Beschreibung:

[Apollo 14, before February 1971] Eight large-format vintage chromogenic prints on fibre-based paper, each ca.50 x 48cm., five with “A Kodak Paper” watermark on verso, printed labels identifying locations at bottom right corners, ring-bound between stiff boards through three file holes along top edge, upper cover with title label as above Extremely rare recognition photographs used by the Apollo 14 crew in training. The orbital views were taken by Apollo 10, 12 and 13 and used to familiarise Command Module pilot Stuart Roosa and his crew with easily recognisable landmarks on the lunar surface. Each is neatly marked with a few locations and traverse routes in extremely fine tape. One view shows the fantastic sight of Earthrise from outer space admired only by 24 Apollo astronauts from 1968 to 1972. “The experience of drifting in was so unreal. Then darkness. Then the burn. Then everything’s okay. Everything checks, you’re in a safe orbit. You go to a viewing attitude. And your first view of the Moon almost knocks you out of the cockpit. So close. You could walk out and touch it. It’s there. It’s like the pictures but you never really thought it would be so much like the pictures, so close, so real. I wasn’t really prepared for that, even though I had studied these maps. I knew them exceptionnaly well. . . I guess I never really had really prepared myself for that initial view of the Moon.” Stuart Roosa