Astronauts Offer Experiences, Artifacts at Auction to Benefit Students
Astronaut Scholarship Foundation and collectSPACE.com Organize Sale to Raise Scholarships
Titusville, FL (May 1, 2003) – The Astronaut Scholarship Foundation (ASF), in cooperation with collectSPACE, the leading online community for space memorabilia collectors, debuted today the online catalog http://www.collectspace.com/auction for its first Astronaut Experiences and Space Memorabilia Silent Auction.
Bidding begins May 24, simultaneously online and in Washington, DC at a astronaut-studded gala hosted by Sims & Hankow Enterprises at the Capital Hilton Hotel.
More than 15 former NASA astronauts are participating in the auction by consigning personal possessions or lending their time by taking part in activities with winner bidders.
“This is the first time the members of the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation have, in a major effort, offered personal items or services to be sold at a silent auction,” said James Lovell, Apollo 13 commander and Chairman of the Foundation. “We became involved only because we have confidence in the sponsors and their ability to produce a first-rate event that will greatly benefit our scholarships.”
“We are honored to host this auction for the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation,” said Robert Pearlman, editor and founder of collectSPACE.com. “Collectors can now help students succeed in their studies by doing what already comes naturally, buying astronaut memorabilia and experiences.”
For his part, Lovell contributed both an Apollo 13 mission emblem that flew to the Moon and a private dinner with him and his wife. “I also wanted to contribute something more personal, and I hit on the idea on hosting a dinner for four, along with my wife Marilyn, at my restaurant, Lovell’s of Lake Forest, in the Chicago suburbs. I look forward to sharing a meal with the top bidders,” said Lovell.
Robert Crippen, four-time flier including as pilot of the first Space Shuttle launch, is offering to take four people on a personal tour of the Kennedy Space Center. Skylab and Shuttle astronaut Owen Garriott will guide a similar tour at the U.S. Space & Rocket Center in Huntsville, Ala..
Apollo 15’s Al Worden will play a round of golf with his lot’s winner. John Glenn, the first American to orbit and the oldest person to venture into space aboard a shuttle 37 years later, will hold a telephone conversation with another lucky bidder.
Before he died in 1998, Alan Shepard, America’s first man in space who later walked on the moon on Apollo 14, left two items to the Foundation, with instructions that they one day be sold to raise money for the scholarship program. Alan had been chairman of the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation for its first 13 years, until Lovell succeeded him in 1997. The items are rare models of his Mercury Freedom 7 capsule and the Antares Lunar Module that he steered to the surface of the Moon.
The models were presented to Shepard by the manufacturers of his two spacecraft – the Mercury by McDonnell Aircraft in 1961, and the Lunar Module by Grumman Aerospace in 1971. These are exquisitly-crafted replicas that are the centerpieces of Foundation’s auction items.
Among the other astronauts consigning items or experiences are Buzz Aldrin (Apollo 11), Mike Collins (Apollo 11), Edgar Mitchell (Apollo 14), Charles Duke (Apollo 16), Skylab astronauts Jack Lousma, William Pogue, Jerry Carr, and Paul Weitz, and Space Shuttle commander Rick Hauck.
Through the years, the Foundation has awarded more than $1.5 million in scholarships to 158 college science and engineering students. ASF currently awards $144,500 annually to 17 students.
“Our short-term goal is to increase the annual payout to $200,000,” said Lovell. “This auction should help us meet that target.”
About the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation
The Astronaut Scholarship Foundation is a non-profit organization established in 1984 by the six surviving members of America’s original Mercury astronauts and Mrs. Betty Grissom, widow of the seventh, Gus Grissom, William Douglas, Project Mercury M.D. and businessman Henri Landwirth. The Astronaut Scholarship Foundation’s goal is to facilitate the United States in retaining its world leadership in science and technology by providing scholarships to upper level college students and those pursuing masters or doctorates in the fields of science and engineering. The ASF’s headquarters is located at the Astronaut Hall of Fame, which is adjacent to Kennedy Space Center in Titusville, Florida. For more information, call 321-269-6119 or visit http://www.astronautscholarship.org/
About collectSPACE.com
Founded on July 20, 1999, the 30th anniversary of the first Moon landing, collectSPACE.com http://www.collectspace.com/ is the leading website dedicated to space memorabilia and artifacts. The site features an exclusive astronaut appearance calendar, original news articles and interviews, a directory of space collectors worldwide and an online memorabilia consignment shop, buySPACE.
