Gemini 3 (GT-3), launched on March 23, 1965, was the inaugural manned flight of the Gemini program, featuring crew members Virgil "Gus" Grissom and John Young. This mission marked the last manned flight controlled from Cape Canaveral. Its main objective was to test the capabilities of the new, maneuverable Gemini spacecraft. While Gemini 3 was the first U.S. manned spaceflight with two crew members, it was not the first globally; the Soviet Union had previously sent a three-member crew into space aboard Voskhod 1 in late 1964.
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| A Gemini 3 cover from "Orbit Covers", featuring a launch day postmark. This cover is signed by Gus Grissom and John Young and postmarked in Cape Canaveral on launch day, March 23, 1965. During this mission, the crew completed three low Earth orbits aboard their Gemini spacecraft, which they named Molly Brown. - RegencyStamps |
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| NASA announced the prime and backup crew of the first Gemini flight on April 13, 1964. |
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| Photo: The Gemini 3 prime crew, Gus Grissom and John Young, and the backup crew, Walter Schirra and Thomas Stafford. |
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| Photo: John Young and Gus Grissom inspect the booster of the Gemini-Titan rocket. |
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Photo: Gemini 3 crew, John Young and Gus Grissom, studying weather charts on the day before the launch.
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| "A "Centennial" cover for the Gemini 3 launch, postmarked at Cape Canaveral on March 23, 1965. |
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| Photo: Gus Grissom enjoying breakfast before his Gemini orbital flight. |
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| Photo: The Gemini 3 crew getting ready for launch on March 23, 1965. |
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| Photo: Launch of the first manned Gemini space flight on March 23, 1965. |
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| Photo: US President Johnson watching the launch of the Gemini space flight. |
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| The primary objective of Gemini 3 was to test the new, maneuverable spacecraft. At the end of the first orbit, over Corpus Christi, Texas, Grissom executed the first orbital maneuver performed by any manned spacecraft, resulting in a near-circular orbit of approximately 158 x 169 km. This cover, sent from the Corpus Christi tracking station, was postmarked on March 23, 1965. |
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| Photo: Technicians and scientists in the mission control center at Cape Kennedy monitored the astronauts during their space flight. |
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| Photo: Picture of earth taken by John Young during the Gemini 3 spaceflight. |
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| Photo: The Gemini 3 capsule, "Molly Brown", made its splashdown north of Grand Turk Island. |
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| Photo: "Molly Brown" is lifted from the ocean onto the recovery ship USS Intrepid. |
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| A Beck rubber-stamped recovery cover for Gemini 3, featuring a rare hand cancel from the USS Intrepid, postmarked on March 23, 1965. |
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| A Beck rubber-stamped recovery cover for Gemini 3, featuring the typical machine cancel from the USS Intrepid. It is postmarked on March 23, 1965, and bears the signature of Captain J. G. Smith. |
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| A rare Gemini 3 USS Intrepid Beck CREW Cover, of which only 25 covers without the "B" number printed exist. |
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| Photo: Aboard the USS Intrepid, Astronaut Virgil Grissom uses a saber to slice a large piece from a cake, entertaining Rear Admiral Donald M. White, the commander of the recovery forces that retrieved the astronauts and their capsule after the splashdown in the Atlantic on March 23, 1965. |
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| This cover features a printed illustration of a Gemini spacecraft and was postmarked aboard the USS Intrepid on March 23, 1965. |
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| Photo: The Gemini 3 crew, Gus Grissom and John Young, met with U.S. President Johnson at the White House on March 26, 1965. |
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| Photo: On March 29, 1965, John Young and Gus Grissom received United Nations "Peaceful Uses of Outer Space" stamps, signed by U.N. Secretary General U Thant.
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(Reference from
Gemini 3)
