Feb 072010
Found near this, and presumably done at Boeing at the same time. This shows the delta-winged “ferry rockets” servicing what appears to be a rather large interplanetary spacecraft. Note the human figures in the windows. The spacecraft is bristly with a multitude of oddly attached propellant tanks, mystery containers, a radio communications dish, a solar-thermal power system (the “trough” at top) and what looks like a crane on the “command sphere.” Once again, I can’t see this as being based on actual engineering. Just artwork.
Note: on the left, that’s not lightning… that’s a crack in the print.
11 Responses to “Space Promo Art: 2”
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Those ferry rockets look like the booster stage of this version of the Bell BOMI: http://www.pp.htv.fi/jwestman/ebhpics/bomi1.jpg
…with a central vertical fin added.
Well, the communication dish and mercury boiler sticking out at odd angles is straight from the lunar lander in the Collier’s lunar mission issue. The artist obviously copied it.
The crane is how the poor astronauts move themselves and any cargo to and from the surface of whatever planet they land on, instead of trying to climb a 100 foot tall ladder. I’ve seen that in other artist conceptions, so chances are it was copied as well.
This is the “Minerva,” from Willy Ley’s 4-volume “Adventure in Space” illustrated by John Polgren. Fascinating that it should show up as contractor art as well…or maybe it was the other way around?
http://dreamsofspace.nfshost.com/advss.htm
http://dreamsofspace.nfshost.com/sp4tr.htm
http://www.flickr.com/photos/nickderington/2256776593/
You’re right… that’s *exactly* what this is.
Huh.
…and there are the same ferry rockets again, and the well-known space taxi.
I think I may have an explanation for some of this.
Willy Ley and the former Peenemunde team were all friends back in this time period (1950-1955) and both Kraft Ehricke and Walter Dornberger were working for Bell on the BOMI project, so it’s not surprising to see cross-fertilization in the designs they came up with, as they probably showed each other sketches of their latest ideas on spacecraft design when they met.
It would be fun to know if the delta-winged ferry is the upper stage of something, or if it’s supposed to be a SSTO vehicle.
There don’t seem to be any obvious stage attachment points on its base and the belly cargo bay seems pretty small, so maybe it’s a early SSTO design.
Any more on it in that “Space Stations” book, showing the liftoff?
Well, it ain’t a SSTO, as I just found a illustration of it sitting on around 500 feet worth of booster rocket: http://dreamsofspace.nfshost.com/1957spacepilots.htm
Here’s another illustration of a apparently smaller one with a added ventral fin being launched from Texas: http://dreamsofspace.nfshost.com/spafl.htm
BTW, am I the only one who thinks that the claws on the hands and feet of the spacesuit in that second illustration would be a great way to accidentally puncture your own or someone else’s pressure suit inside of an airlock?
The claws are indeed silly (particularly when used on the moon)…but the suits in question were fully hard suits, like suits of armor…no fabric involved.
I have all four of the books in question, and recommend them highly. “Space Travel” opens with a college class watching on a wall-screen the telescopic view of the wheel station and the nearby interplanetary ship Minerva, in 1975. *Sigh.* With such agitprop was my own youthful view of space futures shaped…
I’m having a ball going through that website you linked to; I had some of those books as a kid, and it’s very nostalgic seeing the artwork again.
One thing they do show is that Colliers Magazine had grounds for around 100 copyright infringement cases in regards to their von Braun ferry rocket designs. 😉
“With such agitprop was my own youthful view of space futures shaped…”
Screw that noise, we’re going to Planet 6.
When we going to Planet 6?
Real soon: http://www.starshipmodeler.com/gallery/pf_disc.htm
[…] that it is abundantly clear (see comments HERE) that this series of Boeing artwork was cribbed from artwork for children’s books, I’m […]
The claws on the space suit are from those early days when it was unclear if space suit gloves were even possible, much less advisable. Miniaturizing the various protective layers and putting bellows joints on fingers was a daunting task.
Go to
http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3m.html
and scroll down.