{"id":44150,"date":"2025-07-15T23:35:29","date_gmt":"2025-07-15T15:35:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/not-that-into-peace-doves-the-apollo-soyuz-patch-nasa-rejected\/"},"modified":"2025-07-15T23:35:29","modified_gmt":"2025-07-15T15:35:29","slug":"not-that-into-peace-doves-the-apollo-soyuz-patch-nasa-rejected","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/not-that-into-peace-doves-the-apollo-soyuz-patch-nasa-rejected\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Not that into peace doves\u2019: The Apollo-Soyuz patch NASA rejected"},"content":{"rendered":"

Fifty years ago, on July 15, 1975, three NASA astronauts and two Russian cosmonauts lifted off to meet up in orbit for the first time.<\/p>\n

Representing the joint Apollo-Soyuz Test Project (ASTP, or Soyuz-Apollo in the Soviet Union), both crews wore a cloth patch that featured the artwork of an accomplished space artist. The design that flew, however, was not the astronauts\u2019 first pick. That patch idea was rejected because Paul Calle opted to highlight the d\u00e9tente nature of the international handshake in space.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur first choice for a patch\u2026 has been disapproved,\u201d wrote Deke Slayton, the mission\u2019s docking module pilot, in a letter to Calle. \u201cIt seems the powers that be are not that into peace doves and olive branches at the moment.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was an odd objection, given that Soviet General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev later described the ASTP flight as \u201ca symbol of the\u2026 improvement of Soviet-US relations on the basis of the principals of peaceful coexistence,\u201d and Gerald Ford welcomed continued cooperation in space \u201cto ensure peace.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou forgot your patch\u2026\u201d<\/h2>\n

Paul Calle was not new to capturing the essence of space history in the making. One of the first members of NASA\u2019s art program, which recruited artists to document human spaceflight, Calle sketched the Apollo 11 crew as they had breakfast and donned their spacesuits prior to lifting off on the first mission to land astronauts on the Moon. He also designed the popular US postage stamp that celebrated that achievement in 1969.<\/p>\n

\n

\"black<\/p>\n

Paul Calle sketching a scene near a Soyuz simulator at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City in 1974.<\/p>\n

Credit:
\n Calle Space Art<\/p>\n<\/figure>\n

Calle got to know the ASTP crew\u2014NASA astronauts Thomas Stafford, Vance Brand, and Slayton and Soviet cosmonauts Alexei Leonov and Valery Kubasov\u2014while accompanying them to the Soviet Union and sketching them as they trained in Star City, outside of Moscow.<\/p>\n

,<\/p>\n

So when asked by the American crew members to design their patch, Calle came back with concepts that prominently featured a white dove holding an olive branch in its mouth. Other versions incorporated the peace sign and a rendering of Earth showing both the United States and the Soviet Union, the flags of the US and USSR, and his simplified illustration of the Apollo and Soyuz docked together.<\/p>\n

Some of Calle\u2019s designs included all of the crew members\u2019 names, some had only the American astronauts\u2019 names, and others had no names at all.<\/p>\n

\n

\"a<\/p>\n

Space artist Paul Calle submitted this mission patch design to the American crew of the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project. The astronauts liked it, but NASA \u201cdisapproved\u201d of the peace dove.<\/p>\n

Credit:
\n Calle Space Art<\/p>\n<\/figure>\n

But none of the versions were to NASA\u2019s liking.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe would be happy to see any new sketches you would come up with,\u201d wrote Slayton. \u201cThe top choice would be heavy on red, white, blue, and gold colors, if that is any value to you.\u201d<\/p>\n

Calle, though, was more drawn by the call of the West than by the cooperation with the East.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe had just started his career painting and drawing the American West, so he really wasn\u2019t taking any more illustration assignments,\u201d said Chris Calle, Paul Calle\u2019s son and a successful space artist in his own right. \u201cHe really wasn\u2019t doing much for NASA [any longer], so I think that\u2019s why, when they came back balking about the patches with the doves and olive branches, he just didn\u2019t have the time to put toward that.\u201d<\/p>\n

That said, Calle was not completely done with the patch. While attending the US launch, Calle drew a cartoon of the Apollo liftoff with him running after it and holding up his \u201cdisapproved\u201d insignia with the caption, \u201cWait\u2026 you forgot your patch of doves and olive branches!\u201d<\/p>\n

