Mariner 4 was the first spacecraft to fly by Mars, and the first to return close-up images of the Red Planet. On July 15, 1965, the Mariner 4 spacecraft made its closest approach to Mars, and made history by taking the first photos of another planet from space.
The Mariner 4 spacecraft consisted of an octagonal magnesium frame, 50″ across a diagonal and cm 18″ high. Four solar panels were attached to the top of the frame with an end-to-end span of 22.6′, including solar pressure vanes which extended from the ends. A 41″ × 26″ elliptical high-gain parabolic antenna was mounted at the top of the frame as well.
Our space museum houses a spare solar panel and cosmic dust detector (photos to come) from Mariner 4. The cosmic dust detector, mounted on the body with microphone plate approximately perpendicular to the plane of orbit, to measure the momentum, distribution, density, and direction of cosmic dust.
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