheric
Glow Emission in Red)
On board the Columbia was a copy of a drawing by Petr Ginz the editor-in-chief of
the magazine Vedem who depicted what he
imagined the Earth looked like from the Moon when he was a 14-year-old prisoner in the
Tereziacuten concentration camp The copy was in the possession of Ilan Ramon and was lost in
the crash
19
ORBIT
Historical Document
Downloaded by your Editor on the day of the tragedy this page from a NASA
website presents starkly the dreadful
truth of what has just happened
The opening phrasing ldquoA contingency has been declaredrdquo is very much in the
laconic and measured tradition of Apollo
13rsquos ldquoHouston we have a problemrdquo and the ldquoObviously a major malfunctionrdquo
used by Mission Control of the Challenger tragedy in January 1986
Below and at bottom of opposite page Launch and Conclusion covers for the
flight The brightly coloured mission patch is appropriately printed in black
20
ORBIT
21
ORBIT
Faux commemorative dollar bills with a
value of ldquo107rdquo were issued to mark the occasion
The Israeli issue of 2422004
commemorated their first astronaut was a revised version of the stamps issued in
advance of Ilan Ramonrsquos flight see page 22
At least one territory under Islamic influence
which has traditionally cashed in on shuttle flight issues did not print a reference to
Israel on their commemoratives for political reasons see page 23
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
10
ORBIT ORBIT
The APS existed before the first satellite was launched in 1957 The APS library is a great source of philatelic historical information The collector can borrow material contacting the American Philatelic Research Library (APRL)
iii) The American Topical Association (ATA) Organizations that have since ceased to exist include
the Explorer and Inner and Outer Space Past issues are available from the American Philatelic Research Library and the Space Unit See 14 Sources of Information
How covers are made Space covers are typically made from envelopes (letter 6 or business size 10) with at least 25 rag content and archival quality The acid left in paper from the manufacturing process turns the paper yellow with age and eventually destroys the paper Archival quality envelopes are
acid free have 25 rag content and will survive storage for long periods of time They cost more but result in a better space cover Envelopes purchased from the USPS or those used by organizations are typically not archival
Some collectors choose to make envelops from space related documents (maps figures photographs) This makes for an interesting envelope but be concerned about the archival quality of the paper and adhesives If you plan to make envelopes with different dimensions than the standard envelopes used by the USPS check with the USPS to ensure
the envelope is acceptable Some collectors use post cards or make post cards
for space covers The thickness of the papercardboard must be greater than that of the envelops in order to give the card the necessary stiffness and strength to survive the postal handling system The same caution about dimensions and archival ability applies to post cards For more information see Space Covers Definition and Description
Short history of space covers and types US space covers started in 1958 with the launch or attempted launch of the first US satellites (VANGUARD and EXPLORER) Space covers have been produced for every US satellite launch or attempted launch since 1958 Many space events have also been commemorated by space covers Space covers have been produced for foreign satellites launched by the US and US satellites launched by other countries US Space Cover manufactures have also produced space covers for non US satellites launched by other countries and various space events both US and foreign Space covers from past events can be purchased or traded from a number of different sources in the US and around the world See section 12 Sources of Space Covers It is unfortunate by some space cover manufactures have produced covers of suspect authenticity or outright forgeries Excellent sources of information are Bulver and the Astrophile see section 14 Sources of Information
Different methods are use to create and deliver space covers to the collector The more popular are
- Manufactured cachets applied to covers sold covers as own (eg Space Voyage Orbit Goldcraft Space Craft Beck)
- Manufactured cachets applied to covers sold covers through a reseller (eg Havekotte)
- Manufactured cachets sold or given cachets to others (eg Swanson Dubeau)
- Given or purchased cachets applied to covers covers sold as own (eg Dubeau)
- Given or purchased cachets applied to covers covers sold through a reseller (eg Whitney)
- Given or purchased covers sold covers as own - Given or purchased covers with cachets added
information to cover sold covers as own (eg Titusville Moonport Stamp Club Dubeau)
Given or purchased covers with cachets added information to cover sold covers through a reseller
Sources for space covers The collector has two options for obtaining space covers 1) purchase them or 2) make one=s own But the buyer-
beware should always be practiced Many great references are listed in section 14 Sources of Information and the Bibliography and should be read before purchasing space covers Many attempts have been made to identifycatalog all the space covers produce in the USby US Manufacturersfor US space Events None are complete Some catalogs may focus on a specific topic eg APOLLO Program Be that as it may something is better than nothing The following is a list of some of the more comprehensive listcatalogs listed in alphabetical order and found in the bibliography Courtney Davis Dubeau 2
Lollini Ramkissoon2 Vukotich and Wilhelm
The following is a partial list of space cover providersmanufacturersproducerssellers for US events (as of 2005)Astrophile 20021
- Goddard Space Flight Stamp Club Box 261 Greenbelt MD 20768 ‑‑0261
- JPL Stamp Club PO Box 771 La Canada CA 91012‑0771 httpwwwjplrecclubscaltechedustampindexshtml
- Resellers A good source is the Astrophile - Space Coast Philately PO box 446 Cape
Canaveral FL 32920 - Space equipment manufacturer individuals companies organizations clubs - SpaceCoast Cover services 1190
Montego Bay Dr Merritt Island FL 32953 - Stamp shows A good source of information about local stamp shows is
Linn=s Stamp News Astrophile and the APS - Titusville Moonport Stamp Club PO Box
6071 Titusville FL 32782 - Web sites httpstargate1usacom
stampsresourcehtm Auctions Space Unit Tom Steiner PO Box 550 Northville MI 48167 Web sites (eg E-Bay)
Most US space events are documented by space cover manufacturers Whether it is a major manned launch or a rocket motor test someone usually produces a space cover
11
ORBIT
commemorating the event This was more evident during manned programs See Space Covers Definition and Description
Making your own space cover Place the necessary postage on the envelopecard
At this point you have several options Put a return address on the envelopescard Include a Self Address Stamped Envelope (SASE) for the return of your covers The types of addressing will depend if you want the address to be a permanent part of the space cover or removable after the cover is returned to you Use a live gummed label that is removable if you do not want the address to be part of the cover Contact the post office where you want the envelope to be cancelled to determine if - a) they will hold the covers until the day of the event b) cancel them on that day and c)place the cancelled covers in the mail to you Follow the instruction of the post office
After receiving the envelopescards from the post
office (which are now Space Covers) many collectors apply a cachet to the Space Cover and place additional information inside the cover It is recommended that you identify who made the space cover and cachet in or on the Space Cover For more information see Space Covers Definition and Description
The following are the more popular post offices that
service space covers (as of 2005)Astrophile 20021 - Postmaster Kennedy Space Center Fl 32815 (about
1 week before the event)
- Window Services Unit Houston GPO 401 Franklin St Houston TX 77201-9999
Postmaster Edwards AFB CA 93523
Sources of Information
- Ad Astra Magazine of the National Space Society 922
Pennsylvania Ave SE Washington DC 20003 httpwwwnssorg
- American Philatelic Research Library (APRL) 100 Match Factory Place Bellefonte PA 16823 wwwstamplibraryorg
- American Philatelic Society American Philatelist Journal of the American Philatelic Society APS 100 Oakwood Ave PO Box 8000 State College PA 16803 Phone 814‑237 ‑3803 Fax 814 ‑237‑6128 httpwwwstampsorg
- Aviation Week and Space Technology 1221 Avenue of the Americas New York NY httpwwwaviationweekcom
- Bulver Ramkissoon Winick A Study of Suspect Space Covers 2001 Space Unit see Astrophile in the Bibliography
- Cranford Bruce ldquoSpace Covers Dictionary amp Identifier 2006 Editionrdquo Bruce Cranford 1 Cliffe Hill Ct Potomac MD 20854 USA ISBN 978-0-9711657-1-7
- Explorer International Association of Space Philatelists BO Box 302 Yonkers NY 10710 Editor Bill York 780 West End Ave Apt 11F New York NY 10025 No longer in business
- FIP Section for Astrophilately Joseacute Bergamin 16 6C 28030 Madrid Spain wwwastrophilatelycom Astrophile 200201
- Final Frontier Magazine PO Box 20089 Minneapolis MN 55420
- Linn=s Stamp News PO Box 29 Sidney OH 45365-0029 wwwLinnscom 800-837-0194
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration NASA 300 E Street SW Washington DC 20024‑3210 USA httpwwwhqnasagov
- Orbit Newsletter of the British based ASSS Orbit which had a special section on space stamps and postmarks httpwwwasssutvinternetcom Brian Lockyer The Secretary ASSS 21 Exford Close Weston‑Super‑Mare Somerset BS23 4RE Great Britain
- Quest The history of Spaceflight Magazine CSPACE 123 32nd St SE Grand Rapids MI 49509-0331 Glen Swanson httpwwwspaceeduquest
- Smithsonian Air amp Space Magazine monthly 900 Jefferson Dr Washington DC 20560 httpwwwsiedu
- Smithsonian National Postal Museum 2 Massachusetts Ave NE Washington DC 20002 (202) 33‑5555httpwwwpostalmuseumsiedu
- Space Unit President Tom Steiner PO Box 550 Northville MI 48167-0550 (As of 2005) publishes The Astrophile Member of the American Philatelic Association American Topical Association httpstargate1usacomstamps
- Space Week weekly publication of Army Times Publishing Co 6883 Commercial Drive Springfield VA 22159-0500
- Spaceflight The international Magazine of Space and Astronautics published by the British Interplanetary Society (BIS) 2729 South Lambeth Road London SW8 1SZ England httpfreespacevirginnetbisbisBishtm - US Library of Congress The Library of Congress 101
Independence Ave SE Washington DC 20540 (202) 707‑5000 httpwwwlocgov
- US Postal Service (USPS) Washington DC 20260-2435 (httpwwwuspsgov )
- USPS Stamp Fulfillment Service PO Box 219424 Kansas City MO 64121-9424 1-800-782-6724 fax 816-545-1212 wwwstampsonlinecom - Web Sites
- Friends and Partners in Space 1999 httpsolarrtdutkedu7Ejgreenfpspacehtml
- Mark Wade s Encyclopedia Astronautica 1998 httpsolarrtdutkedu~mwadespaceflthtm
- International Spacecraft and Launch Vehicle Names Glossary 2003 httpwwwspacecraftnamesinfo
- NASA httpwww‑paokscnasagovkscpaoscheduleschedulehtm
- Spaceflight Now httpwwwspaceflightnowcomtrackingindexhtml
- Gunther=s Space Page httpwwwskyrocketdespacespacehtml
- Contractors (many have merged or gone out of business since 1958)
Lockheed Martin httplmmsexternallmcocomremospascieoshtml Boeing httpwwwboeingcomflashhtml Orbital Science httpwwworbitalcom
Editorrsquos Note
Bruce has asked me to point out that he is not the
owner of the flown Apollo XI cover which I attributed to his collection on page 40 of the last edition
He just wishes he was
12
ORBIT
50th anniversary of NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration was established
by the National Aeronautics and Space Act on July 29 1958 replacing its predecessor the National Advisory Committee for
Aeronautics (NACA) The agency became operational on October 1 1958
13
ORBIT
So Who Did Invent the Telescope
A memorable fact from a different viewpoint
Did you know that in 2009 it is four hundred years since the first great discoveries in space took place Then it so happened that for the first time in the history of mankind craters on the moon some details on the planets and amongst other things the four great moons around Jupiter were seen Very soon the observation instruments became better and larger and gradually many more details on the moon and planets were seen Rings were discovered around Saturn bands of clouds and areas of storms on Jupiter and polar caps and surface structures on Mars
Now you may think where is the writer going with this
That is quite simple it so happened that in 2008 precisely 400 years ago the telescope was invented and that happened in our own little Holland For a long time it was not determined who had made the first Dutch viewer as these were called (see the New Zealand stamp issued 12-2-1997)
Zacharias Jansen and Hans Lipperhey both resident in Middelburg were seen as inventors of the telescope but there were other people who claimed this discovery It was said that Robert Bacon (1214-1294) already knew how the instrument could be made Jacob Metius of Alkmaar could also be the inventor he knew Jansen and Lipperhey and had also visited them Then there is also the Italian Raffael Gualterotti (1543-1639) of whom it is known with some certainty that in 1598 he had already made a viewer However this man evidently did not recognise the significance of his discovery and did not act upon it After very lengthy investigation it was finally decided that Hans Lipperhey (1570-1619 right) could lay claim to this invention
As often happens with new inventions the telescope was first seen as a military instrument to outsmart the enemy With the telescope the movements of the enemy could now be seen and followed over a much greater distance so that timely countermeasures could be taken It was the famous scholar Galileo Galileiuml (1564-1642) who heard about this discovery from others and immediately saw what further possibilities this instrument had to offer Based on the data he could get hold of Galileiuml himself made a telescope that magnified nine times Soon after he made another that
magnified to almost thirty times These instruments consisted of two lenses in a tube a lightly curved convex lens in front and at the rear a powerful concave lens as an eyepiece We must not expect too much from these first telescopes because the
optics at that time were far from the quality that we now know
At that time it was very difficult to make pure glass and the lenses were really rather small in proportion to the focal length so as a result the luminosity was mediocre To get a good lens a piece of clear rock crystal was sometimes used We can suppose that the first telescopes were of a lesser optical quality than simple binoculars in our time Nevertheless in 1609 Galileiuml was able to see craters on the moon and Venus as a sickle for the first time He was the discoverer of the first four moons of Jupiter and he concluded from sunspots that the rotation of the sun around its axis was about 25 days
The discovery of the telescope heralded a new era in space research in the widest sense of the word In my opinion we could call this the start of space exploration such as we in space travel now readily do Meanwhile all the nearby planets in our solar system have been explored with a space probe one or more times except Plutohelliphellipbut yes we cannot call that a planet any longer We have even been to the Moon and new discoveries are reported daily also in our own solar system moons of minor planets new rings around Uranus and small moons around the giant planets Jupiter and Saturn
Although in the very beginning there were no space probes doing investigation it is my opinion that we may take the opportunity during this commemoration year to recognise the fact that the telescope was invented four hundred years ago After all this was the beginning of a great voyage of discovery in space Therefore the year 2009 has been declared the International Year of Astronomy 2009 - IYA 2009 - by the UN (on the recommendation of the International Astronomical Union) The UN has designated UNESCO as the body chiefly responsible for IYA 2009 and the IAU as a support organisation for practical interpretation
HN Frankener March 2009
Specially translated for Orbit by Eleanor Coker this feature by Henk Nieuwenhuis first appeared in issue 24 2009 of Nieuwsbrief the journal of
Ruimtevaart Filatelie Club Nederland and is produced (with different illustrations) by
permission of the author and Editor Arie Olckers
14
ORBIT
Our Astonishing Nicolaus Copernicus By Stan Wekka Bydgoszcz Poland with Jeff Dugdale
IYA could not go past without our journal
marking once again this great thinker so here
is a specially commissioned and edited article
from an Orbit enthusiast in Poland
Nicolaus Copernicus was born 19 February 1473 in the wonderful City of Toruń on the River Vistula and died 24 May 1543 in Frombork
Consider this famous astronomermdashmathematician- doctor of medicine and monetary system expert (economist ) - physicianmdashclassical scholar - jurist - artistmdashtranslatormdashmilitary leadermdashdiplomat and hellipCatholic cleric - Treasure of our Earth NICOLAUS COPERNICUS (in Polish Mikolaj Kopernik)
He has been honoured in international philately on hundreds of postage-stamps items of postal ndashstationery commemorative cancellationshellip
His name is on Navyrsquos ships planes streets places schools universities factories on Moon satellites planetoidshellip
There have been are currently and will be in the future many
different celebrations of that Great Man of Geniushellip as for inst World Philatelic Exhibition ldquoPoland 1973rdquo organized from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of His Birth US carnet issued 1973 presents three proofs of stamps from Poland and the US
dedicated to Copernicus
A selection of Polish postage-stamps presents
