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$49.95
This is a table medal of Soviet ? USSR astronaut Leonov issued after US/USSR joint flight in 1975. The medal has Leonov?s raised face on the front and his signature on the back. It was made out of aluminum alloy. The medal is 1.5 inches in diameter and 3/8 inches in thickness. This Russian table medal is the great item for space collectors. Leonov was one of the twenty Soviet Air Force pilots selected to be part of the first cosmonaut group in 1960. Leonov's second trip into space was similarly significant: he commanded the Soviet half of the Apollo-Soyuz mission -- Soyuz 19 -- the first joint space mission between the Soviet Union and the United States. The Apollo?Soyuz Test Project (ASTP) Soyuz-Apollo flew in July 1975. It was the last Apollo mission, the first joint U.S./Soviet space flight, and the last manned US space mission until the first Space Shuttle flight in April 1981. Though the mission included both joint and separate scientific experiments (including an engineered eclipse of the Sun by Apollo for Soyuz to take photographs of the solar corona) and provided useful engineering experience for future joint US/Russian space flights such as the Shuttle-Mir Program and the International Space Station, its primary purpose was symbolic. ASTP was a symbol of d?tente that the two superpowers were pursuing at the time, and it ended the tension of the Space Race. From 1976 to 1982, Leonov was the commander of the cosmonaut team (''Chief Cosmonaut''), and deputy director of the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center, where he oversaw crew training. He also edited the cosmonaut newsletter Neptune. He retired in 1991. You buy what you see on the pictures. Please visit other pages of our website for more variety of Russian and Soviet gifts, collectibles, antiques, jewelry and much more.
