This belt buckle is memorabilia from Space Patrol, a television program which aired nationally on ABC between December 1950 and March 1955 as a half-hour program. The show began as a 15-minute program on KECA in Los Angeles beginning in March 1950. The police show set in space followed the adventures of Commander Buzz Corry (Ed Kemmer) and his young sidekick Cadet Happy (Lyn Osborn) of the United Planets Space Patrol.

The donor, Dr. David DeVorkin, who grew up in LA, remembers loving the show as a child. His parents took him to a big public promotional event featuring the show’s actors appearing at a department store. He recalls that, “It was a mob scene.” He remembers standing in a line of people that stretched all the way around the corner before they got inside for the event. From DeVorkin's family photos, the belt buckle can be dated to 1952 or earlier.

The buckle illustrates how excitement about a vision of spaceflight caught the fancy of a child who eventually became so important in the field of astronomy that the American Astronomical Society (AAS) named Dr. DeVorkin one of the inaugural fellows of the AAS.

DeVorkin gave the book to the Museum in 2021 upon his retirement after 40 years of continuous service to the Smithsonian Institution.