Him as most important citizen of Poland and World see a page from my stock book opposite filled with Polish stamps for the great man
In this short memorial to His Life and Work we must mention a few events of his rich life His family had its roots in the Polish Region of Lower Silesia ( today in SW Poland ) On a few covers and post-cards are shown different cancels of the KOPERNIKI Post Office initiated from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of the Great Astronomerrsquos Birth
After the death of Nicolausrsquo father his uncle Bishop Watzenrode of Warmia looked after the family and saw young Copernicus into university at Cracov As an 18 year old youth he presented himself at the Jagiellonian University in 1491 and studied geometry trigonometry mathematics and astronomy there for the next four years
15
ORBIT
His teachers were famous in those times astronomers and mathematicians such as John of Glogoacutew (1445-1507) who had written a commentary on Ptolemyrsquos Cosmography and Wojciech Brudzewski (1445-1497) who was hostile to the geocentric system expounded by Ptolemy It was he who infected Copernicus with his theories based on the writings of Aristarchus of Samos three centuries before Christ Their teachings bore fruit in due course in Copernicusrsquos De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium published at Nuremberg at the printing house of John Petreius in 1543 This stamp issued in March 1942 and cancelled on September 11th 1943 depicts a monument to Nicolaus Copernicus within the quadrangle of the library of the
Jagiellionian University
In due course Copernicus proved that the Geocentric System by Ptolemy was not true and his Heliocentric or Solar System was accurate This is shown on block Michel Cat Bl52 and 2 interesting philatelic items showing His most famous work De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium his autograph and the Solar System on the postmark
In 1510 Copernicus settled at Frombork and having bought the Castlersquos Tower he established his Observatory and Library
there as seen on rare pair of especially overprinted (middle vertical black overprints ) post-cards and stamps Michel Cat 805 1194
Many people assign a single nationality to Copernicus Nazi Germany claimed Copernicus to have been purely German as on stamps Michel Cat 100 104 However Germans destroyed the monument to Copernicus in the quadrangle of the library (shown on stamps Michel Cat 396 446) at the University of Cracov in 1944
After World War II Poles rebuilt that Monument and it is now displayed at Cracovrsquos Botanical Gardens
During World War II Polish Prisoners of War of The Woldenberg Camp II C organized by Germans for Polish
officers initiated Camprsquos Post there and issued many interesting philatelic values One of them is a complete of souvenir sheet or block and set of 3 stamps dedicated to 400th Anniversary of Copernicus Death (shown right)
Warsawrsquos Scientific Society initiated the investigation of Copernicusrsquo tomb and remnants in 1802 but found little of interest In 2004 Prof George Gąsowski of The Institute of Anthropology and Archaeology in Pułtusk initiated new wave of investigation and in 2005-2008 he found human remains in the crypt of The Cathedral at Frombork After the war with Sweden war in the 17th century the Swedish robbed many Polish national treasures and among them were books formerly belonging to Copernicus One of books was ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo found in the Museum of Uppsala In that book were found two of Copernicusrsquo hairs which were examined forensically
In due course genetic comparison of the alleged Copernicus remnants found in Frombork Cathedral crypt and those two hairs in the ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo at Uppsala confirmed that the Frombork remains were those of Copernicus proving once and for all where his tomb lies
Polish anthropologists have since tried to do a reconstruction of Copernicusrsquo face and published their results in the Polish
press see below
16
ORBIT
Un-manned Satellites on Postage Stamps 31 By Guest Contributors Don Hillger and Garry Toth
A version of this article first appeared in The Astrophile for July-August 2008
The Elektron Series This is the thirty-first in a series of articles about un-
manned satellites on postage stamps This article
features the Russian Elektron-series satellites Four Elektron satellites were successfully launched with
Elektron-1 and 2 paired up on 30 January 1964 and Elektron-3 and 4 similarly paired on 10 July 1964
Elektron was one of the earliest Soviet scientific satellite missions to be authorized following the initial
Sputnik series The spacecraft had the mission of mapping the van Allen radiation belts at higher
inclinations than previous US satellites had followed In these missions two different types of spacecraft
were paired and launched together as mentioned
above Elektron-1 and 3 were put into a lower orbit to map the inner van Allen belt while Elekton-2 and 4
were boosted to a higher orbit to study the outer belt
For identification purposes Elektron-1 and 3 had
cylindrical bodies 075 m in diameter and 13 m long with six solar panels extending outward almost like
paddles Elektron-2 and 4 were shaped like the cupola of a public building in the basic form of a cylinder with
a flattened and broadened end with a diameter of 18 m and a height of 24 m
Both Elektron types are easily distinguished and are represented on many postal items mostly from
eastern bloc nations Some of the items show both Elektron-1 and 2 (or Elektron-3 and 4) since they
were launched together
A checklist of postal items identified as showing the
E l e k t r o n - s e r i e s s a t e l l i t e s ( h t t p wwwciracolostateedurammhillgerElektronhtm) is
available on the Website developed by the authors for the un-manned satellites featured in this series of
articles (httpwwwciracolostateedurammhillger
satelliteshtm) E-mail correspondence with the authors is welcome Don Hillger can be reached at
hillgerciracolostateedu and Garry Toth at garry_tothhotmailcom
Elektron-A
From Mark Wadersquos site httpwwwastronautixcom
Elektron-B
17
ORBIT
18
ORBIT
Flight STS-107 Commander Rick Husband Pilot William McCool MS Michael Anderson MS David Brown MS Laurel Clark MS Ilan Ramon MS Kalpana Chawla KSC Launch Date 1612003 Proposed KSC Landing 1203 Purpose SPACEHAB Double Main Payload Module
Shuttle Story 2003 STS ndash107 The Columbia Disaster
Columbia disintegrates on re-entry killing all seven astronauts on board
ldquocontingency declaredrdquo
STS-107 was a multi-disciplinary microgravity and Earth science research mission with a multitude of international scientific
investigations conducted continuously during 16 days in orbit
The seven-member crew died on February 1 2003 when the
shuttle disintegrated during re-entry into the Earths atmosphere The cause of the accident was determined to be a piece of foam
that broke off during launch and damaged the thermal protection system components (reinforced carbon-carbon panels and
thermal protection tiles) on the leading edge of the left wing of
the Shuttle orbiter causing an extensive heat build-up During re-entry the damaged wing slowly overheated and came apart
eventually leading to loss of control and total disintegration of the vehicle
STS-107 carried the SPACEHAB Double Research Module on its inaugural flight the Freestar experiment (mounted on a
Hitchhiker Program rack) and the Extended Duration Orbiter pallet
One of the experiments a video taken to study atmospheric dust may have detected a new atmospheric phenomenon
dubbed a TIGER (Transient Ionospheric
Glow Emission in Red)
On board the Columbia was a copy of a drawing by Petr Ginz the editor-in-chief of
the magazine Vedem who depicted what he
imagined the Earth looked like from the Moon when he was a 14-year-old prisoner in the
Tereziacuten concentration camp The copy was in the possession of Ilan Ramon and was lost in
the crash
19
ORBIT
Historical Document
Downloaded by your Editor on the day of the tragedy this page from a NASA
website presents starkly the dreadful
truth of what has just happened
The opening phrasing ldquoA contingency has been declaredrdquo is very much in the
laconic and measured tradition of Apollo
13rsquos ldquoHouston we have a problemrdquo and the ldquoObviously a major malfunctionrdquo
used by Mission Control of the Challenger tragedy in January 1986
Below and at bottom of opposite page Launch and Conclusion covers for the
flight The brightly coloured mission patch is appropriately printed in black
20
ORBIT
21
ORBIT
Faux commemorative dollar bills with a
value of ldquo107rdquo were issued to mark the occasion
The Israeli issue of 2422004
commemorated their first astronaut was a revised version of the stamps issued in
advance of Ilan Ramonrsquos flight see page 22
At least one territory under Islamic influence
which has traditionally cashed in on shuttle flight issues did not print a reference to
Israel on their commemoratives for political reasons see page 23
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
11
ORBIT
commemorating the event This was more evident during manned programs See Space Covers Definition and Description
Making your own space cover Place the necessary postage on the envelopecard
At this point you have several options Put a return address on the envelopescard Include a Self Address Stamped Envelope (SASE) for the return of your covers The types of addressing will depend if you want the address to be a permanent part of the space cover or removable after the cover is returned to you Use a live gummed label that is removable if you do not want the address to be part of the cover Contact the post office where you want the envelope to be cancelled to determine if - a) they will hold the covers until the day of the event b) cancel them on that day and c)place the cancelled covers in the mail to you Follow the instruction of the post office
After receiving the envelopescards from the post
office (which are now Space Covers) many collectors apply a cachet to the Space Cover and place additional information inside the cover It is recommended that you identify who made the space cover and cachet in or on the Space Cover For more information see Space Covers Definition and Description
The following are the more popular post offices that
service space covers (as of 2005)Astrophile 20021 - Postmaster Kennedy Space Center Fl 32815 (about
1 week before the event)
- Window Services Unit Houston GPO 401 Franklin St Houston TX 77201-9999
Postmaster Edwards AFB CA 93523
Sources of Information
- Ad Astra Magazine of the National Space Society 922
Pennsylvania Ave SE Washington DC 20003 httpwwwnssorg
- American Philatelic Research Library (APRL) 100 Match Factory Place Bellefonte PA 16823 wwwstamplibraryorg
- American Philatelic Society American Philatelist Journal of the American Philatelic Society APS 100 Oakwood Ave PO Box 8000 State College PA 16803 Phone 814‑237 ‑3803 Fax 814 ‑237‑6128 httpwwwstampsorg
- Aviation Week and Space Technology 1221 Avenue of the Americas New York NY httpwwwaviationweekcom
- Bulver Ramkissoon Winick A Study of Suspect Space Covers 2001 Space Unit see Astrophile in the Bibliography
- Cranford Bruce ldquoSpace Covers Dictionary amp Identifier 2006 Editionrdquo Bruce Cranford 1 Cliffe Hill Ct Potomac MD 20854 USA ISBN 978-0-9711657-1-7
- Explorer International Association of Space Philatelists BO Box 302 Yonkers NY 10710 Editor Bill York 780 West End Ave Apt 11F New York NY 10025 No longer in business
- FIP Section for Astrophilately Joseacute Bergamin 16 6C 28030 Madrid Spain wwwastrophilatelycom Astrophile 200201
- Final Frontier Magazine PO Box 20089 Minneapolis MN 55420
- Linn=s Stamp News PO Box 29 Sidney OH 45365-0029 wwwLinnscom 800-837-0194
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration NASA 300 E Street SW Washington DC 20024‑3210 USA httpwwwhqnasagov
- Orbit Newsletter of the British based ASSS Orbit which had a special section on space stamps and postmarks httpwwwasssutvinternetcom Brian Lockyer The Secretary ASSS 21 Exford Close Weston‑Super‑Mare Somerset BS23 4RE Great Britain
- Quest The history of Spaceflight Magazine CSPACE 123 32nd St SE Grand Rapids MI 49509-0331 Glen Swanson httpwwwspaceeduquest
- Smithsonian Air amp Space Magazine monthly 900 Jefferson Dr Washington DC 20560 httpwwwsiedu
- Smithsonian National Postal Museum 2 Massachusetts Ave NE Washington DC 20002 (202) 33‑5555httpwwwpostalmuseumsiedu
- Space Unit President Tom Steiner PO Box 550 Northville MI 48167-0550 (As of 2005) publishes The Astrophile Member of the American Philatelic Association American Topical Association httpstargate1usacomstamps
- Space Week weekly publication of Army Times Publishing Co 6883 Commercial Drive Springfield VA 22159-0500
- Spaceflight The international Magazine of Space and Astronautics published by the British Interplanetary Society (BIS) 2729 South Lambeth Road London SW8 1SZ England httpfreespacevirginnetbisbisBishtm - US Library of Congress The Library of Congress 101
Independence Ave SE Washington DC 20540 (202) 707‑5000 httpwwwlocgov
- US Postal Service (USPS) Washington DC 20260-2435 (httpwwwuspsgov )
- USPS Stamp Fulfillment Service PO Box 219424 Kansas City MO 64121-9424 1-800-782-6724 fax 816-545-1212 wwwstampsonlinecom - Web Sites
- Friends and Partners in Space 1999 httpsolarrtdutkedu7Ejgreenfpspacehtml
- Mark Wade s Encyclopedia Astronautica 1998 httpsolarrtdutkedu~mwadespaceflthtm
- International Spacecraft and Launch Vehicle Names Glossary 2003 httpwwwspacecraftnamesinfo
- NASA httpwww‑paokscnasagovkscpaoscheduleschedulehtm
- Spaceflight Now httpwwwspaceflightnowcomtrackingindexhtml
- Gunther=s Space Page httpwwwskyrocketdespacespacehtml
- Contractors (many have merged or gone out of business since 1958)
Lockheed Martin httplmmsexternallmcocomremospascieoshtml Boeing httpwwwboeingcomflashhtml Orbital Science httpwwworbitalcom
Editorrsquos Note
Bruce has asked me to point out that he is not the
owner of the flown Apollo XI cover which I attributed to his collection on page 40 of the last edition
He just wishes he was
12
ORBIT
50th anniversary of NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration was established
by the National Aeronautics and Space Act on July 29 1958 replacing its predecessor the National Advisory Committee for
Aeronautics (NACA) The agency became operational on October 1 1958
13
ORBIT
So Who Did Invent the Telescope
A memorable fact from a different viewpoint
Did you know that in 2009 it is four hundred years since the first great discoveries in space took place Then it so happened that for the first time in the history of mankind craters on the moon some details on the planets and amongst other things the four great moons around Jupiter were seen Very soon the observation instruments became better and larger and gradually many more details on the moon and planets were seen Rings were discovered around Saturn bands of clouds and areas of storms on Jupiter and polar caps and surface structures on Mars
Now you may think where is the writer going with this
That is quite simple it so happened that in 2008 precisely 400 years ago the telescope was invented and that happened in our own little Holland For a long time it was not determined who had made the first Dutch viewer as these were called (see the New Zealand stamp issued 12-2-1997)
Zacharias Jansen and Hans Lipperhey both resident in Middelburg were seen as inventors of the telescope but there were other people who claimed this discovery It was said that Robert Bacon (1214-1294) already knew how the instrument could be made Jacob Metius of Alkmaar could also be the inventor he knew Jansen and Lipperhey and had also visited them Then there is also the Italian Raffael Gualterotti (1543-1639) of whom it is known with some certainty that in 1598 he had already made a viewer However this man evidently did not recognise the significance of his discovery and did not act upon it After very lengthy investigation it was finally decided that Hans Lipperhey (1570-1619 right) could lay claim to this invention
As often happens with new inventions the telescope was first seen as a military instrument to outsmart the enemy With the telescope the movements of the enemy could now be seen and followed over a much greater distance so that timely countermeasures could be taken It was the famous scholar Galileo Galileiuml (1564-1642) who heard about this discovery from others and immediately saw what further possibilities this instrument had to offer Based on the data he could get hold of Galileiuml himself made a telescope that magnified nine times Soon after he made another that
magnified to almost thirty times These instruments consisted of two lenses in a tube a lightly curved convex lens in front and at the rear a powerful concave lens as an eyepiece We must not expect too much from these first telescopes because the
optics at that time were far from the quality that we now know
At that time it was very difficult to make pure glass and the lenses were really rather small in proportion to the focal length so as a result the luminosity was mediocre To get a good lens a piece of clear rock crystal was sometimes used We can suppose that the first telescopes were of a lesser optical quality than simple binoculars in our time Nevertheless in 1609 Galileiuml was able to see craters on the moon and Venus as a sickle for the first time He was the discoverer of the first four moons of Jupiter and he concluded from sunspots that the rotation of the sun around its axis was about 25 days
The discovery of the telescope heralded a new era in space research in the widest sense of the word In my opinion we could call this the start of space exploration such as we in space travel now readily do Meanwhile all the nearby planets in our solar system have been explored with a space probe one or more times except Plutohelliphellipbut yes we cannot call that a planet any longer We have even been to the Moon and new discoveries are reported daily also in our own solar system moons of minor planets new rings around Uranus and small moons around the giant planets Jupiter and Saturn
