Museum of Space History - Oct 2005

The Museum of Space History is located in Alamogordo, New Mexico. The entire complex, including the museum, an IMAX theater, a "Space Garden" and a memorial garden, sat atop a hill to the northeast of town and the views were impressive. The architecture of the building that houses the museum was quite modern and I loved how the nearby mountains were reflected in the wall of windows. Once inside the building, we had to take an elevator to the fourth floor and from there, we began viewing the exhibits. It seemed odd to start at the top, but then we figured out their design and it made sense. Each floor had a circular display path and then there was a ramp down to the next lower floor. Every floor had a theme and the exhibits contained artifacts, photos and descriptions of various phases and projects within the space program. We wound our way down through the building enjoying the displays and also enthralled with the view out the floor-to-ceiling windows. The exhibits covered everything from rockets and missiles to space shuttles and satellite systems. The amount of information was overwhelming and by the end, our brains were so tired of trying to absorb information that we were reduced to just looking at the pictures. I'd recommend that this museum be covered in about 3 or 4 days.

The museum had an exhibit that was particularly interesting to me (and also disturbing.) They had documents, artifacts and photos of all the chimps, monkeys and dogs (aka Pupniks) that had been used in the beginnings of the space program. I was amazed at the number of animals that were involved in the program and it was also sad to see the photos of these poor animals strapped into their space suits in teeny tiny capsules. It made me wonder how scary that must have been for them. Most of the animals didn't survive the testing, but some did and they were treated as heroes just as much as the men who later joined their ranks.

The outdoors "Space Garden" had a number of artifacts from projects that had taken place at the White Sands Missile Range (also near Alamogordo.) This was the Little Joe II rocket -- a launch vehicle that was used to test unmanned flights in preparation for the Apollo spacecraft.

The "Space Garden" had this cool communication device -- this was one of a pair of Whisper Dishes. The other parabolic dish was positioned about 50' away and they each had a sweet spot where Frank could whisper into it and I could hear him clear as a bell. Much better than our walkie-talkies! Too bad they don't come in miniature versions.

The Challenger Memorial Garden -- a lovely site with a pretty view -- a good spot to remember and say a prayer for the crew who lost their lives.