Omega Speedmaster "Ed White"

1965 was a banner year for NASA. It was the year of the first spacewalk ever undertaken by an American astronaut, Edward Higgins White. But successful missions in the Ranger and Mariner programs that same year would prove pivotal in interplanetary exploration, laying the groundwork for missions that continue to this day. The Ranger program, which spanned from 1961 to 1965, ultimately led to the determination of a landing site for Apollo 11. That same year, the success of Mariner 4 expanded man’s horizons even beyond the Moon. The Mariner program began in 1962 with Mariner 1. Mariner 1’s objective was to fly past Venus and transmit data about the planet’s surface back to mission control. However, a fault in the guidance commands led the range safety officer to abort the mission 294.5 seconds after launch. Mariner 2 (which was identical to Mariner 1) successfully completed the mission that Mariner 1 set out to do, and was the first unmanned probe to encounter another planet. In Mariner 3