Since its creation in 1959, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration has used 3 logos. The first one, which is round and very detailed with space-related icons has come to be known as the "meatball". The next, a Logotype of stylized letters, is the one we find on this matchbook. Designed in 1975 by the graphic-design team of Dunne & Blackburn, it was recognized with an "Award of Design Excellence", a Presidential Design Award, in 1984. (The awards were created by President Ronald Reagan in 1983, thus the time difference between the creation of logo and the subsequent award.) Due to the smooth lines that depict the letters, this design has been referred to as "the worm".
Despite winning an award, the use of the worm logo only lasted 17 years and was replaced by...the original meatball, in 1992. This was to invoke memories of the successful Apollo missions, when we landed on the moon- except for Apollo 13.
Whew! It would seem that there's still a problem- the KC Matchgirl, for one, was not really aware that NASA had been switching logos back and forth.
But it does give some good clues for dating this matchbook. Newer than 1975, but older than 1992, which puts the date vaguely into the 1980's.
The space center itself was built in 1963 as the Manned Spacecraft Center and was renamed the Johnson Space Center in 1973, for President Lyndon B. Johnson. Most likely this matchbook would have been available at a visitor's center or gift shop, not from the pocket of an actual astronaut.
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