mostly true

during the space race in the 60's, NASA spent $11 million to finance the development of this...
a pen.
a pen with nitrogen and special ink making it usable in extreme temperatures, underwater, and without gravity.
do you know what the russians used?
pencils.


okay, okay. that's a myth.
kind of.
the the nonexaggerated story is that the U.S. used pencils as well. they, in fact, spent $128.89 per pencil which (for some unknown reason!) people found ridiculous. NASA also saw the broken pencil tips as harmful and didn't want anything flammable on board (a rocket) so they spent $1 million on space pens.
i don't really know what the russians did. just roughed it, i guess. harmful pencil tips and all.


i haven't decided yet which story is going to be the version i tell people.

Comments

Em said…
This made me laugh so hard I cried a little bit. At school we have a problem with kids stealing pencils so we have "classroom pencils" that are just like regular pencils except they have an anti-thieving element that consists of teachers writing our room number on them. They cost the same as regular pencils plus the time and effort put in by employees to write "Rm B3" 50 times. The pencils still disappear at the regular rate.
Mon Oct 12, 03:41:00 pm
bwing said…
I must be a nerd, cuz $1 million on a design for something that is going into space wouldn't be too hard to believe. It probably cost like $50,000 to design and manufacture the pen and another $950,0000 to do the paperwork that says the pen will work in space!
Tue Oct 13, 08:16:00 am
The Chad said…
You are my hero for the following reasons. First, you are willing to use your blog to write exposés of government waste. Second, you give facts and figures in your exposés. Third, you are willing to point out the faulty logic in NASA's assumptions of pencil tip breakage in anti-gravity. And you're also probably thinking of the Simpsons episode where Homer goes into space and they're afraid that the ruffles will clog the instruments because they have ridges. Booya.
Tue Oct 13, 09:49:00 pm
Heather said…
As this blog's self appointed math-historian, I think it is important to point out that the incident of the space pen took place before the invention of the calculator- back when astronauts actually did have to do math with pencils (or space pens) and slide rulers out there in space.

What is insane to me is that they actually managed to go to the moon with the technology they had. I had to take a "History of Math" class toward the end of college and one of our assignments was to solve a few logrithmic problems that would be really simple using a calculator using a slide ruler instead. It was painful and in the end I had to have my dad help me with it. He was pretty pleased because it was the first time since I was 12 that he got to help me with my math homework.

Anyway, my point is this - anyone who can figure out the precise angle of re-entry into the earth's atmosphere without a computer or calculator deserves a million dollar pen.

Or I could be irrationally fond of that time period right now because I really like the way the men dress on "Mad Men."
Thu Oct 15, 01:28:00 pm
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