Map poster celebrating early American achievements in the Space-Race. A photo-mosaic lunar map produced from imagery provided by the Lick Observatory in California, with panels of information about craters and early satellites.




This piece was produced by Chicago-based publishers Rand, McNally & Company in 1958, just one year after the launch of the Russian satellite Sputnik I in October 1957.




The first American satellite was Explorer I which was launched atop the first Juno booster rocket in January 1958. It remained in orbit until 1970! 


The Vanguard satellite and the Vanguard rocket launched in March 1958, was the fourth American earth-orbiting satellite, and the first to be solar-powered. Communication was lost in 1964 but it remains in orbit. 


Alongside these is the research vehicle, a Jupiter-C rocket, which was used for three sub-orbital spaceflights between 1956-1957. This model was the pre-cursor to the Juno I launch vehicle for the Vanguard satellite.



Printed colour. (SL) [CELEST1187]