"New" images from NASA's Project Gemini program

These photos look like lost stills from 2001: A Space Odyssey, but they are actually newly digitized images from NASA's Project Gemini program of 1965 and 1966. The Gemini mission was to develop and test technologies that would later be used by the Apollo program to bring humans to the moon. Smithsonian Air & Space selected these and several other images from Arizona State University's March To The Moon site, a clearinghouse for scanned photos from the Project Mercury and Project Gemini programs, that Rob posted about previously. Above and left is Gemini astronaut Ed White, the first American to walk in space. When he finally had to return to the spacecraft after the spacewalk, White said having to come back in was "the saddest moment of my life." He died in the tragic Apollo 1 launchpad fire of 1967.

• [satn]

  The 50 Mb+ raws are some drool inducing zoom-in fun.

• [MarcVader]

  My favorite blog had a story about this some time ago… http://boingboing.net/2012/01/16/gemini-mission-images-restored.html

  • [David Pescovitz]

    Thanks for the reminder! (And for digging BB!)

• [jkg]

  haha, thanks for this great post!  I have a rare UK Hanna Barbara record (vinyl LP) from 1965 called “Gemini 4: Walk in Space” which has a “professional re-enactment” of the entire White moonwalk dialogue. http://www.popsike.com/GEMINI-45EIGHT-DAYS-IN-SPACE1966-HANNA-BARBERA-MONO/390288254463.html It is corny and cool as hell all at the same time,and I used it profusely in session mix I did from 1994. You can hear the full mix @ http://www.dopanex.com (click on the DeeUnderworld mix link) and most of the good dialogue is at the very end.