Rand McNally’s Modern Space Map
I was out at the annual Strang Institute Garage Sale over the holiday weekend. It’s a yearly deal held in the parking structure near Mission Control. Anyway, I casually opened up an old Rand McNally atlas and my eyes beheld a map of the solar system just like one that I had when I was a little kid. At five bucks, I couldn’t pass it up!
I had something very much like this on my wall when I was in high school. It’s so “almost right”.
Thank you for reminding us of futures that weren’t. Oh, and thank you for Ellie.
*Sigh*! On this map Pluto is still a planet!
That art was cool back then!
Pluto *IS* still a planet. Just because some silly organization of astronomers says so, doesn’t make it so! Who put them in charge? Besides, if you want to revoke someone’s planethood, you are required to do it in person!
If Planet X is a planet (and clearly it is as it says so right in the name), then so is Pluto.
And Odo, you’re welcome for Ellie! My pleasure.
I had that map when I was a kid. I especially remember the very colorful Saturn with the multi-colored rings. Sigh.
I’d have to say that my memory of the picture of Saturn’s rings at the bottom is the sole reason that Planet X has rings.
Ah, the good old days. When writers could have a planet be volcanic, or have water, or be multicolored if they wanted to. None of those pesky facts there to get in the way.
At least the moons of Jupiter still have a lot of that going on. Volcanic Io, Europa’s oceans…and even Saturn’s moon Titan and it’s methane seas. Plenty of cool stuff to look back and giggle at in fifty years and how we got it wrong.
Speaking of images and artifacts that we grew up with in the 60’s, check out this news story on NPR’s Morning Edition about Googie architecture and the design aesthetics that came with the Space Race. Some of the objects noted my now be lying around the Strang Institute.
http://www.npr.org/2011/07/14/137763046/out-of-this-world-designs-of-the-space-age
Thanks for the great story, nels. I seem to recall a tea kettle similar to the one in the article when I was a kid. Yeah, there’s a few things around the institute that definitely beckon back to the Googie style. One day, perhaps, I’ll show some of it here on the site.
This reminds me of a book I have at home called Yesterday’s Tomorrows: Past Visions of the American Future.
[sigh] I remember this poster from when I was a kid. I used to stare at it for hours. For some reasons I went looking for it today and found this. Thanks for the nice-sized version and the memories
My pleasure Andrew. Feel free to have a look around the rest of the site. Hopefully you’ll find something else you like. Oh, and thanks for the comment!
Hi are you willing to sell this? I would love to pass this on to my daughter. Thanks! Hilary
Hi, Hilary. Nope! I’ve been looking for this since I can’t remember. So I’m hanging onto this one.
Wow.. I used to have this map when I was a kid. Like the other poster mentioned above, I would stare at it for hours sometimes. The one I had was on a large plywood board. It was this exact same map, but somehow it was a version that they applied to a 3ft x 4ft 3/4″ thick board, I guess for classroom use. I used to use it as a work surface when building models and all kind of stuff. I don’t know where it is now, but I was searching for that map online and came to this site. Thanks for posting an image of it! I love running across things I have not seen since I was a kid.. so much has happened between then and now but I like to connect to simple things from the past like this. In some small way it’s like going back in time.
I remember getting this poster in about 2nd or 3rd grade (near 1971 or so) while on a field trip to the Armour Dial (soap) factory in Montgomery Illinois. I still have it and love it!
That’s awesome, Mike! I wish I still had my original poster. The last I remember it was tearing pretty bad along the folds. It disappeared not long after that – probably over 25 years ago. I had a cool poster of the moon from the time of the Apollo missions too, along with the Detroit News from the first landing. All stuff that vanished somewhere. Probably with all my lost socks.
I grew up with this space map in my room in Scottsdale Ariz. I printed it out and now I have it in my office in Jerusalem, Israel- Thanks
Glad I could help with the reunion! 🙂