This is a Gemini ringsail drogue parachute test article with attached pilot chute for pulling it out. Manufactured by Northrop Ventura in 1963, it is made largely of nylon and is 5.6 m (18.3 ft) in diameter when fully deployed. Carried in the Rendezvous and Recovery Section at the front of the capsule, the drogue parachute deployed to stablize the spacecraft before the deployment of the main parachute, which occurred with the separation of the Rendezvous and Recovery Section.

In 1971, McDonnell Douglas Astronautics Company in St. Louis transferred many leftover artifacts from the Gemini program to the Smithsonian on behalf of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, including this parachute. The former McDonnell Aircraft Corporation had manufactured the Gemini spacecraft.