It may seem odd to include a section on NASA logo patches in a site dedicated to crew patches but the patch designs detailed below were either worn by the crews on their actual spacesuits (for the Mercury and Gemini projects and for Apollo 1) or worn on their flight suits immediately after the missions (from Apollo 7 onwards). To my mind this certainly makes them worthy of a place in any serious space patch collection.

After studying the best images I could find of the patches used on the various missions it's clear that at least four different patch designs have been used during the Mercury-Gemini-Apollo period. I refer to these designs as Types I, II, III and IV, with a fifth type thrown-in for good measure.

The NASA logo patch used by the Mercury Seven on their space suits was the white-bordered version shown here.

The body of the patch is approximately 3" in diameter.

The NASA logo patch used by the crews of the Gemini missions on their space suits was the white-bordered version shown here.

The body of the patch is approximately 3" in diameter.

Although very similar in appearance to the Type I patch, this design can be distinguished by slightly less bold lettering. In addition, where the Type I patch has an open V-shaped pattern of three stars under the right leg of the final "A" (pointing up to the right), the Type II patch has a fourth star which turns it into a diamond shape.

An example of the Type II patch that was apparently taken from one of Gus Grissom's Gemini 3 space suits is shown here. This scan was kindly provided by Mike Zolotorow.

Note that most examples of this patch have the top left corner of the final "A" bisected by the vector but a few have the vector completely overlaying the top corner (leaving no white thread visible to the upper left) and slightly more bold lettering. You can see this more clearly in this side-by-side image of patches sewn to James McDivitt's Gemini-era flight suits, from images kindly provided by Dave Keeler.

A nice example of the Type II patch was recently sold on eBay for $405^[1].

For Apollo 1 the NASA logo patch used by the crews on their space suits was the white-bordered version shown here. The same desing was used by the crews of Apollos 7, 8, 9 and 11 on their post-flight jump suits.

The body of the patch is approximately 3" in diameter.

Although very similar in appearance to the Type II patch, this design can be distinguished by the fact that the top of the last "A" overlays the red vector, whereas in the earlier versions the red vector cuts through the top of the "A". The point of the vector is also thicker in this version than the earlier ones. Finally, the serif on the letter "N" is much more pronounced, with the top left of the "N" almost reaching the left border.

For Apollo 10 and Apollos 12 through 17 the NASA logo patch used by the crews on their post-flight jump suits was the blue-bordered version shown here.

The body of the patch is 3" in diameter. This design was almost certainly produced by AB Emblem.

There are two exceptions to the use of this patch design for Apollos 12 onwards. After Apollo 13, Jack Swigert wore a white border patch on his post-recovery flight suit as shown in 70-H-0641 , although he also wore a second suit with a blue border patch that is visible in other post-recovery photos. Likewise, after Apollo 14, Shepard wore a white border patch on his flight suit (possibly a Type II Gemini-era version) as shown in KSC-71P-168.

It's also interesting that in S68-46603, a training shot of the Apollo 7 crew from 1968, Cunningham appears to have a blue bordered Type IV patch on his jump suit while the other two have the white bordered Type III patches. This would be the earliest appearance of this particular patch that I've seen.

This smaller white-bordered version of the NASA vector patch is clearly visible in the photo below on suit tech Joe Schmitt's hat during suiting-up activities prior to the Apollo 11 launch.

The patch is just under 2 3/4" in diameter. Probably by AB Emblem.

Although this site is concerned mainly with the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo projects, NASA research pilots at the Dryden Flight Research Center also wore NASA vector logo patches at times and it is interesting to include these vintage patches here.

From the available photographic evidence^[3] it appears that at least two different vector patch designs were worn by NASA's research pilots from about 1960 onwards.

These two different patches are clearly shown in the photo on the right, taken in 1966 after the first flight of the HL-10. Bruce Peterson's flight suit has a large (roughly 4") NASA vector patch on the chest and a smaller (roughly 3") version on the shoulder.

These two patch designs do not match those used on the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo programs, but are consistent in all appearances of the NASA vector patch at the DFRC in photos from 1960 through to at least 1972. The distinctive pattern of stars on the two sizes of DFRC patch is very similar, making it likely that the same manufacturer produced both designs for NASA. I've decided to refer to these designs (at least for now) as DFRC 4" and DFRC 3".

The 4" diameter NASA vector patch worn by Neil Armstrong on his flight suit during his second X-15 flight on Dec 9, 1960 is visible in the photo below, and is a near-perfect match for the white-bordered vintage patch shown here on the right.

A variant of this patch design with slightly narrower lettering, but with an identical pattern of stars, appears to have been introduced by 1966 and can be seen as the larger of the two patches worn by Bruce Peterson on his HL-10 flight suit in the photo at the start of this section. The version with narrower lettering can be seen on the suits of various NASA research pilots in photos through to at least 1972^[3].

These two variants may be analogous with the Type I and II vector patches used on the Mercury and Gemini programs respectively, where the earliest patch (1959-1963) had thicker lettering and the later version (1964-1966) narrower lettering.

The 3" diameter NASA vector patch worn by Bruce Peterson on his shoulder in the 1966 photo, as well as the patch worn by John B. McKay in the photo from 1962 shown below, are a close match for the white-bordered vintage design shown on the right.

According to Dryden historian Peter Merlin, examples of this particular patch were given to NASA personnel assigned to the X-15 project at Dryden in March 1960. X-15 personnel can be seen wearing the patch on their hats in photo E-6460. One of these hats, complete with its original patch, can be seen in this photo, courtesy of Peter Merlin.

It appears that the example shown in my scan has broader writing that the versions shown in most of the photos, so perhaps as with the 4" version there are at two variants with narrower and broader lettering. The layout of stars and all other details appear to be identical.

An example of the DFRC 3" patch was recently sold on eBay for $207^[2].