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Apollo at 50: A History in Artifacts

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Apollo at 50: A History in Artifacts

Evening Program with Book Signing

Inside Science program

Evening Lecture/Seminar

Wednesday, July 10, 2019 - 6:45 p.m. to 8:15 p.m. ET
Code: 1L0258
Location:
S. Dillon Ripley Center
1100 Jefferson Dr SW
Metro: Smithsonian (Mall exit)
Select your Registration
$20
Member
$30
Non-Member

Project Apollo ranks among the most bold and challenging undertakings of the 20th century. Within less than a decade, the United States lept from suborbital spaceflight to landing humans on the moon and returning them safely back to Earth. Hundreds of thousands of people helped make these missions possible, while billions more around the world followed the flights.

The material legacy of these missions is immense—with thousands of artifacts from capsules to spacesuits to the ephemera of life aboard a spacecraft represented in the Smithsonian’s collections. Fifty years after the first lunar landing, Teasel Muir-Harmony, curator of Apollo spacecraft at the Air and Space Museum, reassesses the history of Project Apollo through the most evocative objects of the Space Age.

She examines artifacts that highlight how Project Apollo touched people’s lives, both within the space program and around the world. More than space hardware alone, the objects she features reflect the deep interconnection between Project Apollo and broader developments in American society and politics.

Muir-Harmony’s book, Apollo to the Moon: A History in 50 Objects (National Geographic) is available for sale and signing.

Smithsonian Connections

The December 1968 mission of Apollo 8 produced the unforgettable image of the Earth rising from the darkness of space. In an interview with Smithsonian.com, Teasel Muir-Harmony examines the significance of a photograph and a mission that awed the world during the closing days of a year of unprecedented tumult.

Inside Science