national treasures

Shreds of Apollo 11 Flag For Sale

The photograph of Buzz Aldrin saluting the American flag, firmly planted in the moon’s soil, is one of the most iconic images of the space race. Now, as the space shuttle Atlantis completes the final mission of the American space shuttle program, a NASA engineer has come forward with a piece of memorabilia he’s been holding onto since 1969: shreds of the very flag that made it to the moon. According to the New York Times, the flag had to be trimmed to fit into the mechanism that would make the flag look like it was fluttering in a breeze. As those of you who took that one semester of pass/fail astronomy in college know, the moon has no atmosphere and therefore no wind. (A-ha! Conspiracy theories debunked!) Now the bits of cast-off flag, framed and signed by first-man-on-the-moon Neil Armstrong, are to be auctioned off tomorrow in Beverly Hills for an expected $100,000. [NYT]

Shreds of Apollo 11 Flag For Sale