It happened in 1959, at the height of the Cold War, during the early years of the Space Race between the United States of America and the Soviet Union.
An accident in rural Oklahoma, near the town of Winganon.
Rex Brown/CC BY-ND 2.0
But… don’t be fooled by appearances. This thing is not what it looks like.
That is to say, it is not a discarded space capsule, some early NASA relic.
What is it, then? Why, it is the container of a cement mixer that had an accident at this spot. Cement, of course, has the nasty tendency to solidify rapidly if it is not mixed, and we quickly end up with a block that weighs several tons and… well, it’s completely useless.
There were, I understand, plans to bury the thing but it never happened.
But then, in 2011, local artists had an idea and transformed the thing into something else. Painting it with a NASA logo, an American flag, and adding decorations, they made it appear like a discarded space capsule.
And I already know that if it ever happens again that I take another cross-country drive in America to visit the West Coast, and my route goes anywhere near the place, I will absolutely, definitely, visit it. Just as I visited the TARDIS of Doctor Who 12 years ago when I was spending a few lovely days in the fine city of London.