The year is 1977. Jimmy Carter becomes the 39th president, Elvis Presley dies at just 42 years old and Apple releases its second personal computer. But, what you might not know about is The Golden Record.
Eight years after the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) won the Space Race in 1969, they sent a “kind of time capsule” to space onboard Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft, which they called The Golden Record. On these metal albums, NASA included information about American society at the time; it was NASA’s attempt to make connections with possible civilizations across a major distance.
The contents of the golden records contain 155 images, music from different cultures and eras, spoken greetings in 55 different languages, natural earth sounds and printed messages from the United Nations Secretary General Waldheim and President Carter. All of these were “selected for NASA by a committee chaired by Carl Sagan of Cornell University.” A protective aluminum jacket, a cartridge and a needle and instructions in symbolic language that indicate how the records are to be played were also included.
Included images were encoded in analog and are of various things, including different cities like Boston, various animals like dolphins and elephants, different natural features like sand dunes, various world features like the Great Wall of China, different educational diagrams like human anatomy, plus many other images. Images that were included can be found at this link: https://science.nasa.gov/gallery/images-on-the-golden-record/
In addition to images, 46 audio clips were also included – 27 of which were music clips from 19 different countries that lasted 90 minutes and 19 of which were various sounds, such as animal sounds like dogs, human sounds like heartbeats and transportation sounds like trains, which NASA called “The Sounds of Earth.” Those can be located at the following link: https://on.soundcloud.com/7u5JVuEvt3fDc5aa8
As for the greetings, phrases include: “Hello from the children of planet Earth.” “Hello, everybody.” “How are you?” and “Peace.” To listen to greetings, go to this link: https://on.soundcloud.com/bU9SRV2giBm7VbEf6. For a key to each of the greetings, scroll to the bottom of this article.
For the cover of the discs, images show binary code. The code is used for the “picture lines” and the video portion of the recordings.
For the production of the records, blank records were provided by Pyral S.A. of Creteil, France. “The record’s cover is aluminum and electroplated upon it is an ultra-pure sample of the isotope uranium-238. Uranium-238 has a half-life of 4.468 billion years.” The 12-inch record then had gold plating added on August 23, 1977. To see images of the process, click this link: https://science.nasa.gov/gallery/the-making-of-the-voyager-golden-record/.
A book called “Murmurs of Earth” was originally published in 1978 and was reissued in 1992 by Warner News Media with a CD-ROM that replicates the Voyager records. Although, these books are out of production.
The unfortunate news is that it will be at least 40,000 years before these golden records make any close approaches to any planetary systems, as they left our orbit around 1990, passing Pluto.
Greetings Key:
Akkadian “May all be very well.”
Amoy (Min dialect) “Friends from space, how are you all? Have you eaten yet? Come visit us if you have time.”?
Arabic “Greetings to our friends in the stars. We wish that we will meet you someday.”
Aramaic “Peace”
Armenian “To all those who exist in the universe, greetings.”
Bengali “Hello! Let there be peace everywhere.”
Burmese “Are you well?”
Cantonese “Hi. How are you? Wish you peace, health and happiness.”
Czech “Dear Friends, we wish you the best.”
Dutch “Dear/sincere greetings to everyone”
English “Hello from the children of planet Earth.”
French “Hello everybody.”
German “Heartfelt greetings to all.”
Greek “Greetings to you, whoever you are. We come in friendship to those who are friends.”
Gujarati “Greetings from a human being of the Earth. Please contact.”
Hebrew “Peace.”
Hindi “Greetings from the inhabitants of this world.”
Hittite “Hail.”
Hungarian (Magyar) “We are sending greetings in the Hungarian language to all peace-loving beings in the Universe.”
Ila (Zambia) “We wish all of you well.”
Indonesian “Good night, ladies and gentlemen. Goodbye and see you next time.”
Italian “Many greetings and wishes.”
Japanese “Hello? How are you?”
Kannada (Kanarese) “Greetings. On behalf of Kannada-speaking people, ‘good wishes.'”
Kechua (Quechua) “Hello to everybody from this Earth, in Kechua language.”
Korean “How are you?”
Latin “Greetings to you, whoever you are; we have good will towards you and bring peace across space.”
Luganda (Ganda) “Greetings to all peoples of the universe. God give you peace always.”
Mandarin Chinese “Hope everyone’s well. We are thinking about you all. Please come here to visit when you have time.”
Marathi “Greetings. The people of the Earth send their good wishes.”
Nepali “Wishing you a peaceful future from the earthlings.”
Nguni (Zulu) “We greet you, great ones. We wish you longevity.”
Nyanja “How are all you people of other planets?”
Oriya “Greetings to the inhabitants of the universe from the third planet Earth of the star Sun.”
Persian “Greetings to the residents of far skies.”
Polish “Welcome, creatures from beyond the outer world.”
Portuguese “Peace and happiness to all.”
Punjabi “Welcome home. It is a pleasure to receive you.”
Rajasthani “Hello to everyone. We are happy here and you be happy there.”
Romanian “Greetings to everybody.”
Russian “Greetings! I Welcome You!”
Serbian “We wish you everything good from our planet.”
Sinhalese “Wish You a Long Life.”
Sotho (Sesotho) “We greet you, O great ones.”
Spanish “Hello and greetings to all.”
Sumerian “May all be well.”
Swedish “Greetings from a computer programmer in the little university town of Ithaca on the planet Earth”
Telugu “Greetings. Best wishes from Telugu-speaking people.”
Thai “We in this world send you our good will”
Turkish “Dear Turkish-speaking friends, may the honors of the morning be upon your heads.”
Ukrainian “We are sending greetings from our world, wishing you happiness, goodness, good health and many years.”
Urdu “Peace on you. We the inhabitants of this earth send our greetings to you.”
Vietnamese “Sincerely send you our friendly greetings.”
Welsh “Good health to you now and forever.”
Wu “Best wishes to you all.”
27aarias@usd489.com
