Space Now History

Objects

Images, documents, artifacts, audio, sites, diagrams and film — each shown full frame, with what it proves and what it does not.

object
Hasselblad 70mm camera, Apollo 11
The camera body carried on Apollo 11. Almost every photograph people picture when they think of the first Moon landing was made through a camera of this type.
Last reviewed 2026-08-14
object
Hasselblad film magazine, Apollo 11 lunar surface
A film magazine used on the surface of the Moon. The camera bodies were left behind to save mass; the magazines, holding the exposed film, were what came home.
Last reviewed 2026-08-14
object
Apollo Lunar Sample Return Container, Apollo 11
The sealed aluminium box that carried the first lunar samples to Earth. It was built to hold vacuum, so the material inside would arrive in something close to the condition it left.
Last reviewed 2026-08-14
object
Apollo Lunar Module 2
A complete, flight-built lunar module that never flew. It was constructed for a test flight that was cancelled when an earlier mission succeeded.
Last reviewed 2026-08-14
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Mercury capsule, MA-6
The spacecraft flown on the first American orbital flight — small enough that the pilot put it on rather than climbed into it.
Last reviewed 2026-08-14
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Engine annunciator, Saturn V
An instrument panel that reported the state of individual Saturn V engines — the interface through which a problem in a 7.5-million-pound-thrust first stage became something a human could read.
Last reviewed 2026-08-14