NASA Memorabilia Collector Guide

Why NASA memorabilia is collected

NASA memorabilia runs from crew patches, award pins and logo clothing to objects that traveled on a mission. Much of it is tied to something specific: a crew named on its patch, an employee recognized for flight safety work, or a flight the item can be shown to have flown on.

Mercury, Gemini and Apollo astronauts sold some of their artifacts to collectors and gave many others to museums. A checklist used to turn the Apollo 13 lunar module into a lifeboat sold at a Dallas auction for $388,375; the auction house then put the sale on hold after NASA challenged the astronauts’ ownership.

The meatball and the worm

NASA’s insignia, the meatball, is the agency’s original late 1950s graphic: a red chevron wing piercing a blue sphere that represents a planet, with white stars and an orbiting spacecraft. In 1975 NASA officially introduced the worm, a red type style of the word NASA created by the firm Danne & Blackburn under the Federal Design Improvement Program.

In 1992 the worm was retired, except on clothing and other souvenir items, and the insignia returned. NASA’s merchandise guidance dates the insignia’s retirement to 1976 through 1992 and calls it the agency’s official identifier today. The worm came back on April 2, 2020, when NASA announced it would appear on the Falcon 9 rocket for SpaceX’s Demo-2 crew flight. The meatball remains NASA’s primary symbol.

For dating, NASA’s merchandise rules state that Mercury, Gemini and Apollo predated the worm, so a worm on an item sold as an original from those programs needs explaining. A worm alone also does not date an item to 1975 through 1992: it stayed on souvenirs after 1992 and is approved today for retro merchandise.

What collectors find

Most listings fall into these groups.

• Crew patches: NASA permits crew patches on current merchandise, sometimes with the astronauts’ names removed, so a patch can be new even when it shows an old mission.
• Silver Snoopy pins: the astronauts’ personal award to full-time NASA and contractor employees for flight safety and mission success, given to no more than 1% of the workforce a year. Each pin has flown in space.
• Flown mementos: NASA defines mementos as flags, patches, insignia, medallions, minor graphics and similar items of little commercial value.
• Flight documents and hardware: for Mercury, Gemini and Apollo, the 2012 artifact law names personal logs, checklists, flight manuals, training articles and disposable hardware salvaged from jettisoned lunar modules.
• Logo apparel and souvenirs: the worm stayed on clothing and souvenirs after 1992, and NASA approves retro worm designs today.
• Models and toys: NASA’s approval covers models and toys, and it allows the NASA name in a toy’s title only for a precise, high-fidelity replica of a real spacecraft, rocket or rover.

Flown and unflown

A flown item went to space on a mission; an unflown one may share its design and maker but stayed on the ground. Because the two can look identical, the paperwork is the evidence.

Under NASA’s current rules, mementos are approved in advance and stowed only in an Official Flight Kit, used by NASA and approved organizations for awards and museum collections, or in a crew member’s Personal Preference Kit. Crew members submit PPK lists of items and recipients before launch, and NASA releases information on a mission’s approved mementos to the public on request.

The Silver Snoopy Award shows complete documentation: the flown pin comes with a commendation letter from the presenting astronaut, a letter of authenticity stating when the pin was flown, and a certificate. Without those papers, a pin’s flown status is unproven.

Who owns flown artifacts

For roughly 40 years NASA largely left unchallenged astronauts’ ownership of the checklists, hygiene kits and other equipment they kept. Then NASA counsel began insisting that an item was not an astronaut’s to own, donate or sell without paperwork showing it had been released to him. The government sued moonwalker Edgar Mitchell over a data acquisition camera he saved from being destroyed on the Moon; he settled by turning it over to the Smithsonian.

Congress answered in 2012 with Public Law 112-185. Astronauts who participated in Mercury, Gemini or Apollo, through the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project, have full ownership of and clear title to artifacts they received, and the federal government has no claim to them, even after a sale to a third party. Artifacts include expendable items not expressly required to be returned to NASA and other expendable, disposable or personal-use items. Lunar rocks and other lunar material are excluded.

The law does not cover the space shuttle or the International Space Station. NASA’s current memento rule, which excludes items carried aboard the space station, says items carried in either flight kit will not be sold, transferred for sale or used for personal gain or any commercial or fund-raising purpose. It also names philatelic materials and coins among items that will not be approved for flight.

Vintage, reproduction or current merchandise

New NASA-themed merchandise is made and sold today. NASA does not license its brand: companies submit designs for written approval, with no licensing fees or exclusivity, and the rule covers items sold through NASA employees’ nonappropriated fund activities too. Makers put their own branding on tags and labels, the first place to look when dating a piece.

NASA bars phrases like ‘official NASA’ and ‘NASA approved’ in product descriptions and keeps words such as official, genuine, original and authentic off hangtags and packaging. It also warns that many counterfeit items use its branding without authorization, and that copied versions of its insignia and logotype often contain errors.

What to check before buying

Ask for clear photographs of the front, back, labels and markings, then check these points.

• Logo and era: the logo should fit the claimed date; the worm also appears on post-1992 souvenirs and current retro merchandise
• Flown claims: a letter or certificate naming the mission, plus the chain of ownership since
• Silver Snoopy pins: the commendation letter, letter of authenticity and certificate issued with the award
• Early-program artifacts: whether the item fits the 2012 law’s definition; lunar material is excluded
• Recent flown items: how the piece reached the market, since NASA’s rule says flight-kit items will not be sold
• Condition: fading, stains, loose stitching, tears, missing parts and paper damage
• Returns: a policy suited to an item whose condition and history are hard to judge from photos

Where to find NASA memorabilia now

The NASA page on I ♥ Capitalism keeps the two markets apart. Its Vintage & Secondhand tab collects live, relevance-checked resale listings and links each item to the marketplace selling it; inventory changes as sellers add and remove pieces. Its Official Store tab links to current merchandise. Use the logo history and checklist above to judge what a listing really is.