User:ZooGuard/Sandbox/Dutch

The Dutch moon rock petrified wood story developed in 2009 when a Dutch museum discovered that they had mislabeled a piece of petrified wood as a piece of moon rock brought back by American astronauts. After some poor media coverage, it has become another red herring in the arsenal of the conspiracy theorists who believe that the Moon landings were hoaxed.

No relevant authority (e.g. NASA) ever claimed that the exhibit was a moon rock. While the US government did give moon "rock" samples from Apollo 11 and Apollo 17 (see below) to various countries as a goodwill gift, both samples officially presented to the Netherlands are safe and sound in another museum (the Boerhaave Museum in Leiden).



What happened in 1969?
Ambassador (1924 -)

former dutch prime minister (1886 - 1988, was PM 1948 to 1958)

The actual moon sample gifts
The US government has given lunar samples as gifts only twice - once with material from the Apollo 11 mission (i.e. the first landing, in 1969) and once with samples from the Apollo 17 mission (i.e. the last landing in 1973).

Where Today are the Apollo 11 Lunar Sample Displays?, collectSPACE

Where Today are the Apollo 17 Goodwill Moon Rocks?, collectSPACE

The real "rock" gifts

 * Video from De Pers' visit to the Boerhaave Museum to see the Moon rock gifts, 26 March 2007 (De Pers is a Dutch tabloid)
 * The Boerhaave Museum, official website
 * Picture of the Apollo 11 moon rock display presented to the Netherlands in the museum's collection
 * Picture of the Apollo 17 moon rock display presented to the Netherlands, the same place :)