{"id":43122,"date":"2026-07-17T01:32:29","date_gmt":"2026-07-16T17:32:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/buzz-aldrin-sells-famous-felt-tip-pen-that-helped-launch-apollo-from-the-moon\/"},"modified":"2026-07-17T01:32:29","modified_gmt":"2026-07-16T17:32:29","slug":"buzz-aldrin-sells-famous-felt-tip-pen-that-helped-launch-apollo-from-the-moon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/buzz-aldrin-sells-famous-felt-tip-pen-that-helped-launch-apollo-from-the-moon\/","title":{"rendered":"Buzz Aldrin sells famous felt-tip pen that helped launch Apollo from the Moon"},"content":{"rendered":"

A dried-out felt-tip marker and a snapped-off piece of molded black plastic sold for $857,600 at a Sotheby\u2019s auction on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

What otherwise might have been worthless bits of trash commanded the highest bids due to where the two items were 57 years ago\u2014lifting off aboard NASA\u2019s Apollo 11 spacecraft on humanity\u2019s first mission to land astronauts on the Moon. More than flown odds and ends, one was the problem that almost stranded Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on the lunar surface, and the other was the simple solution to saving the mission.<\/p>\n

\u201cHouston, Tranquility. Do you have a way of showing the configuration of the engine arm circuit breaker?\u201d radioed Aldrin to Mission Control after realizing he or Armstrong had inadvertently broken off the top of the circuit breaker switch that would enable their ascent engine to ignite, beginning their trip back to Earth. \u201cThe reason I\u2019m asking is because the end of it appears to be broken off. I think we can push it back in again. I\u2019m not sure we could pull it out if we pushed it in, though.\u201d<\/p>\n

As engineers on the ground worked to devise a workaround, Aldrin came up with a straightforward idea, as he described decades later in the letter accompanying the artifacts\u2019 sale.<\/p>\n

\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin\u2019s letter describing the broken circuit breaker switch and felt-tip pen from his Moon mission.<\/p>\n

Credit:
\n Sotheby\u2019s<\/p>\n<\/figure>\n

\u201cWhile I could have stuck my finger in and reset the switch, there was electricity flowing through the breaker and I did not want to electrocute myself. I had a plastic felt tip pen in one of my suit pockets and it fit into the breaker opening, so I pushed the marker pen into the circuit breaker, it clicked on, and we rearmed the Engine Arm circuit,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow we could leave the lunar surface,\u201d Aldrin said, \u201crendezvous with Mike Collins in the command module, and head for home. Disaster averted.\u201d<\/p>\n

Storied switch<\/h2>\n

The tale of the pen and circuit breaker is well-known, having been recounted by Aldrin in his books and talks, as well as for years having been included on the pamphlet packaged with every Fisher Space Pen sold until Aldrin pointed out that as an engineer, he would never insert a metal-tipped writing instrument into a live electrical socket. The pen he used, which was sold on Wednesday, was a Duro-brand Rocket felt-tip marker.<\/p>\n

,<\/p>\n

Aldrin also loaned the pen and broken-off circuit breaker switch to the Smithsonian for its \u201cDestination Moon\u201d traveling exhibit featuring the Apollo 11 command module Columbia<\/em>. In 2019, the tour visited five US cities over the course of two years, spanning the 50th anniversary of the first Moon landing.<\/p>\n

\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The location of the engine arm circuit breaker switch in the Apollo lunar module that was broken off on Apollo 11.<\/p>\n

Credit:
\n NASA<\/p>\n<\/figure>\n

A law enacted in 2012 reaffirmed that Aldrin and his fellow Apollo-era astronauts legally had title to the spacecraft hardware and other crew equipment they kept as mementos from their missions. The pieces are theirs to own, sell, trade, or donate as they desire.<\/p>\n

This was at least the second time that the pen and switch had been offered for sale. In 2022, Sotheby\u2019s listed the same set as part of its \u201cBuzz Aldrin: American Icon\u201d sale. Despite eliciting bids up to $650,000, the lot failed to reach its reserve and was passed.<\/p>\n

This time, the bids reached $670,000, and it was sold on behalf of the Buzz Aldrin Family Trust. The $857,600 total includes the buyer\u2019s premium assessed by Sotheby\u2019s. The winning bidder was not identified other than as a participant by phone.<\/p>\n

Not a record-setter<\/h2>\n

While the sale price was impressive, the pen and switch did not break into the top 10 list of the highest prices at a public sale for space artifacts and memorabilia. That ranking begins at $1.625 million, the amount paid in 2015 for a Bulova watch worn outside on the surface of the Moon during the 1971 Apollo 15 mission and tops out at the $2,882,500 spent for the former Soviet Union\u2019s Vostok 3KA-2 space capsule as auctioned by Sotheby\u2019s in 2011.<\/p>\n

\n

\"A<\/p>\n

The broken circuit breaker switch that nearly ended Apollo 11, and the pen that Buzz Aldrin used to save himself and Neil Armstrong.<\/p>\n

Credit:
\n Sotheby\u2019s<\/p>\n<\/figure>\n

As a point of comparison, the second-highest price for a space-flown artifact was the $2,772,500 commanded by Aldrin\u2019s Apollo 11 in-flight jacket, which Sotheby\u2019s sold in 2022.<\/p>\n

Wednesday\u2019s \u201cSpace Exploration\u201d sale was part of Sotheby\u2019s annual Geek Week of science and technology-themed auctions. The sale offered 134 lots, including more than 40 items from Aldrin\u2019s collection. In total, it brought in $2,862,336.<\/p>\n

A modern Moonshine gold Omega Speedmaster chronograph, one of 24 watches consigned by the Aldrin Family Trust, sold for $70,400. The same 2026 model is still for sale from Omega for $53,500 retail.<\/p>\n

Another sale highlight, and the only item other than the pen and switch set to sell for six figures, was the pressure hatch from the Skylab III command module, flown to and from the United States\u2019 first space station in 1974. It sold for $192,000.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A dried-out felt-tip marker and a snapped-off piece of molded black plastic sold for $857,600 at a Sotheby\u2019s auction on Wednesday. What otherwise might have been worthless bits of trash commanded the highest bids due to where the two items were 57 years ago\u2014lifting off aboard NASA\u2019s Apollo 11 spacecraft on humanity\u2019s first mission to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":43123,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-43122","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43122"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43122"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43122\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43123"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43122"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43122"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43122"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}