Kodak's "Pre-Invented" Lunar Orbiter Camera; Or, the Fate of SAMOS Readout

NASA’s 1966-67 Lunar Orbiter missions used a camera system originally built by Eastman Kodak for the classified Air Force WS-117L surveillance program, where Kodak had already developed onboard film processing and a remote “readout” capability. The same hardware, later adapted for the SAMOS and Discoverer-CORONA projects, enabled the unprecedented high-resolution lunar mapping that supported Apollo landing-site selection.