No Single Space Project in This Period Will be More Exciting or More Impressive to Mankind or More Important for the Long-Range Exploration of Space

Five possible moon landing sites harkening back to the Golden Age of Cartography.

“The Apollo command and service modules, which will curry man on his history making flight, are produced for NASA’s Manned Spacecraft Center by the Space Division of North American Rockwell Corporation.” – Text, lower right.

This fabulous piece of Space Race corporate promotion was issued, probably in late 1968, by the North American Rockwell Corporation. The company was formed as a merger between Rockwell-Standard and North American Aviation in 1967, as the latter firm was publicly associated with the fiery catastrophe of Apollo I.

The central image presents a topographic overview of the moon, pinpointing five potential landing sites for the forthcoming manned missions. The right side of the sheet presents a diagram outlining the spaceflight process, with ‘there’ noted in red and ‘back’ outlined in blue. Decorative flourishes like a compass rose (useless in outer space!), Old English script, and an elaborate sun attempt to make a visual connection between space exploration and the Golden Age of Discovery.

The map would have been published between February 1968 (the public announcement of the five potential landing sites) and the successful lunar landing in July 1969.

Source: NASA