Auction research

Authentic vintage first day cover hand signed by the full crew of STS-61-A Challenger, the 22nd Space Shuttle mission. It was a scientific Spacelab mission funded and controlled by West Germany - hence the non-NASA name D-1 (for Deutschland 1). It was also the last successful mission of the Space Shuttle Challenger. STS-61-A holds the record for the largest crew, eight people (all of which have signed this cover), aboard any single spacecraft for the entire period from launch to landing. This shuttle launched on October 30, 1985. (which is the date of cancelation on this cover). This vintage cover is hand signed by Henry Hartsfield, Steven Nagel, Bonnie Dunbar, James Buchli, Guion Bluford, Reinhard Furrer, Wubbo Ockels and Ernst Messerschmid. Full crew signed items from any of the Shuttle missions are certainly quite difficult to obtain and seldom offered for sale.