Fact sheet
Sample 15499 is vesicular lunar mare basalt with a porphyritic texture. The specimen has been dated at around 3.4 billion years but was excavated by a meteorite impact around 114 million years ago.
The thin section shows that the rock is composed of long needles of euhedral pyroxene (augite-pigeonite) set in a dark brownish-grey microcrystalline to glassy (vitrophyric) groundmass. Opaque minerals present include ilmenite, chrome-spinel, ulvospinel, troilite and metallic iron.
Further details of this and other Apollo samples are here: http://curator.jsc.nasa.gov/lunar/
The Apollo 15 landing site was in the Apennine Highlands, and close to Hadley Rille — a long, narrow winding valley. Approximately 76 kg of lunar material, including soil, rock, core-tube and deep-core samples, were returned to Earth.
This mission was the first flight of the Lunar Roving Vehicle which allowed the astronauts to venture further from the Lunar Module than in previous missions. During three periods of extravehicular activity, or EVA, on July 31st, and August 1st and 2nd, Scott and Irwin completed a record 18 hours, 37 minutes of exploration, travelling 17.5 miles, in the first car that humans had ever driven on the Moon.
Apollo 15 was launched on 26 July 1971.