Since the Jefferson Space Museum has the world's largest collection of space flown US $2 bills spanning the history of US manned spaceflight, we have always been interested in other space flown currency. Part of the historic lore around astronauts carrying currency into space includes the tradition of the crews signing one dollar bills, flying them, and turning them over to the National Aeronautical Association (NAA) for their official flight certifications post the mission. Over the years, I have talked to astronauts about these bills -- all have recalled them, and recalled turning them over to the NAA official involved...but no one knowing what ever happened to them. I have also spoken with the NAA, and senior folks there were also aware of the tradition, but had no record of whatever happened to the bills. Then one day I was researching on the Smithsonian website, and stubbled across the bills, which you can see by clicking here, and then scrolling down to the middle of the page where you will see groupings of dollar bills signed by all the Apollo flight crews. These bills all flew on their respective Apollo missions. Amazingly, these bills are not displayed anywhere at the Smithsonian, but are in storage. But at least -- like the Jefferson Space Museum -- they can be enjoyed online. These bills represent the greatest assemblage of space flown US $1 bills in existence across all of the Apollo manned missions. A collection like this would be impossible for private collectors to assemble. But there is hope to acquire one or two of the bills. Note that some flights have 4 bills (one for each crew member, and one for the NAA) which were all turned over. Other flights, like Apollo 14 and 13, only have one bill in the archive...perhaps the crew members kept their bills. One can always hope! :) In the end, however, these bills represent an important part of the tradition of US astronauts carrying currency into space -- as important of an influence as the old fighter pilot short-snorter tradition.


This is one of the 4 flown one dollar bills from the Apollo 11 flight used by the crew to certify their flight with the National Aeronautical Association (NAA). This bill is part of the Smithsonian collection, which has all the NAA bills from the manned Apollo flights. Not that the bill is crew signed, as well as signed by the NAA representative who received the bill from the crew upon their return.

The Jefferson Space Museum logo takes a trip to the edge of space! A few weeks back, we blogged about JP Aerospace and their wonderful program of pong-sat student space experiments using high altitude balloons. We decided to support their noble effort, and sponsor a mission, sending the JSM logo up to the edges of the atmosphere -- and below you can see some of the pictures from the mission, which took place at the end of March. We love the first picture -- if you look closely, you can see the moon out to the far left, deep in space. These are the inital pictures we have received back from JP Aerospace. Many more are on their way. We hope you enjoy -- and if you ever want to do something special with your company logo, or a special message -- why not help out a great cause and sponsor a pong-sat mission today?

The JSM logo on its trip to the edge of space -- with the moon out in the distance!

Astronaut Tom gets some of his first looks out toward the curve of the earth, high above the clouds.

Ground Control to Major Tom.... :)

All good things must come to an end: the balloon pops, and Tom is set to come back to Earth.

Moments before landing!

Last week, it was reported by Michele Orzano at Coinworld that a lunar surface flown $20 bill sold via private treaty sale for "well into the six figures" -- an amazing amount, but testament to the inherent value of these rare items. Michele wrote a further follow up article on this particular bills provenance. A good read, and it makes one wonder what the entire Jefferson collection would be worth on the secondary market, given the price paid for this singular bill.

This large note US $2 bill flew on the last flight of the Mercury space program in the space suit pocket of astronaut Gordon Cooper. This bill, along with all of the Jefferson Space Museum bills, has been officially slabbed and certified by PMG. Note the hand written flight certification and autograph on the bill by astronaut Cooper.

On the back of each bill's label in the PMG slab, the bill's flight status is referenced.

The Jefferson Space Museum is pleased to announce that all of the space flown bills in the collection have been officially certified and slabbed by Paper Money Guaranty, one of the leading paper money authentication and grading services. We took the bills to the PMG offices in Sarasota back in November. We presented PMG with the originals (and copies for their files, as we retain the originals) of all of the background paper work on each bill -- their history, their flight provenance, and all relevant documentation. Copies of this official documentation will always reside with PMG. We took this step of further authenticating these bills for their appeal to the numismatic community, after PMG's sister company NGC certified Buzz Aldrin's lunar surface flown Peach Dollar from Apollo 11. NGC also slabs, grades and certifies space flown Robbins and Flightline medallions, making it a natural for us to select PMG for the space flown $2 bills from our collection.

This bill is one of only a small number of $2 bills to have flown with John Glenn on his historic space flight. This bill was placed aboard the capsule by ground support crew member Joe Tramel.