Although in the very beginning there were no space probes doing investigation it is my opinion that we may take the opportunity during this commemoration year to recognise the fact that the telescope was invented four hundred years ago After all this was the beginning of a great voyage of discovery in space Therefore the year 2009 has been declared the International Year of Astronomy 2009 - IYA 2009 - by the UN (on the recommendation of the International Astronomical Union) The UN has designated UNESCO as the body chiefly responsible for IYA 2009 and the IAU as a support organisation for practical interpretation
HN Frankener March 2009
Specially translated for Orbit by Eleanor Coker this feature by Henk Nieuwenhuis first appeared in issue 24 2009 of Nieuwsbrief the journal of
Ruimtevaart Filatelie Club Nederland and is produced (with different illustrations) by
permission of the author and Editor Arie Olckers
14
ORBIT
Our Astonishing Nicolaus Copernicus By Stan Wekka Bydgoszcz Poland with Jeff Dugdale
IYA could not go past without our journal
marking once again this great thinker so here
is a specially commissioned and edited article
from an Orbit enthusiast in Poland
Nicolaus Copernicus was born 19 February 1473 in the wonderful City of Toruń on the River Vistula and died 24 May 1543 in Frombork
Consider this famous astronomermdashmathematician- doctor of medicine and monetary system expert (economist ) - physicianmdashclassical scholar - jurist - artistmdashtranslatormdashmilitary leadermdashdiplomat and hellipCatholic cleric - Treasure of our Earth NICOLAUS COPERNICUS (in Polish Mikolaj Kopernik)
He has been honoured in international philately on hundreds of postage-stamps items of postal ndashstationery commemorative cancellationshellip
His name is on Navyrsquos ships planes streets places schools universities factories on Moon satellites planetoidshellip
There have been are currently and will be in the future many
different celebrations of that Great Man of Geniushellip as for inst World Philatelic Exhibition ldquoPoland 1973rdquo organized from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of His Birth US carnet issued 1973 presents three proofs of stamps from Poland and the US
dedicated to Copernicus
A selection of Polish postage-stamps presents
Him as most important citizen of Poland and World see a page from my stock book opposite filled with Polish stamps for the great man
In this short memorial to His Life and Work we must mention a few events of his rich life His family had its roots in the Polish Region of Lower Silesia ( today in SW Poland ) On a few covers and post-cards are shown different cancels of the KOPERNIKI Post Office initiated from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of the Great Astronomerrsquos Birth
After the death of Nicolausrsquo father his uncle Bishop Watzenrode of Warmia looked after the family and saw young Copernicus into university at Cracov As an 18 year old youth he presented himself at the Jagiellonian University in 1491 and studied geometry trigonometry mathematics and astronomy there for the next four years
15
ORBIT
His teachers were famous in those times astronomers and mathematicians such as John of Glogoacutew (1445-1507) who had written a commentary on Ptolemyrsquos Cosmography and Wojciech Brudzewski (1445-1497) who was hostile to the geocentric system expounded by Ptolemy It was he who infected Copernicus with his theories based on the writings of Aristarchus of Samos three centuries before Christ Their teachings bore fruit in due course in Copernicusrsquos De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium published at Nuremberg at the printing house of John Petreius in 1543 This stamp issued in March 1942 and cancelled on September 11th 1943 depicts a monument to Nicolaus Copernicus within the quadrangle of the library of the
Jagiellionian University
In due course Copernicus proved that the Geocentric System by Ptolemy was not true and his Heliocentric or Solar System was accurate This is shown on block Michel Cat Bl52 and 2 interesting philatelic items showing His most famous work De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium his autograph and the Solar System on the postmark
In 1510 Copernicus settled at Frombork and having bought the Castlersquos Tower he established his Observatory and Library
there as seen on rare pair of especially overprinted (middle vertical black overprints ) post-cards and stamps Michel Cat 805 1194
Many people assign a single nationality to Copernicus Nazi Germany claimed Copernicus to have been purely German as on stamps Michel Cat 100 104 However Germans destroyed the monument to Copernicus in the quadrangle of the library (shown on stamps Michel Cat 396 446) at the University of Cracov in 1944
After World War II Poles rebuilt that Monument and it is now displayed at Cracovrsquos Botanical Gardens
During World War II Polish Prisoners of War of The Woldenberg Camp II C organized by Germans for Polish
officers initiated Camprsquos Post there and issued many interesting philatelic values One of them is a complete of souvenir sheet or block and set of 3 stamps dedicated to 400th Anniversary of Copernicus Death (shown right)
Warsawrsquos Scientific Society initiated the investigation of Copernicusrsquo tomb and remnants in 1802 but found little of interest In 2004 Prof George Gąsowski of The Institute of Anthropology and Archaeology in Pułtusk initiated new wave of investigation and in 2005-2008 he found human remains in the crypt of The Cathedral at Frombork After the war with Sweden war in the 17th century the Swedish robbed many Polish national treasures and among them were books formerly belonging to Copernicus One of books was ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo found in the Museum of Uppsala In that book were found two of Copernicusrsquo hairs which were examined forensically
In due course genetic comparison of the alleged Copernicus remnants found in Frombork Cathedral crypt and those two hairs in the ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo at Uppsala confirmed that the Frombork remains were those of Copernicus proving once and for all where his tomb lies
Polish anthropologists have since tried to do a reconstruction of Copernicusrsquo face and published their results in the Polish
press see below
16
ORBIT
Un-manned Satellites on Postage Stamps 31 By Guest Contributors Don Hillger and Garry Toth
A version of this article first appeared in The Astrophile for July-August 2008
The Elektron Series This is the thirty-first in a series of articles about un-
manned satellites on postage stamps This article
features the Russian Elektron-series satellites Four Elektron satellites were successfully launched with
Elektron-1 and 2 paired up on 30 January 1964 and Elektron-3 and 4 similarly paired on 10 July 1964
Elektron was one of the earliest Soviet scientific satellite missions to be authorized following the initial
Sputnik series The spacecraft had the mission of mapping the van Allen radiation belts at higher
inclinations than previous US satellites had followed In these missions two different types of spacecraft
were paired and launched together as mentioned
above Elektron-1 and 3 were put into a lower orbit to map the inner van Allen belt while Elekton-2 and 4
were boosted to a higher orbit to study the outer belt
For identification purposes Elektron-1 and 3 had
cylindrical bodies 075 m in diameter and 13 m long with six solar panels extending outward almost like
paddles Elektron-2 and 4 were shaped like the cupola of a public building in the basic form of a cylinder with
a flattened and broadened end with a diameter of 18 m and a height of 24 m
Both Elektron types are easily distinguished and are represented on many postal items mostly from
eastern bloc nations Some of the items show both Elektron-1 and 2 (or Elektron-3 and 4) since they
were launched together
A checklist of postal items identified as showing the
E l e k t r o n - s e r i e s s a t e l l i t e s ( h t t p wwwciracolostateedurammhillgerElektronhtm) is
available on the Website developed by the authors for the un-manned satellites featured in this series of
articles (httpwwwciracolostateedurammhillger
satelliteshtm) E-mail correspondence with the authors is welcome Don Hillger can be reached at
hillgerciracolostateedu and Garry Toth at garry_tothhotmailcom
Elektron-A
From Mark Wadersquos site httpwwwastronautixcom
Elektron-B
17
ORBIT
18
ORBIT
Flight STS-107 Commander Rick Husband Pilot William McCool MS Michael Anderson MS David Brown MS Laurel Clark MS Ilan Ramon MS Kalpana Chawla KSC Launch Date 1612003 Proposed KSC Landing 1203 Purpose SPACEHAB Double Main Payload Module
Shuttle Story 2003 STS ndash107 The Columbia Disaster
Columbia disintegrates on re-entry killing all seven astronauts on board
ldquocontingency declaredrdquo
STS-107 was a multi-disciplinary microgravity and Earth science research mission with a multitude of international scientific
investigations conducted continuously during 16 days in orbit
The seven-member crew died on February 1 2003 when the
shuttle disintegrated during re-entry into the Earths atmosphere The cause of the accident was determined to be a piece of foam
that broke off during launch and damaged the thermal protection system components (reinforced carbon-carbon panels and
thermal protection tiles) on the leading edge of the left wing of
the Shuttle orbiter causing an extensive heat build-up During re-entry the damaged wing slowly overheated and came apart
eventually leading to loss of control and total disintegration of the vehicle
STS-107 carried the SPACEHAB Double Research Module on its inaugural flight the Freestar experiment (mounted on a
Hitchhiker Program rack) and the Extended Duration Orbiter pallet
One of the experiments a video taken to study atmospheric dust may have detected a new atmospheric phenomenon
dubbed a TIGER (Transient Ionospheric
Glow Emission in Red)
On board the Columbia was a copy of a drawing by Petr Ginz the editor-in-chief of
the magazine Vedem who depicted what he
imagined the Earth looked like from the Moon when he was a 14-year-old prisoner in the
Tereziacuten concentration camp The copy was in the possession of Ilan Ramon and was lost in
the crash
19
ORBIT
Historical Document
Downloaded by your Editor on the day of the tragedy this page from a NASA
website presents starkly the dreadful
truth of what has just happened
The opening phrasing ldquoA contingency has been declaredrdquo is very much in the
laconic and measured tradition of Apollo
13rsquos ldquoHouston we have a problemrdquo and the ldquoObviously a major malfunctionrdquo
used by Mission Control of the Challenger tragedy in January 1986
Below and at bottom of opposite page Launch and Conclusion covers for the
flight The brightly coloured mission patch is appropriately printed in black
20
ORBIT
21
ORBIT
Faux commemorative dollar bills with a
value of ldquo107rdquo were issued to mark the occasion
The Israeli issue of 2422004
commemorated their first astronaut was a revised version of the stamps issued in
advance of Ilan Ramonrsquos flight see page 22
At least one territory under Islamic influence
which has traditionally cashed in on shuttle flight issues did not print a reference to
Israel on their commemoratives for political reasons see page 23
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
12
ORBIT
50th anniversary of NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration was established
by the National Aeronautics and Space Act on July 29 1958 replacing its predecessor the National Advisory Committee for
Aeronautics (NACA) The agency became operational on October 1 1958
13
ORBIT
So Who Did Invent the Telescope
A memorable fact from a different viewpoint
Did you know that in 2009 it is four hundred years since the first great discoveries in space took place Then it so happened that for the first time in the history of mankind craters on the moon some details on the planets and amongst other things the four great moons around Jupiter were seen Very soon the observation instruments became better and larger and gradually many more details on the moon and planets were seen Rings were discovered around Saturn bands of clouds and areas of storms on Jupiter and polar caps and surface structures on Mars
Now you may think where is the writer going with this
That is quite simple it so happened that in 2008 precisely 400 years ago the telescope was invented and that happened in our own little Holland For a long time it was not determined who had made the first Dutch viewer as these were called (see the New Zealand stamp issued 12-2-1997)
Zacharias Jansen and Hans Lipperhey both resident in Middelburg were seen as inventors of the telescope but there were other people who claimed this discovery It was said that Robert Bacon (1214-1294) already knew how the instrument could be made Jacob Metius of Alkmaar could also be the inventor he knew Jansen and Lipperhey and had also visited them Then there is also the Italian Raffael Gualterotti (1543-1639) of whom it is known with some certainty that in 1598 he had already made a viewer However this man evidently did not recognise the significance of his discovery and did not act upon it After very lengthy investigation it was finally decided that Hans Lipperhey (1570-1619 right) could lay claim to this invention
As often happens with new inventions the telescope was first seen as a military instrument to outsmart the enemy With the telescope the movements of the enemy could now be seen and followed over a much greater distance so that timely countermeasures could be taken It was the famous scholar Galileo Galileiuml (1564-1642) who heard about this discovery from others and immediately saw what further possibilities this instrument had to offer Based on the data he could get hold of Galileiuml himself made a telescope that magnified nine times Soon after he made another that
magnified to almost thirty times These instruments consisted of two lenses in a tube a lightly curved convex lens in front and at the rear a powerful concave lens as an eyepiece We must not expect too much from these first telescopes because the
optics at that time were far from the quality that we now know
At that time it was very difficult to make pure glass and the lenses were really rather small in proportion to the focal length so as a result the luminosity was mediocre To get a good lens a piece of clear rock crystal was sometimes used We can suppose that the first telescopes were of a lesser optical quality than simple binoculars in our time Nevertheless in 1609 Galileiuml was able to see craters on the moon and Venus as a sickle for the first time He was the discoverer of the first four moons of Jupiter and he concluded from sunspots that the rotation of the sun around its axis was about 25 days
The discovery of the telescope heralded a new era in space research in the widest sense of the word In my opinion we could call this the start of space exploration such as we in space travel now readily do Meanwhile all the nearby planets in our solar system have been explored with a space probe one or more times except Plutohelliphellipbut yes we cannot call that a planet any longer We have even been to the Moon and new discoveries are reported daily also in our own solar system moons of minor planets new rings around Uranus and small moons around the giant planets Jupiter and Saturn
Although in the very beginning there were no space probes doing investigation it is my opinion that we may take the opportunity during this commemoration year to recognise the fact that the telescope was invented four hundred years ago After all this was the beginning of a great voyage of discovery in space Therefore the year 2009 has been declared the International Year of Astronomy 2009 - IYA 2009 - by the UN (on the recommendation of the International Astronomical Union) The UN has designated UNESCO as the body chiefly responsible for IYA 2009 and the IAU as a support organisation for practical interpretation
HN Frankener March 2009
Specially translated for Orbit by Eleanor Coker this feature by Henk Nieuwenhuis first appeared in issue 24 2009 of Nieuwsbrief the journal of
Ruimtevaart Filatelie Club Nederland and is produced (with different illustrations) by
permission of the author and Editor Arie Olckers
14
ORBIT
Our Astonishing Nicolaus Copernicus By Stan Wekka Bydgoszcz Poland with Jeff Dugdale
IYA could not go past without our journal
marking once again this great thinker so here
is a specially commissioned and edited article
from an Orbit enthusiast in Poland
Nicolaus Copernicus was born 19 February 1473 in the wonderful City of Toruń on the River Vistula and died 24 May 1543 in Frombork
Consider this famous astronomermdashmathematician- doctor of medicine and monetary system expert (economist ) - physicianmdashclassical scholar - jurist - artistmdashtranslatormdashmilitary leadermdashdiplomat and hellipCatholic cleric - Treasure of our Earth NICOLAUS COPERNICUS (in Polish Mikolaj Kopernik)
He has been honoured in international philately on hundreds of postage-stamps items of postal ndashstationery commemorative cancellationshellip
His name is on Navyrsquos ships planes streets places schools universities factories on Moon satellites planetoidshellip
There have been are currently and will be in the future many
different celebrations of that Great Man of Geniushellip as for inst World Philatelic Exhibition ldquoPoland 1973rdquo organized from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of His Birth US carnet issued 1973 presents three proofs of stamps from Poland and the US
dedicated to Copernicus
A selection of Polish postage-stamps presents
Him as most important citizen of Poland and World see a page from my stock book opposite filled with Polish stamps for the great man
In this short memorial to His Life and Work we must mention a few events of his rich life His family had its roots in the Polish Region of Lower Silesia ( today in SW Poland ) On a few covers and post-cards are shown different cancels of the KOPERNIKI Post Office initiated from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of the Great Astronomerrsquos Birth
