Lunar Orbiter Image Recovery Project - Marketing and Recruiting Allies

Marketing and Recruiting Allies

Dennis Wingo and Keith Cowing plunged into the management of the project: ordering parts, managing funds, searching surplus yards for equipment, researching refurbishing companies, and recruiting allies to the project. He began sending out an email newsletter, which was later converted to a blog, MoonViews.com, and posting photos to the project's Facebook page. Student interns from nearby San Jose State University were recruited and the team requested help from retired employees of Ampex and from blog writers with audiences that might be able to help. Every day there seemed to be a new visitor to McMoon's, such as Dr. Lisa Gaddis from the USGS project to digitize the Lunar Orbiter film, and Charlie Byrne, who wrote the memo recommending the Lunar Orbiter data be stored on magnetic tape. The project was reported in the L.A. Times, ComputerWorld, National Geographic, the Associated Press, American Libraries, the local news, and numerous blogs. Included in every news story was the message that the images are a vital piece of history, but more than this, they contain scientific data of a time and place and quality that has not been repeated. These are images that can assist in the current research about the Moon and the climate of the Earth. There may even be other lost data from the same era recorded using the same tape drives that could benefit from the efforts of the LOIRP team.