50 years ago today, John Glenn rocketed into orbit on Friendship 7-- making him the first American to orbit the Earth as the US began to catch up to the Russians in the great space race. The Jefferson Space Museum is proud to have a $2 bill that flew along with John on that historic flight. The bill is pictured above, and you can read more about it in the Gallery Section of the museum website, or here on the blog by clicking here.

JP Aerospace will send your logo to the edge of space for as low as $400.

A Japanese TV program took advantage of the program to send a chair into space and video taped it for an episode!

And Samsung sent their Galaxy phone into near orbit. Very cool!

The Jefferson Space Museum to go to the edge of space, thanks to the good folks at JP Aerospace. For a small fee, they will send your logo to the edge of space, and send you back pictures. For a few dollars more, you can send up practically anything (heck, look on their website -- someone sent up a chair! And Samsung sent up a phone!) Very cool. Astronaut Tom will very soon be a real astro! (Well, almost...) It also supports a good cause, in that each sponsored ad supports student experiements that fly up on the mission. 4 missions are slated to launch come March 31st. The Jefferson Space Museum will be along for the ride: we've booked our spot. How about you?

Just added the above wonderful piece to our growing space-art collection. This is a painting by an emerging NJ artist named John Darvie, who paints under the name Apollo1. You can visit his gallery, Apollo1Gallery to see his amazing work. This painting is an acrylic/oil work, measuring 14" x 18". It pays homage to the crew of Apollo 1 (Grissom, White, Chaffee) who perished in the Apollo 1 fire in 1967. It's a wonderful addition to our space art collection, and I encourage all to go to John's site, and support his work.

We are honored to announce that Euromoney magazine has published a short little blurb article, both online and in their January, 2012, edition, about the Jefferson Space Museum. What a thrill! Euromoney has a circulation of around 140,000, and is the world's most prestigious monthly finance magazine read by central bankers, CFO's, CEO's, and the like. And I just love the title: "Buy me to the moon."

For those of you who have not visited our gallery of space flown $2 bills -- please do so by visiting the main museum website by clicking here.  Enjoy! (And don't forget to stop at the gift shop! I highly recommend the note pads....very cool.)

Thanks for all the emails! We appreciate them. And yes, this is just the blog site of the Jefferson Space Museum. To visit the actual virtual museum, with all the bills cataloged with images and their history, go to The Jefferson Space Museum. 

This blog site is simply a place where we will update news and space information relevant to the museum.

Well, after our first full month of being open, I am thrilled to announce we have had hundreds of visitors from many points on the globe -- in fact, the Jefferson Space Museum of flown US $2 bills has been visited by people from 26 different countries -- and from hundreds of cities in those countries. We've had visitors from the following countries (listed in order of their rank in terms of total number of visitors): the US, China, Russia, UK, Germany, France, Japan, Austria, Ukraine, Canda, Australia, Czech Republic, Netherlands, Italy, Sweden, Switzerland, Poland, Spain, Greece, Belarus, Bahrain, Bulgaria, Colombia, Iceland, Cote D'Ivoire, and New Zeland. Thank you all! Please spread the word - we are always open! And if you like what you see, please do send us a note at info@jeffersonspacemuseum.com. And don't forget to visit the gift shop. :)   After all, what would be a trip to a museum, even a virtual one, without a trip to the gift shop???? (My personal favorite is the note pad.)

On December 14, 1972, Gene Cernan and Jack Schmitt finish up their last EVA, and board the lunar module for their ride back to lunar orbit. The last two humans to walk on the moon leave the surface, and bring to a close one of the greatest adventures of the 20th Century. Gene Cernan becomes the "last man" to leave his bootprint in lunar soil.

A wonderful shot of the lunar module's ascent, as taken by Ron Evans orbiting in the command module.

A gorgeous, closeup view of the lunar module taken by Ron Evans as it approaches for docking to prepare for the return trip home.

Bravo to Cambridge University, for putting 4,000 of Sir Isaac Newton's papers online, expanding the world of the virtual museum, and making available for people these most important works. Humanity would never have been able to reach the stars if not for the ground breaking work of Sir Isaac. (Remember the line from the Apollo 13 movie?) The Jefferson Space Museum welcomes this virtual effort!

39 years ago today, on December 11, 1972, the last manned crew of the Apollo lunar program began their four day exploration of the Taurus Littrow valley.

