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Apollo 11 Memorial Items

Ulrich Lotzmann derived the following from NASA News Release No. 69-83F (July 13, 1969)

 

The figure shows a gold replica of an olive branch as a traditional symbol of peace; an Apollo 1 patch, and a silicon message disk.

The disk carries the goodwill statements by Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon and messages from leaders of 73 countries around the world. The disc also carries a listing of the leadership of the US Congress, a listing of members of the four committees of the House and Senate responsible for the NASA legislation, and the names of NASA's past and present top management.

The same process used in making integrated circuits produced the message disk. First the messages were photographed and the photo reduced 200 times. The resulting image was transferred to glass which was used as a mask through which ultra-violet light was beamed on-to a photosensitive film on the silicon disc. After a photo development step, the disc was washed with hydroflouric acid which accomlished the final etching.

The words on the disc - which is about the size of a US 50 cent piece will remain readable through a miscroscope.

At the top of the disc is the inscription: Goodwill messages from around the world brought to the Moon by the astronauts of Apollo 11.

Around the disc you can read: From Planet Earth -- July 1969

The disk was transported in an aluminium capsule and is (hopefully) still in the capsule on the lunar surface.

Additional material about the disk

A NASA Document with details of the disk contents (link);

National Air and Space Musuem image of a duplicate now in their collection (link);

And a photo on Flickr of one now owned by Steve Jurvetson: (link).