One Giant Leap for Mankind: Vintage Photographs from the Victor Martin-Malburet Collection  28 October 2022

A fantastic photograph of the Full Moon over the Pacific Ocean, seen from the Gemini VII spacecraft during its historic 14-day mission in space. The nose of the spacecraft is at lower left. The picture was taken with a 70mm handheld Hasselblad 500 C camera and its 80mm lens, using Kodak (SO217 medium) speed film. 

Gemini VII was the first crew to bring back photographs of the Moon from space, rising over the Earth horizon. 

LIFE, 7 January 1966

“Once the Apollo program was under way, it dawned on me that soon somebody was going to be taking a picture of the Earth from the Moon, so I took this picture of the Moon. When we got there on Apollo 8, we took the Earthrise photograph; they were like before-and-after pictures.”

—James Lovell (Schick and Van Haaften, pg. 55)

“The Moon varied greatly during the 2 weeks of flight. Jim [Lovell] took this picture of the full Moon as a symbol of our next goal in manned space flight, the lunar landing. I think it also dramatizes the difference between mere orbital flight and the future adventures that will take Man a quarter of a million miles into the ocean of space.” 

—Frank Borman (Cortright, pg. 155)