After the death of Nicolausrsquo father his uncle Bishop Watzenrode of Warmia looked after the family and saw young Copernicus into university at Cracov As an 18 year old youth he presented himself at the Jagiellonian University in 1491 and studied geometry trigonometry mathematics and astronomy there for the next four years
15
ORBIT
His teachers were famous in those times astronomers and mathematicians such as John of Glogoacutew (1445-1507) who had written a commentary on Ptolemyrsquos Cosmography and Wojciech Brudzewski (1445-1497) who was hostile to the geocentric system expounded by Ptolemy It was he who infected Copernicus with his theories based on the writings of Aristarchus of Samos three centuries before Christ Their teachings bore fruit in due course in Copernicusrsquos De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium published at Nuremberg at the printing house of John Petreius in 1543 This stamp issued in March 1942 and cancelled on September 11th 1943 depicts a monument to Nicolaus Copernicus within the quadrangle of the library of the
Jagiellionian University
In due course Copernicus proved that the Geocentric System by Ptolemy was not true and his Heliocentric or Solar System was accurate This is shown on block Michel Cat Bl52 and 2 interesting philatelic items showing His most famous work De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium his autograph and the Solar System on the postmark
In 1510 Copernicus settled at Frombork and having bought the Castlersquos Tower he established his Observatory and Library
there as seen on rare pair of especially overprinted (middle vertical black overprints ) post-cards and stamps Michel Cat 805 1194
Many people assign a single nationality to Copernicus Nazi Germany claimed Copernicus to have been purely German as on stamps Michel Cat 100 104 However Germans destroyed the monument to Copernicus in the quadrangle of the library (shown on stamps Michel Cat 396 446) at the University of Cracov in 1944
After World War II Poles rebuilt that Monument and it is now displayed at Cracovrsquos Botanical Gardens
During World War II Polish Prisoners of War of The Woldenberg Camp II C organized by Germans for Polish
officers initiated Camprsquos Post there and issued many interesting philatelic values One of them is a complete of souvenir sheet or block and set of 3 stamps dedicated to 400th Anniversary of Copernicus Death (shown right)
Warsawrsquos Scientific Society initiated the investigation of Copernicusrsquo tomb and remnants in 1802 but found little of interest In 2004 Prof George Gąsowski of The Institute of Anthropology and Archaeology in Pułtusk initiated new wave of investigation and in 2005-2008 he found human remains in the crypt of The Cathedral at Frombork After the war with Sweden war in the 17th century the Swedish robbed many Polish national treasures and among them were books formerly belonging to Copernicus One of books was ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo found in the Museum of Uppsala In that book were found two of Copernicusrsquo hairs which were examined forensically
In due course genetic comparison of the alleged Copernicus remnants found in Frombork Cathedral crypt and those two hairs in the ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo at Uppsala confirmed that the Frombork remains were those of Copernicus proving once and for all where his tomb lies
Polish anthropologists have since tried to do a reconstruction of Copernicusrsquo face and published their results in the Polish
press see below
16
ORBIT
Un-manned Satellites on Postage Stamps 31 By Guest Contributors Don Hillger and Garry Toth
A version of this article first appeared in The Astrophile for July-August 2008
The Elektron Series This is the thirty-first in a series of articles about un-
manned satellites on postage stamps This article
features the Russian Elektron-series satellites Four Elektron satellites were successfully launched with
Elektron-1 and 2 paired up on 30 January 1964 and Elektron-3 and 4 similarly paired on 10 July 1964
Elektron was one of the earliest Soviet scientific satellite missions to be authorized following the initial
Sputnik series The spacecraft had the mission of mapping the van Allen radiation belts at higher
inclinations than previous US satellites had followed In these missions two different types of spacecraft
were paired and launched together as mentioned
above Elektron-1 and 3 were put into a lower orbit to map the inner van Allen belt while Elekton-2 and 4
were boosted to a higher orbit to study the outer belt
For identification purposes Elektron-1 and 3 had
cylindrical bodies 075 m in diameter and 13 m long with six solar panels extending outward almost like
paddles Elektron-2 and 4 were shaped like the cupola of a public building in the basic form of a cylinder with
a flattened and broadened end with a diameter of 18 m and a height of 24 m
Both Elektron types are easily distinguished and are represented on many postal items mostly from
eastern bloc nations Some of the items show both Elektron-1 and 2 (or Elektron-3 and 4) since they
were launched together
A checklist of postal items identified as showing the
E l e k t r o n - s e r i e s s a t e l l i t e s ( h t t p wwwciracolostateedurammhillgerElektronhtm) is
available on the Website developed by the authors for the un-manned satellites featured in this series of
articles (httpwwwciracolostateedurammhillger
satelliteshtm) E-mail correspondence with the authors is welcome Don Hillger can be reached at
hillgerciracolostateedu and Garry Toth at garry_tothhotmailcom
Elektron-A
From Mark Wadersquos site httpwwwastronautixcom
Elektron-B
17
ORBIT
18
ORBIT
Flight STS-107 Commander Rick Husband Pilot William McCool MS Michael Anderson MS David Brown MS Laurel Clark MS Ilan Ramon MS Kalpana Chawla KSC Launch Date 1612003 Proposed KSC Landing 1203 Purpose SPACEHAB Double Main Payload Module
Shuttle Story 2003 STS ndash107 The Columbia Disaster
Columbia disintegrates on re-entry killing all seven astronauts on board
ldquocontingency declaredrdquo
STS-107 was a multi-disciplinary microgravity and Earth science research mission with a multitude of international scientific
investigations conducted continuously during 16 days in orbit
The seven-member crew died on February 1 2003 when the
shuttle disintegrated during re-entry into the Earths atmosphere The cause of the accident was determined to be a piece of foam
that broke off during launch and damaged the thermal protection system components (reinforced carbon-carbon panels and
thermal protection tiles) on the leading edge of the left wing of
the Shuttle orbiter causing an extensive heat build-up During re-entry the damaged wing slowly overheated and came apart
eventually leading to loss of control and total disintegration of the vehicle
STS-107 carried the SPACEHAB Double Research Module on its inaugural flight the Freestar experiment (mounted on a
Hitchhiker Program rack) and the Extended Duration Orbiter pallet
One of the experiments a video taken to study atmospheric dust may have detected a new atmospheric phenomenon
dubbed a TIGER (Transient Ionospheric
Glow Emission in Red)
On board the Columbia was a copy of a drawing by Petr Ginz the editor-in-chief of
the magazine Vedem who depicted what he
imagined the Earth looked like from the Moon when he was a 14-year-old prisoner in the
Tereziacuten concentration camp The copy was in the possession of Ilan Ramon and was lost in
the crash
19
ORBIT
Historical Document
Downloaded by your Editor on the day of the tragedy this page from a NASA
website presents starkly the dreadful
truth of what has just happened
The opening phrasing ldquoA contingency has been declaredrdquo is very much in the
laconic and measured tradition of Apollo
13rsquos ldquoHouston we have a problemrdquo and the ldquoObviously a major malfunctionrdquo
used by Mission Control of the Challenger tragedy in January 1986
Below and at bottom of opposite page Launch and Conclusion covers for the
flight The brightly coloured mission patch is appropriately printed in black
20
ORBIT
21
ORBIT
Faux commemorative dollar bills with a
value of ldquo107rdquo were issued to mark the occasion
The Israeli issue of 2422004
commemorated their first astronaut was a revised version of the stamps issued in
advance of Ilan Ramonrsquos flight see page 22
At least one territory under Islamic influence
which has traditionally cashed in on shuttle flight issues did not print a reference to
Israel on their commemoratives for political reasons see page 23
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
13
ORBIT
So Who Did Invent the Telescope
A memorable fact from a different viewpoint
Did you know that in 2009 it is four hundred years since the first great discoveries in space took place Then it so happened that for the first time in the history of mankind craters on the moon some details on the planets and amongst other things the four great moons around Jupiter were seen Very soon the observation instruments became better and larger and gradually many more details on the moon and planets were seen Rings were discovered around Saturn bands of clouds and areas of storms on Jupiter and polar caps and surface structures on Mars
Now you may think where is the writer going with this
That is quite simple it so happened that in 2008 precisely 400 years ago the telescope was invented and that happened in our own little Holland For a long time it was not determined who had made the first Dutch viewer as these were called (see the New Zealand stamp issued 12-2-1997)
Zacharias Jansen and Hans Lipperhey both resident in Middelburg were seen as inventors of the telescope but there were other people who claimed this discovery It was said that Robert Bacon (1214-1294) already knew how the instrument could be made Jacob Metius of Alkmaar could also be the inventor he knew Jansen and Lipperhey and had also visited them Then there is also the Italian Raffael Gualterotti (1543-1639) of whom it is known with some certainty that in 1598 he had already made a viewer However this man evidently did not recognise the significance of his discovery and did not act upon it After very lengthy investigation it was finally decided that Hans Lipperhey (1570-1619 right) could lay claim to this invention
As often happens with new inventions the telescope was first seen as a military instrument to outsmart the enemy With the telescope the movements of the enemy could now be seen and followed over a much greater distance so that timely countermeasures could be taken It was the famous scholar Galileo Galileiuml (1564-1642) who heard about this discovery from others and immediately saw what further possibilities this instrument had to offer Based on the data he could get hold of Galileiuml himself made a telescope that magnified nine times Soon after he made another that
magnified to almost thirty times These instruments consisted of two lenses in a tube a lightly curved convex lens in front and at the rear a powerful concave lens as an eyepiece We must not expect too much from these first telescopes because the
optics at that time were far from the quality that we now know
At that time it was very difficult to make pure glass and the lenses were really rather small in proportion to the focal length so as a result the luminosity was mediocre To get a good lens a piece of clear rock crystal was sometimes used We can suppose that the first telescopes were of a lesser optical quality than simple binoculars in our time Nevertheless in 1609 Galileiuml was able to see craters on the moon and Venus as a sickle for the first time He was the discoverer of the first four moons of Jupiter and he concluded from sunspots that the rotation of the sun around its axis was about 25 days
The discovery of the telescope heralded a new era in space research in the widest sense of the word In my opinion we could call this the start of space exploration such as we in space travel now readily do Meanwhile all the nearby planets in our solar system have been explored with a space probe one or more times except Plutohelliphellipbut yes we cannot call that a planet any longer We have even been to the Moon and new discoveries are reported daily also in our own solar system moons of minor planets new rings around Uranus and small moons around the giant planets Jupiter and Saturn
Although in the very beginning there were no space probes doing investigation it is my opinion that we may take the opportunity during this commemoration year to recognise the fact that the telescope was invented four hundred years ago After all this was the beginning of a great voyage of discovery in space Therefore the year 2009 has been declared the International Year of Astronomy 2009 - IYA 2009 - by the UN (on the recommendation of the International Astronomical Union) The UN has designated UNESCO as the body chiefly responsible for IYA 2009 and the IAU as a support organisation for practical interpretation
HN Frankener March 2009
Specially translated for Orbit by Eleanor Coker this feature by Henk Nieuwenhuis first appeared in issue 24 2009 of Nieuwsbrief the journal of
Ruimtevaart Filatelie Club Nederland and is produced (with different illustrations) by
permission of the author and Editor Arie Olckers
14
ORBIT
Our Astonishing Nicolaus Copernicus By Stan Wekka Bydgoszcz Poland with Jeff Dugdale
IYA could not go past without our journal
marking once again this great thinker so here
is a specially commissioned and edited article
from an Orbit enthusiast in Poland
Nicolaus Copernicus was born 19 February 1473 in the wonderful City of Toruń on the River Vistula and died 24 May 1543 in Frombork
Consider this famous astronomermdashmathematician- doctor of medicine and monetary system expert (economist ) - physicianmdashclassical scholar - jurist - artistmdashtranslatormdashmilitary leadermdashdiplomat and hellipCatholic cleric - Treasure of our Earth NICOLAUS COPERNICUS (in Polish Mikolaj Kopernik)
He has been honoured in international philately on hundreds of postage-stamps items of postal ndashstationery commemorative cancellationshellip
His name is on Navyrsquos ships planes streets places schools universities factories on Moon satellites planetoidshellip
There have been are currently and will be in the future many
different celebrations of that Great Man of Geniushellip as for inst World Philatelic Exhibition ldquoPoland 1973rdquo organized from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of His Birth US carnet issued 1973 presents three proofs of stamps from Poland and the US
dedicated to Copernicus
A selection of Polish postage-stamps presents
Him as most important citizen of Poland and World see a page from my stock book opposite filled with Polish stamps for the great man
In this short memorial to His Life and Work we must mention a few events of his rich life His family had its roots in the Polish Region of Lower Silesia ( today in SW Poland ) On a few covers and post-cards are shown different cancels of the KOPERNIKI Post Office initiated from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of the Great Astronomerrsquos Birth
After the death of Nicolausrsquo father his uncle Bishop Watzenrode of Warmia looked after the family and saw young Copernicus into university at Cracov As an 18 year old youth he presented himself at the Jagiellonian University in 1491 and studied geometry trigonometry mathematics and astronomy there for the next four years
15
ORBIT
His teachers were famous in those times astronomers and mathematicians such as John of Glogoacutew (1445-1507) who had written a commentary on Ptolemyrsquos Cosmography and Wojciech Brudzewski (1445-1497) who was hostile to the geocentric system expounded by Ptolemy It was he who infected Copernicus with his theories based on the writings of Aristarchus of Samos three centuries before Christ Their teachings bore fruit in due course in Copernicusrsquos De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium published at Nuremberg at the printing house of John Petreius in 1543 This stamp issued in March 1942 and cancelled on September 11th 1943 depicts a monument to Nicolaus Copernicus within the quadrangle of the library of the
Jagiellionian University
In due course Copernicus proved that the Geocentric System by Ptolemy was not true and his Heliocentric or Solar System was accurate This is shown on block Michel Cat Bl52 and 2 interesting philatelic items showing His most famous work De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium his autograph and the Solar System on the postmark
In 1510 Copernicus settled at Frombork and having bought the Castlersquos Tower he established his Observatory and Library
there as seen on rare pair of especially overprinted (middle vertical black overprints ) post-cards and stamps Michel Cat 805 1194
Many people assign a single nationality to Copernicus Nazi Germany claimed Copernicus to have been purely German as on stamps Michel Cat 100 104 However Germans destroyed the monument to Copernicus in the quadrangle of the library (shown on stamps Michel Cat 396 446) at the University of Cracov in 1944
After World War II Poles rebuilt that Monument and it is now displayed at Cracovrsquos Botanical Gardens
During World War II Polish Prisoners of War of The Woldenberg Camp II C organized by Germans for Polish
officers initiated Camprsquos Post there and issued many interesting philatelic values One of them is a complete of souvenir sheet or block and set of 3 stamps dedicated to 400th Anniversary of Copernicus Death (shown right)
Warsawrsquos Scientific Society initiated the investigation of Copernicusrsquo tomb and remnants in 1802 but found little of interest In 2004 Prof George Gąsowski of The Institute of Anthropology and Archaeology in Pułtusk initiated new wave of investigation and in 2005-2008 he found human remains in the crypt of The Cathedral at Frombork After the war with Sweden war in the 17th century the Swedish robbed many Polish national treasures and among them were books formerly belonging to Copernicus One of books was ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo found in the Museum of Uppsala In that book were found two of Copernicusrsquo hairs which were examined forensically
