RADruss

The Origins of the Mission Patches

The mission patches were designed for my Urban Garden in Denver, CO USA. The mission patches are an homage to NASA human spaceflight. Each NASA mission, be it a mission to the Moon or robotic missions to Mars or shuttle missions to Hubble Space Telescope or to the International Space Station Alpha - each mission has a mission patch to commemorate it. I am a scientist at heart and maybe a little nerdy but that is OK by me.

We originally designed the patch to memorialize the first garden, STS-666, in which the number designation was supposed to be ‘scary’ or unlucky … 666. We grew only pumpkins that year so the mission patch had a pumpkin on it. It was for Halloween. “STS” stands for “Scarecrow Transportation System,” of which Barnabas is the scarecrow. Barnabas wears a hockey mask. The names are those of my friends who helped with the garden. A community garden of sorts.

Year 2 was STS-13L. Originally we planned to grow a large, giant, 1000-pound pumpkin but we ended up growing an 80-pound pumpkin instead…

…and several 40 pound pumpkins. Giant pumpkins are labor intensive and high maintenance and I have a life outside of gardening. Haha. 80 pounds is no laughing matter though. The symbols represented the new raised gardening beds and a sunflower, of which many were grown that year. Again ‘13′ was keeping with the theme of unlucky numbers. “L” stood for “large” - for the large pumpkins.

Year 3 was the Great eXperiment - or GX, GX-1134. 1134 was the number designation. A triangle with 3 sides, the mission patch had all sorts of “three” symbolism and that wacky number: 1134. How is that an unlucky number? Turn it upside down and it reads “HELL!” Muhahahahaha!

Year 4, a square, a diamond, symbolizes the 4th year, continuing the Great eXperiment, GX-IV. We discarded the “unlucky number” theme and used the Roman Numeral 4, aka IV. The symbol at the top is a water molecule. With water comes life to the Urban Garden.

Y5, year 5, has a mission patch that goes back to the round. The simple design shows the Earth/Moon system being thrust apart by a stylized “plant,” which is warmed by the Sol, our sun, represented by the mask of Barnabas von Scarecrow.

I am hot in self-promoting and receive all sorts of press for my garden. CNN has featured it twice and there have been write-ups in local Denver newspapers with another article in Westword newspaper. My ultimate goal is a lengthy television news story. I also grow “space basil,” Cinnamon Basil, with next-generations seeds that originally flew aboard the Space Shuttle Endeavour on STS-118 in August of 2007.

If you notice, the common themes that run through all of the mission patches include the scarecrow mask as well as a sun or moon or star.

Barnabas von Scarecrow

As a fun experiment, the first two mission patches have been outside, exposed to the Colorado elements, for over 1000 days! The weather test experiment!

Only 200 of each mission patch are embroidered each year and I send out a lot to people all over the world with the stipulation that they photograph the mission patch in strange and/or unusual and/or visually different places/scenarios. Rome, Greece, Cambodia, Canada, NYC, California - the mission patches have covered a lot of ground. Here is the gallery of mission patch images, including all of the prototype designs and pictures people have taken of them all over the world:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/flight0001/sets/72157603792535847/

My ultimate goal is to have one fly to the ISS!

If you want one for this season, send me a private email with your mailing address and I will mail it out to ya.

Russ