296 a
John Young, Eugene Cernan, or Thomas Stafford

Three quarters of the full Moon seen from the spacecraft after transEarth injection

Apollo 10, May 18-26, 1969

Vintage chromogenic print on fiber-based Kodak paper, 20.3 x 25.4cm (8 x 10in), with “A Kodak Paper” watermarks on the verso (NASA / North American Rockwell) [NASA AS10-27-3948]

296 b
John Young

The whole Moon seen from the spacecraft approaching the equal potential point between the Earth and the Moon

Apollo 10, May 18-26, 1969

Vintage chromogenic print on fiber-based Kodak paper, 20.3 x 25.4cm (8 x 10in), with NASA MSC caption and “A Kodak Paper” watermarks on the verso, numbered “NASA AS10-27-3956” in red in top margin

20.3 x 25.4cm (8 x 10in)

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Lot Essay

296 a
The photograph was taken through the 80mm lens.

From the mission transcript after TransEarth injection:

138:02:36 Cernan: Joe, this is incredible. That thing is getting rounder and rounder and rounder and smaller all the time.
138:02:40 Engle (Mission Control): Rog, Gene-o. Understand.
138:02:46 Cernan: The real show is on the inside here; it’s like three monkeys in a string pod. [...]
138:04:49 Cernan: Hey, Joe, the Moon is almost small enough now where I can see the whole thing from the top, one corner of my forward window to the other corner of my forward window. [...]
138:05:32 Engle: You guys are really hauling the mail out there. [...]
138:08:33 Cernan: Hey, Joe, down at 9 miles [16.7 km] has to be exciting, but this has got to be unbelievable. The wind - the Moon now is well within the boundaries of my forward rendezvous window. [...]
138:10:21 Cernan: See what I mean about size, Joe. It just about fills up, roundwise, right smack in the hatch window. Boy, and is this a full Moon, I’ll tell you.
138:10:39 Engle: You’re just about 1,400 [nautical] miles [2,600 km] out now, Gene.

296 b
The photograph was taken through the 250mm lens after the first night of sleep on the way back to Earth.
The Moon is seen from a perspective not visible from Earth as the spacecraft was high above the equator near 27° E longitude.

From the mission transcript after the first night of sleep following transEarth injection:

147:27:35 Young: The Moon is a - The Moon is a very bright body from here. [...] Our window system on the vehicle right now is in excellent condition. We can see just as clearly as anyone could ask for, on all five windows. [...]
148:49:00 Public Affairs Officer (Mission Control): This is Apollo Control at 148 hours, 49 minutes. During that inflight debriefing there, Apollo 10 did pass the equal potential point between the Earth and the Moon. Has now left the lunar sphere of influence, and is in the Earth’s sphere. That occurred at 148 hours, 39 minutes, 3 seconds. We copied the distance from the Earth at that time of 179,524 nautical miles [332,478 km]. Velocity, 4,869 feet per second [1,484 m/s]. Distance from the Moon at that time was about 33,820 nautical miles [62,635 km]. [...]
149:18:11 Stafford: Roger. Just wanted to describe [garble] kind of the total situation here internal. We’ve got all the spacecraft restowed. Got the music playing, got a beautiful view out here as we rotate around slowly. We’ve got the Moon in one window and the Earth in the other window. We got it worked out where no thrusters are firing and we just feel in great shape. Over.