Paul Calle's July 1975 Cartoon who pricks pleasure in his own rejected Missiepatch for the Apollo-Soyuz test project.
Credit: Calle Space Art
Refuses and revivals
Calle's patch design was not the only excluded by NASA officials.
At first, Stafford, Brand and Slayton chose a design from a competition under the workforce of the US Space Program. The winner, Jean Pinataro of North -American Rockwell (the most important contractor for the Apollo Command Module), came up with a concept that the astronauts liked, but the leaders of the agency rejected it because they had not enough “international meaning” (unofficially, it was also said that it was “cartoon -like”).
This led to NASA accepting the costs of hiring an artist from the NASA art program and Calle who was invited to offer his ideas. It also resulted in the patch that flew.
When Calle stepped, the decision was made to re -use the work of Bob McCall, an artist who had designed the Apollo 17 -Missiepatch and in 1974 painted the scene of the spacecraft of Apollo and Soyuz who approached a docking. McCall would make similar art for a few stamps issued in the United States and the Soviet Union, while Pinataro adapted the original painting by McCall as the central image of the American ASTP emblem.
The Kosmonauts had their own design – it was in fact the first Russian mission match that concerns the input of the crew – but wore both their own and the American patch during their six days in space.
Apollo-Soyuz Test Project (ASTP) Patches, from top left to right: 2021 Embroidered replica of the original design by Jean Pinataro; the Soviet Soyuz 18 crew patch; The Apollo-Soyuz test project crew patch; Souvenir AstP program match; and ASTP program match.
Credit: Ab Emblem/Roscosmos/Collectspace.com
Today, 50 years later, the McCall-inspired design, the patch of the Cosmonauts and the Apollo-Soyuz program Insignia are used to represent the mission. Calle's designs have largely forgotten, but now get a revival for the Golden Birthday.
“I wanted to introduce them again. They don't do them again, but bring them to life,” said Chris.
Working with a fellow artist Tim Gagnon, who created some of the mission patches that were worn by Space Shuttle and International Space Station Crews, has started producing a limited number of embroidered patches based on the ideas of his and his deceased father.
Chris mainly focused on the design of Calle's Dove and Olive Branch.
“It certainly remains the spirit of my father's original idea,” said Chris.
Chris Calle asks readers to contact him via his website to be kept informed when the Limited Edition Apollo-Soyuz patches are available.
Click on to collect Space to see more of the original designs by Paul Calle and the re -devised versions of Chris Calle and Tim Gagnon.