In due course genetic comparison of the alleged Copernicus remnants found in Frombork Cathedral crypt and those two hairs in the ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo at Uppsala confirmed that the Frombork remains were those of Copernicus proving once and for all where his tomb lies
Polish anthropologists have since tried to do a reconstruction of Copernicusrsquo face and published their results in the Polish
press see below
16
ORBIT
Un-manned Satellites on Postage Stamps 31 By Guest Contributors Don Hillger and Garry Toth
A version of this article first appeared in The Astrophile for July-August 2008
The Elektron Series This is the thirty-first in a series of articles about un-
manned satellites on postage stamps This article
features the Russian Elektron-series satellites Four Elektron satellites were successfully launched with
Elektron-1 and 2 paired up on 30 January 1964 and Elektron-3 and 4 similarly paired on 10 July 1964
Elektron was one of the earliest Soviet scientific satellite missions to be authorized following the initial
Sputnik series The spacecraft had the mission of mapping the van Allen radiation belts at higher
inclinations than previous US satellites had followed In these missions two different types of spacecraft
were paired and launched together as mentioned
above Elektron-1 and 3 were put into a lower orbit to map the inner van Allen belt while Elekton-2 and 4
were boosted to a higher orbit to study the outer belt
For identification purposes Elektron-1 and 3 had
cylindrical bodies 075 m in diameter and 13 m long with six solar panels extending outward almost like
paddles Elektron-2 and 4 were shaped like the cupola of a public building in the basic form of a cylinder with
a flattened and broadened end with a diameter of 18 m and a height of 24 m
Both Elektron types are easily distinguished and are represented on many postal items mostly from
eastern bloc nations Some of the items show both Elektron-1 and 2 (or Elektron-3 and 4) since they
were launched together
A checklist of postal items identified as showing the
E l e k t r o n - s e r i e s s a t e l l i t e s ( h t t p wwwciracolostateedurammhillgerElektronhtm) is
available on the Website developed by the authors for the un-manned satellites featured in this series of
articles (httpwwwciracolostateedurammhillger
satelliteshtm) E-mail correspondence with the authors is welcome Don Hillger can be reached at
hillgerciracolostateedu and Garry Toth at garry_tothhotmailcom
Elektron-A
From Mark Wadersquos site httpwwwastronautixcom
Elektron-B
17
ORBIT
18
ORBIT
Flight STS-107 Commander Rick Husband Pilot William McCool MS Michael Anderson MS David Brown MS Laurel Clark MS Ilan Ramon MS Kalpana Chawla KSC Launch Date 1612003 Proposed KSC Landing 1203 Purpose SPACEHAB Double Main Payload Module
Shuttle Story 2003 STS ndash107 The Columbia Disaster
Columbia disintegrates on re-entry killing all seven astronauts on board
ldquocontingency declaredrdquo
STS-107 was a multi-disciplinary microgravity and Earth science research mission with a multitude of international scientific
investigations conducted continuously during 16 days in orbit
The seven-member crew died on February 1 2003 when the
shuttle disintegrated during re-entry into the Earths atmosphere The cause of the accident was determined to be a piece of foam
that broke off during launch and damaged the thermal protection system components (reinforced carbon-carbon panels and
thermal protection tiles) on the leading edge of the left wing of
the Shuttle orbiter causing an extensive heat build-up During re-entry the damaged wing slowly overheated and came apart
eventually leading to loss of control and total disintegration of the vehicle
STS-107 carried the SPACEHAB Double Research Module on its inaugural flight the Freestar experiment (mounted on a
Hitchhiker Program rack) and the Extended Duration Orbiter pallet
One of the experiments a video taken to study atmospheric dust may have detected a new atmospheric phenomenon
dubbed a TIGER (Transient Ionospheric
Glow Emission in Red)
On board the Columbia was a copy of a drawing by Petr Ginz the editor-in-chief of
the magazine Vedem who depicted what he
imagined the Earth looked like from the Moon when he was a 14-year-old prisoner in the
Tereziacuten concentration camp The copy was in the possession of Ilan Ramon and was lost in
the crash
19
ORBIT
Historical Document
Downloaded by your Editor on the day of the tragedy this page from a NASA
website presents starkly the dreadful
truth of what has just happened
The opening phrasing ldquoA contingency has been declaredrdquo is very much in the
laconic and measured tradition of Apollo
13rsquos ldquoHouston we have a problemrdquo and the ldquoObviously a major malfunctionrdquo
used by Mission Control of the Challenger tragedy in January 1986
Below and at bottom of opposite page Launch and Conclusion covers for the
flight The brightly coloured mission patch is appropriately printed in black
20
ORBIT
21
ORBIT
Faux commemorative dollar bills with a
value of ldquo107rdquo were issued to mark the occasion
The Israeli issue of 2422004
commemorated their first astronaut was a revised version of the stamps issued in
advance of Ilan Ramonrsquos flight see page 22
At least one territory under Islamic influence
which has traditionally cashed in on shuttle flight issues did not print a reference to
Israel on their commemoratives for political reasons see page 23
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
14
ORBIT
Our Astonishing Nicolaus Copernicus By Stan Wekka Bydgoszcz Poland with Jeff Dugdale
IYA could not go past without our journal
marking once again this great thinker so here
is a specially commissioned and edited article
from an Orbit enthusiast in Poland
Nicolaus Copernicus was born 19 February 1473 in the wonderful City of Toruń on the River Vistula and died 24 May 1543 in Frombork
Consider this famous astronomermdashmathematician- doctor of medicine and monetary system expert (economist ) - physicianmdashclassical scholar - jurist - artistmdashtranslatormdashmilitary leadermdashdiplomat and hellipCatholic cleric - Treasure of our Earth NICOLAUS COPERNICUS (in Polish Mikolaj Kopernik)
He has been honoured in international philately on hundreds of postage-stamps items of postal ndashstationery commemorative cancellationshellip
His name is on Navyrsquos ships planes streets places schools universities factories on Moon satellites planetoidshellip
There have been are currently and will be in the future many
different celebrations of that Great Man of Geniushellip as for inst World Philatelic Exhibition ldquoPoland 1973rdquo organized from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of His Birth US carnet issued 1973 presents three proofs of stamps from Poland and the US
dedicated to Copernicus
A selection of Polish postage-stamps presents
Him as most important citizen of Poland and World see a page from my stock book opposite filled with Polish stamps for the great man
In this short memorial to His Life and Work we must mention a few events of his rich life His family had its roots in the Polish Region of Lower Silesia ( today in SW Poland ) On a few covers and post-cards are shown different cancels of the KOPERNIKI Post Office initiated from the occasion of 500th Anniversary of the Great Astronomerrsquos Birth
After the death of Nicolausrsquo father his uncle Bishop Watzenrode of Warmia looked after the family and saw young Copernicus into university at Cracov As an 18 year old youth he presented himself at the Jagiellonian University in 1491 and studied geometry trigonometry mathematics and astronomy there for the next four years
15
ORBIT
His teachers were famous in those times astronomers and mathematicians such as John of Glogoacutew (1445-1507) who had written a commentary on Ptolemyrsquos Cosmography and Wojciech Brudzewski (1445-1497) who was hostile to the geocentric system expounded by Ptolemy It was he who infected Copernicus with his theories based on the writings of Aristarchus of Samos three centuries before Christ Their teachings bore fruit in due course in Copernicusrsquos De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium published at Nuremberg at the printing house of John Petreius in 1543 This stamp issued in March 1942 and cancelled on September 11th 1943 depicts a monument to Nicolaus Copernicus within the quadrangle of the library of the
Jagiellionian University
In due course Copernicus proved that the Geocentric System by Ptolemy was not true and his Heliocentric or Solar System was accurate This is shown on block Michel Cat Bl52 and 2 interesting philatelic items showing His most famous work De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium his autograph and the Solar System on the postmark
In 1510 Copernicus settled at Frombork and having bought the Castlersquos Tower he established his Observatory and Library
there as seen on rare pair of especially overprinted (middle vertical black overprints ) post-cards and stamps Michel Cat 805 1194
Many people assign a single nationality to Copernicus Nazi Germany claimed Copernicus to have been purely German as on stamps Michel Cat 100 104 However Germans destroyed the monument to Copernicus in the quadrangle of the library (shown on stamps Michel Cat 396 446) at the University of Cracov in 1944
After World War II Poles rebuilt that Monument and it is now displayed at Cracovrsquos Botanical Gardens
During World War II Polish Prisoners of War of The Woldenberg Camp II C organized by Germans for Polish
officers initiated Camprsquos Post there and issued many interesting philatelic values One of them is a complete of souvenir sheet or block and set of 3 stamps dedicated to 400th Anniversary of Copernicus Death (shown right)
Warsawrsquos Scientific Society initiated the investigation of Copernicusrsquo tomb and remnants in 1802 but found little of interest In 2004 Prof George Gąsowski of The Institute of Anthropology and Archaeology in Pułtusk initiated new wave of investigation and in 2005-2008 he found human remains in the crypt of The Cathedral at Frombork After the war with Sweden war in the 17th century the Swedish robbed many Polish national treasures and among them were books formerly belonging to Copernicus One of books was ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo found in the Museum of Uppsala In that book were found two of Copernicusrsquo hairs which were examined forensically
In due course genetic comparison of the alleged Copernicus remnants found in Frombork Cathedral crypt and those two hairs in the ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo at Uppsala confirmed that the Frombork remains were those of Copernicus proving once and for all where his tomb lies
Polish anthropologists have since tried to do a reconstruction of Copernicusrsquo face and published their results in the Polish
press see below
16
ORBIT
Un-manned Satellites on Postage Stamps 31 By Guest Contributors Don Hillger and Garry Toth
A version of this article first appeared in The Astrophile for July-August 2008
The Elektron Series This is the thirty-first in a series of articles about un-
manned satellites on postage stamps This article
features the Russian Elektron-series satellites Four Elektron satellites were successfully launched with
Elektron-1 and 2 paired up on 30 January 1964 and Elektron-3 and 4 similarly paired on 10 July 1964
Elektron was one of the earliest Soviet scientific satellite missions to be authorized following the initial
Sputnik series The spacecraft had the mission of mapping the van Allen radiation belts at higher
inclinations than previous US satellites had followed In these missions two different types of spacecraft
were paired and launched together as mentioned
above Elektron-1 and 3 were put into a lower orbit to map the inner van Allen belt while Elekton-2 and 4
were boosted to a higher orbit to study the outer belt
For identification purposes Elektron-1 and 3 had
cylindrical bodies 075 m in diameter and 13 m long with six solar panels extending outward almost like
paddles Elektron-2 and 4 were shaped like the cupola of a public building in the basic form of a cylinder with
a flattened and broadened end with a diameter of 18 m and a height of 24 m
Both Elektron types are easily distinguished and are represented on many postal items mostly from
eastern bloc nations Some of the items show both Elektron-1 and 2 (or Elektron-3 and 4) since they
were launched together
A checklist of postal items identified as showing the
E l e k t r o n - s e r i e s s a t e l l i t e s ( h t t p wwwciracolostateedurammhillgerElektronhtm) is
available on the Website developed by the authors for the un-manned satellites featured in this series of
articles (httpwwwciracolostateedurammhillger
satelliteshtm) E-mail correspondence with the authors is welcome Don Hillger can be reached at
hillgerciracolostateedu and Garry Toth at garry_tothhotmailcom
Elektron-A
From Mark Wadersquos site httpwwwastronautixcom
Elektron-B
17
ORBIT
18
ORBIT
Flight STS-107 Commander Rick Husband Pilot William McCool MS Michael Anderson MS David Brown MS Laurel Clark MS Ilan Ramon MS Kalpana Chawla KSC Launch Date 1612003 Proposed KSC Landing 1203 Purpose SPACEHAB Double Main Payload Module
Shuttle Story 2003 STS ndash107 The Columbia Disaster
Columbia disintegrates on re-entry killing all seven astronauts on board
ldquocontingency declaredrdquo
STS-107 was a multi-disciplinary microgravity and Earth science research mission with a multitude of international scientific
investigations conducted continuously during 16 days in orbit
The seven-member crew died on February 1 2003 when the
shuttle disintegrated during re-entry into the Earths atmosphere The cause of the accident was determined to be a piece of foam
that broke off during launch and damaged the thermal protection system components (reinforced carbon-carbon panels and
thermal protection tiles) on the leading edge of the left wing of
the Shuttle orbiter causing an extensive heat build-up During re-entry the damaged wing slowly overheated and came apart
eventually leading to loss of control and total disintegration of the vehicle
STS-107 carried the SPACEHAB Double Research Module on its inaugural flight the Freestar experiment (mounted on a
Hitchhiker Program rack) and the Extended Duration Orbiter pallet
One of the experiments a video taken to study atmospheric dust may have detected a new atmospheric phenomenon
dubbed a TIGER (Transient Ionospheric
Glow Emission in Red)
On board the Columbia was a copy of a drawing by Petr Ginz the editor-in-chief of
the magazine Vedem who depicted what he
imagined the Earth looked like from the Moon when he was a 14-year-old prisoner in the
Tereziacuten concentration camp The copy was in the possession of Ilan Ramon and was lost in
the crash
19
ORBIT
Historical Document
Downloaded by your Editor on the day of the tragedy this page from a NASA
website presents starkly the dreadful
truth of what has just happened
The opening phrasing ldquoA contingency has been declaredrdquo is very much in the
laconic and measured tradition of Apollo
13rsquos ldquoHouston we have a problemrdquo and the ldquoObviously a major malfunctionrdquo
used by Mission Control of the Challenger tragedy in January 1986
Below and at bottom of opposite page Launch and Conclusion covers for the
flight The brightly coloured mission patch is appropriately printed in black
20
ORBIT
21
ORBIT
Faux commemorative dollar bills with a
value of ldquo107rdquo were issued to mark the occasion
The Israeli issue of 2422004
commemorated their first astronaut was a revised version of the stamps issued in
advance of Ilan Ramonrsquos flight see page 22
At least one territory under Islamic influence
which has traditionally cashed in on shuttle flight issues did not print a reference to
Israel on their commemoratives for political reasons see page 23
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
15
ORBIT
His teachers were famous in those times astronomers and mathematicians such as John of Glogoacutew (1445-1507) who had written a commentary on Ptolemyrsquos Cosmography and Wojciech Brudzewski (1445-1497) who was hostile to the geocentric system expounded by Ptolemy It was he who infected Copernicus with his theories based on the writings of Aristarchus of Samos three centuries before Christ Their teachings bore fruit in due course in Copernicusrsquos De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium published at Nuremberg at the printing house of John Petreius in 1543 This stamp issued in March 1942 and cancelled on September 11th 1943 depicts a monument to Nicolaus Copernicus within the quadrangle of the library of the
Jagiellionian University
In due course Copernicus proved that the Geocentric System by Ptolemy was not true and his Heliocentric or Solar System was accurate This is shown on block Michel Cat Bl52 and 2 interesting philatelic items showing His most famous work De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium his autograph and the Solar System on the postmark
In 1510 Copernicus settled at Frombork and having bought the Castlersquos Tower he established his Observatory and Library
there as seen on rare pair of especially overprinted (middle vertical black overprints ) post-cards and stamps Michel Cat 805 1194
Many people assign a single nationality to Copernicus Nazi Germany claimed Copernicus to have been purely German as on stamps Michel Cat 100 104 However Germans destroyed the monument to Copernicus in the quadrangle of the library (shown on stamps Michel Cat 396 446) at the University of Cracov in 1944
After World War II Poles rebuilt that Monument and it is now displayed at Cracovrsquos Botanical Gardens
During World War II Polish Prisoners of War of The Woldenberg Camp II C organized by Germans for Polish
