2013 $7 Honoring Australian Astronauts, Mint Sheet of 4 Stamps, Solomon Islands

Mint Stamps Honor Pioneering Australian Astronauts

Australia didn’t have a space agency until 2018.  So before that, Australians hoping to go to space had to become citizens of other nations to fulfill their dreams.  This neat mint stamp sheet honors three Australians who became American citizens and joined NASA.

Andrew Thomas was the first Australi...  more

Mint Stamps Honor Pioneering Australian Astronauts

Australia didn’t have a space agency until 2018.  So before that, Australians hoping to go to space had to become citizens of other nations to fulfill their dreams.  This neat mint stamp sheet honors three Australians who became American citizens and joined NASA.

Andrew Thomas was the first Australian-born professional astronaut to enter space.  Born in South Australia in 1951, he stayed with NASA for 22 years.  He flew four missions, spending a total of six months in space.

Born in Sydney in 1944, Paul Scully-Power was the first Australian to go into space in 1984 (he was an oceanographer while Thomas was an astronaut).  He was a civilian employee of the US Naval Undersea Warfare Center and flew aboard the Space Shuttle as a Payload Specialist.  During that mission, he confirmed the existence of spiral eddies (a sea surface pattern) and was able to see them with the naked eye.   

Philip Chapman was born in Melbourne in 1935 and was the first Australian-born American astronaut.  He joined NASA in 1967, trained as an astronaut, and worked as a mission scientist on Apollo 14.  However, he never went into space and resigned after five years because he disagreed with the decision to build a space shuttle. 

Add the legacies of these Australian pioneers to your collection today!