Purgatory Post honors astronauts Borman, Mattingly

New Hampshire-based Purgatory Post on December 7 issued a pair of stamps commemorating two Apollo program astronauts who died within days of each other earlier this year.

The 8-sola stamps picture Frank Borman (1928–2023) and Ken Mattingly (1936–2023), with each photo accompanied by reproductions of the official patches for the missions on which the men flew.

Borman served as commander of Gemini 7 and later as commander of Apollo 8, the first manned mission that orbited the moon. He was also part of a NASA review board that investigated the Apollo 1 disaster. Borman died November 7, 2023.

Mattingly was named the backup command module pilot for Apollo 11 and was initially scheduled to fly as command module pilot on Apollo 13, but he was grounded due to exposure to German measles just days before launch. He would, however, serve as Apollo 16’s command module pilot and command two Space Shuttle flights in the 1980s. Borman died October 31, 2023.

The designs of both stamps follow the same general layout Purgatory Post operator Scott A. has used for his series of stamps commemorating the 50th anniversaries of various United States spaceflight missions.

Published 2023-12-18