Mercury 8 Commemorative Mission Patch
Mercury 8 Commemorative Mission Patch
Like all Mercury mission patches, this design was produced after the flight and was not worn by Mercury 8 astronaut Wally Schirra. The patch was produced by the American company A-B Emblem to commemorate America's first crewed space programme.A-B Emblem began work with NASA in the 1960s, before signing an exclusive contract to produce official patches for spaceflight missions in 1970. NASA had only adopted official mission patches from Gemini 5 onwards. This particular patch was made in the 1970s, as collectors started to want more and more space related patches.
Wally Schirra chose the name Sigma 7 for his spacecraft, as the Greek symbol Sigma is used to represent the sum of the elements of an equation, with Schirra suggesting it therefore stands for engineering excellence too. The Sigma symbol and number 7 logo that can be seen flying above Earth on the patch was originally designed by artist Cece Bibby - who also painted the logo on the side of Schirra's spacecraft.
More information
Object number
2021-6
Location
Artefact Store
Has this object been into space?
No
Material
Cotton
Object Production Date
1970s
Object Production Organisation
A-B Emblem
Object Production Place
North Carolina
Weaverville
United States
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