That Duro Rocket pen costs more than a house in some neighborhoods.
Buzz Aldrin sold the very one he used to fix the Apollo 11 lander. The felt-tip tool helped him bypass a snapped circuit breaker. Without it? Stuck on the moon forever. Or at least until air ran out.
It sold for $857,650 at a Sotheby’s auction in New York. Five bidders fought over it. The estimated range was $800,00 to $1.2 million. It landed squarely in the middle-high end.
The lot included the broken circuit breaker piece too. Both came directly from Aldrin’s private stash.
July 1969. The landing had happened. Neil Armstrong and Buzz had just walked on the gray dust. They were heading down for some rest when Buzz saw trouble on the floor of the command module cabin.
A small black switch lay detached. It was part of the engine-arm circuit breaker. That breaker sends power to the ascent engine. No power. No engine. No lift off.
His heart actually jumped. In his 2009 memoir Magnificent Desolation he describes the fear vividly.
Who broke it? Buzz blames himself in later writing. In the auction’s letter of authenticity though, he jokes.
“I think Neil broke the switch. Neil thinks I did it.”
His 2016 book No Dream Is Too High takes responsibility. The breaker was on his side of the cramped capsule. He probably bumped it. Either with the heavy backpack while prepping to exit. Or while returning after the walk. Gravity on earth might make you look. On the moon it might make you knock things loose.
They called Mission Control. Houston wanted to reroute power. Good plan. Impossible execution.
Morning came. Houston delivered blunt news.
“There is no way to reroute power.”
Panic isn’t an option when you wear a million-dollar suit. You think.
Buzz looked around the Lunar Module. He needed something non-conductive to push into the contacts. Metal was a hard no. A short circuit kills engines. Or men. He decided not to stick a finger in it either.
He remembered the pen.
It was in his personal preference kit. Officially. The pen wasn’t on NASA’s flight manifest. But astronauts get small indulgences. A favorite pen? A deck of cards? He kept the black felt-tip in the shoulder pocket of his space suit.
He pressed it gently. GINGERLY. The tip went into the breaker slot. He held his breath. Time slowed. If it failed, the story ends with a moon base made of two ghosts.
He lifted the tip slowly. Almost reluctantly.
It held. The circuit completed. The ascent engine received power. They went home.
Think about that. A felt-tip. Probably $3 in 1969 adjusted for inflation.
It saved two lives.
It bought a house.
Aldrin is 96 now. He’s one of only four surviving moonwalkers. The Apollo landings happened in a frantic burst. 1969 to 1972. Neil died in 2010.
We’re going back though.
NASA wants to touch down by 2028. Four astronauts just flew around the moon in April. The first time since the seventies. China wants in too. Their target for crewed landings? 2030 roughly.
Buzz wants to go further. He has been arguing this for decades. A return to the moon is a detour. A dead end. In 2017 he told the NYT to skip the lunar revival.
Put the resources toward Mars.
He keeps the broken breaker switch. He used to keep the pen too. Not anymore. It has a new owner now.
They paid a premium for history. For the object that turned a catastrophe into a victory lap.
Maybe that’s fine. We preserve our past by selling the tools we used to survive it.
Does the buyer plan to put it on a desk? Or will it sit behind glass?
I hope it’s behind glass.
It was never really a writing instrument. It was a wrench. A life preserver. A piece of plastic that pushed a broken contact together in the dark vacuum.
We love tangible history. We need it to feel like the danger was real. Not just words in a book. A pen you can hold. A switch that snapped off.
Eight hundred fifty-seven thousand dollars.
Seems steep until you realize how cheap insurance gets when you are the only two humans for 238,900 miles.
The next astronauts will need better tools. Or smarter kits. Or both.
They won’t have Buzz’s pen though.
