Neil Armstrong memorial program
His memorial service was today at the National Cathedral in Washington DC.
The cover is an image of one of the cathedral windows which has a piece of the Moon in it!
“The Space Window symbolizes both spiritual and scientific connections to the mystery of the cosmos and is one of the best-loved stained glass windows at the Cathedral. It is also one of the most unique in appearance, departing from the traditional three-panel concept by filling all three lancets with one design.
Photographs taken during the Apollo 11 mission provided inspiration to artist Rodney Winfield for the color palette, and a thin white line among the dark spheres and tiny stars suggests the trajectory of a spaceship. The inscription “Is Not God in the Height of Heaven?” (Job 22:12) appears at the window’s base.
A small round piece of white glass, shining from the center of a deep red upper sphere, contains a 2⅜” sliver of moon rock as its centerpiece. Sealed between tempered glass and steel in an inert nitrogen environment, the basalt chip is approximately 3.6 billion years old and contains the previously unknown mineral pyroxferroite. Neil Armstrong and fellow Apollo 11 astronauts Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins presented this sample — “a fragment of creation, from beyond Earth” — to the Cathedral on July 21, 1974. The window, a gift from former nasa Administrator Thomas O. Paine, was dedicated the same day to commemorate the fifth anniversary of the first steps on the moon.”