officers initiated Camprsquos Post there and issued many interesting philatelic values One of them is a complete of souvenir sheet or block and set of 3 stamps dedicated to 400th Anniversary of Copernicus Death (shown right)
Warsawrsquos Scientific Society initiated the investigation of Copernicusrsquo tomb and remnants in 1802 but found little of interest In 2004 Prof George Gąsowski of The Institute of Anthropology and Archaeology in Pułtusk initiated new wave of investigation and in 2005-2008 he found human remains in the crypt of The Cathedral at Frombork After the war with Sweden war in the 17th century the Swedish robbed many Polish national treasures and among them were books formerly belonging to Copernicus One of books was ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo found in the Museum of Uppsala In that book were found two of Copernicusrsquo hairs which were examined forensically
In due course genetic comparison of the alleged Copernicus remnants found in Frombork Cathedral crypt and those two hairs in the ldquoBOOK by STOFFLERrdquo at Uppsala confirmed that the Frombork remains were those of Copernicus proving once and for all where his tomb lies
Polish anthropologists have since tried to do a reconstruction of Copernicusrsquo face and published their results in the Polish
press see below
16
ORBIT
Un-manned Satellites on Postage Stamps 31 By Guest Contributors Don Hillger and Garry Toth
A version of this article first appeared in The Astrophile for July-August 2008
The Elektron Series This is the thirty-first in a series of articles about un-
manned satellites on postage stamps This article
features the Russian Elektron-series satellites Four Elektron satellites were successfully launched with
Elektron-1 and 2 paired up on 30 January 1964 and Elektron-3 and 4 similarly paired on 10 July 1964
Elektron was one of the earliest Soviet scientific satellite missions to be authorized following the initial
Sputnik series The spacecraft had the mission of mapping the van Allen radiation belts at higher
inclinations than previous US satellites had followed In these missions two different types of spacecraft
were paired and launched together as mentioned
above Elektron-1 and 3 were put into a lower orbit to map the inner van Allen belt while Elekton-2 and 4
were boosted to a higher orbit to study the outer belt
For identification purposes Elektron-1 and 3 had
cylindrical bodies 075 m in diameter and 13 m long with six solar panels extending outward almost like
paddles Elektron-2 and 4 were shaped like the cupola of a public building in the basic form of a cylinder with
a flattened and broadened end with a diameter of 18 m and a height of 24 m
Both Elektron types are easily distinguished and are represented on many postal items mostly from
eastern bloc nations Some of the items show both Elektron-1 and 2 (or Elektron-3 and 4) since they
were launched together
A checklist of postal items identified as showing the
E l e k t r o n - s e r i e s s a t e l l i t e s ( h t t p wwwciracolostateedurammhillgerElektronhtm) is
available on the Website developed by the authors for the un-manned satellites featured in this series of
articles (httpwwwciracolostateedurammhillger
satelliteshtm) E-mail correspondence with the authors is welcome Don Hillger can be reached at
hillgerciracolostateedu and Garry Toth at garry_tothhotmailcom
Elektron-A
From Mark Wadersquos site httpwwwastronautixcom
Elektron-B
17
ORBIT
18
ORBIT
Flight STS-107 Commander Rick Husband Pilot William McCool MS Michael Anderson MS David Brown MS Laurel Clark MS Ilan Ramon MS Kalpana Chawla KSC Launch Date 1612003 Proposed KSC Landing 1203 Purpose SPACEHAB Double Main Payload Module
Shuttle Story 2003 STS ndash107 The Columbia Disaster
Columbia disintegrates on re-entry killing all seven astronauts on board
ldquocontingency declaredrdquo
STS-107 was a multi-disciplinary microgravity and Earth science research mission with a multitude of international scientific
investigations conducted continuously during 16 days in orbit
The seven-member crew died on February 1 2003 when the
shuttle disintegrated during re-entry into the Earths atmosphere The cause of the accident was determined to be a piece of foam
that broke off during launch and damaged the thermal protection system components (reinforced carbon-carbon panels and
thermal protection tiles) on the leading edge of the left wing of
the Shuttle orbiter causing an extensive heat build-up During re-entry the damaged wing slowly overheated and came apart
eventually leading to loss of control and total disintegration of the vehicle
STS-107 carried the SPACEHAB Double Research Module on its inaugural flight the Freestar experiment (mounted on a
Hitchhiker Program rack) and the Extended Duration Orbiter pallet
One of the experiments a video taken to study atmospheric dust may have detected a new atmospheric phenomenon
dubbed a TIGER (Transient Ionospheric
Glow Emission in Red)
On board the Columbia was a copy of a drawing by Petr Ginz the editor-in-chief of
the magazine Vedem who depicted what he
imagined the Earth looked like from the Moon when he was a 14-year-old prisoner in the
Tereziacuten concentration camp The copy was in the possession of Ilan Ramon and was lost in
the crash
19
ORBIT
Historical Document
Downloaded by your Editor on the day of the tragedy this page from a NASA
website presents starkly the dreadful
truth of what has just happened
The opening phrasing ldquoA contingency has been declaredrdquo is very much in the
laconic and measured tradition of Apollo
13rsquos ldquoHouston we have a problemrdquo and the ldquoObviously a major malfunctionrdquo
used by Mission Control of the Challenger tragedy in January 1986
Below and at bottom of opposite page Launch and Conclusion covers for the
flight The brightly coloured mission patch is appropriately printed in black
20
ORBIT
21
ORBIT
Faux commemorative dollar bills with a
value of ldquo107rdquo were issued to mark the occasion
The Israeli issue of 2422004
commemorated their first astronaut was a revised version of the stamps issued in
advance of Ilan Ramonrsquos flight see page 22
At least one territory under Islamic influence
which has traditionally cashed in on shuttle flight issues did not print a reference to
Israel on their commemoratives for political reasons see page 23
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
16
ORBIT
Un-manned Satellites on Postage Stamps 31 By Guest Contributors Don Hillger and Garry Toth
A version of this article first appeared in The Astrophile for July-August 2008
The Elektron Series This is the thirty-first in a series of articles about un-
manned satellites on postage stamps This article
features the Russian Elektron-series satellites Four Elektron satellites were successfully launched with
Elektron-1 and 2 paired up on 30 January 1964 and Elektron-3 and 4 similarly paired on 10 July 1964
Elektron was one of the earliest Soviet scientific satellite missions to be authorized following the initial
Sputnik series The spacecraft had the mission of mapping the van Allen radiation belts at higher
inclinations than previous US satellites had followed In these missions two different types of spacecraft
were paired and launched together as mentioned
above Elektron-1 and 3 were put into a lower orbit to map the inner van Allen belt while Elekton-2 and 4
were boosted to a higher orbit to study the outer belt
For identification purposes Elektron-1 and 3 had
cylindrical bodies 075 m in diameter and 13 m long with six solar panels extending outward almost like
paddles Elektron-2 and 4 were shaped like the cupola of a public building in the basic form of a cylinder with
a flattened and broadened end with a diameter of 18 m and a height of 24 m
Both Elektron types are easily distinguished and are represented on many postal items mostly from
eastern bloc nations Some of the items show both Elektron-1 and 2 (or Elektron-3 and 4) since they
were launched together
A checklist of postal items identified as showing the
E l e k t r o n - s e r i e s s a t e l l i t e s ( h t t p wwwciracolostateedurammhillgerElektronhtm) is
available on the Website developed by the authors for the un-manned satellites featured in this series of
articles (httpwwwciracolostateedurammhillger
satelliteshtm) E-mail correspondence with the authors is welcome Don Hillger can be reached at
hillgerciracolostateedu and Garry Toth at garry_tothhotmailcom
Elektron-A
From Mark Wadersquos site httpwwwastronautixcom
Elektron-B
17
ORBIT
18
ORBIT
Flight STS-107 Commander Rick Husband Pilot William McCool MS Michael Anderson MS David Brown MS Laurel Clark MS Ilan Ramon MS Kalpana Chawla KSC Launch Date 1612003 Proposed KSC Landing 1203 Purpose SPACEHAB Double Main Payload Module
Shuttle Story 2003 STS ndash107 The Columbia Disaster
Columbia disintegrates on re-entry killing all seven astronauts on board
ldquocontingency declaredrdquo
STS-107 was a multi-disciplinary microgravity and Earth science research mission with a multitude of international scientific
investigations conducted continuously during 16 days in orbit
The seven-member crew died on February 1 2003 when the
shuttle disintegrated during re-entry into the Earths atmosphere The cause of the accident was determined to be a piece of foam
that broke off during launch and damaged the thermal protection system components (reinforced carbon-carbon panels and
thermal protection tiles) on the leading edge of the left wing of
the Shuttle orbiter causing an extensive heat build-up During re-entry the damaged wing slowly overheated and came apart
eventually leading to loss of control and total disintegration of the vehicle
STS-107 carried the SPACEHAB Double Research Module on its inaugural flight the Freestar experiment (mounted on a
Hitchhiker Program rack) and the Extended Duration Orbiter pallet
One of the experiments a video taken to study atmospheric dust may have detected a new atmospheric phenomenon
dubbed a TIGER (Transient Ionospheric
Glow Emission in Red)
On board the Columbia was a copy of a drawing by Petr Ginz the editor-in-chief of
the magazine Vedem who depicted what he
imagined the Earth looked like from the Moon when he was a 14-year-old prisoner in the
Tereziacuten concentration camp The copy was in the possession of Ilan Ramon and was lost in
the crash
19
ORBIT
Historical Document
Downloaded by your Editor on the day of the tragedy this page from a NASA
website presents starkly the dreadful
truth of what has just happened
The opening phrasing ldquoA contingency has been declaredrdquo is very much in the
laconic and measured tradition of Apollo
13rsquos ldquoHouston we have a problemrdquo and the ldquoObviously a major malfunctionrdquo
used by Mission Control of the Challenger tragedy in January 1986
Below and at bottom of opposite page Launch and Conclusion covers for the
flight The brightly coloured mission patch is appropriately printed in black
20
ORBIT
21
ORBIT
Faux commemorative dollar bills with a
value of ldquo107rdquo were issued to mark the occasion
The Israeli issue of 2422004
commemorated their first astronaut was a revised version of the stamps issued in
advance of Ilan Ramonrsquos flight see page 22
At least one territory under Islamic influence
which has traditionally cashed in on shuttle flight issues did not print a reference to
Israel on their commemoratives for political reasons see page 23
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
17
ORBIT
18
ORBIT
Flight STS-107 Commander Rick Husband Pilot William McCool MS Michael Anderson MS David Brown MS Laurel Clark MS Ilan Ramon MS Kalpana Chawla KSC Launch Date 1612003 Proposed KSC Landing 1203 Purpose SPACEHAB Double Main Payload Module
Shuttle Story 2003 STS ndash107 The Columbia Disaster
Columbia disintegrates on re-entry killing all seven astronauts on board
ldquocontingency declaredrdquo
STS-107 was a multi-disciplinary microgravity and Earth science research mission with a multitude of international scientific
investigations conducted continuously during 16 days in orbit
The seven-member crew died on February 1 2003 when the
shuttle disintegrated during re-entry into the Earths atmosphere The cause of the accident was determined to be a piece of foam
that broke off during launch and damaged the thermal protection system components (reinforced carbon-carbon panels and
thermal protection tiles) on the leading edge of the left wing of
the Shuttle orbiter causing an extensive heat build-up During re-entry the damaged wing slowly overheated and came apart
eventually leading to loss of control and total disintegration of the vehicle
STS-107 carried the SPACEHAB Double Research Module on its inaugural flight the Freestar experiment (mounted on a
Hitchhiker Program rack) and the Extended Duration Orbiter pallet
One of the experiments a video taken to study atmospheric dust may have detected a new atmospheric phenomenon
dubbed a TIGER (Transient Ionospheric
Glow Emission in Red)
On board the Columbia was a copy of a drawing by Petr Ginz the editor-in-chief of
the magazine Vedem who depicted what he
imagined the Earth looked like from the Moon when he was a 14-year-old prisoner in the
Tereziacuten concentration camp The copy was in the possession of Ilan Ramon and was lost in
the crash
19
ORBIT
Historical Document
Downloaded by your Editor on the day of the tragedy this page from a NASA
website presents starkly the dreadful
truth of what has just happened
The opening phrasing ldquoA contingency has been declaredrdquo is very much in the
laconic and measured tradition of Apollo
13rsquos ldquoHouston we have a problemrdquo and the ldquoObviously a major malfunctionrdquo
used by Mission Control of the Challenger tragedy in January 1986
Below and at bottom of opposite page Launch and Conclusion covers for the
flight The brightly coloured mission patch is appropriately printed in black
20
ORBIT
21
ORBIT
Faux commemorative dollar bills with a
value of ldquo107rdquo were issued to mark the occasion
The Israeli issue of 2422004
commemorated their first astronaut was a revised version of the stamps issued in
advance of Ilan Ramonrsquos flight see page 22
At least one territory under Islamic influence
which has traditionally cashed in on shuttle flight issues did not print a reference to
Israel on their commemoratives for political reasons see page 23
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
18
ORBIT
Flight STS-107 Commander Rick Husband Pilot William McCool MS Michael Anderson MS David Brown MS Laurel Clark MS Ilan Ramon MS Kalpana Chawla KSC Launch Date 1612003 Proposed KSC Landing 1203 Purpose SPACEHAB Double Main Payload Module
Shuttle Story 2003 STS ndash107 The Columbia Disaster
Columbia disintegrates on re-entry killing all seven astronauts on board
ldquocontingency declaredrdquo
STS-107 was a multi-disciplinary microgravity and Earth science research mission with a multitude of international scientific
investigations conducted continuously during 16 days in orbit
The seven-member crew died on February 1 2003 when the
shuttle disintegrated during re-entry into the Earths atmosphere The cause of the accident was determined to be a piece of foam
that broke off during launch and damaged the thermal protection system components (reinforced carbon-carbon panels and
thermal protection tiles) on the leading edge of the left wing of
the Shuttle orbiter causing an extensive heat build-up During re-entry the damaged wing slowly overheated and came apart
eventually leading to loss of control and total disintegration of the vehicle
STS-107 carried the SPACEHAB Double Research Module on its inaugural flight the Freestar experiment (mounted on a
Hitchhiker Program rack) and the Extended Duration Orbiter pallet
One of the experiments a video taken to study atmospheric dust may have detected a new atmospheric phenomenon
dubbed a TIGER (Transient Ionospheric
Glow Emission in Red)
On board the Columbia was a copy of a drawing by Petr Ginz the editor-in-chief of
the magazine Vedem who depicted what he
imagined the Earth looked like from the Moon when he was a 14-year-old prisoner in the
Tereziacuten concentration camp The copy was in the possession of Ilan Ramon and was lost in
the crash
19
ORBIT
Historical Document
Downloaded by your Editor on the day of the tragedy this page from a NASA
website presents starkly the dreadful
truth of what has just happened
The opening phrasing ldquoA contingency has been declaredrdquo is very much in the
laconic and measured tradition of Apollo
13rsquos ldquoHouston we have a problemrdquo and the ldquoObviously a major malfunctionrdquo
used by Mission Control of the Challenger tragedy in January 1986
Below and at bottom of opposite page Launch and Conclusion covers for the
flight The brightly coloured mission patch is appropriately printed in black
20
ORBIT
21
ORBIT
Faux commemorative dollar bills with a
value of ldquo107rdquo were issued to mark the occasion
The Israeli issue of 2422004
commemorated their first astronaut was a revised version of the stamps issued in
advance of Ilan Ramonrsquos flight see page 22
At least one territory under Islamic influence
which has traditionally cashed in on shuttle flight issues did not print a reference to
Israel on their commemoratives for political reasons see page 23
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
19
ORBIT
Historical Document
Downloaded by your Editor on the day of the tragedy this page from a NASA
website presents starkly the dreadful
truth of what has just happened
The opening phrasing ldquoA contingency has been declaredrdquo is very much in the
laconic and measured tradition of Apollo
13rsquos ldquoHouston we have a problemrdquo and the ldquoObviously a major malfunctionrdquo
used by Mission Control of the Challenger tragedy in January 1986
Below and at bottom of opposite page Launch and Conclusion covers for the
flight The brightly coloured mission patch is appropriately printed in black
20
ORBIT
21
ORBIT
Faux commemorative dollar bills with a
value of ldquo107rdquo were issued to mark the occasion
The Israeli issue of 2422004
commemorated their first astronaut was a revised version of the stamps issued in
advance of Ilan Ramonrsquos flight see page 22
At least one territory under Islamic influence
