Pictured above are foam pointed ear tips that Leonard Nimoy wore in his role as Spock in the original 1960s Star Trek TV series, which aired on NBC from 1966 until 1969. Nimoy brought the prosthetics home as a personal memento of his role as the half-human, half-Vulcan science officer on the starship Enterprise.
Until his death in 2015, the ear tips were displayed in Nimoy’s home in a box he made. Donated to the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum by Nimoy’s children Adam and Julie and the Nimoy family, they are now on display in the museum’s Kenneth C. Griffin Exploring the Planets Gallery.
Watch a video of the unboxing of the ear tips, read more about them, and view the museum’s Enterprise model that was also used in the original series.
The ear tips were a gift of the Nimoy Family, in honor of Beit T'Shuvah and the Leonard Nimoy COPD Research Fund at UCLA.