,<\/p>\n

\n

\"a<\/p>\n

Paul Calle\u2019s July 1975 cartoon poking fun at his own rejected mission patch for the joint Apollo-Soyuz Test Project.<\/p>\n

Credit:
\n Calle Space Art<\/p>\n<\/figure>\n

Rejects and revivals<\/h2>\n

Calle\u2019s patch design was not the only one ruled out by NASA\u2019s officials.<\/p>\n

At first, Stafford, Brand, and Slayton chose a design from a contest among the US space program\u2019s workforce. The winner, Jean Pinataro of North American Rockwell (the prime contractor for the Apollo command module), came up with a concept that the astronauts liked, but the agency\u2019s leaders rejected it for not having enough \u201cinternational significance\u201d (unofficially, it was also said to be \u201ccartoonish\u201d).<\/p>\n

That led to NASA accepting the cost of hiring an artist from the NASA art program and Calle being invited to offer his ideas. It also resulted in the patch that flew.<\/p>\n

When Calle stepped away, the decision was made to repurpose the work of Bob McCall, an artist who had designed the Apollo 17 mission patch and in 1974 had painted the scene of the Apollo and Soyuz spacecraft nearing a docking. McCall would go on to create similar art for a pair of postage stamps issued in the United States and the Soviet Union, while Pinataro adapted McCall\u2019s original painting as the central image of the US ASTP emblem.<\/p>\n

The cosmonauts had their own design\u2014in fact, it was the first Russian mission patch to involve the crew\u2019s input\u2014but wore both their own and the US patch during their six days in space.<\/p>\n

\n

\"five<\/p>\n

Apollo-Soyuz Test Project (ASTP) patches, from top left to right: 2021 embroidered replica of Jean Pinataro\u2019s original design; the Soviet Soyuz 18 crew patch; the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project crew patch; souvenir ASTP program patch; and ASTP program patch.<\/p>\n

Credit:
\n AB Emblem\/Roscosmos\/collectSPACE.com<\/p>\n<\/figure>\n

Today, 50 years later, the McCall-inspired design, the cosmonauts\u2019 patch, and the Apollo-Soyuz program insignia are used interchangeably to represent the mission. Calle\u2019s designs have been largely forgotten but are now getting a revival for the golden anniversary.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wanted to reimagine them. Not redo them, but bring them to life,\u201d said Chris.<\/p>\n

Working with a fellow artist Tim Gagnon, who created a number of the mission patches worn by space shuttle and International Space Station crews, Chris has begun the process of producing a limited number of embroidered patches based on his and his late father\u2019s ideas.<\/p>\n

Chris primarily focused on Calle\u2019s dove and olive branch design.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt certainly keeps to the spirit of my dad\u2019s original idea,\u201d Chris said.<\/p>\n

Chris Calle asks readers to contact him via his website to be informed about when the limited-edition Apollo-Soyuz patches are available.<\/em><\/p>\n

Click through to collectSPACE to see more of Paul Calle\u2019s original designs and the reimagined versions by Chris Calle and Tim Gagnon.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Fifty years ago, on July 15, 1975, three NASA astronauts and two Russian cosmonauts lifted off to meet up in orbit for the first time. Representing the joint Apollo-Soyuz Test Project (ASTP, or Soyuz-Apollo in the Soviet Union), both crews wore a cloth patch that featured the artwork of an accomplished space artist. The design […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":44152,"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":[2490,2491,3658,9553,9554,3803,9555,9491,9556,9557,4849,4029,9493,9494,9558,9559,9560,9561],"class_list":["post-44150","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-alexei-leonov","tag-apollo-soyuz-test-project","tag-astp","tag-bob-mccall","tag-chris-calle","tag-deke-slayton","tag-jean-pinataro","tag-mission-patch","tag-paul-calle","tag-peace","tag-space-exploration","tag-space-history","tag-space-collectible","tag-space-memorabilia","tag-thomas-stafford","tag-tim-gagnon","tag-valery-kubasov","tag-vance-brand"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44150"}],"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=44150"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44150\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44152"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44150"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44150"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44150"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}