Antiques Roadshow

GUEST: Our grandpa made experimental, prototype parachutes at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base for about 33 years.

And in the process of that, he got to meet the people who made the spacesuits.

So he made some hot mats out of scraps of material from the early spacesuits.

APPRAISER: Now what about these, uh, parachutes?

GUEST: He made experimental parachutes.

This is a parachute made to bring down a rocket.

This is from the Mercury missions.

This was the prototype that they learned it wouldn't work.

GUEST: And they had to completely redesign the parachutes for bringing down space capsules.

But they tested these in the wind tunnels, and got the design right with these, before making them bigger.

This one, you'll notice there's no openings in this.

If you're gonna land a parachute on Mars, you have to capture as much of the atmosphere as possible so there's no openings in that.

That's the one that was made to land on Mars.

APPRAISER: These parachutes-- they just don't come up, you just don't tend to see them.

So at auction, per parachute, looking at about $2,500 to $3,000 per parachute.

GUEST: Per parachute.

APPRAISER: As far as the pot handles go, maybe $30, $40, for the set.

GUEST: Yeah, it's what figured.