Extremely rare grouping of six vintage signatures of the B-29 crew members who dropped the hydrogen bomb during testing over the Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands on July 1, 1946. Five of the six signatures are on the return address areas on the back flaps of mailing envelopes sent to collector Leonore Knight, with the sixth having been removed from a similar envelope. Signers are: Jack W. Cathran (Radar Operator), H. H. Wood (Bombardier), H. Lyons (Scanner), R. M. Glenn (Flight Engineer), Wm. C. Harrison (Co-pilot), and Woodrow Swancutt (Pilot). All have added their Roswell, New Mexico addresses under their signatures. In very good overall condition, with a moderate block of toning over Lyons and a bit of staining and smudging to Wood. Accompanied by a flight-flown commemorative cover, carried aboard the aircraft on the test mission in 1946.
Competition was swift for what was to be the first atomic bomb test done during peace time—and the fourth atomic blast in history—with Swancutt and his crack bomber crew securing the honor over three other crews in a competition. On July 1, 1946, Operation Crossroads, which was a series of tests to measure the effect of an atomic outburst, began. In Test Able, Swancutt piloted the B-29 Dave's Dream and released an atomic bomb over a cluster of 70 various target ships anchored in Bikini Lagoon. A virtually unobtainable set of signatures from the beginning of the “atomic age.” RRAuction COA.