Dramatic panoramic view of the lunar module Challenger, and the lunar rover vehicle. Panoramas of this kind can be obtained by visiting the good folks @ www.moonpans.com.

Along with Commander Gene Cernan, the first scientist in space Jack Schmitt, a geologist, would capture some of my favorite imagery of the Apollo program.

Jack Schmitt, with the falg and Earth, is photographed by Gene Cernan on December 11, 1972. You can see Gene's reflection in the sun shield of Jack's helmet.

After three days of travel, and conducting many experiments, the crew of Apollo 17 performs lunar orbit insertion manuevers that place them firmly in orbit around the moon as they prepare for the last lunar landing of the Apollo program. The crew also conducts lunar orbit photography and observation activities as well. Visit the mission flown $2 bill of Commander Gene Cernan in the gallery section of the Jefferson Space Museum.

Earthrise over the lunar surface on December 10, 1972, as seen from the lunar module Challenger. The flown $2 in the Jefferson Space Museum is stowed away in Gene's PPK in the lunar module, and will descend to the lunar surface the next day.

The Apollo 17 landing site in the valley of Taurus Littrow as photographed on December 10, 1972, from the command module America.

This coming Wednesday, December 7, 2011, will mark the 39th anniversary of the launch of Apollo 17 -- the last of NASA's manned lunar missions. That mission launched in dramatic fashion at night, lighting up the skies over Florida, to bring to close one of the greatest chapters of US exploration. Aboard that mission was Commander Eugene Cernan -- the last man to leave his bootprint on the moon. For luck, and in memory and homage to his father, Gene also took with him a $2 bill that flew on his other flights --- and was given to him by his father to fly on his first space flight. It is amazing to think that we have not returned to the moon in all those years....but, you can visit the bill that historically flew with and landed on the moon by visiting it at the museum!

Apollo 17 Launches on December 7, 1972 for the last manned lunar mission of Apollo - on board is Gene Cernan's GT9A and A10 flown $2 bill, which was given to him by his father after his father carried it for years in his wallet for luck. The bill is now a part of the Jefferson Space Museum collection. View it at www.jeffersonspacemuseum.com

A fantastic new post about the museum just hit Paul Fraser Collectibles wonderful blog. The article is a very nice tribute and overview of the museum, how I started the collection, and my interests in the bill. You will enjoy the other article's on Paul's site, too, so make sure you poke around -- especially in the space collectibles sections. UPDATE: And they did an expanded version of the article, with more pictures of the bills, and more background on the collection. Read this version here.

Noted collector and paper money blogger Tom Chao wrote about the new Jefferson Space Museum on his blog site. You can see the post by clicking here. Tom's blog is great! If you are at all interested in Paper money, you really need to check it out. Also his famous world paper money gallery, which can be found here. Thanks for the blog post, Tom!

Earlier this month, I spent time down at the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation's annual gathering at the Kennedy Space Center. On my way down, I stopped off in Sarasota at the office of the Paper Money Guaranty folks to show them the flown Jefferson bills. They've got some fatastic offices and people down there. We spent some time chatting about flown currency, and I left them with a lot of resource material, provenance paperwork, etc. (Copies, of course....) And they were kind enough to certify and slab the bills in their PMG holders. I got the idea from going to the World's Fair of Money exposition in Chicago this past year, seeing all the wonderful exhibits of historic paper money....all of which was usually PMG slabbed, cataloged, and certified. It was a great experience, and another attempt by the Jefferson Space Museum to educate those in the paper money world about these unique bills. Afterward, I took the bills back to the ASF show, and here is a picture of Gene Cernan with the JSM bill of his that flew on all three of his missions, including landing on the moon during Apollo 17. It was a nice opportunity to reunite Gene with the bill, and we had a great time chatting about it once again.

And in an ultimate display of vanity -- and fun loving commercialism -- we've launched a Jefferson Space Museum gift shop, with logoed items that are, ahem, reasonably priced. Some cool items. And best yet, they feature the museum logo, which was custom designed for us by noted German space artist and illustrator Detlev van Ravenswaay. Now how cool is that?

After many years of collecting the bills for the Jefferson Space Museum, we have finally reached a point to launch a full fledged virtual museum! The site will go live on Sunday, November 27, 2011. Check out our new place on the web at The Jefferson Space Museum. (Many thanks to Fish-I Design & Video for their work on the site.) And please join us here in the conversation, as we post to this blog updates on new acquisitions, research on the bills in the collection, and discuss space artifact collecting in general.