Dollieh Sanctuary

Deke Slayton, an original Gemini astronaut, in front of The Deke Slayton Memorial Space & Bicycle Museum
http://www.dekeslaytonmuseum.com/

With Deke!


A full scale model of a Gemini Capsule - it's not very big, is it!








How would you like to sit in this on the way to the moon?

It's an original Apollo seat on loan from Nasa, and yes, it has been there!



I think Hazel liked the balloon too, maybe someday...

Pretty neat Hazel, I'm jealous! Always been somewhat fascinated with space myself.

Hazel is one well traveled fairy!

zirconmermaid wrote:How would you like to sit in this on the way to the moon?

In zero G, it probably wasn't that bad. Being in the sitting position for the entire trip would be the uncomfortable part. However with the LEM attached to the command module for most of the way, the astronauts could get up and move around, even "stand up" in the LEM.

You had to be really good friends to fly in the Gemini capsules.

Gerald just saw this post and corrected me - that's a Mercury replica - much smaller than Gemini. Oops! I really recommend this museum, it's well worth the trip!

Back in 1969 or 1970, NASA brought an exhibit to the California group, Foundation For The Junior Blind. I was able to visit the exhibit and they had one of the original Mercury capsules on display. You could see the damage done to the heat shield and paint during re-entry. I remember peering into the tiny door... the inside smelled! The NASA person said that the astronaut would get in, settle himself into the seat and then the engineers and technicians would *re-assemble* the control panels and equipment around him! There was no way an astronaut could get *out* again until splash-down when the personnel of the recovery ship would unbolt all that stuff and remove it. Then the guy had to be lifted out.

We got to see (and touch) the capsule, the space suits (they had two of them) and get a sample of this *incredible* space-age fastening stuff! It was a little cloth strip with sort of wooly stuff on one side and another strip with coarser wiry stuff on the other... I think it was called... Vel-Cro? Man I hung onto that little strip for YEARS! We blind kids were among the very first civilians to get samples of the new material.

Swan