Skylab

Okay.

I always thought the International Space Station was, you know, basically, like I said, I'll go back to my Skylab and then maybe a third more of the size.

It's that big.

Have they put that together already? Because I don't remember them setting up a space...

and what they do when they're up there, and also the risks they take.

Because some of the activities they've done, some of the things they've done up there have been absolutely mind-boggling.

The way they've rescued Skylab.

You mentioned Skylab earlier on.

We are on the air right now with Dolly Parton, and I don't have to tell you who Dolly Parton is, but I would like to tell you that she is a gal who was in Australia...

And there was a man there who found a hunk of Skylab, and he could make a fortune with that, but that didn't bother, he didn't care about that at all.

All he wanted to, he wanted to exchange some of his Skylab for a couple of tickets to a sold-out concert of Dolly Parton's in Melbourne and Sydney.

He's still looking for the tickets, but he's got his hunk of Skylab, but not Dolly Parton.

And by the way, it's nice to be with you, and thanks for all the crazy things you can say about a person.

I really was in Australia when the Skylab fell.

In fact, we were flying in close to the area where it did fall.

And my dad was back home in East Tennessee.

Tension mounts inside the sub.

Then, Jet May discovers a coping strategy so effective, NASA will take it to Skylab.

Do you remember we used to play darts in here? We'd set the dartboard up in the forward area.

We'd stand here and we'd throw darts.

We'd play games.

And then Chet said, now how can we make this as a safe thing for the spacecraft? Because he was studying this as an analog for the Skylab.

They use Velcro-tipped darts in the spacecraft right now.

So that came out of the trip.

new kind of biodomes and colonies in space, things like that.

And one day JG Ballard was kind of in the garden and his neighbor was kind of over the hedge and He pointed up and he said, look at that dot, like shining in the distance, that Skylab, which was America's first space station.

And the guy was like, I don't care.

Bit of technology in the sky, winking, tell me something I don't know.

After extensive testing, in 1967 NASA placed an order for 400 Fischer Space Pins at $2.95 a piece, around $30 today.

First flown aboard the Apollo 7 mission in October of 1968, the pen was used throughout the Apollo, Skylab, and Space Shuttle programs, and continues to serve reliably aboard the International Space Station.

Whether used to keep mission-critical records in outer space, or file a tax return back down on Earth, Laszlo Biro's elegant invention has become a ubiquitous part of our lives, an indispensable tool that attracts little attention, but is always sorely missed when needed.

Even as digital technology takes over more and more of our work and leisure time, there will always be a need to reach for a handy bit crystal or other cheap and reliable pen.