which has traditionally cashed in on shuttle flight issues did not print a reference to
Israel on their commemoratives for political reasons see page 23
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
20
ORBIT
21
ORBIT
Faux commemorative dollar bills with a
value of ldquo107rdquo were issued to mark the occasion
The Israeli issue of 2422004
commemorated their first astronaut was a revised version of the stamps issued in
advance of Ilan Ramonrsquos flight see page 22
At least one territory under Islamic influence
which has traditionally cashed in on shuttle flight issues did not print a reference to
Israel on their commemoratives for political reasons see page 23
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
21
ORBIT
Faux commemorative dollar bills with a
value of ldquo107rdquo were issued to mark the occasion
The Israeli issue of 2422004
commemorated their first astronaut was a revised version of the stamps issued in
advance of Ilan Ramonrsquos flight see page 22
At least one territory under Islamic influence
which has traditionally cashed in on shuttle flight issues did not print a reference to
Israel on their commemoratives for political reasons see page 23
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
22
ORBIT
Above complete souvenir
sheet of SG 1690 of 2422004 marking the first
death anniversary of Ilan Ramon
Below the 2001 Philately Day issue (SG 1567) in
anticipation of STS 107 which was much delayed
Left an unofficial JNF-KKL
(Jewish National Fund) souvenir sheet
commemorating Ramon and the crew of STS 107
Stamps supplied to your Editor by Ron Berger
Jerusalem
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
23
ORBIT
International Commemorations A complete listing of all philatelic items issued to honour the Columbia STS-107 crew is available from
D r R o s s S m i t h s w e b s i t e httpmembersoptusnetcomau~rjsmith3sts-107htm Note that the Columbia omnibus issues
included a sheet of seven stamps from the Maldive Islands showing the seven astronauts and the flags of the US India and Israel The wording on the seven
sheets eg Gambia and Liberia below left is as follows ldquoThe people and the government of____________ join the United States Israel and India in mourning the tragic loss of the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia Our hearts go out to the families of the astronauts The sheet from the Maldive Islands omits the words Israel and India The Maldives is a Sunni Muslim country the same as parts of Iraq R e f w w w s p a c e s t a m p s c o m amp
wwwespacelollinicom
Right The Gambia was one of several small countries to capitalise via an
omnibus issue of six or more mini-sheets each which used stock NASA
photographs and mission patches of
previous missions flown by the deceased astronaut featured
in the design or missions famous for other reasons
Although a completist by nature
your Editor bought these
issues very sparingly
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
24
ORBIT
A garish and somewhat hypocritical issue given this Islamic territoryrsquos strong dislike for the USA and Israelmdashif indeed any such stamps ever saw the light of day in
ldquoSomaliardquo
And by contrast an elegant and tasteful Hungarian issue which was just right for the occasion
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
25
ORBIT
Measuring and Surveying on Stamps by guest contributor Fritz Kessler
Dr Fritz D Kessler of Leverkusen in Germany concludes his final great piece of research the second part of which appeared in our June 09 issuehellip
2 The Metric Conversion With the stamps issued on the occasion of World
Standardisation Day the collector will definitely be confronted with a divided world in the world of
science of the world of economy the world of
technology On the one hand he will meet the one world measuring in yards pounds and gallons on the
other he will realise that the participation of many countries on World Standardisation Day shows clearly
the change to the metric system The aim of this new collecting aspect is to show how the different
Commonwealth countries joined the international
market eg a set issued by Ghana 1975 The introduction is propagated with pictures and
conversion-techniques Characteristic marks are the shieldlike images with M G and Ghana goes metric
also texts like a (1) litre of water is about a pint and
frac34 on a scale 2frac14 lbs of jam is a little more than a kilogram Best of all is the length measure with image
and text a metre (m) of material will be a little more than 3 foot 3
The Dominions of the British Commonwealth decided
almost at the same time to accept the metric system
Australia encouraged the change into the new world in
1973 by using comics A little man of 180 cm measures with a tape-measure 5ft 11in a person
enjoys a 7fl oz drink instead of 300ml in addition are
15stone10lbs are exactly 100kg
Pakistan is satisfied with one single three-divisional stamp gram litre and meter with the images of
weights tumbler tape-measure so without the
conversion weight capacity length In a similar way Singapore and New Zealand are using abstract images
In Japan the conversion to the metric system had already taken place in 1959 and depicted this with one
single stamp issue a pair of scales and a measuring cup entwined with a tape-measure
Bangladesh decided to take this step only in 1983 issuing one stamp with the image of a pyramid with
five steps a can and tape-measure a second value
depicts a pair of scales
An exception is India The already mentioned block of 2004 (pg4) praises the great survey of India The pre
-history is shown by the stamp of 1967 the
Bicentenary ie 200 years Survey of India And with the stamp of 1972 is referred to the twenty-five
years approval of the MKSA system (m kg s A) indicating with the symbolic triple chains consisting of
triangle circle square and the perpendicular the metric system m kg s
On other continents the British (Imperial) measurement were also replaced by the metric ones
The Bermuda Islands decided in 1975 to introduce the decimal system with a set Decade of Progress So
did Tonga making this step quite clear with the big
printed M
The meridian survey in the highland of QuitoEcuador as mentioned before took place in 1736 (S3)
According to the stamp of Uruguay issued in 1831 the Direccioacuten de Topografia was founded The 150th
jubilee reminded with a stamp depicting a Tachymeter
(Theodolit) above a map of this event This was 31 years before Brazil founded the Metric Institute in
1862 This and the company founded in 1976 for technological units standardisation were reasons for
issuing stamps Very special is Guyanarsquos Block of stamps on the introduction of the metric system
Guayana-Metrics are shown in six images a tap-
measure with m- and cm-division a metric-man with m-shirt juggling with balls on which the shorts
l ml kg ha deg0 written a metric baby on a scale postage for a 10g letter and a tap with the hint
conserve water resources its cheaper by the litre
The question remains Where are the big nations with their yard standards
The World of Inches and Pounds
The United States of America participated at the Congress of 18 May 1875 in Paris and along with
seventeen other nations signed the International Convention on Weights and Measures In the
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
26
ORBIT
Dictionary for weights and measures (Orbis publication
1960) is written the promising sentence
Other nations allowed the introduction of the new system like Great Britain Ireland (1864) USA (1866)
Canada (1871) and Egypt(1873)
One hundred years later in December 1975 the US President Gerald Ford signed the Metric Conversion
Act and introduced at the same time the United States Metric Board (USMB) consisting of seventeen members
who were only nominated by President Carter in October 1977 and confirmed by the Senate in March
1978 Only in 1979 submitted the to Congress a report
Providing a metric option concluding that it was not necessary to establish a new legal procedure for
metrication of laws and regulations and the change to the metric system was voluntary
The issue of USA Today of 4 October 1999 writes in retrospect The metric board was soon disbanded to
save money
In 1982 President R Regan dissolved the USMB and the responsibility for metric coordination was transferred to
the Office of Metric Programs in the Department of
Commerce
A new attempt was made with the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 designating the metric
system as the preferred measurement system and
requiring to be metric by the end of fiscal year 1992 But in on 03081993 one can read in Die Presse ldquoThe
USA as the only industrial nation beside Burma (Myanmar) and Liberia holds on to the old
systemEven Great Britain and Canada have made
the change at least officially (SR 31081993 GB 1993) President Bill Clinton expressed himself to the
topic that the change was to be done by 14041994
Meeting with stiff opposition by the population the postal administration of the USA and also that of Great
Britain have been very hesitant in issuing metric stamps
barring one the daily temperature for the population a very important observation
So the stamp concerning this topic appeared in a set of
the Year of Industry on 14011996 The image shows
a pharmaceutical laboratory and on the edge of the right hand side a thermometer-detail with two scales
The liquid column is marked red The calibration on the left hand side shows distinctly the metric information at
37deg degree Celsius and on the opposite side at 986degF which is temperature according to Fahrenheit The two
friends the Swede A Celsius (1701-1744) and the East-
Prussian G Fahrenheit (1686-1736) complemented one another Fahrenheit defined a temperature scale
according to which at sea-level water freezes at 32deg F and boils at 212deg F Celsius proposed long before the
French revolutionary idea the 100deg division and defined
a temperature scale at which at sea-level water freezes
at 0deg C and boils at 100deg C The thermometer liquid
has to be mercury The degrees between the fixed points on both thermometers are in a ratio of 180
100 or 9 5 Depending on the Cdeg or Fdeg temperature the conversion is as follows
from degC to degF degC x 9 5 + 32 = degF and vice versa from degF to degC degF - 32 x 5 9 = degC in practice then 37 x 9 = 333 986= 32+ 666= 5
as seen on the image of the stamp
1992 the Turkish postal service on Cyprus issued a set
of stamps on the occasion of 18 years weather service and also the jubilee of 14 years cartographic
registration of the country The set show the whole range of this work Triangulation (compass) rainbow
with anemometer a thermometer with a double scale
as already described above on the British stamp
Mars Flight Lost Through Measuring Error Foot against foot - pound against Newton Go
Metric meets with deaf ears in America Why the Mars climate orbiter got lost (Warum die
Marssonde abstuumlrzte) so run the headlines in the
FAZ on 13111999 In the paper USA Today one could read Nasa lost its $125 Mars Climate Orbiter
last week because one set of engineers was working with metric measurements while another worked with
English measurements officials reported on Thursday
On board of the orbiter metric values were calculated
according to the metric unit Newton per second (1Newton = 1mkg2) on the ground however Anglo
Saxon pounds per second were used Also in USA Today Paul Hoversten wrote Bad math added up to
doomed Mars craft
All Presidents of the USA from Ford to Clinton
achieved little more than the metric system being used in Defence - and the Computer Industry Most
of all a complete conversion to metrication had taken place in the Automobile Industry and that for
economic reasons 1976 the first car completely
produced according to metric measurements could leave the assembly line (Die Welt 01091991) The
US Weather Service now transmitted in degrees Fahrenheit and Celsius but precipitation rainfall or
wind force is given according to the British system
From Great Britain it was reported Britain is
undergoing the processof metrication by weights It happened slowly similar to the decimal currency-
change over On 15021971 the decimal system for
currency came into force Britain got rid of its shillings the pound was now worth one hundred
pence instead of the old two hundred and forty pence The same happened with the weights The
kilogram replaced pound and ounce but a pint remains a pint and a mile is a mile These are
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
27
ORBIT
concessions from Brussels (Baltimore Press 11091995)
To draw the readers interest once more on this topic you might like to know about a little leaflet of the US
Keller measurement Publication which came out
197475 in Wisconsin with the subtitle Living with the Metric System and liking it a little taste of the
discussed matter A meter is a yard - plus a little extra A kilogram is two pounds - plus a little extra A litre is a quart - plus a little extra Now that wasnt bad was it
The metric measures are close enough To what you are using now so you wont have a big problem in adjusting your measure stick
It remains an open question whether British Postal
Service will publish a special issue on day X and which kind of design for the final introduction of the metric
system
Some Cartography Belonging to the discussed topic is also the area of
cartography but because of limited space only a special event can be treated here It is the
commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the
circumnavigation of the HMS Beagle (1831-1836) under the command of Captain Robert Fitzroy (spg 5)
on which the edition Year of the Beagle 1982 beautiful stamps have been issued
The Palau Islands (nautical instruments) St Helena and Ascension Islands (nautical maps) Kokos Islands with portraits of famous captains also the one of captain R Fitzroy Afterwards only one more time
does the captains portrait appear in a set issued by St Helena in 1986 Famous Discoverers among them
also James Ross and James Cook In all other jubilee
editions of the Beagle voyage circumnavigating the globe the image of the only passenger on board is
favoured Charles Darwin (1809-1836) whose arrival at St Helena was celebrated by all people
Captain Fitzroy a significant hydrographer had
conducted by orders of his Admiral F Beaufort (1774-1857) a two years survey along the south coast of the
Feuerland Isles During this time he discovered a new passage to the Pacific an even nearer passage to
the feared Cape Horn today the much frequented Beagle passage Fitzroy also laid the foundation of the
weather-forecasting service so valuable to seafarers
today
Closing Words In a radio play consisting of several parts about the
above mentioned expedition Darwin is the focus of interest At the end of the play the two bid each other
farewell in more or less these words You my friend Darwin can expect fame as well contradiction
because of your evolution theory your extensive
collection and research work I perhaps might once be apportioned a ship
Something similar could be said of surveyors or
cartographers whose laborious and unnoticed work
remains hidden behind all the map-work
And then after the long often tedious way and final realisation of the metric system in so many countries
the working with and thinking in weights and measures might also mutate towards the weight of
more unity and thus a fair measure of peace
28 December 2007
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
28
ORBIT
ASTEROIDS Some Bits and Pieces
Members Appear in British Glossies Your editor had articles fully illustrated in colour on the Apollo XI 40th anniversary in the August issue of
both STAMP Magazine and Gibbons Stamp Monthly
There was a feature on Andrew Swanston in the September issue of STAMP Magazine as one of its
oldest readers as the magazine celebrates its 75 years in existence and the magazine also picked up the story
in the last issue of Orbit about Amza the son of
Romanian member Alec Bartos being our youngest member and this will feature in a forthcoming issue as
a news story
Facebook Page The society now has a Facebook page where members can sign on to become a fan and get the latest space
and space stamp news administered by our website manager Derek Clarke You can find this athelliphellip
httpwwwfacebookcompagesThe-Astro-Space-Stamp-Society125401870287ref=ts
Your editorrsquos recent ApolloXI articles appear on his
own Facebook page athelliphellip httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30010ampid=1062354811ampl=48b1a4bf69 httpwwwfacebookcomalbumphpaid=30026ampid=1062354811ampl=6d19726469
should you want to peruse them
Masonic Astronauts
The Masonic Philatelic Club has published a short article pointing out that some early US astronauts were Masons John Glenn was made a ldquoMason at Sightrdquo by the Grand Master of Ohio in 1978 and joined Concord lodge (New Concord Ohio) no 688 Virgil Grissom was initiated and raised in Mitchell Lodge 228 in May 1949 Edgar Mitchell is a member and Past Master of Artesia Lodge No 28 New Mexico
Canadian Philatelist has no space for space
Thanks to Alan Tunnicliffe (New Zealand) who advises that the front cover of MayJune 2009 issue of The Canadian Philatelist (journal of the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada) features space stamps against a backdrop of the night sky However there is no related article within the magazine
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
29
ORBIT
Harvey D on Venus
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
30
ORBIT
Venera 1
Venera 3
Venera 4
Venera 7
Venera 8
Venera 9 10
Venera 11 12
Venera 13 14
Vega
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
31
ORBIT
Reproduced from the MarchApril issue of The Gannet Alan Tunnicliffe is Editor of New Zealand Air Mail News and a regular reader of Orbit
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
32
ORBIT
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
33
ORBIT
In an article first published in Orbit for October 1999 and now refreshed our New York based member Peter Hoffman who was an engineer on the Apollo programme continues his series of recollections of these momentous flights
