No. 464: Three Apollos

No. 464, "Three Apollos" by Tom Wills, pencil, May 2020.
Elaine and Dan Rosenhamer Eastbourn

I love when an art order requires me to employ a bit of sorcery, using magic to produce a one-of-a-kind image.
"Three Apollos" is such an image.
Here we have three historic American figures, all astronauts, all went to the moon and two walked upon it: Alan Bean, Neil Armstrong and Michael Collins.

Yet they never posed together, and Armstrong and Collins never flew to the moon with Bean.
Armstrong, Navy, of course is the first human to set foot upon the moon July 20, 1969, followed by Buzz Aldrin (Air Force) 19 minutes later
Collins, Air Force, flew the Apollo 11 command module Columbia and orbited the moon 30 times, waiting for Armstrong and Aldrin to land and return in the Eagle lunar module.
Bean, a Navy officer, was the fourth person to walk on the lunar surface, Apollo 12 in November 1969.

I was told that these three men are the favorite space cowboys of the recipient of this drawing, a guy who loves the adventure and history of manned space flight. His wife -- a friend from even before high school -- just thought it would be cool to put his three favorites together.
Turns out she was right, probably not for the first time.

I used NASA images and right-sized them to get the heads to the right size and orientation.  Once I had roughed them in, I emailed her and got cleared for launch.

We also added something very special: The frame was handmade by hubby's brother. At one time it held a space shuttle poster but when it came to me, the glass was being held in with tape.  I restored the frame and treated the wood, and put the new drawing inside.

So, we have a favorite fantasy image in a family heirloom frame. And we are all over the moon about that.