Skylab astronauts took this photograph as they approached the orbiting laboratory on the the third and final mission in November 1973.
This sketch of Skylab was drawn by Dr. George E. Mueller, NASA associate administrator for Manned Space Flight. Mueller drew the sketch on August 19, 1966, during meeting at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala.
This photograph was taken during installation of floor grids on the upper and lower floors inside the Skylab orbital workshop at the McDonnell Douglas plant at Huntington Beach, Calif. under the direction of NASA Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala. on Jan. 1, 1970.
In the 1970s, turning a rocket into a habitat was an affordable way for NASA to build a space station with existing hardware. Image taken Jan. 1, 1970.
This illustration Skylab shows the Apollo capsule, which was launched on a Saturn 1B rocket to ferry crews to space, docked to the multiple docking adapter, which was designed and built at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala.
This interior view of the orbital workshop upper level was visible from the airlock hatch. The octagonal opening separated the workshop's two levels. Image taken May 1, 1972
This cutaway view of a half of the Skylab orbital workshop shows details of the living and working quarters.
This photograph shows testing of an emergency procedure to free Skylab's meteorite-and-sun shield that had torn loose during launch, and a primary solar array that was jammed. Image taken May 1, 1973.
Astronaut Charles Conrad, Jr., Skylab 2 commander, smiles happily for the camera after a hot bath in the shower in the crew quarters of the orbital workshop of the Skylab space station. Image taken June 1, 1973.
Astronaut Owen Garriott eats dinner in the orbital workshop crew wardroom designed and built at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala. Skylab's kitchen was equipped so that each crewman could select his own menu and prepare it to his own taste.
Earth and Skylab are reflected in the gold-coated visor of Astronaut Jack Lousma during a spacewalk in which he and fellow Skylab 3 crewman Owen Garriott deployed the second sunshade. Image taken July 14, 1973.
This ultraviolet photograph of a massive solar flare, spanning a third of a million miles into space, was taken on Dec. 19, 1973, during the Skylab 4 mission by a telescope mounted on the Apollo telescope mount designed and built at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala.
Seamstresses sewed a protective shield to replace the one lost during the Skylab launch.
The first American Christmas holiday aboard a space station occurred in 1973 during the Skylab 4 mission to the first American space station Skylab. The station's three-man crew saved up their food cans to create this space Christmas tree.
Astronaut Gerald P. Carr, commander for the Skylab 4 mission, jokingly demonstrates weight training in zero-gravity as he balances Astronaut William R. Pogue, pilot, upside down on his finger.