Apollo 12
This sheetlet from Hungary (SG 2516 Weebau 192) was the only format in which the stamps were issued It shows Conrad and Bean on the surface one at the automatic Surveyor IIIrsquos landing site
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
34
ORBIT ORBIT
Charles Pete Conrad Jr Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University 1953 recipient of two Honoris Causa Doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot unsuccessful application for NASA astronaut group 1 he was the third man to walk on the lunar surface he left NASA on 01021974 to accept a position as Vice President for ATC Denver Colorado 1976 he became Vice President of McDonnell Douglas Corp he left this position on 31031996 to serve as Chief of Universal Space Lines hobbies Golf water skiing automobile racing he died on 08071999 from complications of internal bleeding received in a motorcycle accident In addition to Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 5 Gemini 11 and Skylab 2 flights Alan La Vern Bean Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas 1955 two honorary doctorates Captain USN Ret test pilot he was the fourth man to walk on the lunar surface he retired from Navy in 1975 but continued as head of the Astronaut Candidate Operations and Training Group within the astronaut office in a civilian capacity from 1978 - 1981 he was acting chief astronaut he resigned from NASA on
26021981 to devote his full time to painting He also on the Skylab 3 flight Richard Francis Dick Gordon Jr Bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Washington 1951 Captain USN Ret flight test pilot later he was Executive Vice
President of the NFL New Orleans Saints Pro Football Club in August 1977 he became General Manager of Energy Developers Ltd from May 1978 until August 1981 he served as President for Resolution Engineering and Development Co from September 1981 until February 1983 he worked as Director Los Angeles Division of Scott Science and Technology Inc a firm of the former Apollo 15 Commander David R Scott in March 1982 he became President of Astro Science Corporation in Los Angeles California later he served as President of Space Age America Inc currently he lives in Sedona Arizona hobbies Water Skiing golf Before Apollo 12 he was on the Gemini 11 flight
Adapted from the Spacefacts website
httpwwwspacefactsdeenglishbio_asthtm
Sweden 1988 and Togo 1970 both show Conrad on the surface whilst Ras Al Khaima 1970 shows both working
near the seismographic equipment
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
35
ORBIT
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
36
A remarkable story about an Apollo stamp By Bert van Eijck
There were interesting stories on the Apollo Project in Junersquos Orbit It reminds me of a philatelic Apollo story probably most ASSS members do not know about Although it happened sixteen years ago itrsquos still remarkable and here it is It all began with a Press Release in 1993 from the Philatelic Department of the smallest country in the world San Marino The release announced the issue of a Souvenir Sheet with three stamps on March 16 1993 for the inauguration of San Marinorsquos State Television It was the first hologrammatic stamp produced by the country The three stamps in the sheet depicted television images of the Olympics Games in Tokyo Monte Titano the highest point of San Marino and the first man on the moon In fact the third stamp has nothing to do
with the Apollo XI We do not see Neil Armstrong saluting the US flag but James Irwin from Apollo XV two years and four months a f t e r July 1969 And that was not the only mistake As you can see on the stamp the astronaut is saluting the flag with his left hand and not correctly with his right hand The photograph used for the stamp had been reversed This blunder was discovered by the Dutchman Klaas Wijchman living in Furth Germany who contacted the editor of the Dutch monthly stamp magazine Philatelie who contacted me as a specialist on space philately It was easy to see Klaas
Wijchman was right How could this have happened Therefore I wrote a letter to Dr Marino Zanotti Director General of the Philatelic Department in San Marino His response on August 24 1993 ldquoI must admit that you possess an exceptional capacity of analysis as in fact you are the only person who indicated the two presumed errors of the Souvenir Sheet issued for the Inauguration of our State Television and you should know that our Press Releases are sent to 2400 journalists and we have 50000 collectors not to mention our various experts who prepared the sheetrdquo
The compliment of Dr Zanotti of course goes entirely to Klaas Wijchman the first one who identified the mistake The Director General continues his letter ldquoI do not doubt the fact that the Astronaut featured on the third stamp of our Souvenir Sheet is J Irwin and not the first man on the moon as you claim even though the Agency which furnished us with the photograph had attached an explanation which dealt with the landing of the first man of the moon Regarding the entire image on the third stamp it was in fact turned upside-downrdquo
In my letter to Dr Zanotti I had asked him if this lsquowrongrsquo Souvenir Sheet should be withdrawn by San Marino He answered as follows ldquoThe only comment I have to make at the moment is that you are in possession of a ldquolittle scooprdquo There is no way that these Souvenir Sheets can be withdrawn from the market as our complete stock is almost entirely sold outrdquo Of course this answer was for me as a philatelic journalist at that time a real scoop My own newspaper Nieuwsblad van het Noorden based in Groningen ndash with a daily circulation of 140000 the biggest in Northern Netherlands ndash printed the full story on its front page on August 31 1993 About twenty other newspapers working together in a syndicate followed Proud I
ORBIT
am with the publication ldquoSan Marino Space design errorrdquo on September 27 1993 in Linnrsquos Stamp News the worldrsquos largest weekly stamp news magazine The image of the San Marino stamp of James Irwin but then the right one we see on a painting by astronautexplorerartistmoonwalker Alan Bean in his book ldquoApollo an eyewitness accountrdquo - see extract below Bean was lunar module pilot on Apollo 12 and the fourth man to walk on the moon ldquoand the first to eat spaghetti thererdquo he says San Marino is situated in the Appenine Mountains in North-East Italy Its size is about 60 square kilometers with almost 30000 inhabitants It is the oldest state and constitutional republic in the world having founded in the year 301
Above the San Marino issue with two design errors below the issue ldquoflipped
horizontallyrdquo by computer imagery and bottom the
1972 issue from Chad which gets it right
Above Alan Beanrsquos interpretation of the event
in one of his paintings
We can distinguish this saluting issue from others
eg for Apollo XI because of the Hadley-Appenine
mountains shown in the background
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
37
ORBIT
UFO The Limits of Space Travel
Concluding part by John Beenen
Part 6 Spacecraft space entities and far away planets
In a strict sense this subject does not belong to UFOrsquos as
everyone agrees that it is completely originating from our
fantasy Writers cartoonists
movie makers in short artists of all different area have occupied
themselves intensively with this subject which broadly outlined is
satisfied by the word lsquoscience
fictionrsquo
Designers of stamps of many countries have contributed
themselves to this area and a
large amount of stamps sheets and blocks have been
issued showing the most fantastic extraterrestrial space
crafts I mention some Guinea Equatorial WB 515
Hungary 33844 (one from set shown left) Sharjah 3815 Aiman 35762 and USA 8993
Others have found inspiration in extraterrestrial
landscapes on far away planets such as Cuba 1149 and
1238 and Soviet Union 217221 Also some created fantastic space entities such as Guinea Republic 916
and the Dutch Antilles (see cover below)
In 1936 the radio broadcast of the book HGWellsrsquo lsquoWar of the Worldsrsquo by Orson Welles created much commotion
in the United States and many years before (and still
read today) the books of Jules Verne became bestsellers Hence also science fiction writers such as Arthur CClarke
ndash also known from the Telstar satellite ndash Isaac Asimov
and HGWells were issued on stamps of eg Israel
(9900 ISR 13) StVincent-Grenadines (9600 SVG 57B) and Great-Britain 1995 as illustrated below
A very special issue is a sheet with 16 stamps from San Marino entitled lsquoUn secolo di fantascienzarsquo (a
century of science fiction) on which 16 writers of
science fiction novels have been honoured with an
appropriate stamp (San Marino 9900 SMA 520C)
Films about lsquoother worldsrsquo became great successes Images from lsquoStarwarsrsquo lsquoStartrekrsquo and lsquoLost in spacersquo
have been issued more on stamps than you probably
think such as the often very expensive series of Australia StVincent-Grenadines Guyana en Guinea
Equatorial
I will sum them up here without striving to
completeness
Review of countries issuing stamps about science fiction
For the stamps themselves see eg httpsci-fistampscom and httpstorecoolstampscom
which sell hundreds of stamps blocks and sheets for unfortunately often rather high prices
Startrek Australia Angola Touva Guyana Grenada
StVincent Amurskaya Bashkiria
Lord of the Rings New Zealand Isle of Man GB
Spiderman StVincent EquatGuinea Madagascar
The Incredible Hulk StVincent USA Madagascar X-man United StVincent
2001 A Space Odyssey Antigua Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Starwars StVincent Guyana Togo (9700 TOG 22B
(shown top of next page)
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
38
ORBIT
Xena Warrior Princess nearly all Russsan Republics
Superman USA The Lost World Liberia
Lost in Space EquatGuinea Togo And even the figures from the cartoon movies
Flintstones in space StVincent
Jetsons in Space Mongolia Mickey Mouse in Space StLucia Maldives
Finally
As a result of the first UFO wave in 1947 the
American Air Force decided to carry out an
invest iga t ion wi th
respect to these unknown flying objects
They thought that they could be secret military
missions related to the Cold War Though fairly quickly
this hypothesis appeared not to be tenable still further investigation followed first under the name lsquorsquoProject
Grudgersquo and later changed into the project lsquoBlue Bookrsquo lead by CaptEdward JRuppelt Over the next 17 years
his group investigated 12618 observations from which at the end of the project 701 (55) remained unsolved
Finally the project was closed by the physician Edward
UCondon who drafted a crushing report of 1465 pages about the Blue Book Project
The contents of this report were and are still
violently opposed by the lsquobelieversrsquo who would not accept any negative conclusion about UFOrsquos This
lead to the final conclusion that UFOrsquos did not constitute a thread to the United States but the
believe in it does
If this is the case than it is interesting to trace where
such a belief is coming from
In the literature many explanations can be found in general based upon feelings of uncertainty for the
future also called social pessimism From these
feelings it is good to know that there are extraterrestrials caring about us and cleaning the
mess we made of the Earth
Moreover there are experts giving many explanations
based upon mass hysteria and a principally lack of trust in all communications of the authorities also
called a complot or conspiracy theory
As I am not an expert in those kinds of psychological theories I leave them for what they are and will not
go further into it but if you are interested many
theories can be found on the Internet
Finishing this piece of work I gradually became even less convinced about the existence of UFOrsquos To me
they are just ordinary earthly phenomena which can
be explained in one way or another by logical arguments and scientific research but for some of
them the solutions are not known yet Finally the lsquoCanals at Marsrsquo and the lsquoHead at Marsrsquo were
nonsense after all too From a scientific point of view
however it would be worthwhile to investigate those phenomena which are still inexplicable as we may
learn from it aspects of our atmosphere and weather which still are unknown to us But for the time being
there is no reason to suppose the existence of extraterrestrials also because any conclusive and
convincing argument still is lacking in spite of the
over 10 million hits on the Internet After all lsquounidentifiedrsquo does not mean lsquoextraterrestrialrsquo and a
lsquotestimonyrsquo is no lsquoproofrsquo
Investigated thoroughly lsquowitnessesrsquo are often non-
traceable or have vanished completely and important documents could not be found back or are lsquolostrsquo Also
hardly ever is even the tiniest part of a space craft shown or if it can be presented after analysis is of
ordinary earthy composition That statements of witnesses often are contradictory is not that strange
as it is a well-known fact also by accidents that
witnesses mostly are not very reliable and in the case of UFOrsquos certainly not when belonging to the
group of lsquobelieversrsquo
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
39
ORBIT
Still there exists a problem with respect to the attitude of
military authorities It is obvious that in some cases information is and has been kept back This will not refer
to extraterrestrial encounters but will serve screening of secret sometimes not in all aspects too ethical projects
Hence it is not by accident that a great deal of
mysterious observations concentrate around the New Mexico desert an area where the American Army is very
active (Area 51)
But as an object for a collector all those images of mysterious men and women are very attractive And
speaking for myself donrsquot you think that it would be very
thrilling if some of it were true Hoorn November 2007
Literature Where the Gods Astronauts Erich von Daumlniken ISBN 90-202-8077-5 1969 The Soviet dossier ColDrMarina Popovitsj ISBN 90-5121-348-4 1991 (writer is positive about UFOrsquos)
Alien Logbook Jim Marrs ISBN 90 5121 750 1 1997(writer is convinced of the existence of UFOrsquos)
UFOrsquos above Belgium (Dutch) John van Waterschoot ISBN 90 209 3102 4 1997 (writer is rather positive about the phenomenon UFO)
Are we alone UFOrsquos in The Netherlands and Belgium (Dutch) Marieke Groen ISBN 90 351 2012 4 1999 (nice neutral article) UFOrsquos Wonders and Mysteries Orbis Publishing Ltd 1995 DutchTranslation Zuid
Boekproducties Lisse 1997 ISBN 90 6248 9141 (somewhat popular)
The extraterrestrial Enigma (Dutch) Marcel van Beurden 2004 ISBN 90 6728 124 7 (The writer does not believe in UFOrsquos and refutes all stories about it)
The new UFO Wave (Dutch) Julien Weverbergh Jean-Claude Bourret Manteau ISBN 90 223 0488 4 2e druk 1976 (opinion of the writer is not clear but is certainly not completely negative)
httpwwwcrystallinkscomufohistoryhtml UFOrsquos in Earthrsquos history (somewhat vague site with many references to historical lsquodatarsquo)
http wwwastrosurfcmlombry Le deacutefi des OVNI (French) (Hundreds of pages in which the phenomenon lsquoUFOrsquo is discussed on a very neutral base Basis for this series of articles)
httpwwwufocasebookcombestufopictureshtml (many pictures of UFOrsquos) httpwwwweeklyworldnewscomfeaturesaliens10524 The 10 most spine-tingling space alien abductions ever documented wwwcufosorg DrAllen JHynek Center for UFO studies wwwmufoncom Mutual UFO Network wwwfuforcom Fund for UFO Research Inc wwwufoevidenceorg (much information)
httpstorecoolstampcom (supplier of nearly all nice sheets and stamps) httpbedlamrutgerseduufohtml (gigantic data-base for further study) httpwwwcsicoporgbibliographysearchcgi Etc
One Small Steppe by Tim Furniss Paperback Spaceport Publishing timspaceportcouk wwwspaceportcouk +44 01237 477883 Bideford Devon-based spaceflight journalist and author Tim Furniss has published the first of two autobiographies ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo a personal story of the Space Age from 1948 to 1989 ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is an inspiring story of a 12-year old British space enthusiast whose interest in space was fired by Yuri Gagarinrsquos flight in 1961 and whose ambition was to become a spaceflight journalist Tim purchased his first copy of Flight International in 1962 when the magazine featured a Space Special issue and he continued to read the magazine every week His ambition was to meet astronauts visit spaceports to see launches and to get a job in space He witnessed Apollo Shuttle and other launches from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre and also met and interviewed many astronauts and cosmonauts Tim became Flight Internationalrsquos spaceflight correspondent in 1984 after being one of the first journalists to visit the Soviet Unionrsquos Star City training centre In1988 Tim was the first British journalist to witness a manned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the remote steppes of Kazakhstan When he stood on the launch pad from where Gagarin was launched - while also meeting with veteran cosmonauts Gherman Titov and Alexei Leonov -Tim had come full circle remembering that day in 1961 with gratitude to God Tim left Flight International in 2006 Tim is also an author broadcaster lecturer and theatrical presenter of his personal space story ldquoOne Small Stepperdquo is a personal inspiring amusing moving and feel-good read accompanied by a popular history of the international space age to 1989 including Timrsquos reporting and travelling for Flight International
Log onto wwwspaceportcouk to purchase the book - and also read a short biography on the menu
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
40
ORBIT
Some Apollo XI Anniversary issues
ref to others on
Lollini site and to
British sheet
Eg Isle of Man
20709
top related